Multi car pile up on the motorway

Loko said:
Sorry but no. The highway code states stopping distances. That is, coming to a halt. The fact that the car in front hit something or not is irrelavant. He didn't leave enough space to stop.
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Your arguing with the wrong guy

I'm arguing with the guy who said that even if you followed the highway code, you wouldnt have had enough distance to stop.

I'm pointing out that the highway code distances are based on 60s cars with drum brakes and in fact leave you shed loads of room to stop.

I quite agree with you. You need to be quoting him not me !

The fact that nobody follows these distances because some numpty always pulls into them cutting your distance in half is not the point however lol.
 
Will Gill said:
undoubtedly, unless you are an OcUK forum poster then you could feather the brakes use IAM techniques and use your windscreen wipers as sails to avoid the incident
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:D:cool::D

That's just the amateurs, I would have predicted the movement of all cars and vehicles ahead through my seti farm thus knowing how to avoid the accident.
 
Glad to hear no one was seriously hurt - it sounds nasty.

So what happens with regards to it being a courtesy car? I can't see the garage being particularly amused.
 
Westyfield2 said:
Ouch looks nasty :eek:.

Agree with Fox et al, going into the back of someone else is only ever your fault. But Tom seems pretty humble and sticking up his hands about it to me!
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Even if the car in front of you ( in this case the insignia) slowed down faster than he ever would by just braking because he went into another car not granting him the right of way ( Ka) and you would have more than enough space to brake to not hit the insignia if he'd slam on his brakes ?

I mean, do you have to keep as much distance to the car in front to be able to come to a complete standstill in that amount of space, that is quite frankly unrealistic in higher traffic...
 
MagicBoy said:
Glad to hear no one was seriously hurt - it sounds nasty.

So what happens with regards to it being a courtesy car? I can't see the garage being particularly amused.
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their courtesy cars are always basically the lowest value of their used retail stock at the time as far as i can make out, doesn't appear to be the same one and they always have the price board shoved behind the passenger seat! It's fully insured and their insurer have taken over now, so it shouldnt really affect them too badly. They've said don't worry about it just let the insurance sort it and get better (also my car is having the best part of £500 of work so it's not a completely lose situation for them lol)
 
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no one, including the insurance company who have spoken to me directly, have mentioned any such excess thus far! I wasn't made aware of any excesses upon being given the courtesy car which they're usually fairly quick to point out. Was a bit drowsy today to go into more detail than they asked me for but I'm sure more will become clearer tomorrow
 
snowdog said:
Even if the car in front of you ( in this case the insignia) slowed down faster than he ever would by just braking because he went into another car not granting him the right of way ( Ka) and you would have more than enough space to brake to not hit the insignia if he'd slam on his brakes ?

I mean, do you have to keep as much distance to the car in front to be able to come to a complete standstill in that amount of space, that is quite frankly unrealistic in higher traffic...
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It's not unrealistic at all.
 
MrLOL said:
you quite clearly don't read the highway code, because it advocates At Least a 2second gap

Or more Specifically:



http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/TravelAndTransport/Highwaycode/DG_070304

It quite clearly says "The safe rule is never to get closer than the overall stopping distance"

The Overall Stopping Distance at 70mph is ..315 feet / 96maccording to the highway code.

http://www.direct.gov.uk/prod_consum.../dg_188029.pdf

Thats quite long, which i dont think anybody on the motorway follows so this isn't a criticism of Tom.
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70mph is 31.2 meters per second, so a 96m gap would be just over 3 seconds behind the car infront, it's not an unreasonably large distance.

It's done now anyway, I hope the next few days aren't too bad for everyone involved.
 
Quite long as the context of what people actually leave :p

Sit on the M6 at rush hour and most don't even obey the 2 second rule let alone a 3 second one.
 
It's just not possible to leave 100m between you and the car in front on a busy stretch of dual carriageway or motorway.
Someone will fill that gap, guaranteed.

Sorry to hear about the mess Tom, get well soon :p
 
MrLOL said:
Your arguing with the wrong guy

I'm arguing with the guy who said that even if you followed the highway code, you wouldnt have had enough distance to stop.

I'm pointing out that the highway code distances are based on 60s cars with drum brakes and in fact leave you shed loads of room to stop.

I quite agree with you. You need to be quoting him not me !

The fact that nobody follows these distances because some numpty always pulls into them cutting your distance in half is not the point however lol.
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Sorry my post wasn't clear. I was addressing it at him / agreeing with you.
 
MrLOL said:
Your arguing with the wrong guy

I'm arguing with the guy who said that even if you followed the highway code, you wouldnt have had enough distance to stop.
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If you could point out where I said this I'd be very grateful, otherwise you can stop with the incorrect assertions please.

I actually said "The HC advocates leaving a 2 second gap on faster roads such as motorways (double this in the wet) which is not enough to avoid a collision if the car front went from 70mph to stationary instantly."

Argue until you are blue in the face if you wish, but a 2 second gap would not give you enough time to stop in the extraordinarily unlikely possibility the car in front instantly comes to a halt instantly. The fact that this is so overwhelmingly unlikely to happen is the whole reason you can safely use a minimum of a 2 second gap in good conditions. If you don't understand this please say and I'll give up.
 
Dogbreath said:
If you could point out where I said this I'd be very grateful, otherwise you can stop with the incorrect assertions please.

I actually said "The HC advocates leaving a 2 second gap on faster roads.
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They dont

They advocate AT LEAST a second gap

The key here is at least.

It also says not to get closer than the total stopping distance in the highway code. Stop trying to nit pick.
 
I think what Dogbreath is trying to say is that given two identical cars, you only need to leave the thinking distance and that is "roughly" what the 2s rule alludes to.
 
You would want to leave a gap suitable for the reaction time, plus the difference in decelleration time between yourself and the car infront as they will be braking slightly harder than you would be doing at any given point, eating into the gap between you.

This assumes that both cars have identical braking performance, so you would need to alter the distance and time to suit the conditions and vehicles.
 
Just Doing some maths here

There are 5280 Feet in a Mile, so at 70 Miles an hour, you are travelling 369,600 feet an hour. 60 minutes in an hour so thats 6,160 feet in a minute, 102 feet a second.

2 Second Rule would Leave a 204 foot gap.

Thinking Distance at 70mph is 21 metres according to the highway code, thats 68 feet.

So that leaves an actual stopping distance of 136 feet.

Pulled off some stats of a Focus RS, that stopped from 70mph in about 45 metres, which is 147 feet.

Which leaves us needing 11 feet which is 3.3 metres short.

Had the 2 second rule been observed, with only 3m left to brake he would have been doing almost single digit speeds and the accident would have been much less severe.

Heck, you could even argue he might JUST have made it, since the car in front wouldn't have stopped on the spot. At the point Tom reacted it could easily have travelled another 5 metres or so leaving Tom room to stop.

Completely pointless argument of course, because the car behind wasn't following the second rule either, and he would have been shunted from behind and pushed into the insignia by the woman behind.
 
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Morba said:
It's not unrealistic at all.
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Yes it is:

mjt said:
It's just not possible to leave 100m between you and the car in front on a busy stretch of dual carriageway or motorway.
Someone will fill that gap, guaranteed.

Sorry to hear about the mess Tom, get well soon :p
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People will fill that gap, motorways are extremely busy at times, people will not wait at junctions/sliproads until there is enough space, they will simply squeeze in.
 
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