[kjmccarx]

I'm a hardcore lighting geek, I have been long before I even got a Jeep. Anyway, I've wanted to upgrade to LED tail lights for a while now. After going to my basic training for ROTC I fell in love with humvees. I would love to put some humvee tail lights on my Jeep... they aren't even that much more expensive than a normal tail light upgrade.

Anyway, I found the trucklite HMMWV lights for $100 each (+$15 flush mount buckets). These come in black and run at 12v or 24v (no problem there), but there are some little white things under the actual LED portion of the light. Does anyone here know what those do? Or would I be better off asking on a humvee forum?

Thanks for the help!

 

[Pmryall]

Those are the blackout lights. For when your running combat operations and trying to go unseen. They put off enough light that the guy behind you in the convoy can see you. But they don't light up the night like a true brake light.

 

[NH2112]

Yep, blackout tail & brake lights. The brake lights are the single ones at the bottom and are white (filtered by the white plastic.) The blackout tail lights are above, and are used to put you at the correct convoy interval for blackout drive. If you see all 4 lights you're too close, if you see only 1 you're too far, and if you see 2 you're at the right distance. (About 18m/60 feet.)

 

[kjmccarx]

Yep, blackout tail & brake lights. The brake lights are the single ones at the bottom and are white (filtered by the white plastic.) The blackout tail lights are above, and are used to put you at the correct convoy interval for blackout drive. If you see all 4 lights you're too close, if you see only 1 you're too far, and if you see 2 you're at the right distance. (About 18m/60 feet.)

Thanks for the info! That's actually pretty cool... could be nice when wheeling with friends at night, unless they're too dim to be seen when the tail light is on.

The concept kind of reminds me of a PAPI at airports for landing airplanes.

 

[NH2112]

They're way too dim to be seen with the tail lights on, although you could probably rig up a blackout light switch using a SPDT relay with the factory taillight wiring cut & connected to terminals 30 & 87a, a second set of wiring going to the blackout tail lights through terminal 87, and a toggle switch to energize the coil and switch between the 2. The brake lights could be done the same way with a second SPDT relay (or use a DPDT relay and do both at the same time, but you won't find those relays & their sockets at auto parts stores.)

ETA I don't even know if soldiers train for blackout drive today, everyone has night-vision goggles! Damn noobs! I remember the first time I used NVGs, it was better than winning the lottery. But that was only after a few years of straining my eyes to see that dim patch of light on the ground from the blackout drive light.

 

[kjmccarx]

ETA I don't even know if soldiers train for blackout drive today, everyone has night-vision goggles! Damn noobs! I remember the first time I used NVGs, it was better than winning the lottery. But that was only after a few years of straining my eyes to see that dim patch of light on the ground from the blackout drive light.

I can't answer that, but from my understanding they don't really use Humvees at all anymore (except as trucks here in the US). Obviously I'm just a student, but the few prior enlisted people I know say that they only use MRAPs while deployed. MRAPs look like they're so high up that you wouldn't be able to see the blackout lights at all, which means they probably just use night vision.

 

[Pmryall]

I'm to old for nvg's never got the experience. We relied on the cat eyes on our helmets and if nescessary those red lensed flashlights.

 

[METT-TC]

Random thoughts, but I came across this as I was researching lights.

Yes, we definitely still use black out drive lights when NVG driving. Our skills have atrophied on the ground as so many convoy ops overseas required bright, bright lights to see possible IED emplacements. But we are starting to use it again as we train for near peer force on force vs booger eaters and mouthbreathers.

The front blackouts actually assist with NVG visual acuity on dark moonless / little ambient light nights. And both the front and back black out drive lights greatly assist (when you want to--if the bad guys have NVGs too, it might be worth it, or not, to run totally blacked out/no lights whatsoever) with not smacking into other vehicles on the road. Says the guy that almost smacked into a Bradley pulling checkpoint duty late one night north of Barstow not too many years ago. "Where the **%$ did he come from on this MSR..." I'm sure he could see me well enough with his FLIR as I sped along in my M998. But the same could not be said of me no matter how much I've done it.

 

[jesseo]

how about putting the new HMMWV Headlights in the front?! That would look pretty awesome

 

[NH2112]

Random thoughts, but I came across this as I was researching lights.

Yes, we definitely still use black out drive lights when NVG driving. Our skills have atrophied on the ground as so many convoy ops overseas required bright, bright lights to see possible IED emplacements. But we are starting to use it again as we train for near peer force on force vs booger eaters and mouthbreathers.

The front blackouts actually assist with NVG visual acuity on dark moonless / little ambient light nights. And both the front and back black out drive lights greatly assist (when you want to--if the bad guys have NVGs too, it might be worth it, or not, to run totally blacked out/no lights whatsoever) with not smacking into other vehicles on the road. Says the guy that almost smacked into a Bradley pulling checkpoint duty late one night north of Barstow not too many years ago. "Where the **%$ did he come from on this MSR..." I'm sure he could see me well enough with his FLIR as I sped along in my M998. But the same could not be said of me no matter how much I've done it.

We drove with no lights whatsoever in Desert Storm, but did have our "bud lights" - tiny, dim IR markers visible only through NVGs that you clipped onto a 9V battery and put somewhere on the rear of your vehicle.

I remember my last unit had some M577 command post tracks that were painted solid green, and they were nearly invisible in NVGs. You could have one parked in a field with no camo netting, and as long as it wasn't silhouetted against the skyline you wouldn't see it (other than the black rubber on the road wheels, those stood out if not muddy or hidden by vegetation.) I usually found the platoon HQ by either looking for the head of the OE254 antenna silhouetted above the trees, or by the light from the track's master power switch shining through the driver's periscopes. Same thing with the XMIT light on the old 524 radios, I always took the bulbs out of mine. If you stopped and listened you could often locate a position from the radio volume, at night a 524 on max volume was easily audible from over 1/4 mile away. It was like talking to the wall, getting my drivers to turn the volume down to just a whisper if they were staying in the vehicle and to turn the radio off if they were leaving it.

 

[Sito_Origami]

ETA I don't even know if soldiers train for blackout drive today, everyone has night-vision goggles! Damn noobs! I remember the first time I used NVGs, it was better than winning the lottery. But that was only after a few years of straining my eyes to see that dim patch of light on the ground from the blackout drive light.

I did some limited blackout driving in the Canadian military, admittedly some years ago. Very disorienting feeling in the dark, driving over broken ground, almost like weightlessness. I hope this is a skill still being taught.