Lifer – Member

Really? I thought it was written on signs beside the road…

We weren’t talking about the speed limit, do keep up (and the speed limit is not always on signs besides the road, their are other methods).

Yep. 🙂

edlong – Member

How about, you don’t drive close enough to the limit that you need to slow down

Where is the limit, and how do you know where it is?

As others have said, keep your friends/family/missus around you and hang in there.

molgrips – Member

Anyway – never mind present company. People cannot be trusted to make their own judgments about appropriate speed. Or stopping distance, or levels of attention

With the right education (I believe) they can.
Take away the need for people to think for themselves and they will, however, stop thinking for themselves.
That’s ok if you can think for them, but unfortunately nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool, so I’d rather we strived towards the former.

I think I paid £800 for mine.
Be aware that no matter what locks you have in place, a thief can always just cut through the sides.

molgrips – Member

I know how it performs under hard braking and swerving. Just not cornering.

Swerving is cornering. 🙂

molgrips – Member

I have no idea how hard I can corner in either of my cars – I can’t see how I need to know?

When you have done all you can to avoid evasive maneuvers but some unforeseeable turn of events means you might have to resort to them, it is very useful to already know how the car will behave at or beyond the limit.

molgrips – Member

All this guff about driver training and car handling is total bollocks. Testosterone fulled alpha male bollocks.

Firstly, I haven’t mentioned car handling when talking about driver training.
Secondly, your mention of testosterone and the fact that you think it is “total bollocks” shows that you know nothing about the subject, and the fact that insurers will often offer discounts to IAM members proves that you are wrong.

Do yourself (and everyone else) a favour; get some training.

There are only two male emotions; happy and angry.
So not only should you feel guilt for encouraging your dog to rip apart a defenceless animal, but you’re also a massive Jessie.
HTH.

Nope, still not regretting selling my television.

sbob – Member

And it’s cheap too.
Institite of Advanced Motorists

Go on, give it a click. Chances are you’ll be able to find a group close to you and more often than not you’ll be able to go out with an observer for no greater cost than your petrol for an initial assessment of your driving.

With so many lambasting the driving of others, it’s great to see the number of comments and questions from those posters regarding the above. 🙂

Oh.
🙁

hora – Member

The one thing that I will leave you with. Never ever panic.

The one instruction my friend got (possibly learning to drive in the army) was “If you’re going to crash, do it as slowly as possible”.
😆

ahwiles – Member

possibly, the worst idea i’ve ever heard.

Would you care to expand on that?
I’m not saying it’s a good idea but I think you have probably misunderstood what advanced driving is about.

hora – Member

lose arms

Steer with your knees?
🙂

dazh – Member

Err, just relax and drive a bit slower? If you have to be somewhere at a certain time, leave a bit earlier (only a bit, cos we all know driving fast doesn’t save you much time anyway)?

I said that “The whole point of driving is to get from A to B quickly”.
You disagreed.
Going to offer up an alternative view?
You’ve had plenty of time.

Nipping out for a bit, so take your time Daz. 😉

dazh – Member
You simply can’t have one set of drivers driving to completely different rules than others.

It may have escaped you but we already have that situation (using your definition of completely different rules meaning different allowed speeds). 💡

dazh – Member
waiting for the ‘if we spend all our time looking at the speedometer it’s more dangerous’ excuse

It only takes a fraction of a second to glance at the speedometer, and doing so should not make driving dangerous.
Does taking your eyes off the road make driving more or less safe though?
Let’s have an actual answer.

dazh – Member

Another superb example of warped logic to justify driving fast. Keep ’em coming!

Yet you fail to offer an alternative.
Come on then, what is your alternative? Spit it out boy.

aracer – Member

It’s a limit, not a target.

It is a target, to achieve if safe to do so.
You would fail your driving test if you chose to drive under the speed limit when it was safe to do the limit.

The whole point of driving is to get from A to B quickly. If it wasn’t then we would all still be walking everywhere.
Of course, the aim is to not only get there quickly, but safely.

dazh – Member

If you had asked the instructor on your advanced driving course if your new skills now allow you to drive faster than everyone else on public roads, what would have been his answer? I’m pretty sure I know what he/she would have replied.

I’m sure the instructor would have replied that his new skills should enable him to choose an appropriate speed for the road he’s driving on.
😉

edlong – Member

Driver training may make better drivers, but the unintended consequence also kicks in when driver training makes people think that they are driving gods and needn’t bother about speed limits since they are now so well trained.

As rebel12 is probably alluding to with his question, you’ve almost certainly got the wrong end of the stick with regards to driver training.
The vast majority of advanced driving is all about attitude and mentality, not how you can make your car go faster round a particular corner.
I seriously recommend you look into it. 🙂

rebel12 – Member

Additional driver training is available to everyone.

And it’s cheap too.
Institite of Advanced Motorists

Go on, give it a click. Chances are you’ll be able to find a group close to you and more often than not you’ll be able to go out with an observer for no greater cost than your petrol for an initial assessment of your driving.

The outcome is an increase in more serious injuries.
I don’t have any links to his data, in fact I haven’t seen the figures myself, but I have no reason to question him.
It was of interest to us both as we work (in my case worked) with explosives so have a fair amount of experience in dealing with potentially dangerous circumstances and dealing with the risks involved.

This post is going to be long enough as it is so I will however cut to the chase.
Prevention is better than cure.
By concentrating on mitigating the effects of an outcome, we fail to address and eliminate the root cause of that outcome.
An accident at 40mph is always going to be more favourable than the same accident at 60mph, I’m sure we’re all agreed, but we should be aiming for eliminating the accident entirely, not just mitigating the outcome.
My greatest fear is that we have already gone too far down the road of mitigation (pardon the pun) to be able to address elimination.
The “speed kills” mantra has been so successful in warning people of the dangers of speed that those people now equate driving within the speed limit with safe driving.
I’ve overheard conversations in the pub where someone has been involved in an accident (which was their fault) but they have justified their position by exclaiming that they weren’t speeding, and then gone on to accuse the other party of speeding (well, they must have been to “cause” the accident).
Prevention is always better than cure, and education is the key to prevention.
If someone asks what’s the best way to spend their money to improve their cycling on this forum, the answer won’t be “buy a dropper post” it will be “go and see Jedi”.
There seem to be a lot of people here who are quite vehement about their desire for others to drive more safely, but how many of those have sought additional training once they’ve swapped their pink licence for a green one?

And the floor is yours… 🙂

molgrips – Member

So you’re saying my three year-old pays attention to the floor surface before attempting some climbing?

Why would I be commenting on a child I didn’t know existed? 😕

deadlydarcy – Member

Until we have your Utopian world of negligible accident figures because of the awesome level of skills of drivers, folk have to be limited so that when they take you roughly from behind, you risk a slightly scratched rear end rather than one that needs mechanical repair.

I’ve got a mate who works for the HSE.
I was having an interesting chat with him about the effect of replacing old hard surfaces in playgrounds with that soft rubber stuff you now get.
Care to guess what the outcome is?

Edit: I was probably talking balls.

No different to a low rise stem with a riser bar…

johnellison – Member

I wouldn’t recommend using a drill, especially if you’ve never attempted this job before.

Nope; recipe for disaster.

weeksy – Member

that’s not butter… and should never ever ever be consumed

Correct, and for your first bonus question on butter;

In which common kitchen appliance would the mentally deficient keep their butter?

🙂

jacksonwwirl – Member

@poly – yes really ! i have often seen banned drivers on the road

How many banned drivers do you know? 😯

cp – Member

It will cost a good chunk more then if you can’t provide the cad.

It shouldn’t do.
All the companies I’ve worked with can change any picture file to CAD, and CAM takes no operator time at all for something as described by the OP.

anW – Member

Now I am nearly 50 and haven’t had fisticuffs for a long time but that young fella was fat little tin box dweller who got mullered by an old man

😆

Glad you’re well enough to tell the tale and glad there were witnesses for you.
Hope you get any damage sorted with minimum fuss, and as above, you did nothing wrong so no need to feel guilty, although it’s testament to your character that you do. 🙂

The missus has a Lloyds account and whenever we go on holiday she upgrades her free account for a month or two to get the travel insurance then downgrades on our return. 8)
Cheaper for us to do that and have stand alone breakdown cover than pay for the account all year round.
Neither of us need mobile phone insurance though which could swing it.

tthew – Member

Impossible to give advise

Correct.
You could give him some advice instead though. 🙂

mrlebowski – Member

ps I’m 42 & it sounds ok to me…

You are currently using an *elevator and I claim my five pounds! 😀

*Americanism for comedic purposes only.

bren2709 – Member

Machining usually costs in the region of £25/hr.

T’was a lot more at my old gaff…

tomaso – Member

If you report the accident your insurance will go up. I’d leave it and take it on the chin.

Why would the police contact his insurers?

hora – Member

I’d rather stick with my standard seatpost thanks.

Doesn’t this limit choice when you do your weekly bike shop? 😀