Well on this side of the pond its different the cities are well lit so you dont need Fogs on at all, most of the times you cant even see your own lights because its so bright out, and when you are on the highway, the lanes are split far appart or they have a cement wall between so most of the time you dont see the other lanes, and they cant see you, and so if you use them most of the time you are bothering the ones ahead of you and that is if they are aimed improperly, mine are lowered down and they bearly reach 30ft ahead of the car but they light up the sides like no other, and thats why I like em....
So far I havent had issues with people flashing lights at me for them being too bright but they sure can be seen from long ways away.
With the dual xenon set up I put so much light on the road that I often times find myself leading a column of cars behind me and no one ahead of me, especially in the dark places in the middle of nowhere, most of the drivers feel comfy driving behind me and using my lights to see ahead... LOL... 
... >:(sometimes its anoying...
It's a poor substitute for decent headlights though, and you can see quite clearly from the photos you posted that there is a lot of scatter above the cut-off.
Over here HID headlights provide plenty enough light, with a good cut-off and automatic levelling to minimise glare. And they work quite well, you can see well and aren't blinded by oncoming lights. If I switch on the fog lights on my Omega it makes very little difference to the light on the road, but it certainly increases glare.
I expect one of the problems in the US/Canada is the DOT standards for lighting. Quite simply they are a joke -- the beam patterns are often shocking, there is much more glare from what I observed. That before you even consider things like there is no requirement for distinct rear indicators (many cars flash the brake light on one side instead), and no requirement for there to be indicators visible from the side of the car (which is a nightmare on the freeway when making lane changes). The DOT is about 40 years behind Europe when it comes to lighting standards 
I still don't like the idea of having fog lights on when there is oncoming traffic, the glare borders on dangerous at times -- I've often had to squint because of it, which obviously doesn't help your chances of noticing something unexpected happening.
I agree with you completely M8 the DOT requirements here are so bad, they are the worst ones and thats why a lot of us try to get European units in order to improve the lighting one of the reasons being teh DOT does not allow for sharp cut off line, and no one can understand the reasoning behind them. My HIDs are no better then my dads van in terms of cut off and due to some faded lenses they do spread some light above teh cutoff line and I hate them I want to upgrade to a Bixenon projector or something with better design. Such modification can easily cost me 400-500 dollars and so I was looking at the AUX lights on the car and I realized that they are quite nice and the primary design is side lighting, not so much forward, and then i saw a guy who upgraded to HIDs, I was afraid that with the HIDs the light output will look like poop but I was surprised to find out that they worked quite nice... no distortion but a lot more light to the side where the OEM stuff really needed help so then I found the kit on ebay, for cheap and decided to jump on it the worst thing would have been to resell it if it didn't work... Lucky enough the light output didn't change, but the intensity did, I wish I had some pictures for comparison...
One other issue I think is the fact that in Europe often times you drive on two lane roads and you pass people etc... something unheard of on this side of the pond and thus the reasons why you guys have leveling headlights and nicer beams... Often times when go down the road we dont even see the other guys because they are usually behiind a wall or separated from us with some sort of divider, and also we drive on 4-6 lane roads in each way so a European beam pattern will bother the people to the right, or should I say blind them from behind...
Thus the DOT figured we need to have useless flat beams. THe issues are not in the city but rather on the highway where poor beams and darkness are just ingredients for disaster because often times I find myself coming up on something at 70-80mph and not seeing what it is until I run it over... so it would have been great to have a sharper beam which you can aim farther but then again the stupid DOT requirements... I hate em...
Also I figured I can always turn the Fogs off if they ever bother anyone but so far I hvent had issues with anyone, I believe the lack of inspections here allows for people to drive around with broken lights that shake and bother the other drivers, and no one ever gets a ticket or anything because of it. So is the system flawed...
yes you betcha....
Another thing is that the DOT thinks like this, as long as you can be seen by others you are safe... :-? no go figure this one out...
So I do a lot of highway driving and these fogs certainly help see small animals crossing the road sometimes or just simply debris and I dont think they compromise safety for anyone...
Here are some pics of what the typical highway looks like..
Anyways you see my point that even wtih teh shitty system that we got we still manage to get by, the more money you got the better headlights you get and the better you can see... thats what it comes down to... frankly even thou everyone talks about safety no one gives a damn about people driving with their high beams on or Fogs. EU is teh best.
Author
Topic: 5000K HID Fog Install DIY. (Read 3537 times)