The Tail Light Assembly Warns Dummies Behind Us
One of the most overlooked, underappreciated and often forgotten parts of your vehicle is the tail light assembly. Such a simple replacement part on your car or truck (simple meaning most anyone can replace one) and yet this simple car part is often forgotten about until it is too late and an accident occurs or we receive a ticket from the boys (and girls) in blue for a broken tail light assembly.
Tickets aside, this is really a matter of safety. The tail light assembly houses the turn signals, which of course tells a driver following you that you are about to turn and they should slow down; the assembly also houses the brake lights which again warns a following driver; and it houses the reverse lights which tells people to get the heck out of your way because you are reversing directions. Not only all of that but the tail light assembly also provides lights at nighttime so drivers behind you know you are there; especially on foggy nights this crucial car part can save lives.
So why, then, do so many people drive with a malfunctioning tail light assembly? Simply because they are taken for granted. We do not normally prepare for a trip to the store but first check our rear lights; to do that properly we would have to have someone stand behind the car and check the lights while we turned signals on, hit the brakes, and put it in reverse. Those actions of precaution are way too troublesome and time consuming when all we wanted was a gallon of milk at the store. Usually the first inkling that something is wrong with our tail lights is when we see the flashing lights of our friendly neighborhood police officer signaling us to pull over to the side of the road.
About the best we can hope for in the way of precaution is to check our tail lights once a week; realistically that’s the best we can hope for with most Americans driving the road today and quite frankly that is being very optimistic.
There are so many parts on our car that are real difference-makers and yet we pay them very little attention. The headlights are another that can save lives and yet we rarely check them to see if they are working properly. Windshield wipers should be checked regularly as well as tire pressure and oil level and transmission fluid. These are simple maintenance actions that can save the average driver a lot of headaches down the road. Next time you see some of these parts on sale at a local salvage yard head on down there and stock up on these necessary and life-saving replacement parts.
