Age of vehicles.

[freebeard]

I'm pretty sure that's the one I saw at a show-n-shine. The red part is a Rabbit convertible rear valance w/ back bumper. The EV conversion was done by the Sate of Oregon.

[Isaac Zackary]

Originally Posted by freebeard

I'm pretty sure that's the one I saw at a show-n-shine. The red part is a Rabbit convertible rear valance w/ back bumper. The EV conversion was done by the Sate of Oregon.

Cool! I found that by searching "Mr. Sharkey pusher trailer."

Originally Posted by redpoint5

When a vehicle disappears into a trail of its own smoke and blinds everyone following behind, that should be cause for immediate citation.

Hey! Mine used to do that you know!

I had a guy follow me to the store at the top of Monarch Pass to tell me that my car was burning oil badly. I had to explain that that's what happens when a non-turbo, non-altitude-compensated, adjusted-for-sea-level, mechanical-injection diesel climbs a mountain pass at 11,000ft.

Of course after that I got the injection set back for the altitude and no more smoke.

[JockoT]

My second SAAB 99 had seriously worn valve guides. And the engine was on a tilt so there was always plenty oil around them. If you went down a hill, on a closed throttle, it would draw oil into the cylinders, and when you opened the throttle it would blow a thick cloud of blue reek out of the exhaust. I loved doing that when I got some moron stuck on my back bumper! They'd be cleaning their windscreen for weeks.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

Talk about counter-intuitive.

Why? Seems perfectly obvious to me: only a small fraction of auto accidents are caused by mechanical problems, or have mechanical problems as a contributing factor, and only a small fraction of the problems would be caught by annual inspections.

[Isaac Zackary]

Originally Posted by jamesqf

Why? Seems perfectly obvious to me: only a small fraction of auto accidents are caused by mechanical problems, or have mechanical problems as a contributing factor, and only a small fraction of the problems would be caught by annual inspections.

Better inspection of the nut behind the wheel would probably do a lot more good.

But most people seem to feel they've been treated unjustly when given a speeding ticket.

So it looks like the government's and car maker's response is to head in the direction of automated driving. Cars already know not to lock up their brakes on ice and to reduce power to the wheels when they start to spin. Some cars even sense when you're going out of your lane and warn you or even put pressure on the steering wheel to try to keep the car in its lane. Apparently a lot of nuts behind those wheels couldn't be adjusted properly for those functions.

I was once in a car with a driver who texts while driving. Talk about being scared out of your pants! I'm not sure how that person is still alive and driving to this day!

Anymore I've gotten to the point that I don't let other people drive nor do I ride with them. I obey all the speed limits no matter what. If it's night or snowing or raining I reduce my speed and following distance accordingly.

This reminds me, once I was traveling along in my 1985 Golf when I came across an ice storm. It was a 3 lane one-way highway. In the two right lanes was most of the traffic going about 25mph average. In the left lane occasionally a big 4x4 SUV or pickup truck went flying down it. And I swear, every last single one of those SUV's and pickups were wrecked and flipped over farther down the road. We counted dozens of them, all seemingly brand new too. It was so slick that I could spin out in 5th gear with good all-season tires! And that's pretty slick in view of the 45hp engine!

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by Isaac Zackary

But most people seem to feel they've been treated unjustly when given a speeding ticket.

Perhaps because few accidents are caused by speeding, and of those that are (like your ice skating pickups), only a small fraction are happening in circumstances where speeding tickets are likely. At least in my observation, most speeding tickets are given on open, fairly empty roads where speed is no problem at all.

Indeed, legend would have it that a lot of places put artifically low speed limits in such places just so they can catch out-of-towners and fatten their coffers thereby. I know some places do this with other things: a few years back I got a cititation in the mail for going through a toll gate without paying, with an automated photo included. It was from some town in Washington (a state I hadn't visited in over a decade) the license plate was clearly not from my state, and the vehicle was a car, not a pickup. So what reason is there for this other than money-grubbing?

[Isaac Zackary]

I'm not trying to be rude or anything, but where are the statistics for what causes the most wrecks?

It seems that in this thread so far it has been stated that very few wrecks are caused from not testing for mechanical errors, and the same has been said about speeding. I've also heard that tailgating isn't a cause for wrecks and I've even heard that drunk driving doesn't cause very many wrecks either.

So what causes them?

Personally I just go no faster than the speed limit whether the road feels like I'm going too slow or not.

1. I feel that someone put that speed limit there for some reason.
2. Going that speed keeps me from getting pulled over and ticketed.
3. The slower I go the better fuel mileage I get!

[Isaac Zackary]

Doing a little googling (or should I say "binging" since I used Bing instead of Google) I didn't find anything that looked thoroughly investigated. But it seems that most internet sites state that the top 25 causes of accidents are:

1. Distracted Driving
2. Speeding
3. Drunk Driving
4. Reckless Driving
5. Rain
6. Running Red Lights
7. Running Stop Signs
8. Teenage Drivers
9. Night Driving
10. Design Defects
11. Unsafe Lane Changes
12. Wrong-Way Driving
13. Improper Turns
14. Tailgating
15. Driving Under the Influence of Drugs
16. Ice
17. Snow
18. Road Rage
19. Potholes
20. Drowsy Driving
21. Tire Blowouts
22. Fog
23. Deadly Curves
24. Animal Crossings
25. Street Racing

https://seriousaccidents.com/legal-a...car-accidents/
I know that in CDL school we're taught that even a 10mph change in speed can change the stopping distance of a vehicle by a factor of 2 or more. For an example, going 60mph in a 50mph in any vehicle the vehicle will take twice the distance to stop than going at 50mph.

[freebeard]

Originally Posted by Isaac Zackary

But most people seem to feel they've been treated unjustly when given a speeding ticket.

I don't get speeding tickets lately... but when I did I viewed it as a surtax on efficient use of the roadway, if not fuel.

Bing is no better than Google. DuckDuckGo is hosted in the United States. Start Page is hosted in Germany. Choose your poison.

[JockoT]

These are the Government figures for accidents caused by vehicle defects, here in the UK where we have very strict testing.

Fatal Serious Slight All
Vehicle Defects 2.8% 2.2% 1.9% 1.9%
And the individual categories:
Tyres illegal, defective or under inflated 1.5% 0.9% 0.7% 0.7%
Defective brakes 0.7% 0.6% 0.6% 0.6%
Overloaded or poorly loaded vehicle or trailer 0.4% 0.3% 0.2% 0.2%
Defective lights or indicators 0.2% 0.2% 0.2% 0.2%
Defective steering or suspension 0.2% 0.2% 0.2% 0.2%

So 2.8% of all fatal accidents are caused by vehicle defects, of which the bulk are down to defective tyres.