What is some of your Pet Peeve's

[Jstpssng]

I blew nearly every bulb both inside and outside my 1984 Mustang about 30 years ago, by bypassing the voltage regulator, while trying to debug a bad wiring harness. It was very exciting and very bright in my garage for about 3 seconds. Live and learn

I rewired a '68 Dodge Dart from the battery to the ignition switch and everywhere in between... using two colors of wire.
Unfortunately I didn't even know what a voltage regulator was... started it up and fried every wire.
It went to the junk yard the following week.

 

[Fuddyduddy1952]

I told this story long ago but some may find it interesting.
About 40 years ago my business was in the front of a large building and in back was a garage occupied by an upholstery shop, the owner of the building (Jim). His brother Bob worked with him and one day Bob borrowed Jim's 1956 Ford F700 dump truck.
I'm at my desk, Bob leaves and an hour later see the dump truck return towed by a large wrecker (expensive tow) which drops it off behind building.
After a while I hear commotion so I go over and there's a contractor trying to push F700 in with a tractor, spinning wheels and tearing up asphalt lot. So I asked what happened. Bob said he was driving along when smoke rolled out from under the dash, all wires were burned up. "Why don't you just drive it in?" I asked.
Everything went silent...then Bob says "Fuddy! You dumb axx! I just said all the wires were burned up!!!".
"I understand, but why don't you just drive it in? I can have it running for you in a minute."
By then everyone there could see steam pouring out of Bob's ears.
Jim said, well, it's my truck...why not let Fuddy try?
So I popped the hood, in one pocket I carried a clip lead...so battery positive to ignition coil positive and with by small screwdriver jumped solenoid and it fired right up...I gave it some gas working carb linkage. It was idling.
"Now...you can simply drive it in the bay."
The contractor rolled his eyes as he left on his tractor. As Jim drove in in the bay I removed clip lead shutting it off. Bob never said a word but got in his car burning rubber down the street and to this day has never said a word to me.

 

[Highlandr]

In headlight/taillight assemblies it can get pricey if they go bad (not usually the LEDs themselves, but the power supply)

Or, the outer lens (plastic) gets cloudy/foggy. On my '04 Tundra I tried about every "fog away" product I could find and all the home grown solutions (including toothpaste) and none lasted more than a month. I ended up replacing the entire assembly. 'Bout time to do it on the missus' car.

My pet peeve for the day.

 

[Oaktree]

LED's operating off 12VDC likely just have a single series resistor, and maybe a capacitor for reducing any flicker. The LED's themself should basically never fail (> 100 years MTTF), and unlike an LED bulb designed to operate off houshold 115VAC, there's no "power supply circuit" to fail on a DC system.

You would think so, but it doesn't seem to be that way in the real world. I replaced the halogen headlights in my car with LEDs, and there's a module with circuitry in the power cable of each bulb. I believe the LEDs are pulsed at a high frequency to regulate the intensity. Even aftermarket LED "fog" lights have a circuit board with a couple chips on it.
I'm sure there's a reason, makes no sense to make them more complicated if there wasn't.

We have clear LED Christmas lights strung around the perimiter of our living room for ambiance. The LEDs are in series, with a load resistor and some sort of shunt system to keep the rest of the string lit if a couple bulbs go bad. And they do, don't really see any more longevity with the LED strings than with the old incandescent ones.

 

[Oaktree]

Or, the outer lens (plastic) gets cloudy/foggy. On my '04 Tundra I tried about every "fog away" product I could find and all the home grown solutions (including toothpaste) and none lasted more than a month. I ended up replacing the entire assembly. 'Bout time to do it on the missus' car.

My pet peeve for the day.

Yeah, once those lenses cloud up there's no long term solution. I will say that they've gotten a lot better in that regard in the last 10-15 years. Pretty rare to see something from the teens on with clouded lenses.

 

[Highlandr]

Pretty rare to see something from the teens on with clouded lenses.

True. They still look good on the '15 Tundra.

 

[rontaki]

Yeah, once those lenses cloud up there's no long term solution. I will say that they've gotten a lot better in that regard in the last 10-15 years. Pretty rare to see something from the teens on with clouded lenses.

Probably the most important thing after polishing the fog off is a clear coat to protect the soft surface.

 

[WinterDeere]

You would think so, but it doesn't seem to be that way in the real world. I replaced the halogen headlights in my car with LEDs, and there's a module with circuitry in the power cable of each bulb.

There's a lot more going on in a modern headlight. I thought we were still on simple gauge cluster lights.

The headlights on some of our cars are electronically steerable, they literally turn proportionally with the steering wheel, with no mechanical linkage. Obviously more complicated than a plain old single LED running off 12VDC.

 

[kenmbz]

My newer car (2022 audi)has all kinds of features built into the headlights, including the ability to create pseudo Fog/side lighting. I am sure it is a whole computerized (read expensive) module.
Even the Jeep has a whole computer module to control all the analog lights, so simplicity is not built in, even back in 2011.

 

[Highlandr]

Probably the most important thing after polishing the fog off is a clear coat to protect the soft surface.

Yeah, most of the kits came with some sort of protectant to be put on as the final step.