Anyone else get this? Vehicle overtaking, either through thoughtlessness, stupidity or just being a dick, gives the windscreen a squirt and it goes in your face. Pretty foul. Van did it to me this morning, he was behind a bus that took ages to overtake me… so I think it was on purpose. 😕

Something should be done! Can’t they make it out of something that tastes nicer?

Its a hard one to call, I’ve had it on occasion. I think sometimes its just thoughtlessness and other times i reckon its done on purpose.

I get this on the motorbike occasionally.  Anyone so doing gets a flash, two fingers and, if the opportunity should present itself, the loss of their driver’s side wing mirror shortly thereafter.

I use berry flavour to avoid cyclist disappointment

I get this on the motorbike occasionally.

Full face must help..!

mike_p

Member

I get this on the motorbike occasionally.

Only done it once to a motorbike but he was trying to read the nutrition label on the food packets in the boot at the time doing 75mph.

That’s pretty bloody anti social! But also, how badly aimed must your washer heads be to get a passing cyclist !!

Pretty painful if it got in your eyes!

Isn’t that classed as careless driving?

Same as if a driver had driver through a puddle and splashed a pedestrian.

https://www.nhs.uk/news/lifestyle-and-exercise/legionnaires-risk-from-wiper-water/

maybe you looked like you needed a wash!

I got “screenwashed” by a (close) passing van on Tuesday morning, he only got a couple of spots on me as it was a 50 limit, it’s probably easier to judge when passing at 43 (standard van speed in a 30 zone innit?)…

Could be worse, at least it’s not a can of coke or some spare bodily fluids…

Roter Stern
https://www.nhs.uk/news/lifestyle-and-exercise/legionnaires-risk-from-wiper-water/

From the tastes I’ve had, i’m not getting legionnaires anyway. Should be grateful I suppose!

Isn’t that classed as careless driving?

I’ll try reporting the plumber from this morning, see what happens 😆

I actually had it done to me by a bloke from work on my old commute. A real full on squiiiirrrrtt in slow traffic. Said to him the next day “Steve,” cos that was his name, “did you know you squirted me with your windscreen washer?” He had absolutely no idea. Nice fella, so I believed him.

I’ll try reporting the plumber from this morning, see what happens

If you’re lucky he’ll get a propeller Wittering from the fuzz.

Sorry, wrong thread.

^^^ STW is really plumbing the depths with the puns these days.

New drivers should be screened for bad attitude, to weed out the little squirts.

^^^ STW is really plumbing the depths with the puns these days.

Some people just have to faucet.

😥

It was a close pass with a windscreen squirt that prompted me to give a “coffee beans” signal to the driver of a silver Mercedes estate.  He slammed his brakes on which meant I hit the back of his car.  He then tried to get out of the car yelling he was going to kill me.  I got out of there sharpish.  If it was to happen again I’d not react as that’s what these dicks are hoping for.

EDIT – there was no damage to his car, it was only a little tap.

you can only be done for splashing someone through a puddle if they can prove it was deliberate, this has always been the case for bus/truck drivers, i remember being told about it when i passed my bus test in 2003. £500 fine if proven to be deliberate.

£500 fine if proven to be deliberate

Cop: Was it deliberate?

Plumber: No.

Cop: Off you go then.

Cop: Was it deliberate?

Plumber: No.

Cop: Off you go then.

Did you slow down?

Did you see the person?

Did you???

Then decide if it’s deliberate – unless you are pinned in, nowhere to go and the pedestrian/cyclist is hidden from view it’s either deliberate or careless – again admitting to not being in control or taking due care is very bad

Someone did that to me when I was on a motorbike once. Saw them look in the mirror, nudge their mate, then squirt the washer over the roof of the car, onto me, then have a good laugh.

If you fancy doing this, beware, lots of lids have flip fronts, and it’s advisable to shut your driver’s window first….

It must be twenty years ago now, I was riding up a steepish hill locally when an old Mini drove past, passenger hanging out of the window shouting at me. I got hit in the face by what I first thought was gob, then realised was screen-wash.

The idiot driver pulled in at a shop at the top of the hill, passenger must have gone inside and the driver was still in his car when I got there a minute later, a little angry.

Confronting him I demanded if he knew what his windscreen washers were really for, grabbed a wiper and the whole assembly came away in my hand. Genuine accident – I didn’t mean to pull the thing off! Had to make it look good, so I tried to look even more aggressive – wearing Lycra, remember – threw the thing at him, grabbed my bike and bombed back down the hill to the safety of a bike path before him and his mate could catch me.

Burden of proof would be on the accuser surely?

i don’t know if it’s always been classed as careless driving, but that’s what i was told by the driving instructor who prepared me for my bus test, he’s also am advanced police driving instructor, so I’d guess he knows his stuff.

you have to remember also, buses are different to cars, we have much less room to swerve within one lane, and we can’t just slam the brakes on unnecessarily as there may be standing passengers.

hence it could be quite reasonable to assume a car might be able to miss a puddle, but a bus might not.

we can’t just slam the brakes on unnecessarily as there may be standing passengers.hence it could be quite reasonable to assume a car might be able to miss a puddle, but a bus might not.

How did we get to puddles & buses?

Anyway, funny with the bus that overtook me shortly before the squirty plumber – a van coming in the opposite direction stopped dead, weird I thought.. but he’s stopped to let the bus overtake me! Gestured with his arms outspread when the bus didn’t! What a moron. Either would’ve had a head-on with the bus or I would’ve been shoved off the road. But, I digress. People are just thick.

There was an Audi A3 doing this on Chelsea embankment the other day. Blasting the washers for 5-10 seconds in a couple of bursts. They were hideously adjusted (meaning most was going over the car/out the sides), so I couldn’t decide if they just needed them to be on that long in order to get enough screenwash on the windscreen, or if it was malicious. Either way they were a total dick, clearly.

I think a lot of people are actually oblivious that you can easily change the angle of the washer jet, and over compensate by just squirting more.

Having them poorly angled just means you have to top up the tank more often, who in thier right mind would want to do that more often than is strictly nessesary?

I’m calling ignorance, rather than malice on this one.

Half a lifetime ago a friend had a Vauxhall cavalier with headlight washers. These were set to pointing outwards to crotch height! To be fair he only nailed “friends”!

Had one with a bloke near me with his rear washer very deliberately adjusted to fire backwards at following vehicles – in this case me on my bike.  Rural road so no way I’d ever have caught him if he wanted to be away.

He spent a couple of hundred yards trying to spray me, kid in the passenger seat laughing his head off; me trying to “push” him further and further over towards the verge in the hope that he’d hit it while looking in his mirror.  We both failed.

“People are just thick”

Yep.

First time I drove my new to me Honda Accord a few years back I used the screen wash facility whilst in a queue of traffic. I hadn’t clocked that the wash nozzle on the headlamp which was connected was missing so I fired a jet of water about ten feet in front of me. Unfortunately there was a convertible with the roof down there, cue much confused looking around from the occupants as they tried to figure out who’d flung water over them.