Change Speed Limit?

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by RH77

I mean no disrepect, but is there a poll or data that the 55 limit was a "failure"? Popularity notwithstanding, it should have decreased overall consumption. If not,
I apologize in advance, with the impending data to support.

Back to DPOV: I agree with his statement. I sacrifice my 50-mille drive by 10-15 minutes to get 40mpg vs. 26. I'll stay up that much later to maximize my "loaf" time (same with longer trips). Money vs. Time. It's how much value is placed upon it.

So, I stand up and give time back for consumption and emissions -- and I'm none the poorer. Can't we all give a little back?

For most of the populace, that answer is "no". Which is where laws step-in.

RH77

RH77,no disrespect inflicted.Your's is a noble cause if you can get your classmates to rationally debate the issue.------------- Maaaaaaaaaaaany articles were published inthe popular press with respect to the national 55-mph speed limit.Straight physics dictated that road load would be reduced,at the lower speed,and that cannot be disputed.The fly in the ointment was,that cars were not "calibrated" for the new speed,and many consumers found their cars to get "lower" mpg,in spite of the lower load.My Dodge pickup suffers from this conundrum.-----------------------What the legislators hadn't figured for,was BSFC,which could "peak" at velocities significantly higher than the 55 limit.---------------------My family was involved with Tri-State Trucking Co.,and found its rigs to "suffer" mpg loss under the new law.------------------------ Compliance was an issue,as most drivers drove 63-mph,regardless of what the posted limit was.---------------------- Some motorists literally fell asleep at the wheel,on long stretches,and died,often taking innocent nearby motorists with them.----------------------------------- Billions of dollars in man-hours were "lost"each year behind the wheel in lost productivity.------------------------- Law abiding motorists,who "impeded" speeders,"wasted" millions of gallons of fuel through momentum death,caused by velocity discrepancies,deceleration,and re-acceleration.------------------------------ People "hated"the law,and felt it an infringement on their rugged individualism and right to free choice.------------------- As mentioned,Sammy Hagar attacked it.Hollywood fought a proxy war against it.Smokey and the Bandit,The Fall Guy,Night Rider,etc.,helped perpetuate contrived notions of masculinity and rights of passage in a car culture.More recently,Demolition Man,and The Fast and the Furious have done what they could to emasculate any red-blooded American male that might consider a "green" car,or green behavior.-------------------------- If you'll dig through old CAR and DRIVER,HOT ROD,MOTOR TREND,AUTOMOBILE,AUTOWEEK magazines,you'll probably find a lot of grist for your project.-------------------------- Speed limits do matter.Rational limits may not be suited to a democracy unless there is broad-based education to go with it,and cultivation of the public mind to accept it as "the right thing to do".---------------------- If you can't find any more specific data,I probably have some dated stuff I could dig out.Let me know.-------------------------- Get ready for a good time,cause your fixin' to open a big can of worms! Good luck.------P.S. 78 no-drive days this year,and drove 15-mph under the posted limit coming to town today)no one else on the road).

[whitevette]

Originally Posted by aerohead

RH77,no disrespect inflicted.

... cars were not "calibrated" for the new speed,and many consumers found their cars to get "lower" mpg,in spite of the lower load.

My Dodge pickup suffers from this conundrum.

...and found its rigs to "suffer" mpg loss under the new law.

Compliance was an issue,as most drivers drove 63-mph,regardless of what the posted limit was.

Some motorists literally fell asleep at the wheel,on long stretches,and died,often taking innocent nearby motorists with them.

Billions of dollars in man-hours were "lost"each year behind the wheel in lost produductivity.

Law abiding motorists,who "impeded" speeders,"wasted" millions of gallons of fuel through momentum death,caused by velocity discrepancies,deceleration,and re-acceleration.

'cause your fixin' to open a big can of worms! Good luck.------P.S. 78 no-drive days this year,and drove 15-mph under the posted limit coming to town today)no one else on the road).

HOW does one "calibrate" a car for lower speed? How? Your Dodge pick-up suffers from what conundrum? Methinks it's not your truck which suffers....

Rigs suffer MPG loss under this new law? I see the laws of physics & thermo have been waived again for you boys.

"Some motorists literally fell asleep at the wheel...yada, yada, yada. So? Don't other motorists do this, also? Does 55 bore them to sleep? This sounds like "We need an argument, quick!"

Billions of dollars in man-hours were lost...". What has this got to do with anything? Have you priced funerals lately?

This next is so absurd...where does one start? "...'impeded' speeders, wasted millions of gallons of fuel through MOMENTUM DEATH ( What is this ???), caused by velocity discrepancies, deceleration, and re-acceleration. Poor truckers! Are these the same scum-sucking *&%!#$! who shove me from the rear in their 60,000 pound rigs? I got news for these cats...BRAKES !!!

Enough foolishness for one month! -whitevette

[DifferentPointofView]

uh, the only way I see you having a mpg loss is if your truck doesn't shift into O/D until like, 65, maybe 100 miles an hour. Not to be rash, but isn't the EPA ratings rated at lower speeds anyway which is the reason people complained in the first place cause no one drives that slow?

Have you confirmed this with like, a scangauge or a mpguino or something? If not, what are you going off of?

Most people get low mileage @ low speeds because they can't keep their pedal still, they keep either letting the speed go to low and it downshifts and they put the pedal down to get back up to speed, or they're foot gets on the gas too much, and they creep up to a higher speed, slow back down, creep back up, start falling a sleep at the wheel, and mpg suffers.

I don't know about you, but my Jeep traveling down the road @ 1250-1300 RPM @ 45 gets much better mpg than it doing 2000 RPM @ 70. or 1550 @ 55, or 1700 @ 60. Thats how its been in all the cars I've driven.

Rant over.

[tasdrouille]

Originally Posted by aerohead

[...]Some motorists literally fell asleep at the wheel,on long stretches,and died,often taking innocent nearby motorists with them.[...]

I would just like to point out that more people died when the speed limits were raised (all else being equal). I read a Canadian govt study (can't find the link anymore) in which they were considering getting the highway limit up in Canada (currently ~62 mph), but due to the impact on the fatalities rate they found in the states which went up from 55, they decided not to.

Billions of dollars in man-hours were "lost"each year behind the wheel in lost productivity.

I can agree with that argument when taken in a business perspective. But I'd like to provide a counter argument valid for a lot of people (at least where I live). I work a fixed amount of hours per week and get paid a fixed amount per year. Whatever time I use behind the wheel is taken on my free time, which is worth nothing in term of productivity as I'm not going to work more anyway. But in fact, it's worth quite a lot to me, because I actually enjoy it and I have a feeling I'm doing something good for everyone.

[Formula413]

Originally Posted by tasdrouille

I can agree with that argument when taken in a business perspective. But I'd like to provide a counter argument valid for a lot of people (at least where I live). I work a fixed amount of hours per week and get paid a fixed amount per year. Whatever time I use behind the wheel is taken on my free time, which is worth nothing in term of productivity as I'm not going to work more anyway. But in fact, it's worth quite a lot to me, because I actually enjoy it and I have a feeling I'm doing something good for everyone.

[aerohead]

Originally Posted by whitevette

HOW does one "calibrate" a car for lower speed? How? Your Dodge pick-up suffers from what conundrum? Methinks it's not your truck which suffers....

Rigs suffer MPG loss under this new law? I see the laws of physics & thermo have been waived again for you boys.

"Some motorists literally fell asleep at the wheel...yada, yada, yada. So? Don't other motorists do this, also? Does 55 bore them to sleep? This sounds like "We need an argument, quick!"

Billions of dollars in man-hours were lost...". What has this got to do with anything? Have you priced funerals lately?

This next is so absurd...where does one start? "...'impeded' speeders, wasted millions of gallons of fuel through MOMENTUM DEATH ( What is this ???), caused by velocity discrepancies, deceleration, and re-acceleration. Poor truckers! Are these the same scum-sucking *&%!#$! who shove me from the rear in their 60,000 pound rigs? I got news for these cats...BRAKES !!!

Enough foolishness for one month! -whitevette

whitevette,I knew when RH77 broached the subject of lowering the speed limit it would touch nerves,in your case,its an inverse reaction to mainstream America's,when the 55-mph National speed limit was enacted in the 1970s,and this is the context to which I made my comments.This is the era when I began ecomodding and I paid very close attention and have accumulated over 30 years of data,as I could,just to document developments.--------------------------- Your points are well taken and I'll address them in order of listing 1) The American automotive fleet on the roads at the time of the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973,was not designed around,nor optimized for a 55-mph cruise speed.When Congress passed legislation which enacted the speed limit,motorists were forced to operate at the new speed limit,whether their car got better fuel economy or not.As I mentioned in my post,Physics does dictate that a vehicles road-load WOULD be reduced at the lower speed,but what physics doesn't take into account,is that a vehicles best BSFC may not be improved by arbitrarily lowering the load(i.e. its calibration).You should know this!---------------------------------(2) With respect to the Dodge pickup,it's been in the family since it was purchased new in 1962.My Grandfather kept a vehicle diary.When the vehicle passed into my parents possession,my father kept a logbook.I've had the truck since 1998,and I've recorded all mileage data since its been in my possession.--------------- The truck gets its best mpg at 65-mph.If I slow down to 55-mph the mpg suffers.the environment suffers,as well as the US balance of trade.(Soldiers?)You may not like that but it happens to be fact.------------------------ (3) My uncle Ellis Conner Burnett owned a trucking company.He owned dozens of Peterbilt conventional tractors and did OTR long haul all over the Continental US and Canada.His rigs got lower mpg with the 55-mph speed limit.He was a business man and he was interested in such things.--------------------------------- (4)Some motorists which did not fall asleep and die at 65 and 70-mph,fell asleep and died at 55-mph.Some killed other motorists when they veered out of their lanes or crossed medians into on-coming traffic.---------------------------- (6) The Harvard Business School appears to establish methodologies for economic analysis used widely in the United States.In the United States,time has been associated with Gross National Product.When time lost to vehicular incidents were factored against the average wage for American labor,the losses to GNP were measured in the billions of dollars.This may have no significance to you,but I thought I'd mention it to RH77,since he's going to have to defend his position.----------------------(7) If you're a "hyper-miler",then you are practicing "MOMENTUM-DRIVING",introduced around 1945,with the Shell and Mobil Economy Runs."Momentum-Death" is my expression,and I use it to illustrate how momentum is killed anytime a vehicle changes its velocity.Since very few Americans respected the 55-mph limit,they would be "impeded" by the few who were driving the limit(Me),for perhaps a net loss in efficiency,as the pissed-off motorists,which had to slow to prevent colliding with me,once past me,would gun the throttle,hurtling down the road,burning untold gallons over the course of a year ( times 180-million cars).------------------------------(8) Yes truckers speeded.They're paid by the mile.You can divide 200,000 miles(they drive each year) by 70 and 55 to calculate their "lost time".If it were up to me,I'd "professionalize" trucking,and pay the drivers a salary,taking the time pressure off driving.I'm happy to pay a little more for shipping.

[dcb]

Are newlines considered irrational or something?!? I aint reading that.

[RH77]

Well, I'd better comment since I brought-up the whole 55-deal...

My car also gets better FE at 65 than 55 in hilly terrain (which is where I drive). Aero's mention of "Momentum Driving" is spot-on.

Let it be known that I'm not advocating a blanket 55-limit. The core of my argument is that our current speed limits are often beyond that of a vehicle's optimum load, from an aerodynamic perspective. The "Wall of Air" theory. The best example in recent history was the national 55-limit.

I just drove 500 miles in an '09 Chevy Malibu 4-banger, 4-speed. With a constant tailwind of about 10-15 MPH, I got about 31 MPG at 70 MPH (speed limit). I sped up to 75 to outrun a thunderstorm, and the mileage average during that segment was ~28 MPG. In construction zones, 55 MPH yielded ~33 MPG (smaller subset of data). So an argument could be made that 65 would be a good compromise. In the many cars that I've driven, the difference between 65 and 70 had a dramatic impact on FE. 75 even moreso.

The stigma that's attached to "55" will not soon be forgotten. The average person tends to speed. Life is getting faster -- all that mess. Lowering the limit would have a backlash, yes. Just 3 years ago, I remember seeing limits of 75 cropping up and simply enjoyed the speed.

So, what are we to do? Many trucking companies have a 61 mph governor on their tractors. A statistician/accountant somewhere figured the time and money equation. Unfortunately, owner/operators are stuck with per-load requirements to "make the mortgage" on their rigs.

But the "fell asleep because it was too slow" argument doesn't sit right. Driving at 80 mph sleepy, seems to be the same as 55 to me. What about railroad engineers? They don't even have a steering wheel and tend to stay awake at speeds of 45 mph all day and night.

Now for passenger vehicles. Again what to do? Since we essentially have a mixed bag of BSFC maps and Cd's out there on the road, wouldn't it make sense to cap limits at 65?

So, am I foolish for driving a company-paid vehicle at the limit for many hours? I'm a salaried employee, so I'm not making any more money. I could have set the cruise for my old traditional "6-over" and got to the hotel early, so I could plop my arse, watch TV, and post on EM. Honestly, I would rather use fewer gallons of fuel in the process, like Tas.

RH77

[DifferentPointofView]

I could have set the cruise for my old traditional "6-over" and got to the hotel early, so I could plop my arse, watch TV, and post on EM. Honestly, I would rather use fewer gallons of fuel in the process.

Amen to that dude.

[Funny]

Originally Posted by RH77

But the "fell asleep because it was too slow" argument doesn't sit right. Driving at 80 mph sleepy, seems to be the same as 55 to me.
RH77

I don't want to start an argument here, just a discussion. It's all about numbers, people. Look at it this way: Hi, my name is Bob and I'm a truck driver. I have 500 miles to go until I reach my destination and sack out, because I'm tired. I can drive 55 MPH and get there in 9 hours and 6 minutes, OR I can drive 75 MPH and make it to my destination in 6 hours and 24 minutes. which do you think is going to be safer for the other drivers?


Now I love to save gas and money, but have you ever calculated how much time is worth? Nine hours is a long drive, man. Six and a half is much more manageable. Nuff said.