Rhythm Thief:
Backing off to let things past works well in the dead of night when there’s sod - all traffic; it doesn’t work quite so well in the daytime. All that tends to happen is you find yourself slowing down to let one truck past, then while you’re doing that another one pulls out to overtake, so you continue going slowly to let him past. And so on and so on …
Why is that a problem? Keep it at 85-87 kph and not only will almost everything be overtaking you, but you won’t have the stress of trying to overtake all day. The cost to you will be mere minutes on a journey - something most drivers can absorb in most of their shifts. Try it for one day and you’ll be amazed how different you feel.
Rhythm Thief:
Backing off to let things past works well in the dead of night when there’s sod - all traffic; it doesn’t work quite so well in the daytime. All that tends to happen is you find yourself slowing down to let one truck past, then while you’re doing that another one pulls out to overtake, so you continue going slowly to let him past. And so on and so on …
Why is that a problem? Keep it at 85-87 kph and not only will almost everything be overtaking you, but you won’t have the stress of trying to overtake all day. The cost to you will be mere minutes on a journey - something most drivers can absorb in most of their shifts. Try it for one day and you’ll be amazed how different you feel.
All that you’re doing by running at 85 kmh is ( trying to ) create the speed differential that speed limiters have removed in the case of overtaking situations.Thereby slowing down the traffic in lane 1 even more because the traffic following you has to slow down even further to maintain seperation distances.Thereby requiring even more vehicles to overtake. Thereby blocking up lane 2 even more than would otherwise have been the case in the days before limiters.
The whole thing is a joke all based on a bs fuel saving crusade and so called ‘safety’ issue that actually creates more danger in the form of bunching and has more to do with making road transport less competitive against the rail freight interests.
ajt:
Can’t believe there are truck drivers who are scared just to back off a bit due to the risk of someone running into the back of them. These folk are in charge of 44 tonnes plus of metal FFS Unbelievable
Jesus. Can you people actually read? No one’s saying they’re scared to back off a few k, just that it seems better to be aware of what’s going on around you and, by extension, not tap the exhaust brake when someone is right behind you. We all know they shouldn’t be driving right on the back bumper of your trailer, and equally, we all know that people do. I don’t tap the exhaust brake when one of these people is on the back bumper because I can do without the hassle of having to disentangle my trailer from the front of his cab. You may well be one of those drivers who delights in teaching tailgaters a lesson, but that’s not what most of us are out on the road for. If I have to slow to get my braking distance back then I will - as someone else said, you can control the distance in front of you - but I prefer not to surprise the idiot tailgating me when I do so. Does that make anything clearer, or would you prefer me not to use long words?
Its not your words its your logic. Don’t tap on the exhaust brake then, just lift off the loud pedal and ease it back a touch. Its not rocket science. Talk about making heavy work of a minor situation.
Rhythm Thief:
Backing off to let things past works well in the dead of night when there’s sod - all traffic; it doesn’t work quite so well in the daytime. All that tends to happen is you find yourself slowing down to let one truck past, then while you’re doing that another one pulls out to overtake, so you continue going slowly to let him past. And so on and so on …
Why is that a problem? Keep it at 85-87 kph and not only will almost everything be overtaking you, but you won’t have the stress of trying to overtake all day. The cost to you will be mere minutes on a journey - something most drivers can absorb in most of their shifts. Try it for one day and you’ll be amazed how different you feel.
Like I say, it’s less of an issue on nights. I used to do this sometimes when I worked days, and on occasion I drive something limited to 83kph and it is less stressful, but I don’t really need to do it when there’s just me and a set of tail lights in the middle distance, and nothing else.
Rhythm Thief:
Backing off to let things past works well in the dead of night when there’s sod - all traffic; it doesn’t work quite so well in the daytime. All that tends to happen is you find yourself slowing down to let one truck past, then while you’re doing that another one pulls out to overtake, so you continue going slowly to let him past. And so on and so on …
Why is that a problem? Keep it at 85-87 kph and not only will almost everything be overtaking you, but you won’t have the stress of trying to overtake all day. The cost to you will be mere minutes on a journey - something most drivers can absorb in most of their shifts. Try it for one day and you’ll be amazed how different you feel.
All that you’re doing by running at 85 kmh is ( trying to ) create the speed differential that speed limiters have removed in the case of overtaking situations.Thereby slowing down the traffic in lane 1 even more because the traffic following you has to slow down even further to maintain seperation distances.Thereby requiring even more vehicles to overtake. Thereby blocking up lane 2 even more than would otherwise have been the case in the days before limiters.
The whole thing is a joke all based on a bs fuel saving crusade and so called ‘safety’ issue that actually creates more danger in the form of bunching and has more to do with making road transport less competitive against the rail freight interests.
You’re all theory and politics mate. In the practical world the vast majority of traffic behind me will not “slow down even further to maintain separation distances”. They’ll continue to perceive me as a slightly slower pain the backside than they normally would, race up to my back door, pull out at the last second, and overtake me at the speed they would normally be doing anyway. I can assure you that in the real world driving at 85kph does not block up 2 lanes for longer than 2 lorries battling it out for 4 or 5 miles. It’s all roughly the same, only without the risk of receiving a potential sanction.
Rhythm Thief:
Backing off to let things past works well in the dead of night when there’s sod - all traffic; it doesn’t work quite so well in the daytime. All that tends to happen is you find yourself slowing down to let one truck past, then while you’re doing that another one pulls out to overtake, so you continue going slowly to let him past. And so on and so on …
Why is that a problem? Keep it at 85-87 kph and not only will almost everything be overtaking you, but you won’t have the stress of trying to overtake all day. The cost to you will be mere minutes on a journey - something most drivers can absorb in most of their shifts. Try it for one day and you’ll be amazed how different you feel.
All that you’re doing by running at 85 kmh is ( trying to ) create the speed differential that speed limiters have removed in the case of overtaking situations.Thereby slowing down the traffic in lane 1 even more because the traffic following you has to slow down even further to maintain seperation distances.Thereby requiring even more vehicles to overtake. Thereby blocking up lane 2 even more than would otherwise have been the case in the days before limiters.
The whole thing is a joke all based on a bs fuel saving crusade and so called ‘safety’ issue that actually creates more danger in the form of bunching and has more to do with making road transport less competitive against the rail freight interests.
You’re all theory and politics mate. In the practical world the vast majority of traffic behind me will not “slow down even further to maintain separation distances”. They’ll continue to perceive me as a slightly slower pain the backside than they normally would, race up to my back door, pull out at the last second, and overtake me
I think that says everything and should be required reading for all the so called road ‘safety’ experts.
At best it’s a potential crash waiting to happen and if/when those wagons do ‘overtake’ you without running into the back of you,as I said,it’s still a case of those wagons needing to occupy lane 2 however you look at it.It’s just that even with all that extra aggravation you’ve still only got a 3-5 kmh speed differential at best between trucks running at 85-87 kmh in lane 1 and 90 kmh in lane 2,as opposed to the 10 mph,often more,that would have been there before limiters.While even cutting your speed back to 80 kmh would still only provide a 10 kmh speed differential which is still effectively zb all from the point of view of keeping lane 2 moving at a decent rate.
IE limiters have produced the worst of all worlds situation of effectively non existent speed differentials between trucks running in lane 1 and lane 2,and dangerous bunching situations,just as I said.While the idea of trying to fix the issue of those non existent speed differentials by running even slower in lane 1 is just making that situation worse.
