Tips for driving at night??

One other sugestion, if I may. I used to drive overnight every load, well most every load. One thing I would do is stop somehwere along the way (closed scale house, welcome center, park somewhere at ts and nap for an hour or two. I was dedicated so ran the same router all the time. Knew where I could stop and do this, knew when I did and did not have time to do this. That helps big time.

 

They usually turn them off after I blind them. My truck has amazing high beam headlights.

 

Having worked many a graveyard pushing a black and white around, I learned to turn the dash lights down as dim as possible while still being able to read the gauges and speedometer, takes some getting used to but it reduces eye fatigue. Make sure the dome lights are off. I always looked to the right at the fog line when oncoming cars were close to passing, low or high beams, why have your retina open an close constantly, adds to fatigue. Make sure your headlights are adjusted and clean, as well as your mirrors. For rainy driving I uhad a pair of yellow lenses shooting glasses, it the glare and enhanced the darkness. As for approaching cars with high beams, I used to flash mine, they tell you not to, but some drivers just can't figure out what that blue light is on the dash and need to be reminded.

 

Military pilots use green or red lense sunglasses to prepare their eyes for night flying.
Try that; I think most use green these days. When it gets dark, take a 30 or 45 minute break wearing those sunglasses, then hit the road. Your eyes won't have to strain to adjust to night driving.

 

I got assigned a brand new truck last month and like all of our new trucks it has HIDs installed. I PITY the driver that comes at me with their brights on.

 

+1 on dimming the interior lights as much as possible. I see drivers with their dash lights brighted up to the max I guess it looks cool but doesn't work for me. Eyes have to adjust from super bright interior lights to look out windshield where everything is dark.

Same concept when out in enemy territory and they shoot up a night flare, close your eyes to preserve your night vision til the flare lands. They have a tiny parachute so they stay up for a long time and make night look like daytime. Any movement and the enemy can pick you off.

Some of the lights on the dash cannot be dimmed like cruise control light or maybe jake brake light. In that case I have gone to home depot and picked up big roll of window tint and cut small pieces out of it. Spray the tint with window cleaner and stick in on the fake glass dash and voila, you can still see the light but it is tinted mellow and won't blind me.

A lot of trucks have under dash red lights (foot well) lights up the floor red which looks cool and may help.

 

Yeah it's the correct settings inside your cab and the night vision glasses you will be fine. I was the same as you but started to love night driving. What I hated was to be driving or sitting at a stop while the sun comes up.

 

Isn't it amazing? On most of the state and county routes in the Midwest, you can see oncoming headlights miles away yet they leave their brights on up until the last few hundred feet. If they turn them off at all.

@Thull I prefer night driving but will take more 5 minute breaks compared to driving during day light. Usually just a quick few walks around the truck but it helps. Leave the dome lights off in your cab when you're on break though. I put velcro flaps over the radio and on guard screen and the qualcomm is usually blacked out. The night modes are still too bright for me.

 

It's 5 am as I'm posting this and I'm wide awake. I just got home from driving all night. I'm used to it because I've had the night shift for 18 years straight.

Here's a story that I've kept in back of my brain all these years but I thought I would share with you:
14 years ago a young company driver admitted to me while at the fuel island that he was having problems driving at night. He was a really nice guy who took classes at the community college during the day and volunteered at church during the weekends. I used to call him Milli Vanilli because he looked like the smaller guy in that famous band. Anyway I gave the usual suggestion on how to sleep well during the day and how to stay awake while driving at night. He said thanks for the suggestions and I said anytime.
Less than 12 hours later at around midnight as I was driving to work I came up on a bunch of emergency workers tending to an accident on the side of the road. As I got closer I realized it was one of our trucks laying on its back on a ditch. It was the guy that I talked to earlier and he died that night. The roof of the cab collapsed and it broke his neck. The investigators thinks that it was a solo crash.

I'll give you the advice that I wish I had given him that day, if you don't feel comfortable driving all night then maybe you need to find another solution. Don't push yourself.