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Toyota GR86 - long-term review - Report No:6

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Life with a Toyota GR86: the down side of living with a sports car in winter

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The nights are drawing in, and there's a problem with driving a low-slung car...

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Life with a Toyota GR86: the down side of living with a sports car in winter

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Toyota GR86 - long-term review - Report No:6 | Top Gear

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The nights are drawing in, and there's a problem with driving a low-slung car...

# data.attributes.metatag[].attributes.content
Toyota GR86 - long-term review - Report No:6

# data.attributes.metatag[].attributes.content
The nights are drawing in, and there's a problem with driving a low-slung car...

# data.attributes.metatag[].attributes.content
The nights are drawing in, and there's a problem with driving a low-slung car...

# data.attributes.metatag[].attributes.content
Toyota GR86 - long-term review - Report No:6

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Dark, innit? It gets late early this time of year, as my grandad used to say. With the nights drawing in, and mornings now consisting of stumbling, blinking into the twilight, my biggest driving pet peeve is back for another year.

Not all-year round annoyances like middle-lane hoggers. And ‘BO55 CEO’ numberplates. The culprit is British politeness.

It’s good manners to say ‘thanks’ to your fellow driver when they’ve given way. In daylight, this is achieved with the customary hand-up gesture from the top of the steering wheel. Maybe just the index and middle-finger, if you’re trying to look cool and aloof. It’s not a massive pantomime display of reality telly emotion. Just a brief ‘cheers for that’ and on your way. No biggie. Harmony reigns.

But now of course, it’s pitch black during the hours of commuting. A simple flick of the fingers can’t be detected in the murky gloom. So instead, a quick flash of the headlights its substituted.

I imagine this came about in the olden days, when car headlights were billed as ‘slightly better than navigating by moonlight’. The old halogen glow-worms in jam jars you got in a Ford Cortina or Vauxhall Vectra were so weak you could usually biff along with main beam permanently activated without causing nearby hedgehogs to even squint.

Then along came xenon headlights with their whiter glare. Car makers got serious about headlights. All of a sudden you had a social responsibility to make sure your beam was dipped, and your headlights were well-adjusted. But the thank-you-flash remained.

But now we live in a world of LED headlights, and even lasers. Cars can turn pitch blackness into broad daylight. An ever-more furious arms race of safety and one-upmanship has resulted in headlights which can contact life in faraway galaxies and incinerate nearby planets like some sort of rogue sci-fi death ray. Some are even so clever they use a ‘matrix’ beam to fully illuminate the hedgerow and verge while keeping nearby cars in a dimmer beam. Ingenious. But not foolproof.

As a result, being blasted with a white-hot pulse of light as a ta-for-waiting now leaves you pretty much blind for a good few minutes. It’s a moment of innocent kindness that’s been superseded by technology. So, please, I beg of you, can we knock it on the head?

It’s particularly bad in the GR86, because it’s low. If you daily-drive a sports car, you’ll know that sitting closer to the ground means you’re even more vulnerable to a quick scorch of the high-beams. And because everyone else is in an SUV, the GR86’s windscreen is in the optimum X5 and Range Rover Sport laserbeam blast radius. Just getting across town is like watching a highlights reel of nuclear weapons tests. Without the safety goggles.

And I can’t retaliate with a ‘you’re welcome’ salvo, because the 86’s headlights aren’t all that bright. They’re fine – they see far enough for a car with 228bhp. But the other day, as an experiment, I left my main-beam on when I spotted the ominous glow of another car approaching over the brow of a hill. I poised my hand on the stalk ready to dim the bulbs.

And… nothing. No angry flash. No furious strobes. They didn’t seem to notice my lights were on maximum brightness. And neither did the car after that. Or the next.

So, my headlights aren’t bright enough to irritate, but I’m at the perfect height to be vaporised by light blasts every time I wave someone out of a junction. This has to stop. We need a new way to say thank-you during winter. I’ve seen the light. Anyone got any better ideas - and new retinas?

# data.attributes.body.processed
Dark, innit? It gets late early this time of year, as my grandad used to say. With the nights drawing in, and mornings now consisting of stumbling, blinking into the twilight, my biggest driving pet peeve is back for another year.

Not all-year round annoyances like middle-lane hoggers. And ‘BO55 CEO’ numberplates. The culprit is British politeness.

It’s good manners to say ‘thanks’ to your fellow driver when they’ve given way. In daylight, this is achieved with the customary hand-up gesture from the top of the steering wheel. Maybe just the index and middle-finger, if you’re trying to look cool and aloof. It’s not a massive pantomime display of reality telly emotion. Just a brief ‘cheers for that’ and on your way. No biggie. Harmony reigns.

But now of course, it’s pitch black during the hours of commuting. A simple flick of the fingers can’t be detected in the murky gloom. So instead, a quick flash of the headlights its substituted.

I imagine this came about in the olden days, when car headlights were billed as ‘slightly better than navigating by moonlight’. The old halogen glow-worms in jam jars you got in a Ford Cortina or Vauxhall Vectra were so weak you could usually biff along with main beam permanently activated without causing nearby hedgehogs to even squint.

Then along came xenon headlights with their whiter glare. Car makers got serious about headlights. All of a sudden you had a social responsibility to make sure your beam was dipped, and your headlights were well-adjusted. But the thank-you-flash remained.

But now we live in a world of LED headlights, and even lasers. Cars can turn pitch blackness into broad daylight. An ever-more furious arms race of safety and one-upmanship has resulted in headlights which can contact life in faraway galaxies and incinerate nearby planets like some sort of rogue sci-fi death ray. Some are even so clever they use a ‘matrix’ beam to fully illuminate the hedgerow and verge while keeping nearby cars in a dimmer beam. Ingenious. But not foolproof.

As a result, being blasted with a white-hot pulse of light as a ta-for-waiting now leaves you pretty much blind for a good few minutes. It’s a moment of innocent kindness that’s been superseded by technology. So, please, I beg of you, can we knock it on the head?

It’s particularly bad in the GR86, because it’s low. If you daily-drive a sports car, you’ll know that sitting closer to the ground means you’re even more vulnerable to a quick scorch of the high-beams. And because everyone else is in an SUV, the GR86’s windscreen is in the optimum X5 and Range Rover Sport laserbeam blast radius. Just getting across town is like watching a highlights reel of nuclear weapons tests. Without the safety goggles.

And I can’t retaliate with a ‘you’re welcome’ salvo, because the 86’s headlights aren’t all that bright. They’re fine – they see far enough for a car with 228bhp. But the other day, as an experiment, I left my main-beam on when I spotted the ominous glow of another car approaching over the brow of a hill. I poised my hand on the stalk ready to dim the bulbs.

And… nothing. No angry flash. No furious strobes. They didn’t seem to notice my lights were on maximum brightness. And neither did the car after that. Or the next.

So, my headlights aren’t bright enough to irritate, but I’m at the perfect height to be vaporised by light blasts every time I wave someone out of a junction. This has to stop. We need a new way to say thank-you during winter. I’ve seen the light. Anyone got any better ideas - and new retinas?