Safe Speed Forums

Hi all

This post is about my parents driving habits. They are in their early 60's. Both have never had an "accident" in the conventional sense during their driving lives but there are some things they do that I cannot fathom out:

Both of them seem to pull away in 2nd gear; with my old man I think it's laziness but he said 1st is only for getting car moving from standstill. If the car is at all moving he will start out in 2nd, revving the engine and pulling the car up to speed, needless to say the new clutch on their car is now already juddering (worn out with his driving).

He states that this (2nd gear thing) was taught to him when he learned in the 60's. He also says you should have the car in the highest gear possible as soon as you can, this consists of him labouring up hills until the car is almost out of puff then changing down a gear. The same is the case with my mum?

I don't know how many times I have subtly hinted at the straining sound of the car going up a hill or of pulling away in 2nd.

Does anyone else have Family members with annoying driving habits; or just annoying Family members full stop And what do you think of the procedure (supposedly) taught about getting into a high gear ASAP?

Regards

Andrew

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Homer Simpson

In the fifties and sixties, 1st gear was more like an emergency gear, very low ratio, and 2nd was about the same as today's 1st.

I was taught to get into high gear as soon as possible, providing the engine did not labour, as it benefits both the fuel consumption and the environment.

Life was so much more leisurely in those days.

I still tend to drive like that, 2nd if I'm still rolling, top gear ASAP. Never worn a clutch out in my life!

To modify that, while I was still working, we had to be tested every year, (tankers), and our examiner also followed those principles, i.e. drive in the green band on the rev. counter.

A very similar principle!

Also in the 50s and 60s, first gear in most cars didn't have synchromesh - it was a "crash" gear and to change into first while the car was still moving required "double declutching", which was a skill that many motorists had trouble with... Hence, if the cars still moving, leave it in 2nd and hammer the clutch!

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I have to admit that I rarely use 1st gear to move off - I try to judge it so that I don't actually come to a complete stop if possible and with a nice torquey deisel it will easily pick up in 2nd. If I'm actually stationary then I will use 1st. I tend to try to drive on the torque thus keeping the revs down (below 2k) to save fuel, so I will use the highest gear possible at all times.

I also tend to use the clutch in an 'on/off' manner rather than slipping for ages. Both are techniques the other half taught me when I started talking about preparing to take my HGV tests.

BTW I took my test in 1999.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

I'm a first gear avoider too. I'd never pull away from a standstill in second, but if I'm rolling then second is usually the best gear choice. I've also never worn out a clutch in my entire driving career (although I did once buy a car for cash only to discover a couple of hours later that the clutch was worn out and slipping very occasionally).

The real trick to clutch preservation is to never open the throttle significantly until the clutch is fully engaged in normal driving.

I'd make greater use of first gear on uphill gradients or when towing - i.e. any time when the overall load is significantly greater than normal.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
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my two Bad habits are allways parking the car in gear
and accelerating to 50 in second then dropping into 4th

reasons... old triumphs and vans... never trust the handbrake
I never likes third gear & the rev counter looks nice when the needle is pointing to the right

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Running the engine at low revs is fine for the economy, but running it under load at low revs is terrible from the point of view of engine wear. Low revs and low load is OK, but as the load increases the revs must increase too, to avoid accelerated engine wear. Think of it as a sort of exclusion zone in the load versus revs map.

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Peter Humphries (and a green V8S)

And one big part of the reason is that low revs deliver low oil pressure. With high loads at very low revs you can 'push through the oil' in big ends and main bearings.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

I always open the throttle significantly on my bike to get a fast start at lights etc. in order to achieve a dominant position. Will this burn out a bike clutch?

Following my Father recently I saw he's succumbed to the extraordinarily annoying (and dangerous) habit of indicating R and then L when going straight on at a roundabout. I will have a word when the chance arises.

He also gets as close as possible to the car in front when coming to a halt in a traffic queue.I'll have to explain the T&T rule to him.

Dunno. Bike clutches are 'multiplate wet' aren't they? I don't have much experience of those. And of course the other big issue is relative power. A lighting pull away on a bike may only need 20% of the engine's output - while of course the clutch is specified with 100% of the power in mind.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety

It won't 'burn it out' in the sense of causing the friction material to break down, but it will overheat and warp the steel pressure plates and cause the clutch to drag.

The big advantage is that its somewhat easier to change the clutch on a bike!

Paul. Yes most bike clutches are 'multiple wet'. (I say most becayse someone will probably tell me that there's some classic or other that's got a different setup!)

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

Of the newer bikes Ducati's still have dry clutch setup.

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Useless laws weaken necessary laws.

See!

I didn't know that Dixie. I've only got (limited) experience with Jap bikes.

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Science won over religion when they started installing lightning rods on churches.

I used to work with a guy who had done the IAM test. I noticed when in a car with him that he used to get to the cruising speed quite quickly from a start (not boy-racerish just spirited). Is this something they teach you in IAM, like to avoid hesitancy in any motorised operation?

Generally I'm quite a slow starter from lights etc. and it seems to annoy people (their prob.) but I do have a huge amount of mechanical sympathy.

Regards

Andrew

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It's a scam........or possibly a scamola


Homer Simpson

Wasn't trying to wind you up Sixy, just though you'd like to know

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Useless laws weaken necessary laws.

Not a great attitude that. You don't need to race away from lights but being "quite a slow starter" is selfish and inconsiderate - not just of the vehicle immediately behind but any who may be queuing further back.

Purposeful acceleration away from lights, by all vehicles, massively increases the capacity of the control system and directly reduces congestion.

when I say slow starter I mean relative to the white van man or mondeo rep behind me trying to get to 100 before their rings blow out!!

The speed I pull away at is comfortable to me and generally a good mix of sound driving principles, reasonable acceleration and progress.

Regards

Andrew

_________________
It's a scam........or possibly a scamola


Homer Simpson

In two lanes at lights and roundabouts, if at the front then stopping about a half to a car length back gives more space to accelerate up to speed a bit earlier, so with some anticipation one can get off to a better start.

Clutch wear is related to dissipated energy, which is the accumulation over time of the product of slip rate and torque. Hence high slip rate combined with high enginer torque equal high wear rate of clutch. So getting the clutch fully engaged as quickly as possible reduces wear.

Only had clutch problems with a car when the crankshaft oil seal started leaking as I drove of the ferry into France at Calais, but managed to drive down to Marseille ok before changing the oil seal by the road side, then drove to Italy and over the Alps ok. Ah those were the days when motoring weren’t for wimps.

Oh I remember when I were a laad down on farm it used to be a bit of a b**ger to get old dobbin in gear in mornin until he haad his feed.

This graph shows one important reason to be careful of first gear. The five traces are the five gears for a BMW E34 M5 3.6:



In low gears the gearbox acts as a torque multiplier and all components downstream of the gearbox see something like twice as much torque in first as they do in any other gear. Since it's peak torque that will cause failures in components like drive shafts, it's generally wise to be careful with first.

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Paul Smith
Our scrap speed cameras petition got over 28,000 sigs
The Safe Speed campaign demands a return to intelligent road safety