hyperion667

Heads, drivers, fans:

I'm so glad our cars do not have these bicycle reflectors on our rear bumpers.......
some people may like the shiney advantages of having extra reflection on their tails, but I think it kind of looks cheap and plastic-ish.....

any one else? a lot of cars are having these, been seeing more and more.......hope they don't migrate to MB

bigigg

Nothing a little paint or vinyl wont fix..

hyperion667

haha, what fun that would be: the black out bandit! coming to find reflectors in your hood today

CEB

The red reflectors are required by FMVSS 108. It all depends on how a manufacturer integrates them.

BM2BZ

i still remember bmw e60 (5 series) used to have black "reflectors". people hated them so much and swapped them to red or matched body paint. they changed to body paint later.

K-A

I agree. Was just really noticing how bad this looks on BMW's, especially on the M-Packs as they get affected by the clutter more. I don't know what M-B does differently with their tails to ensure that they don't need to use them, but I hope they continue to do so. I'd throw some black vinyl over them if I had them on my bumper.

WEBSRFR

I think some integrate these "reflectors" into the design of the brake lights. This is an essential feature though and you'd thank it is there if you or your family end up stranded on the side of the highway one day awaiting help.

CEB

Correctomundo. Point a flashlight at your taillights at night and you'll see the reflector. They've done a good job with that.

dbtk

Oh, so that's what those reflectors are for. I did not realize they were a requirement by the DOT. I wondered why my Cayenne had them below the bumper. I guess because they wanted the rear taillights to be all LED uncluttered by non-functional reflectors.

K-A

M-B does such a good job of putting reflectors within the taillights, that you can't even tell. I never really payed attention to that fact. This is yet another reason why I'm glad I smoked the white part of my tails on this car, rather than the red part that I did on my last 2 E's.

newyorktoLA

All Mercedes SUVs have the red reflectors in the lower bumper. It doesnt bother me on my GL since they are really low next to the exhaust pipes.

CEB

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to explain some of the challenges manufacturers face. Sidemarkers/reflectors are a prime example

The US mandates sidemarkers and reflectors - amber in front and red in the rear. The colors "amber" and "red" are defined.

Germany does not allow sidemarkers or reflectors, but encourages blinkers that can be seen from the side of the car.

The US requires reflectors on the rear but does not set a height limit. Other countries set height limits AND have different requirements for SUVs. A few countries do not allow reflectors at all.

Some countries require rear fog lights on the driver's side of the car, some require rear foglights but don't care if it is one or two and some countries(the US for one) doesn't regulate foglights at all (but regulates the number of "lights" that can be on the front of the car in addition to high beams - thereby restricting fog lights to use with low beams only)

And that's only for auxilliary lighting. Getting around the myriad regulations and trying to find a compromise that meets all or the regs is often impossible.

MB has done an outstanding job integrating the required rear reflectors into the taillighting assembly. I'm not sure what BMW was thinking with the 5 series as the reflectors are pretty well integrated into the 3 series. As a general rule, Euro manufacturers do a much better job of integrating requirements into their cars while most Asian manufacturers make some of these things look tacked on. The US is pretty good with most newer cars but hit-and-miss with older cars and "economy" versions.

dbtk

CEB, yes some manufacturers are better than others in integrating the mandated reflectors. For some, including BMW, they make the car appear wider and more planted to the ground. And amaycg, I found this true for the face-lifted GLs as well. MB did a nice job of leveraging the reflectors to slim down and modernize the appearance of my prior 2010 GL350. I much prefer the 2010+ GLs to the older ones.

hyperion667

now I'm seeing them EVERYWHERE, sheesh.....

RobbieRob

Hey Hype, guess whats on the back end of that new Lexus GS everyones talking about.....lol I'm surprised you didn't say anything on that post.

hyperion667

haha, I still have been seeing them everywhere, although I have not seen any new lexus out there anywhere......
so our's are built into the rear tail lamps?

thekurgan

Yes, agree. MB did good here. I do with our U.S. cars were able to disable the side markers when the headlights are on, as in the EU. Just looks better at night to have all white; for some BMWs, there was the ability to do a EU tune on the lighting module software; haven't found the same for MB (yet).

K-A

Yeah, the front ends of U.S cars with those orange lights is just bad. I covered up my side markers, but my LED turn signals (in the "eyebrow" of the headlights" are orange and you can clearly see them setting an orange hue up there (even when they're not on), which sucks.

hyperion667

yeah, there was one cat who covered his and they looked good....forgot who it was