Originally Posted by Jerzeyjoe

I have tried the search feature with no luck.

I'm new to MB ownership. Been playing with all the little buttons and knobs. One thing that has me stumped right now are the fog lights. I have the 2 "hockey puck" fog lights. Is there a way to get all 4 to light up? Wondering if there is something wrong, or if I'm just not seeing it.

Thanks.

Originally Posted by Arrie

What do you mean by "all four"?

If you have the hockey stick DRLs in the front there is no other lights with them. And these hockey stick lights are NOT fog lights. They are Daytime Runnig Lights that actually turn OFF when you turn on the rear fog light.

Daytime these lights are bright, when your main head lights come ON the hockey sticks go half power and when you turn the fog light in the rear ON the hockey stick go all OFF. This is because the DRL is made to shine in all directions to improve your car visibility to others but in foggy conditions a light beaming up would make the visibility for the driver worse. For this reason the hockey stick lights go OFF when fog light is turned ON.

Originally Posted by Arrie

What do you mean by "all four"?

If you have the hockey stick DRLs in the front there is no other lights with them. And these hockey stick lights are NOT fog lights. They are Daytime Runnig Lights that actually turn OFF when you turn on the rear fog light.

Daytime these lights are bright, when your main head lights come ON the hockey sticks go half power and when you turn the fog light in the rear ON the hockey stick go all OFF. This is because the DRL is made to shine in all directions to improve your car visibility to others but in foggy conditions a light beaming up would make the visibility for the driver worse. For this reason the hockey stick lights go OFF when fog light is turned ON.

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

....And this begs the question, for step #3 above, why do they bother turning OFF the "hockey stick" LEDs when the rear fogs are turned ON?

Originally Posted by Live Oak

Because the the hocky stick DRL lights would illuminate the fog in front of you, making it worse --- blinding you.

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

No, that cannot be the reason. These DRL's are only at "half power" per #2. I don't even think it's "half power", but the brightness of it at this partial level is very much a non-factor. It doesn't illuminate much of anything and it just for looks at "half power". The four headlights are ON if the rear fog light is ON. And if those Xenons don't illuminate the fog, I don't know what will!

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

No, that cannot be the reason. These DRL's are only at "half power" per #2. I don't even think it's "half power", but the brightness of it at this partial level is very much a non-factor. It doesn't illuminate much of anything and it just for looks at "half power". The four headlights are ON if the rear fog light is ON. And if those Xenons don't illuminate the fog, I don't know what will!

Originally Posted by Arrie

Even with half power the DRLs make it worse in dense fog and they are switched off for that reason when you hit that fog light button.

Another thing that also happens is that your head lights automatically go to low beam and also to the shortest distance if your automatic adaptive is on.

Originally Posted by Live Oak

If you had paid attention to the pattern of the lights, you would have seen that the headlights have a very sharp vertical cutoff, and the DRLs have very little vertical cutoff.

The very idea of light control in fog is to keep the necessary lights low, to avoid further illuminating fog, thus blinding the driver's forward visibility. THAT is why the DRLs are shut down when the "fog" lights are on, and why high beams are disabled.

But, you have your theories . . .

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

Do I need to take a video to show you that the four headlights don't move as you claim it does when the DRL's are toggled on/off?

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

So not trying to be a jerk,

Originally Posted by Live Oak

READ!! Nobody ever said they move..

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

You're right and I apologize... I misread your post.

What I should have written was for you to read the post where I stated that the partial lighting of the DRL's is a non-factor in illuminating anything. I.e. - even if you turn it off, it doesn't do anything. Also, since the four XENON headlights remain ON that they would illuminate everything in their path - including fog.

I think I may have taken offense to you stating that "I have my theories" when, in fact, I'm the one testing things practically. It is you who have theories and haven't pointed to any documentation supporting any of your statements. It's a pet peeve of mine when people post their theories as if they were fact - misleading others in forums. In another forum, someone claimed that our C63 AMG had an adjustable suspension that changed dampening via the drive program selector (C, S S+, M, or Race Start mode) and was pretty adamant about it until he finally practically walked out to the car to go on his hands and knees to see that the suspension is not electronically adjustable.

So I guess I leave it that "we can agree to disagree".

Originally Posted by Arrie

Mabuhay, Reading the posts it seems YOU have the theories and no support to them. Go find a place where the visibility is only 30 feet or less due to dense fog. I guarantee you will see difference between the DRLs ON or OFF.

Originally Posted by Arrie

Mabuhay,

Reading the posts it seems YOU have the theories and no support to them.

Go find a place where the visibility is only 30 feet or less due to dense fog. I guarantee you will see difference between the DRLs ON or OFF.

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

Arrie, 2.5 years ago, you actually started a thread that seems to support what I wrote. So I'm confused to your post above. Here it is:

https://mbworld.org/forums/e-class-w...osed-work.html

Also, last Thursday at 4:30 am EST on the way to the airport, there was dense fog in the Boston area. Of course, I played around with the (rear) fog light switch... No difference. If the US E-Class headlights actually moved liked the video of the Euro model you drove, then I would believe it. As you say in your own thread, it appears the fog light feature may not have been enabled in the US.

Live Oak, not much fog in New Mexico I bet. Again, it's a free country and we can disagree....

Originally Posted by Arrie

In my post that you refer to is no one word to support your opinions about the DRLs and fog.

If you read it and understand the english language I used I wrote the post when I had owned the car for two weeks. Since then I have learned a lot and especially not from my very ignorant and glueless dealer at the time. They had no fu###ng idea how the lights work.

In Europe the fog lights function actually widens the light beams to sides but this is not the case in U.S. What does work is that the P2 Bi-Xenon lights will automatically go to low beam and to the shortest distance in 2011 models and later. And the DRLs go OFF to keep them from impairing the visibility in very dense fog.

You say you tested the lights in fog. Was it really a fog where you could see only 30 ft or even less. I'm talking about a fog that does not normally exist other than if you drive in the mountains when you are practically driving in clouds. Boston is in sea level.

People designing these cars make them for people living in mountains too as the Alps are just around the corner from Stuttgart. The people need to be able to drive these cars down or up the mountain roads in dark in extremely dense fog.

Originally Posted by Arrie

I'm a 2-week '11 E350 sports package owner with P2 package and have a question about the front lights of the car.

I asked the dealer service today and got somewhat confusing answers.

I was first told that the "hockey stick" lights are fog lights, which is not true as also was corrected for me by another person at the dealer. They are DRL as I already knew.

What is confusing to me is that car operation manual says that these DRLs turn off when actual driving lights come on either automatically (gets dark outside) or are manually switched on but in my car these DRLs stay on at all times with actual driving lights. The only way to turn DRLs off is to disable them at the control display or another impractical way that I explain below in this post. Is this normal DRL operation amongst E350 2011 models?

Another thing is with fog lights. I thought my car does not have front fog lights but dealer sales manages told me that the Bi-xenon light package includes fog lights that are built in with the automatic HI-beam function. He said that when fog light switch is pressesd, which illuminates left rear fog light with amber symbol in the analog clock, it also switches front lights to do fog lighting. He said that front lights will reduce lighting distance and widen to both sides. I tried to see in dark how it would work but could not see any difference in front lights at all when pressing the rear fog light switch other than it turns the DRLs off.

Then it is kind of funny how the DRLs first come on very bright for a flash when rear fog light switch is pressed to turn rear fog light off again but immediately take much dimmer light position.

Then there are those round lights next to the driving lights. Mine stay on always if driving lights are on. Is this correct?

Does anyone else have lights acting like mine? Do I have some sort of a problem with my lights? Shouldn't DRL's turn off when actual driving lights come on like the manual says?

Thanks for your help,

Arrie

Originally Posted by Mabuhay

Are you kidding me? Yes, I did read it in the "English" language. It's not in incomprehensible German with accents. If you can't even read YOUR OWN posts, here, I'll quote it for you.



You had the same exact experiences as I am having now. One would think that you'd be helpful. If you feel differently about your old posts, maybe at least you should have posted some finality to it so that when newbies such as myself are searching for answers, can then leverage more senior members such as yourself on the forum. Instead, I get jackass "in the English language" remarks and "theories" that are not documented anywhere. I.e. - it's a theory when it's not substantiated by fact. You yourself posted that you practically and factually tried to see the difference. And you got the same result as I did. So how can you say I'm the one posting "theories" when I'm trying to do things practically like you did? And yes, the dealerships here are also clueless.

I've worked in Spain, Switzerland, Germany and Austria and am very well versed in the fog that you mention. While it's "more interesting" to drive in it in the mountains, the fog here in Boston is fog nonetheless. Do you think the car will say "Oh, it's just Boston fog, I won't function."? I think not.

And lastly, I'm also within 2 weeks of ownership. Actually, this is my wife's commuter car and we were trying to figure things out. We're not new to Mercedes or German cars. My C63 doesn't work this way. None of our Porsches work this way and neither does the Audi. With our previous BMWs, it is possible to only turn the fog lights on without headlights. So yes, we're trying to figure this out.