Newbie warning: Low Sun.

[Alex321]

Please don't. It can't compete with the sun unless it's also dazzling and dazzling lights are dangerous and illegal.

There is NO good reason to say "Please don't". Decent (preferably flashing) rear lights will never hurt, even if they won't always help.

It's worth learning how to do an emergency turn if you haven't already, plus wear black (not sun like yellow) and sit up and try to make yourself cast a larger shadow.

Try to find quieter or safer routes or vary the time if reasonable, but if you've got to go east or west, you've got to go...

Absolutely. I have no choice in the matter unfortunately. My office is very slightly South of due East from home, and when I am riding in, my ride is between 7:00 and 8:00 AM, which at this time of year means low sun unless it is cluody.

They can bleat all they like and they will anyway whatever you wear, but it's better to minimise the risk of being hit by not wearing yellow.

Wearing yellow is hardly ever going to reduce the chances of you being seen, and in many cases will increase the chance.

And these mornings with low sun, you will usually also have parts of the ride where you are in fairly heavy shadow, where it will definitely help.

 

[Alex321]

Another thing if you are going to be riding into low sun, get yourself a cap with a brim, to shield your own eyes from it.

I normally never wear one, but at this time of year, it is invaluable for my commute.

 

[Ajax Bay]

I would just warn you, @Alex321 , as I discovered 6 years ago when this thread was initiated, that @mjr is an expert on conspicuity with whom you best remonstrate from a position of knowing the facts, not intuition. He is of course 6 years older and wiser now, but the facts and research have not really moved on.

 

[T4tomo]

I would just warn you, @Alex321 , as I discovered 6 years ago when this thread was initiated, that @mjr is an expert on conspicuity with whom you best remonstrate from a position of knowing the facts, not intuition. He is of course 6 years older and wiser now, but the facts and research have not really moved on.

6 years older, I'll give you...

 

[mjr]

I would just warn you, @Alex321 , as I discovered 6 years ago when this thread was initiated, that @mjr is an expert on conspicuity with whom you best remonstrate from a position of knowing the facts, not intuition. He is of course 6 years older and wiser now, but the facts and research have not really moved on.

I just did some looking into the factual research due to a mix of curiosity about my own mildly-unusual eyesight and a few bitter experiences where I was following convention (yellow hi vis, for example) and suffering far worse outcomes (hit with a van, for example). Much is written about conspicuity supported only by stuff claimed to be "common sense" which, sadly, turns out to be neither.

There have been a few new studies in the last few years but the main one I remember as surprising is that those bike lights that project lines on the ground seem to be correlated with reduced casualties, but I think that was mostly night use, not sunset and sunrise.

 

[Brandane]

Low sun cost a local cyclist his life. Driver not driving to road conditions whilst driving in to a low sun cost one of our local cyclists his life a month ago.
He was out at 6.30 am just as the sun was coming up, and riding east. Sadly, a white van man was driving on the same bit of road at the same time, and failed to see the cyclist. Local paper link. The A760 is a horrible road to cycle at the best of times.

 

[mjr]

There is NO good reason to say "Please don't". Decent (preferably flashing) rear lights will never hurt, even if they won't always help.

Sadly, that is not true because they can hurt by reducing contrast. Flashing lights especially have been repeatedly found to offer no benefit over steady ones, with any benefit of attention-grabbing (which is also detrimental to other riders) probably outweighed by the reduced ease of identifying the light's exact position.

Wearing yellow is hardly ever going to reduce the chances of you being seen, and in many cases will increase the chance.

Again, that is not what the research shows: it's more of a problem in spring, but yellow will indeed reduce the chances of your being seen against yellow backgrounds. The greeny-yellow popular for so-called "hi vis" even more so.

And these mornings with low sun, you will usually also have parts of the ride where you are in fairly heavy shadow, where it will definitely help.

Heavy shadow means not much light which means the colour becomes almost irrelevant. I don't know where you are getting your "definitely" from. Reflectors are far more important in heavy shadow, and they might be places where lights could help more than hinder, but even they're not sufficient if you're sharing a road with drivers who aren't slowing down enough until they can see clearly what they're driving into.

 

[Mike_P]

Low sun cost a local cyclist his life. Driver not driving to road conditions whilst driving in to a low sun cost one of our local cyclists his life a month ago.
He was out at 6.30 am just as the sun was coming up, and riding east. Sadly, a white van man was driving on the same bit of road at the same time, and failed to see the cyclist.

Plainly not giving full attention but last week whilst driving I was only aware of a cyclist ahead, black clothed with no rear light, because their was some distortion in the shadows caused by the low sun on a tree lined road.

 

[DRM]

Low sun cost a local cyclist his life. Driver not driving to road conditions whilst driving in to a low sun cost one of our local cyclists his life a month ago.
He was out at 6.30 am just as the sun was coming up, and riding east. Sadly, a white van man was driving on the same bit of road at the same time, and failed to see the cyclist. Local paper link. The A760 is a horrible road to cycle at the best of times.

It’s easy to blame white van man, but having been on the A64 heading east to Scarborough, near Malton Nth Yorks, as the sun was coming up, and at the time the glare filled the whole horizon, nobody could see anything, the three vehicles in front of me ran into each other because the first one braked, then the other two hit each other, I had some decent polarised sunglasses perched on my head as I’d twigged what was coming, I just about managed to avoid being number 4 in that collision as I managed to glimpse the wreckage and miss it by centimetres, the glare was so bad that the Police actually closed the road until the sun cleared the road and got higher in the sky later on in the morning

 

[mjr]

It’s easy to blame white van man, but having been on the A64 heading east to Scarborough, near Malton Nth Yorks, as the sun was coming up, and at the time the glare filled the whole horizon, nobody could see anything, [...]

If that was true, then motorists must stop until the glare clears, as required by their driving licence and summarised in the highway code. Driving blind is never legal or acceptable. It's easy to blame the white van man in that case because he did wrong!

 

[mustang1]

When the sun is low and visibilty not great, I'll get off the bike and use the sidewalk. If that's not possible or too inconvenient, I'll use alternative routes and sometimes I'll even not use the bike (well, if it came to that, but so far it hasn't).

 

[ColinJ]

I had the glare problem yesterday evening when cycling back to my sister's house at 18:15. It got so bad that I had to ride one-handed and use my left hand to shield my eyes. It could have been a bit iffy on the narrow lanes if there had been cars about but fortunately the roads were quiet at that time.

My cycling helmet has a peak visor but it is not long enough to be much use. I had to tilt my head so far forwards to cut the sun out that I ended up staring at my front wheel!

 

[Ajax Bay]

Echo all the comments about glare. Driving west before (great) sunset yesterday was in and out of serious in-yer-face glare. Mostly it could be predicted (so slow down) and if really bad just keep slowing down till you can see, or the road turns - @mjr is on the money: if a driver "can't see anything" then take action: decellerate.
On bike empathise with @ColinJ 's hand for bars, hand for eyes limitation - and this is problematic downhill.
I guess the point the OP and resurrecter is making is: 'be aware that drivers are affected and might behave without sufficient care'. Avoid riding at times and directions where the sun is low and 'in-line' if possible.

Flashing lights especially have been repeatedly found to offer no benefit over steady ones, with any benefit of attention-grabbing (which is also detrimental to other riders) probably outweighed by the reduced ease of identifying the light's exact position.

You acknowledge, I think, that there is probably an attention-grabbing benefit. In the context of a lone rider sporting a flashing rear light (I prefer one which is a variable frequency flash), I'd be keen that the attention of a driver behind behind me is grabbed and if they can't immediately "identify the light's exact position [easily]" I think they are more likely to look for me than just drive along in SMIDSY mode.

 

[ColinJ]

The other problem I had yesterday was a very severe strobing effect from the sun as I passed trees and hedgerows. (AFAIK!) I don't suffer from epilepsy but the flashing was starting to get to me.

 

[classic33]

The other problem I had yesterday was a very severe strobing effect from the sun as I passed trees and hedgerows. (AFAIK!) I don't suffer from epilepsy but the flashing was starting to get to me.

The strobing effect will only affect a small minority of those with photosensitive epilepsy.

There is evidence that it can lead to an increase in headaches in a number of people.