I'm coming to this thread from a different angle, and that's daytime riding. In France, as with a lot of other countries , it is a legal requirement on modern machines to ride with dipped headlight, indeed they are wired in to the ignition nowadays. This is supposedly a safety feature, which does work to a certain extent in dull conditions, but as soon as the sun comes out pretty useless on it's own. Think about the SMIDSY situation of an emerging vehicle not seeing a motorcycle because it's not moving against the background. The emerging vehicle driver may not even see a single headlight, or even attach much importance to it as it doesn't give the appearance of anything significant in size, but put some width into the light display and it's a different matter, you appear much bigger and more threatening, and other road users tend to notice and be more careful.

I completely agree with Walter Colebatch on beam pattern for those days when a bit of night riding is unavoidable, but equally I am a fan of some bright day time running lights placed at a good width on the front and not on the same level as the headlight. ( lower).

At the same time good reflectors placed wide or pannier lights as discussed are good at giving you width at the rear, which makes overtakers give you more room as they pass.

It works for me - been doing it for years!

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