Your bad driving encounters

VincentHanna said:
I do wonder how many people drive coked off their ****. Or maybe they are abusing steroids or something.

So many weirdly aggressive drivers on the road who are stuck in traffic like everyone, else but can't seem to accept it.
Click to expand...
On litter picks down A and B roads, we do find loads of empties of beer cans, small (35cl) vodkas. Sometimes we find a bag full of empty Polish beer cans with Polish writing. Poland have zero tolerance with drinking n driving too.
 
Finglonga said:
Well 5am this morning one car with near side front fog light on and nothing else. Another car with no lights on at all and both between two villages with no street lights. Then 3 pushbikes with no lights and all of them wearing dark clothing. Why are people so stupid nowadays and why are there no police around to give the suitable advice.
Click to expand...
Cyclists come in two groups - safety conscious- reflective gear, extra lights, helmet, camera either on helmet or at front.

Then get those like you describe which doesn’t show them up. Saw about 8 today both in the morning (7:40am) and evening (5:15pm)

I remember at school in the early 90s, we were all given reflective patches to stick to coats and bags.

Plus I think that wearing the reflective gear such as sashes etc isn’t fashionable.
 
Finglonga said:
Well 5am this morning one car with near side front fog light on and nothing else. Another car with no lights on at all and both between two villages with no street lights. Then 3 pushbikes with no lights and all of them wearing dark clothing. Why are people so stupid nowadays and why are there no police around to give the suitable advice.
Click to expand...
On the flip side of that i find the amount of people driving around with either badly fitted headlights or high beams is staggering. The other day had a guy behind me on the motorway with his high beams on, only thing i could think was to put my hazards on for a few seconds, didn't think it would work but they almost instantly turned them off and flashed me to say thank you, i was amazed as normally they are qlueless as to why everyone is flashing them!
 
cheesefest said:
Cyclists come in two groups - safety conscious- reflective gear, extra lights, helmet, camera either on helmet or at front.

Then get those like you describe which doesn’t show them up. Saw about 8 today both in the morning (7:40am) and evening (5:15pm)

I remember at school in the early 90s, we were all given reflective patches to stick to coats and bags.

Plus I think that wearing the reflective gear such as sashes etc isn’t fashionable.
Click to expand...
In the late 60's we had to do cycling proficiency lessons and do a test at school if we had bicycles. Yes I did sometimes ride without lights( not enough pocket money to always buy batteries), and you had to ride on the road. You could be on the path if you were only standing on the pedals scooting it along, police were also quick to pull you over if you did something wrong.
 
see very few cyclist with cameras in Cambs, not rich enough ?, but it would just be hassle mounting that kind of fragile equipment for a commute/shopping trip,
if they have a helmet with some kind of protected embed area/inbuilt maybe I'd consider it.

you get some fashionable high viz french cut - they have a big (legally mandated) market

jpaul said:
what is the concensus on best colour for fluo hi-viz wear ? have ordered a few French standard EN 1150 gilets from Amazon.fr
they all have night/white reflective panels, but I think fluo red/orange is better compromise for both dusk/day and night visibility than yellow ? ... didn't choose the Rapha pink
31022148527_c5fd633e27_o_d.jpg
Click to expand...
 
tonys said:
In the late 60's we had to do cycling proficiency lessons and do a test at school if we had bicycles. Yes I did sometimes ride without lights( not enough pocket money to always buy batteries), and you had to ride on the road. You could be on the path if you were only standing on the pedals scooting it along, police were also quick to pull you over if you did something wrong.
Click to expand...
My school did - 1992. I can’t ride a bike so did something else
 
InHuman said:
On the flip side of that i find the amount of people driving around with either badly fitted headlights or high beams is staggering. The other day had a guy behind me on the motorway with his high beams on, only thing i could think was to put my hazards on for a few seconds, didn't think it would work but they almost instantly turned them off and flashed me to say thank you, i was amazed as normally they are qlueless as to why everyone is flashing them!
Click to expand...
I drove last night and definitely some drivers with their high beams on. I don’t want to be blinded thank you
 
cheesefest said:
Cyclists who don't wear anything reflective or cycle without lights are breaking the highway code. https://www.cyclist.co.uk/in-depth/what-does-the-law-say-about-cyclist-visibility#:~:text=Failing to use lights or,ankle bands) in the dark.
Click to expand...

Driving around towns and cities almost every cycle I see is illegal in some way. From illegal retro-fitted motors that exceed the 15.5mph limit) to minor stuff like no reflectors (1 red rear & 2 amber pedals)

InHuman said:
On the flip side of that i find the amount of people driving around with either badly fitted headlights or high beams is staggering. The other day had a guy behind me on the motorway with his high beams on, only thing i could think was to put my hazards on for a few seconds, didn't think it would work but they almost instantly turned them off and flashed me to say thank you, i was amazed as normally they are qlueless as to why everyone is flashing them!
Click to expand...

I see loads driving without lights, well with front DRLs that are blindly bright
 
On the subject of light discipline, I have one....people who think it's okay to leave full beam on because they are on a dual carriageway. There may be a central reservation, but you're still dazzling oncoming traffic.

I've just driven home along the A11/M11 and the amount of people in the other carriages who didn't bother dipping their headlights was worrying. I get it, there are long unlit sections, and it's nice to use your full beam if you can, but don't be a selfish dick.
 
Conscript said:
On the subject of light discipline, I have one....people who think it's okay to leave full beam on because they are on a dual carriageway. There may be a central reservation, but you're still dazzling oncoming traffic.

I've just driven home along the A11/M11 and the amount of people in the other carriages who didn't bother dipping their headlights was worrying. I get it, there are long unlit sections, and it's nice to use your full beam if you can, but don't be a selfish dick.
Click to expand...

One of the dual-carriageways I use a lot each side only loosely follows the other and widens and narrows quite a bit along the length of it, in some places one side of the other twists or dips into bits which are pitch black at night, makes it quite tricky if someone is coming the other way - some people just leave their main beams on along that road without a care :s
 
How many times have you been driving at night and you're blinded by another's full beam so you give them a polite flash, only for them to whack their full beams on to prove they didn't have them on, just driving a car with either badly designed or configured lights.

Car headlight designers should dip their heads in shame.
 
Mysterae_ said:
Car headlight designers should dip their heads in shame.
Click to expand...

I think part of this is people doing mods/upgrades which technically aren't legal and/or they don't know what they are doing, some of them might get pulled up at an MOT, some might slip past.

I know a colleague did a HID upgrade or whatever on one of his cars which was like that, angle was just completely wrong and dazzling people but wouldn't listen and it was 2 years before he got pulled up on it.

Some newer cars are ridiculously bright on dipped beams though - I've a few times thought people had their main beams on when approaching only to see them flick them on in the rear view after they've passed me.
 
I picked up the kids last night from a panto around 5ish (in before oh no you didnt :p ), so reasonably dark. I noticed even while walking some cars are mega bright so my head must be a good foot above a normal car height. Imo I'm not sure a light could misalign that much.
 
Went out yesterday afternoon in the rain, Nissan Navara coming towards me, LED light bar's on the roof, end of the bonnet and bottom of the bumper plus spotlights on the grille. Car in front seemed to be doing everything in his power to cover his mirror and we were seeing spots for ages after as well, guy had enough light coming off the front of him that he could have lit Wembley 10x over
 
cheesefest said:
I drove last night and definitely some drivers with their high beams on. I don’t want to be blinded thank you
Click to expand...
Do you wear glasses when driving?

I thought similar recently, that I was being dazzled more than usual.

Turns out that the glasses I wear are making the dazzling effect worse, particularly from LED headlights. A simple test is to flick your glasses up for a split second whilst being dazzled and see if it take the edge off. Though I wouldn't recommend doing that if your vision is really awful without glasses.
 
4 cars inside 5 minutes cut in on me after overtaking at the start of a dual-carriageway... 2 of them starting to slow down as they did so when I was driving a constant 70... I think that I got going pretty briskly off the lights but stayed to 40 in the 40, then got up to 70 fairly quickly confused their perception of me and they were too stupid to adapt.

Had a lady in the car behind definitely giving me a sarcastic hand clap for something - I think due to not indicating at a roundabout where it isn't really possible to do so clearly due to how close the exits are so I don't bother... then as we pulled up at lights she gets her phone out and starts tapping away and doesn't notice the lights change...
 
There seems to have been a massive influx of bell end/poor drivers recently. Had a guy give way to me, on my right at a roundabout. I probably spent 30 seconds waiting for him to go. He then didn't know what lane to be in a dawdled a lot. Had a woman in a big people carrier this morning, doing 35 in a 50. I just don't understand it.
Also when I went to pick my daughter up from brownies last night, quite a few people just dumping their cars on double yellows, regardless of the fact that it makes the path less than a foot wide, or narrows the road to make it difficult for cars to get through. It seems the "I'm alright but **** everyone else crowd" are out in force when it comes to kids.

I've also noticed quite a few cats have a whole headlight cluster out, not just the dipped but the sidelight as well, I assume dodgy connection but there's seems to be quite a few of them.
 
Last edited:
Lights are definitely brighter but I think it’s a good thing. On a long motorway trip in the rain, I was surprised how poor some of the older car lights were. A dull yellow glow in your mirror that was almost impossible to spot more than about 50m away through the rain and spray. It was even worse spotting older cars with the non led DRLs (side lights) and no lights on.

LED lights, even just the LED DRLs were much more visible. Even as a spectacle wearer I never feel dazzled by standard LEDs and find them far safer for visibility.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom