One of the Coolest Features!

[MrBigwat]

Not for use behind enemy lines but to prevent giving air strikes a solid position of a road. Neat to see.

[MultiPurposeReviewer]

In the dark of a cloudy night, on a rural European country road, where there's not a single light around for miles, I bet you'd be surprised how bright that blackout driving light it. Kinda like how in total silence, a whisper seems loud.

[SweetDaddy]

I’m old enough to have driven a Jeep in the army and remember these blackout lights. We trained with them in night convoy operations. We called them “cat eyes”

[DavidTenhundfeld]

The tread pattern on military vehicles is designed in such a way that the enemy cant tell which direction the vehicle was traveling

[PaulKentSkates]

I was a canadian soldier in the 90's. I hated driving with blackout markers. I did my training it the winter and while in convoy got to drive with blackout markers in a snow storm on mountain roads. It was terrifying.

[ostlandr]

My father drove truck for a while in WWII. He said that the challenge of driving in convoy in blackout was not having the barrel of the 155mm howitzer hooked to the truck in front come through the windshield.

[xzx_sparky_xzx]

Alot of the blackout driving lights i encountered were green. It gives off a less obvious glow. Additionally, the marker lights are designed as a distance measurement. As you are driving, the halves get closer together or farther away. For the taillights, if you are behind the vehicle and you can see all 4 red lights, you are too close. Of you see 1 red light, you are too far. If you see a total of 2 red lights on each side, you are the correct following distance.

[bryaninnc]

In addtion to the blackout lights, we cut up empty sandbags and put them over the headlights, held in place by the bezel. This was on M151s

[harrygatto]

Many Army trucks used to have the back cover of the "banjo" on the rear differential painted white and illuminated by a small light. This meant it was only visible to the vehicle driving behind and forcing the driver to keep a safe distance from the truck in font of him.

[Fatherofheroesandheroines]

We had blackout lights on our humvees in the military. I remember being forced to use them on a night convoy once. I have never prayed for safety more lol.

[Dusdaddy]

On the rear, each assembly shines 4 distinct triangles. When you are following too close, you will see all 4, when you are at proper distance, the 4 blend into two, When you are too far away, the blend into one. That's all we had until the NVGs were handed out to drivers.

[FrequentFlyer]

In modern military vehicles, black out lights still exist, but theyre EVEN DIMMER than before. Thats because we have night vision goggles! The goggles show a rough outline of the vehicle and the suroundings, and the black out lights give the other drivers in the convoy better clarity to where the other trucks are.

[aardque]

Fun fact: "slit" style headlight covers, which the Germans used extensively, tend to create a "flat" beam of light, which in turn tends to create "polarized light, " that was far less visible at strafing angle of attack, than it was at the driving angle of viewing, on the same principle that sunlight glares off your car hood, or the surface of water, that becomes invisible when you move your point of view perpendicular to the reflecting plane. Allies were driving with "scattered" light, Germans with focused light.

[dougparson]

I love these old jeeps. I drove these from 1980 to 1984 and all were older than 1950 yet very well maintained. They were snappy and would go everywhere. Were coming back from field training and I bumped a 5-ton truck in front of me at a stop light one time. It actually jiggled the big truck just a bit. We all had a good laugh !!

[jackdurden]

That heel has been restored beautifully! It’s nearly flawless! Maybe even so, as I cannot see the entire thing. Still such an exciting thing to drive on old country roads with.

[Xingularity]

Driving around, at night, in the desert during Desert Storm, if there was any moonlight, we could drive around fine. On the few nights with new moons, so it is close to pitch black as it gets, these Black Out lights work amazingly well....

[raymondw.]

Majority of our military vehicles still used that same manual version of switch up until the current models where it’s a keypad now

[Helo]

A guy I used to off-road with had an old ex-military Defender (or Series, I can't remember which) Land Rover with "Convoy Lights". The rear differential cover was painted white, and a small lamp shown down on it at night. When you were in a blacked out convoy at night, all you had to do was look for the white differential cover.

[martinw]

Every British military vehicle has had this since the 1960s to my certain knowledge. Switching to convoy lights also disconnects the horn, and shines a light onto the white-painted rear diff- which only a following vehicle can see.

[Dsschuh]

Blackout lights were not just for behind enemy lines, they were also used in friendly territory also.