Safe Speed Forums

That's EASY! You think of the reduction you'd like to make if you could wave a magic wand, and voila - Bob's your mums brother!

Interestingly, the French PEOPLE will not accept it if they dont want it. Brittany even refused to implement road tolls for major road improvements, despite the national government's insistance, and led the way in abolishing road tax too.
When they refused to let in British Beef, inspite of an EU directive, AND major fines being imposed, they refused point blank, AND refused to pay the fines too!
NOTHING was ever done about it!

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Time to take responsibility for our actions.. and don't be afraid of speaking out!

Yep.. I'm all for intransigence on these sorts of matters! It's not in the English makeup to rock the boat though. Instead just pretend in our minds that we are superior and cave in anyway saying we have no choice. A bit like what Ladyboy said in fact....

I love the french absolutely love them, the trouble is the traits that make me love them make them do things that make me hate them and I even love that!

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

Don't you?

I know what he means - they unashamedly stick up for their own interests, often at our expense

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

It's true.

They do what they want in their way. The problem is that that often rubs us up the wrong way a la the beef ban. That makes us hate them but you have to love the attitude!!

We need a strong leader in government (or several vigilante's nationally) to tell brussels to come up with some worthwhile projects or sack those day dreamers scheming up new ways to justify their salary. For far too long we have sat on our fat arses being walked over and dictated to by people that think crooks, kids and thugs should have rights at all or more than they need. I envy the french constitution in some ways, at least the majority are listened to not just those that can be bothered to vote.
It would be more appropriate to have a complete re-education of every european driver. A special police force dealing purely with motoring offences (oh yeah, we already have one), I mean every offence. then every offender goes to a one day (or multiple days depending on the severity) training course or gets a fine and licence endorsements. An end to discrimination based on which mode you choose to travel by would be welcome too. I've been told by my local MP that "to oppose the 3rd driving licence directive would give more power to those trying to bring it in and some millitant motorcycling organisations do not understand this" I wonder if he means MAG?? He sounds more like a tired out old git who just wants a quiet life. We need a jay walking law to sort out those muppets (14-16 year olds) that KNOW they can walk in front of traffic and KNOW we will stop. If you're careful you can still put the fear of christ into them. may make them think next time.

The arguments against DRL are well established. they need backing up with proof and proper statistics and a proper lobby set up. I'm sure there are more, far reaching arguments against DRL. The major motorcycle lobby groups are already on the case to protect the rights of those that wish to use them. our freedom of choice is being eroded, common sense is not to be trusted in the hands of the unwashed masses, so it being removed from many aspects of our lives. when will we all stand up and say "enough is enough"?

On a similar but slightly disconnected. Ever noticed the glare, as if the oncoming vehicle has their full beam on? especially when they're browing a hill? These new head lights which are much cheaper to produce have the reflector fragment the beam instead of the lens, at first I thought it was another new bulb like those poxy xenons.

Hi, take a look here if you haven't seen it already:-

www.dadrl.org.uk/

Interesting site, could do with a bit less of the cheesy MS Publisher wordart in order to be taken seriously though.

I mostly agree with it, apart from the bit where it recommends using LEDs instead. If this were ever to happen, me and my partner would both have to stop driving since bright car LEDs are usually achieved by strobing the LEDs one after the other to save energy and increase the lifespan. Typically they will flash 50 times per second.

Unfortunately, we can both see the damn things switching on and off, I find this incredibly distracting and find my eyes automatically move to look at the flashing LED and it's hard to pull them away for any length of time. I hate being behind new Mercs for this reason.

It's just the same as refresh rates on monitors. Some people have no problem working with the display at 60Hz, others will complain if it's anything below 85. Personally I find 72 is at the limit of tolerance, my GF needs 85. We have a 100Hz TV for this reason.

Now there is plenty of research to show that low refresh rate monitors causes eyestrain, even when the refresh rate is sufficiently high that you don't conciously notice the flicker, and now you lot want to fill our roads with flickery LEDs. No thanks.

If you use LEDs then get the simpler non-strobed type. Please!

Let's have everyone drive around with their hazard warning lights on too, that's bound to make things safer by the same logic isn't it?

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Peter Humphries (and a green V8S)

Ah you mean like the Japanese bikes imported from america. come with the headlamps and all indicators hard wired to the ignition switch, always on. the relevant indicator flashes as usual. surely being lit up like a christmas tree will distract following drivers?

I've rarely used lights in good visiblity. Smidsy incidents are less frquent these days. is this because through education drivers are more aware of us? or do I ride differently than I did 10 years ago?

When I used to rally, running four Cibie Oscars on night events increased our fuel use by about 20%. Surely, we are supposed to be finding ways of using less fuel, not more?

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Aquila



Licat volare si super tergum aquila volat...

That’s were it’s all becoming a farce, it’s all about manipulating the populace to fit the equation

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Useless laws weaken necessary laws.

Surely not... the Oscars were 100w weren't they? So 4 is 400W, say 500W into the alternator - if 500W was worth 20% then average engine output would have been about 2.5KW. - About 3.5bhp.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

You forgot to factor in the weight of the bloody things...

I also forgot that about 90% of rally driving is at full throttle with most of the rest on full brake.

So if you're already at full throttle, how can the lights increase the consumption at all? They just slow you down instead as they steal engine output.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

They also increase the wind resistance - like having four damned great soup plates in the airflow.

The wind resistance alone is enough to knock them off line if not also held at the top to stop them twisting

I agree with Paul.

NO WAY!!!!

I expect there might have been other factors to take into consideration but alternator drag, weight and wind resistance can't make up 20%. Put another way, if switching them off freed up the sort of power that an extra 20% fuel consumption warranted, the car would have finished the stage before it started!

The safety implications ---

HC
201: You MUST use headlights when visibility is seriously reduced, generally when you cannot see for more than 100 metres (328 feet). You may also use front or rear fog lights but you MUST switch them off when visibility improves (see Rule 211).


So a new HC is on the cards??



Perhaps the most damning evidence was posted on this site some time ago by a biker -

It showed a (i think ) Some sort of Land Rover with lights on , with a bike (also with lights on ) in front -- the bike was almost invisible ,it's light were sort of caught up ( to the veiw from behind) in the lights of the vehicle and to most drivers vision all that was behind was a 4x4.To all intents and purposes the bike was invisible.


The idea to me was terrifying that a bike could "dissapear " so easily.