I’ve had my TL since 2004 and crazy things are starting to go wrong with it. So tonight I was pulled over because the cop thinks my high beams are on but I show him that my indicator is not on in my car. He says that both of my lights are on and that I have a malfunction. I get a warning. He also says my back license plate light is out. I get home and the license plate lights are both working and my brights seem to be working fine, but just want to make sure I know how they work because so many little weird things are going wrong, I need a sanity check.

When the lights are on my fog lights are also on. When I put brights on, my HID’s stay on and seem to get brighter and my fog lights turn off. Is the the way the lights should work or do I have a malfunction?

Sorry for the stupid question, but this is the first time in 14 years I’ve been pulled over for this and like I said the car has some weird issues. 🙂

 

That is the correct operation.
the high beams and low beams are one bulb. There's a solenoid that flips up or down, I forgot...but it just opens up more light.

There fogs turn off when high beams are on because the fogs are less useful.
High beams reflect moisture in the air, opposed to fogs which illuminate below

 

actually I believe its federal laws require your fog light to be turn off once high beam come on, The actual paraphrase in stated you can't have more than four lights (facing forward) on at the same time while driving on public road. Well in our TL we never had more than 4 light facing anyway. Your TL light function as it was designed and may be that cop smoking too much donut for the night.

 

Were your fog lights on when he pulled you over? The fogs on the 04 - 06 TL's are in the position where the high beams are so maybe he mistook your fogs for high's..


What I do know is that this cop was definitely high... Unfortunately you have a fix-it ticket now for his idiocy..

 

There is no federal law that requires fog lights to be turn off when high beams are activated. Nor is there a federal law that limits forward lighting to 4 lights on at once.

However, some states do limit forward lighting to 4 lights on at once but not the feds.

 

So you saying all auto manufacture wiring fog light and headlight the way that once high beam on the fog light turn off because just some states regulation? I did not know that interesting ...

 

I have never fully understood why our fogs turn off either. I know on my '05 I would love for the fogs to stay on with the brights since they shine off to the sides so much better. I never have known if it was state, federal, or something else that mandated the lighting limits. I know the lights themselves are regulated at the federal level...but how they are implemented and such I never knew.

 

Since the 3g TL hi beams and low beams are using the same bulbs then you can legally have your fog lamps on with the high beams, a total of 4 lamps on at any given time, whether in low or high beam mode.