Safe Speed Forums

Dear all,

Firstly, my support and thanks to the SafeSpeed campaign, keep up the good work, it's appreciated.

There are so many things I don't understand but which I would love to find out why they exist or take place. If you know the reason behind any of these things please enlighten me:

People driving in lane 2 all the time. Old, young, experienced and otherwise, they all do it.
HGVs with two blue LEDs in the window. Why?
Exhausts the diameter of France.
Speed bumps - clearly the daftest idea ever.
Sunstrips that read "MotorSport". Why?
Trucks with a thousand green, yellow and blue lights all over them. Why?
Fog lights on all the time. Why?

Above all, why nobody ever seems to get pulled up hogging lane 2, for having a car covered in daft LEDs or having a huge and blatantly illegal exhaust system, or for having their f***ing fog lights on.

Loud pipes save lives.......

BTW no one gets pulled because there is no one left to pull 'em. Policing is done with cameras these days. So long as you obey the speed limit in front of a camera you can get away with just about anything.

I agree on the rear fogs. All new cars have to have self-canceling ones that trip out every time the lights or ignition is turned off. No excuses there.

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Speed camera policy Kills

Ahhh, thank you. That's shed some light (sic) on a couple of things. I'd like to be safer myself so maybe I'll get some big pipes fitted so they can hear me comin'.
Also, since I can now do anything so long as there's not a camera around, think I'll turn off the traction control and do some 240bhp donuts in the middle of the M6 when I get bored. That MotorSport sun strip is looking more inviting all the time too.
On the fog lights I agree completely, but I was also thinking about the front ones (ones that really are fog lights and not those Volvo "driving light" thingys.) The way manufacturers often show their cars in ads with them turned on, presumably to make the car go faster, is pretty irresponsible I think. Nothing like driving down a dark back road and having some tosser with 4 headlights come the other way. Subaru are the worst offender, in my book at least.

Lack of education, Think only emphasise speed.


Life is pretty boring being forced to travel around at 4mph below the speed limit. Got to brighten things up somehow. And they are legal.


Nope, don't unerstand this in the same way I don't understand hanging baskets.


Councillors who want to be seen to be doing something even if it is completely the wrong thing.


Why do people live in ..... oooh .... Essex?


See hanging baskets.


Same as the lane 2 hogs. And plod is never around. Not like the old days when he was just never around when you need him. These days he is just never around full stop.

Hi Homer, thanks for the insight.
I'm suprised to learn that those truck blue LEDs are legal. I saw some car magazine this month giving away blue tyre cap LEDs on the cover and the packet said "for off road use only" (as if) so it's probably not legal to light up your wheels. How do the windscreen ones get away with showing a blue light?
Funny, I do sort of understand hanging baskets, but then I've spent a lot of time talking to them.

Homer as for your 'Essex' comment I come from Essex and can safely say that I've never seen 'Motorsport' - too many letters normally 'WRX'

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Gordon Brown saying I got the country into it's current economic mess so I'll get us out of it is the same as Bomber Harris nipping over to Dresden and offering to repair a few windows.

Chaos, panic and disorder - my work here is done.

http://www.wildcrafts.co.uk

It's because the law doesn't restrict blue lights, it restricts flashing or moving lights.

HGVs and blue lights. Because they think they are "cool"???????????

Trucks with a 1000 coloured lights all over them. At least you saw the truck, most drivers can't.
I've been looking for the fuse on many trucks I have driven, you know, the fuse for the Klingon cloaking device that renders the truck invisible, I've given up looking and just remain invisible to most car drivers.

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Semper in excreta, nur quantitat variat.

that gives a coke advert

There are lots of thing I don't understand.

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Shooting is good for you and too good for some people.

Like... "How does the man who drives the snow-plough get to work on the first snowy morning?".

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"Politicians are the same the world over... We build bridges where there aren't any rivers." - Nikita Kruschev

Sorry, just a random choice of county.

My point being there is no reason to have a problem with what people have written on their sunstrip.

People are all different, as long as they are not being dangerously different then why worry about it.

But hanging baskets, now they could fall on someones head.

Too true. With the posible exception of "DARREN ____TRACY" on XR3i's

Joking aside. Many sunstrips out there are verging on the illegal.

Rule appears to be: If your wipers can sweep the area - thou shalt not stick crap to it.

I've seen sunstrips on boy-racer brigade for years at upto 12" deep for novas & the like trying to get round this by fitting shorter wiper blades!

Of course it doesn't obscure their vision - they're driving in a practically horizontal position anyway in mock Recarro recliners with the wheel barely in finger tip reach.

They certainly do Gizmo....they certainly do

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What makes you think I'm drunk officer, have I got a fat bird with me?

Motion Seconded

I don't understand big tea trays bolted on top of boot lids. At what speed to they serve a purpose?

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Shooting is good for you and too good for some people.

It varies from car to car. However, typically they come into their own at illegally high speeds (in this country) and actually make matters worse at 50mph. By careful design and typically muchj smaller "tea trays", they can be made to not do harm at lower speeds, cut in and do a minute amount of good at higher speeds. however, in almost all cases, they serve as decoration. I think. anyone got a different take?

I reckon that you're spot-on.

As aerodynamic "aids" they can work, but not really at legal speeds in this country. The odd small spoiler on the roof of some hatchbacks can help to keep the back window and tail lights clean but doesn't contribute anything to "downforce". I'm fairly sure that none of the decorative spoilers fitted to production cars ever have a positive effect on downforce, regardless of the speed, but may act to neutralise lift at high speed. The only figures that I have to hand at the moment are for the Porsche 911 in its "pre and post-Carrera" incarnations and they're quite strange because of the near-aerofoil shape of the early cars... At 150mph, without spoilers the car generates a shade over 400lbs of lift - ie almost 20% of the weight of the car - whereas with spoilers, lift is reduced to 37lbs. They also reduce drag somewhat so allow a higher top speed and/or better fuel consumption.

F1-type downforce (which is what I suppose is being implied by the marketing and styling departments of "adorned" road cars) is only achieved at the expense of massive aerodynamic drag, to the extent that at about 160-170mph, putting the car into neutral produces retardation of better than 1g without even touching the brakes!

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"Politicians are the same the world over... We build bridges where there aren't any rivers." - Nikita Kruschev

Only don't do this in Durham. We get well acid over it





Never seen why this is such a craze. Perhaps it's the closest they feel to a





Nope - do not understand this as with hanging baskets or sticking an ear-ring stud in one's nose. As my young Swiss cousin has once remarked somehere - they look like a giant zit from a distance



They always employ cowboys to do the job too.



So that they can dance around hand bags? An' spea' estua'y English I fink innit Glottal stop glottal stop glottal stop



Possibly the number of cyclists whio tried to undertake them? They don't like high viz - so perhaps these truckers feel they have to do it for them?



Hmm- we are ubiquitous in our patch.

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Take with a chuckle or a grain of salt
Drive without COAST and it's all your own fault!

A SMILE is a curve that sets everything straight (P Diller).

A Smiley Per post
FINES USfor our COAST!

Approach love and cooking with reckless abandon - but driving with a smile and a COAST calm mind.

Shouldn't that be "Glo'al sto' glo'al sto' glo'al sto'"?

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"Politicians are the same the world over... We build bridges where there aren't any rivers." - Nikita Kruschev