Kentucky Aftermarket Lights: White or Amber Front, No Flashing, No Blue

The color rule is the one that catches most aftermarket builds. KRS 189.040(14) says that when operating on a highway or upon the right-of-way of a highway, visible front lights on a motor vehicle, or any light affixed to the front of a motorcycle or moped, shall only be white or amber, and visible rear lights on a motor vehicle shall only be white, amber, or red. The single escape is factory fitment: a light installed as original equipment by the manufacturer is exempt. That wording is why green, purple or red underglow, colored grille bars and colored halo rings are unlawful in Kentucky on a public road even when they are not flashing, and why the same lights are untouched by the statute at a show on private ground, since the prohibition is written around highway operation and the highway right-of-way rather than around possession.

Headlamps get four separate rules in the same section. Subsection (10) requires headlamps to emit white light, allows halogen units a slight yellow or amber tint, and permits a slight blue tint on nonhalogen units only where they were installed by the vehicle manufacturer as original equipment or meet subsection (11). Subsection (11) requires that any headlamp on a motor vehicle, motorcycle or moped meet United States Department of Transportation regulations, which is what rules out uncertified imported projector and LED conversions. Subsections (12) and (13) close the two obvious workarounds: no retrofit headlamp that appears to emit a solid color other than white, and no retrofit headlamp cover or film that changes the emitted light to a color other than white. Subsection (9) fixes mounting height, requiring the center of the headlamp to sit between twenty-four (24) and fifty-four (54) inches above level ground with the vehicle unloaded, which is the provision a lifted truck runs into.

Flashing is treated as a separate question from color. KRS 189.040(8) prohibits flashing lights on all motor vehicles except to indicate a right or left turn, or to warn other operators of a vehicular traffic hazard requiring unusual care in approaching, overtaking or passing. KRS 189.043 then spells out what a lawful hazard-warning installation looks like: lamps warning to the front must be mounted at the same level, spaced as widely laterally as practicable, and flash simultaneously in white or amber or any shade between white and amber, while lamps warning to the rear must flash simultaneously in amber or red or any shade between amber and red, and the whole set must be visible from at least fifteen hundred (1,500) feet at night in normal atmospheric conditions.

KRS 189.950 layers the emergency colors on top. Subsection (2) bars any vehicle other than a designated emergency vehicle from carrying or using a red or blue flashing, revolving or oscillating light, and from placing a red light on the front, while expressly leaving alone school bus red flashers and rear stop lights and turn signals. Subsection (3) goes further and forbids illuminating a blue light affixed to a motor vehicle while it is being operated on a highway at all, flashing or steady, with only two carve-outs: a light on a motorcycle that is not affixed to the front of the motorcycle, and nonhalogen headlamps with a slight blue tint that meet USDOT regulations. That motorcycle exception is unusual and worth reading precisely, since it permits blue accent lighting along the side or rear of a Kentucky motorcycle while the same light on a car is prohibited. Subsection (4) reserves yellow flashing, revolving or oscillating lights to public safety vehicles, then hands back turn signals, emergency flashers, mail carriers while on duty, funeral escort vehicles and church buses. Subsection (1) covers sound rather than light: no siren, whistle or bell except on an emergency vehicle, although any vehicle may carry a theft alarm signal device so long as it cannot be used as an ordinary warning signal.

Two boundaries close the picture. KRS 189.045 reaches beyond vehicles and forbids installing or maintaining a red, yellow, green or similarly colored flashing light within one hundred (100) feet of the right-of-way of a state maintained highway for any purpose other than safety, highway construction or emergency purposes, which is the provision that catches a business sign or yard display near a Kentucky state route. And KRS 189.011(2) provides that the chapter's light regulations do not apply to common carrier motor vehicles whose equipment is regulated by the rules of the Interstate Commerce Commission.

990(1)(a) at not less than twenty dollars ($20) nor more than one hundred dollars ($100) for each offense. Blue light is treated far more seriously. 993(11)(a) then fines that at one hundred dollars ($100) for the first offense, two hundred dollars ($200) for the second, and one thousand dollars ($1,000) for each subsequent offense. 950 is confiscated and forfeited to the county where the offense occurred. 993(1). Because Kentucky has no periodic safety inspection for passenger vehicles, all of this is enforced at the roadside by the Kentucky State Police and local departments.