you could do using the above method, if driver behind gets the message and doesn’t speed back up again to purposley close the gap, but if that happens then i would probably pull over, especially if in my car the situation being to dangerous. like i had to driving back from manchester airport not long back in my car on the stocksbridge by-pass towards sheffield, the road had lots of surface water, it was gushing off the hills onto the road making little rivers in places on the surface, the road is very uneven and has some very tight bends, and had an artic about 10 feet behind at speeds of around 50 mph, and i was being forced to take bends/corners way to fast even in the car, never mind the artic. Very dangerous driving situation, and one i had to get out of, so pulled over.
Simon:
jimmy0000:
< snip > one example of many—driving a car towing a motorbike on a trailer doing 50mph.articulated truck with loaded trailer about 10 feet at the most behind me < snip >.So why were you driving so slowly?
WTF?
He said that the truck driver first tried to overtake on a solid white line, and met oncoming traffic. This strongly suggests a single carriageway road.
What’s the speed limit for a car towing a trailer on a single carriageway road? 50 mph according to my copy of the highway code.
Simon:
You say it was a loaded articulated truck. The driver of the truck would have to sustain speeds of over 50mph to be able to catch you up. For a loaded articulated truck to be able to sustain speeds of over 50mph, the road has to be fairly straight. They aren’t exactly built for high speed handling.
A loaded artic will happily hit 50 mph downhill which is where he said it was.
Simon:
If a loaded artic’ can sustain speeds of over 50mph, why couldn’t you?
So, it’s his fault that the truck was tailgating him and trying to overtake dangerously because he stuck to the speed limit (which was actually 10 mph over the truck’s speed limit)? You have an interesting grasp of the Highway Code.
How deal with a tailgater if you have more accelerater power…
Or How I dealt with a complete numpty truck driver in 2005 on the M69 in 50 mph roadworks 
M69 2 out of 3 lanes open and no restrictions for lorries.
I passed Lorry numpty about a mile before the start of the speed restriction and then did 50. Lorry numpty must have kept to 56 limiter cos he caught me up about half way through the restriction. Traffic was fairly light and there was lots of time & space to use lane 2 for an overtake. But did Lorry numpty use lane 2 - NO - he just got right up my rear end 
I tried indicating a couple of times to the nearside to encourage him to pass - but to no avail, so tried putting brakes lights on with left foot, but kept 50, and then indicating to n/s - still no reaction. Only one thing left - slow down by 1 mph every few seconds until I got to 30 - gear from 5 to 3, foot down, back to 50 and left Lorry numpty flashing his lights, blowing his horn and I think he missed his gear - what a Lorry numpty he was 
As I have said a few posts above this one - you cannot control the rear gap but you can control the front one & THE SPEED 
jimmy0000 what do you think you’ll accomplish by coming on an internet forum and blurting on about driving standards? Phis off and grow up!
I dont give a crap if someone is so close to me that his grille is wearing paint off my doors. It isnt me who will get squashed. I do object to the knobs who dive in and take my safety space though.
If I do leave too large a gap it will be filled with numptie car drivers or even truckers who think they have gained a place when all they have done is force me and probably 10 trucks behind to slow down to allow me to regain my space.
Last week I was driving from Uttoxeter to Cheadle JCB when a much more urgent delivery had to be past me and forced me into the hedge. I was doing 40 where the road allowed it. Imagine his frustration when I turned up at JCB and went straight on the loading ramp blocking him in 
It surprised me he didnt try to ask me to let him out but he wasn’t that brave 
smile!:
i do think speed limiters are a major contributor to lgv tailgating. everyone just seems hell bent on sitting at their vehicle’s maximum calibrated speed (which is perfectly understandable - on a motorway)as if the problem wasn’t bad enough, now the dumb [zb] at the EU put them into 7.5 tonners as well. You ever noticed now how so many little trucks are stuck that close to the rear end of bigger lorries that it almost looks like wag-n-drag! ? L. [/i]
Got speed limiters on some vans now.I got 1 set at (allegedgely)74mph on my sprinter.
Ho I want to see 56mph speed limiters on all MORON!!! Car’s
I think that those with limiters fitted stay behind the vehicle they are due to overtake until the last possible moment because they feel that they will hold up others too long if they pull out at the minimum safety gap (2 secs) - they put the convenience of others over safety.
nothin worse than being on the limiter (100 kmh) and the clown in the car in front is running at a steady 90 - 95 then when you eventually have an empty outside lane you pull out and come up alongside him and he speeds up to 100, obviously after realising, oh dear, theres a truck coming around me, im going too slow OR f–k this cheeky bloke hes not getting past me.
im not sure which, but either way, its dangerous, ive had people fly up behind me whle ive been trying to gradually overtake someone and nip around my inside and jump out in front of me, narrowly missing the car / truck im trying to overtake.
i suppose the safest thing for me to do would be to sit behind the slower moving vehicle, but i cant be responsible for all the other people out there that want to drive dangerously.
one reason not to tailgate in germany
Tailgating the car in front of you to make
it speed up is considered very bad taste.
And very dangerous. German traffic law
punishes this kind of bullying with a
penalty of 250€ and by revoking the driver’s
license. Traffic authorities suggest a safety
distance between cars, which can easily be
calculated by dividing the speed at which you
are going by two and leaving that amount in
meters between yourself and the car in front of you.
The above penatly does get handed out and
they have such a excellent vidieo system,it
makes no mistakes, 2-3cameras are all
ways used to check that the person caught
is either guilty or innocent,fines start lower
than that one posted but can also go higher
with the addition of points as a added bounus,
Tramper:
jimmy0000 what do you think you’ll accomplish by coming on an internet forum and blurting on about driving standards? Phis off and grow up!
Who knows, but ill bet it’s more than you accomplished by posting that. Real classy Tramper!
Tailgating is not clever and is extremely dangerous, the germans seem to have the right idea on how to deal with the offenders, good use of video cameras for a change, to catch offenders. Bad driving must be the main causes of accidents and grief.
Concur that keeping the gap in front of you is vitally important giving you more time to react to what is happening and also even gives the tailgater time to avoid squashing themselves against your rear end if you have to stop.
I do not agree with flashing the brake lights as this is likely to stress them out even further and cause them to be even more dangerous. If they get even closer best to let them overtake you and then you can smile at them when you catch them up at the next set of lights!
Jimmy…Jimmy so little time to do the job and so much pent up anger
Take a chill pill man o ur going to end up having a heart attack.
Bye the way thanks for tarring us all with the same brush.
The mojority of LGV and HGV drivers I know are very proffessional but like in most jobs around the world u will always get the odd village idiot here and there just a shame u seem to attract them 
Panther Collection:
OK. i’m slightly confused here. This guy has ONE bad experience and says the MAJORITY truck drivers are bad drivers.
Unfortunately, i would tend to agree with him. A majority just has to be more than 50%.Given the fact most HGV drivers have had extra training (above car drivers) you would expect a very low percentage of bad driving from them. I don’t see that to be the case myself. Maybe because we are driving so much we become over confident and expect others to be similar and in ‘press on mode’? Tailgating is common with lorry drivers. Trying to come around narrow roundabouts with another lorry is also fast becoming a popular one. Another one is when a lorry infront eases up (they’re generally so close they can’t see) they don’t ease up they pull out and bat on. You can’t deny this type of stuff goes on everyday from a majority, i just try to understand it!!
Tailgating is not that unsafe.
No I’ll correct myself driving inside the braking distance is not that unsafe if you imagine that you have a big soft balloon around your vehicle. Safe braking distance at front same space at rear.
If someone closes space at rear that will push the balloon out towards the front so you allow for the clown behinds braking distance.
If you don’t allow for that your balloon will push out to the next lane (on a motorway)
What space do you have there? If it’s clear you know you can take evasive action into that lane so you are still safe. If not, could you go on the hard shoulder ‘safely’?
If all the space is taken then you should adjust your speed and space accordingly.
It’s called spacial awareness. Some drivers don’t know what planet they’re on never mind what available space there is around them.
That said an increasing amount of truck drivers pull into my braking distance after overtaking. As I’ve said before I think those guys must be gay…cos one day someone will end up their A Hole
robB39:
Tailgating is not that unsafe.
No I’ll correct myself driving inside the braking distance is not that unsafe if you imagine that you have a big soft balloon around your vehicle. Safe braking distance at front same space at rear.If someone closes space at rear that will push the balloon out towards the front so you allow for the clown behinds braking distance.
If you don’t allow for that your balloon will push out to the next lane (on a motorway)
What space do you have there? If it’s clear you know you can take evasive action into that lane so you are still safe. If not, could you go on the hard shoulder ‘safely’?If all the space is taken then you should adjust your speed and space accordingly.
It’s called spacial awareness. Some drivers don’t know what planet they’re on never mind what available space there is around them.
That said an increasing amount of truck drivers pull into my braking distance after overtaking. As I’ve said before I think those guys must be gay…cos one day someone will end up their A Hole
Let me guess Rob, you’re smoking skunk? Right? I’d love you to expand on your theory about spacial awareness and balloons and also put it into context with your statement that ‘tailgating is not that unsafe’. Ok, go !!
Kiowan:
I think it’s someone who got bored with complaining about his layby being used as a tip and has come up with a new campaign against us now.Problem is it’s not always as it seems, I end up tailgating cars briefly several times a day because the morons think it’s clever to cut in about a foot infront of me, or slow down significantly after pulling infront of me. I will either slow down or pull out to overtake if there’s room but you can’t just jam the brakes on when someone does this to you.
The other problem is idiots doing the as above said, driving their car at 54mph and then speeding up as you overtake, then slowing down once you pull back in, or coming off the sliproad and being so incompetant they cannot figure out how to get themselves onto the motorway without causing chaos.
Some trucks do tailgate though, had one behind me for about 5-6miles tonight on the M40, nothing on the motorway so didn’t bother me and it’s him that’ll get squashed if I have to brake hard.
Also. Has anyone come across these new cars, that hit the motorway at 50/52 mph sit there for about 2 minutes and can’t accelerate until you attempt to pass them? Bassas 
robB39:
Tailgating is not that unsafe.
No I’ll correct myself driving inside the braking distance is not that unsafe if you imagine that you have a big soft balloon around your vehicle. Safe braking distance at front same space at rear…
Are you for real or what? following a few yards behind at 56mph is not unsafe?
Tailgating is not that unsafe.
A lot of drivers ‘BELIEVE’ that because they get away with it so often UNTIL ONE DAY… BANG
Nothing will make these type of drivers change their habits until they start to look at their own beliefs.
Ive gotta agree in someways with Jimmy0000, even tho he is a troll and comes across as a ■■■■.
Truck drivers tailgating cars is moronic and dangerous. Yeah there is times cars cut us up, i wouldnt call that tailgating when you end up close to him.
Fair enough tailgate the truck in front kill yourself, but tailgating a car, you will go right through with a good chance of killing the people in the car.
The last time i was in a physical fight was driving through some roadsworks years ago i was doing 50mph in a 50mph with 9 points on my licence driving through an area popular for scamera vans and police patrls and a tipper truck was inches off my rear bumper. I slowed right down to 20mph so he would get the idea. Stoped at a petrol station and he pulled in after me had a go at me, ended up in a fight with him over it !
Drivers on here saying well why are the cars going so slow ■■? What the hell has that gotta do with it. A lot of the time see HGV’s tailgating cars is when the speed limit is lower. Even if the car is doing 50mph on a motorway, maybe there is a fault with their car, maybe they are running on a space saver tyre, even if they just fancy driving at a slower speed conversing fuel, still no excuse to put their lifes at risk.