How serious are you about driving safely? How many crashes have you had?

[niky]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

We used to teach this unconventional rear-crash avoidance technique:

1) IF when you're stopping there is no escape route to either side, and,


2) IF nobody has yet stopped behind you,

3) Then leave 3-4 car lengths ahead of you.

4) Blink your brake lights as cars approach from behind.

5) Imminent collision: you may be able to move ahead and use your front buffer to avoid contact when the idiot behind finally locks brakes/activates ABS.

6) Worst case scenario, and you're going to get hit: you avoid being the meat in the car sandwich and only have one end of your car to repair.


7) Or, as non-idiotic cars are slowing to a stop behind you, creep ahead and close the 3-4 car buffer.

Gospel. I do the blink blink thing A LOT when I'm coming up to traffic. I'm also a big advocate of leaving space and marking escpae lanes. Rather lose a single place in traffic than both bumpers!

Some of the truck drivers here are absolute idiots. (they don't get the training they do in more civilized places).

Originally Posted by jcp123

It was in a Ford Focus. Lift-throttle and trail-braking at once! I was on an unfamiliar road and came to a corner too hot, there was an Integrated coming the other way. I'd been driving maybe 6 months on my own, so I was pretty darn ignorant and panicked a bit on top of that. And this, ladies and gentleman, is how you oversteer a FWD automobile into a barbed wire fence.

I later found out that the Control Blade rear suspension was set up to be a little bit loose. Lift the throttle in a corner under more sane circumstances and it drifts out just enough to neutralize the understeer. Done properly it's actually an exceptionally entertaining FWD car to hustle around corners.

My Echo would snap oversteer on emergency lane changes. I avoided an accident, but I had to juke to the next lane because someone just didn't see me and was muscling in from the other side. The rear just gave up and it took a fancy steering wheel hustle that I'm rather proud of to tuck the car back in to the right heading. IIRC that's a torsion beam under there, and they have a reputation for snap oversteer in sudden maneuvers.

Focii are absolute sweethearts to lift-oversteer. It'll kick out just enough to keep you entertained, before the Control Blade geometry changes as it loads up and gives you back your grip.

Echo. Nasty. Toyota's small cars are usually under-damped. Add to that a simple rear torsion beam and oversteer can be snappy and stuttery.

[jcp123]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

I have read that the ST Focus and Fiesta are quite tail-happy.


Only tail-happy FWD car I've had the white-knuckle pleasure of rescuing from fishtailing (it was actually downhill oversteer - similar cause as lift oversteer) was one with rear tires that were a lot more worn out than the fronts.



Which is why most tire shops will install new tires on the rear of a FWD vehicle if you're only getting a pair of new ones.

I have zero firsthand experience in either car. I know the Focus RS Drift Mode is really aimed at excessive tail-happy behavior. More for fun than real Motorsport. The Focus I had was more buttoned down than that, very euro-refined with lots of compliance to soak up bumps instead of skittering over them, and aimed at being pretty neutral. Shame I didn't have the glorious Bay Area roads of my youth to compare it and my SVT Focus.

Originally Posted by niky

Gospel. I do the blink blink thing A LOT when I'm coming up to traffic. I'm also a big advocate of leaving space and marking escpae lanes. Rather lose a single place in traffic than both bumpers!

Some of the truck drivers here are absolute idiots. (they don't get the training they do in more civilized places).


Focii are absolute sweethearts to lift-oversteer. It'll kick out just enough to keep you entertained, before the Control Blade geometry changes as it loads up and gives you back your grip.

Echo. Nasty. Toyota's small cars are usually under-damped. Add to that a simple rear torsion beam and oversteer can be snappy and stuttery.

In a car I do try to tap-tap the brakes to give warning. Truckers (myself included) will toss on the hazards.

Underdamped would be an understatement. The incident in question happened at better than 12 years of age, deep into the 200k miles. And if the general condition of the car is anything to go by, I'd be absolutely shocked (sorry/not sorry about the pun) if they had been replaced.

[Xist]

Niky! You used Focii!

People seem to think that pluralization rules do not apply to names, even if those names are nouns that have been established for centuries.

I had dashcam footage of when a woman merged into my car, broke my mirror, and dented her door. I was going to share it, but it only showed my car shifting several inches to the right, and I do not think that I said anything.

I was on the phone with my mother when I was rear-ended by a full-size work van on the freeway. I said "Mom, I was just rear-ended. I am okay, but I need to go."

I am not sure that I say anything interesting. Oh, when bad things happen either.

I backed into one of those posts in front of O'Reilly's some months back. It is probably steel and concrete, but the outside is plastic, and it has a three-sided coroplast sign on it.

That removed the paint. I could totally buff it, it would simply remove more paint.

[Xist]

Is it off-topic to ask about "Accident Forgiveness?" I know that other agencies have advertised it for a few years, but it seems like that is all that Liberty Mutual pushes, aside from their jingle (Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty!). What kind of entitled garbage is this? "Yeah! Why should my insurance go up just for my first accident?!"

You drove into someone! You may have hurt them! Why shouldn't you need to pay if you mess up so badly the police need to be involved?!

I think it is like automatic braking. "I don't need to pay attention! My car will brake for me! I do not need to pay attention! Liberty forgives my first accident!"

Why won't millennials get off my lawn?!

[cRiPpLe_rOoStEr]

Originally Posted by Xist

Is it off-topic to ask about "Accident Forgiveness?"

Not at all.

I think it is like automatic braking. "I don't need to pay attention! My car will brake for me! I do not need to pay attention! Liberty forgives my first accident!"

I have objected to such technological interferences mostly because they seem excessive and may prevent some responses to dangerous situations, you know, such as escaping an ambush attempt. But your point of view makes sense.

[Xist]

What happened to you that your first thought is escaping an ambush attempt?

The more they attempt to idiot-proof driving the less the idiots will try to not hit things, but hopefully overall it works out.

You know how they say self-driving cars need to decide the survivors? Can you program an algorithm for recognizing the driver was watching "Harry Potter?"

[cRiPpLe_rOoStEr]

Originally Posted by Xist

What happened to you that your first thought is escaping an ambush attempt?

Being born in Brazil doesn't seem dangerous enough?

The more they attempt to idiot-proof driving the less the idiots will try to not hit things, but hopefully overall it works out.

Hopefully, but it seems like idiots can always go that one step further.

You know how they say self-driving cars need to decide the survivors?

No idea.

Can you program an algorithm for recognizing the driver was watching "Harry Potter?"

Even though I'm aware of people who watch TV or movies while driving, I'm not sure how any algorithm could find it out. The IT genius in the family is my youngest uncle

[Xist]

I have never tried being born in Brazil...

Should self-driving cars be programmed to prioritize the life of the occupant over a litter of schoolchildren? What about the President of the United States? What about the current President of the United States? What if the car belongs to the current President of the United States and he is about to run over the team famous for being about to cure childhood leukemia?

Imagine the uproar if the current President of the United State's car ran over Psy because the car decided to save an old lady that turned out to be a middleaged woman that partied too hard?

How are cars supposed to know which people are popular?

The "Harry Potter" reference was because of the guy who was watching that movie when his Tesla drove into a semi.

[jcp123]

Ah the trolley problem! I actually hope that teams who are working on the logic for these systems are also picking up philosophers and the like. It's an important and deep question, and somehow it's up to us to give some sort of answer. That's kinda heavy.

I sort of agree that I'm not all that much into this active stuff. Why? Because of the awful experience I have with radar cruise and automatic braking in my truck. It has created its own dangerous moments, and isn't very reliable, either. I have never tried it in a car though, so maybe it's a smoother experience. And either way, in my experience it's rather stupid and silly to entrust digital technology with safeguarding an essay, let alone a life.

[cRiPpLe_rOoStEr]

Originally Posted by Xist

How are cars supposed to know which people are popular?

That's a good question. You know, it's hard even for humans to, so to speak, put a price on someone else's life. It may become another reason for a 100% autonomous-driving vehicle to not happen. At least not so soon...