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Quote:
Originally Posted by Daddio
Here's an interesting thread I heard on 'another' forum that I'm submitting here for your comments / debate.
An experienced classic car importer in Australia says, as a matter of course, he replaces all headlight lamps on North American cars ...
He claims this is necessary to allow proper aiming of the headlights for driving on the left hand side of the road. He says he has a bin full of working NA headlights that are useless / potentially dangerous.
I would have thought he could have adjusted the beam by using standard aiming methods without replacing the lamps.
Can anyone verify this? ...
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The short answer is Yes, right-hand / left-hand drive headlights are a real thing.
The next time your car is facing a wall at night with the headlights on look at the shape of the field of light. Older headlights are just an oval blob of light. As lens and reflector technology improved the beam of light from each headlight became off-set to your own side of the road, slightly reducing the area of light that could interfere with oncoming drivers without diminishing the light on your own side of the road.
Some modern headlights on low beam have a slightly wider beam with a sharp horizontal cutoff that can function nearly as well as actual fog lights. They also don't shine as much into the rear-view mirrors of cars in front of you while still illuminating the right-hand side of the road.
Image below, a quick sketch with rough examples of some 'drive on the right' patterns of a headlight.