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PostPosted: Fri Jan 24, 2014 01:02 
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IAM are doing a short survey for Environment Speed Limits.

Questions are interesting but no complete or correct from my POV.

IAM Survey wrote:
IAM Logo
Speed limits

1. Are you:
Are you: Male Female

2. Are you:
Are you: An IAM member
An IAM associate
A non-member

3. Age:
Age: Under 25
26-35
36-45
46-55
56-65
65+
Rather not say

4. Where do you live?
Where do you live? North East
North West
Yorkshire and the Humber
East Midlands
West Midlands
East of England
London
South East (excluding London)
South West
Scotland
Northern Ireland
Republic of Ireland
Wales
Other (please specify)

5. Which vehicle do you predominantly use?
Car
Motorcycle
Commercial vehicle
Bicycle
None

6. Do you agree that speed limits should be reduced as part of a plan to improve air quality?
Yes
No
Don’t know

7. Should the speed limits go back up if local air quality improves?
Yes
No
Don’t know

8. Speed limits on some motorways already vary to reduce congestion, should the same systems be used when pollution is
measured as being high?
Yes
No
Don’t know
Other (please specify)

9. New engine and fuel technology has delivered substantial air quality improvements. Do you think that cleaner cars can deliver
clean air without the need for speed limit reductions?
Yes
No
Don’t know

10. Lower speed limits for environmental reasons are only proposed for motorways – should all roads be covered?
Yes, all roads
Yes, on congested roads
Yes, on A-roads
No
Don’t know
Other (please specify)

11. Do you think zero/low emission vehicles should be exempt from the lower limit as an incentive to buy them?
Yes
No
Not sure

12. Which of these reasons for a speed limit should be the number one priority for police and speed camera enforcement?
Speed limit imposed for environmental reasons
Speed limit imposed for safety reasons
Speed limit imposed for congestion reasons
Don't know

13. Do you have any other comments about motorway speed limits?
Response
Percent : Male 91.1% Female 8.9%

Q 7 is badly put
IAM wrote:
7. Should the speed limits go back up if local air quality improves? Yes No Don’t know

I do know its neither no yes nor Don't know. If I have answered NO to Q6 then Q7 is a joke because you cannot answer without implying some approval of the system! If I say Yes or No then I imply that I agree to some degree with the concept if I say that I don't know then I imply I am not sure - yet I am sure, I know that I disapprove of it, period. They NEED to ASK should Speed Limits alter for anything other than for Road Safety ?
(Q12 implies this but again ONLY relates to speed AND enforcement as if Police and cameras are always to be linked implicitly !!! As if cameras will provide safety! Awful just awful.
Q10 should have a reply that "NO Roads should have this".... ridiculous excuse for the reduction of a speed!

So the n Q11 is silly as all cars ought to pay a flat road tax ... an incentive to buy a lower emission car at some point will increase once the critical mass has been bought. So just make it fair on all of us and make it our direct choice than some time limited incentive.

Q13 - could be that the m/way ought to be raised ... the fact that the Gov is claimed to have retracted due to a fear of 18 'extra deaths' has to be an excuse as deaths cannot be estimated to this degree with any true success rate as it is far too small a figure to be meaningful. To ignore the 85%ile is foolish and dangerous.

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PostPosted: Fri Jan 24, 2014 15:09 
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I'd find it a MUCH harder one to argue than safety, to be honest. I certainly think speed limits SHOULD be higher for vehicles with proven emissions benefits. That will be an excellent way to incentivise the technology uptake. It would also be really funny watching all the small car people blasting past the Range Rovers! I'd want the figures to be meaningful though. The current EC drive cycle doesn't measure emissions at 80 and only does so at 75 for about 10 seconds! It also applies the same acceleration rate to all vehicles so the really quick ones can do it on a virtually closed throttle, whereas the small-engined cars are foot-to-the-baords for a a lot of it. Id like to see all cars obliged to use a wide open throttle for (say) 15 seconds of the cycle. (Human nature being what it is) :twisted:

As for variable limits when air quality is poor, I'd like to see the provenance of the figures first. I'd also insist on transparency. Basically, some means of allowing Joe Public to access the air quality monitoring station outputs in real time. Like smokeless zones when they were established, I don't see the need (or justification) for a blanket reduction all round the country just because of a few air quality hot spots, mainly in the South East and some big cities. I'd also be worried that the network of gantries (with variable speed limits and cameras) is exactly what they want a mandate for, just so they can then enforce existing speed limits automatically AND roll our road pricing.


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PostPosted: Fri Jan 24, 2014 17:38 
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I am not sure that the IAM should be involved with this type of political issue. In fact I'm not sure about the value of the IAM at all.

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PostPosted: Fri Jan 24, 2014 20:22 
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I think they might see a need to get involved. I see more press releases from them these days and most are OK and fairly sensible.
This is the latest potential fad isn't it - let's face it.
I totally agree this needs hard facts.
I recall briefly going though an 'environmental report' which was trying to show the facts but I cannot say that I as convinced but what I had read - sorry I'll need to dig out the report of course... I had meant to add it on here at the time. but like lots of things lately I haven't managed to make them happen.
It is only hotspots but are the facts truly showing that we need to watch road design. The tv recently reported (in interview) that this was around motorways BUT a nature program shown later then showed (by chance) that nature was really thriving exceptionally well - as it was cut off with motorway all about it ! So on one hand 'we as humans' located by motorways are meant to be doing worse, and kids as they are low to the ground, but then animals checked by motorways are thriving ?
A total contradiction just to start with.
My concern and somewhat skeptical is that they have looked for 'answers' than properly, thoroughly and scientifically research the whole data extensively. But I will get the links and we can thoroughly look at it.

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PostPosted: Sat Jan 25, 2014 00:16 
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Q 6- 9 need to be revised. But WHY should an Institute like IAM feel the need to be dragged into a discussion on what constitutes clean air ? Had they got involved in a survey on how to drive more economically I'd think they were on safer ground.

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PostPosted: Sat Jan 25, 2014 00:54 
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SafeSpeedv2 wrote:
I think they might see a need to get involved. I see more press releases for them these days and most a quit fair enough and fairly sensible. :)
This is the latest potential fad isn't it - let's face it.
I totally agree this needs to hard facts.
I recall briefly going though an 'environmental report' which was trying to show the facts but I cannot say that I as convinced but what I had read - sorry I'll need to dig out the report of course... I had meant to add it on here at the time. but like lots of things lately I haven't managed to make them happen.
It is only hotspots but are the facts truly showing that we need to watch road design. The tv recently reported (in interview) that this was around motorways BUT a nature program shown later then showed (by chance) that nature was really thriving exceptionally well - as it was cut off with motorway all about it ! So on one hand 'we as humans' located by motorways are meant to be doing worse, and kids as they are low to the ground, but then animals checked by motorways are thriving ?
A total contradiction just to start with.
My concern and somewhat skeptical is that they have looked for 'answers' than properly, thoroughly and scientifically research the whole data extensively. But I will get the links and we can thoroughly look at it.


I'm happy to believe it's a real enough problem. Soon, I think airborne pollution is going to overtake smoking in the list of health problems. London is regularly getting fined for breaches of EU air quality by the European Commission. I've had (brief) dealings with this lot and they're pretty switched-on:

http://www.comeap.org.uk/

London is a bit like Athens and Mexico City, but not as bad. It wallows in a bowl of it's own cr4p under certain atmospheric conditions.

Of course, it's by no means all cars, and with the current anti-nuclear sentiment, power generation is unlikely to improve air quality too. I'm not raving "lentilista", but (unlike safety and speed) I can much easier see the connection between air quality and engine power output.

I think the animals are fine because they don't live as long as people and meat animals are killed long before they have the chance to develop the breathing disorders. We don't eat the lungs anyway. I think lead content of animals grazed near busy roads used to be a problem before they banned it from petrol, but am not sure.


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PostPosted: Sat Jan 25, 2014 03:34 
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As far as I can recall (and I'd have to check to be sure from many years back now), the surveys done on lead were all based around a certain area near Birmingham, after the area was swamped with a section of immigrants. Then they said it was effecting learning! But the people they asked the survey questions to, didn't speak English very well!
At the time many people questioned the validity of the reports being quoted (as I recall) but they just ploughed ahead anyway. Now we have unleaded that makes the atmosphere / ozone (which changes shape and size anyway) ... worse off. If any of it truly effects anything anyway !
I do see why the IAM are getting involved, as it relates to driver technique to 'drive for environment' ...

I do get the overall feeling that if one 'dare to disagree' to the environment propaganda machine, that you might feel immediately ostracized for being a 'traitor to the environment' .... but that requires that you 'believe' the whole green mass of issues. They introduce one, then the next, then the next, and before you know it the whole of life has changed around you ! Sound familiar?

It's another old sales technique too of 'create a problem to 'solve', after you have already created a way of solving it! Makes good money every time.

I do think being sensible and looking out for common sense solutions to try and be scientifically sensible as one possibly can be toward 'Mother Nature' is smart and sensible.
If I can place turbine into water and obtain 'free' electricity great, because it makes sense.
We started the modern industrial revolution mostly off water wheel power! Now we are in essence going back to it.
Designing cars which can be built to work with MNature than just abuse 'our world' is simply sensible.
Perhaps a car manufacturer and a Government have played their games for so long, that a straight talk is useless, so they convince and bargain their demands to produce an agreeable solution to them for business. But we do see some benefits and some laughable ideas, but many should have been developed anyway!
The racing car has helped develop standard vehicles too of course. That had little to do with 'environment' but just solving driving issues.
Would we go for sensible scientifically better products anyway ? :D Perhaps some .....

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PostPosted: Sun Jan 26, 2014 01:24 
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It's going back a while now but I think pretty much every heavily-used section of road had quite high concentrations of lead near it. Apparently almost enough to start mining in some places round the M25! I don't think there was any research that said lead from car exhausts made kids think - rather that lead made kids thick and cars produced lead. Either way, there can be little argument that we're not better off without it!

Unleaded isn't any worse for the atmosphere / ozone layer than leaded. It's still the same stuff but without the lead. The lead was just deposited locally (being heavy, it didn't go far).

Personally, I'm much happier to disagree with the "speed kills machine" than with the "saving the planet machine". I know there are sceptics and maybe I'm wrong, but I feel more willing to believe that even if we don't end up with a climate change problem, we're going to run into a supply problem and things will turn nasty.


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PostPosted: Sun Jan 26, 2014 05:48 
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It does need a LOT more research to verify their position...
The 'climate change is seriously unproven' ... see other topic ...

Sensible measures are generally acceptable 'anyway' but taxing people to 'enforce' is not because it is unproven therefore un-necessary.

I am not trying to push this ... got my hands full and it would take a vast amount of time to properly research all the science and facts and figures. Sadly time that i just do not have .... yet! :)

I did a quick look up of leaded / unleaded and foudn this interesting forum page from '99 :
http://www2.abc.net.au/science/k2/stn-a ... 10884.shtm

(Plain Speaking - Clean air act : http://www.epa.gov/air/caa/peg/pdfs/peg.pdf)

:)

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 27, 2014 01:22 
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When it comes to man-made global warming, then yes, the debate rages on (although most scientists appear to agree it's real). When it comes to air quality however (nothing to do with global warming), I don't believe there's any disagreement? It's easy enough to measure what comes out of car exhausts and I think that there's pretty much unanimous agreement that some of the stuff that comes out is bad for you. You might get the odd loony that thinks otherwise, but then, you also get people who think smoking is good for you :loco:

That first link was just a forum like ours with people discussing unleaded vs leaded fuel (with varying degrees of insight)! Even I knew enough to know that some of the posters there were talking complete cobblers. In terms of research value, you may as well just eavesdrop on a group of blokes chatting in a pub!

Didn't read all of the second link, but it looked like a reasonable "kiddies' guide" to the American Environmental Protection Act.


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PostPosted: Mon Jan 27, 2014 14:31 
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Lead in petrol, what can I say ?
Oh, it´s been replaced with benzene.
Lead, ingested in relatively small amounts, causes various nervous system defects.
Benzene, ingested in almost any amount (but mainly lots) causes cancer. I remember the early years in engineering when posters warning about that were around the workshop.
So lead was replaced with benzene, and xylene.
Now, instead of lead poisoning scares, we have scares about benzene fumes from petrol stations!
Tempus: Fugit!
Someone said we don´t eat lungs?
Yes we do. At least we do if you eat beef mince!
As for climate change. Yes, it´s all down to people (at least it is if your money comes from selling scare stories about boiling oceans). A look at the actual temps is interesting. Less than a single degree centigrade in 150 years. Not really runaway heating is it?
And 0.03 degrees C in the last 17 years....
I´m not losing any sleep over it.
Funnily enough, while all the greens are wringing their hands to pulp over the prospect of shale gas, they are ignoring that fact that CO2 emissions from power stations are falling dramatically as they switch to natural gas as a fuel!
Weird!
Of course, we also have to factor-in the bird choppers. Well, at the moment we have a whole 3.5GW of wind energy available, compared to the 17GW from coal and 13GW from gas (nuclear is base at 8GW).
Largely due to the use of wind, we also have 3GW of diesel generation available for short-term use in case of need.
Road tax: I think it ought to be dropped, and the cost transferred to the fuel used.

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PostPosted: Mon Jan 27, 2014 23:59 
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Mole wrote:
I'm happy to believe it's a real enough problem. Soon, I think airborne pollution is going to overtake smoking in the list of health problems. London is regularly getting fined for breaches of EU air quality by the European Commission. I've had (brief) dealings with this lot and they're pretty switched-on:

http://www.comeap.org.uk/

London is a bit like Athens and Mexico City, but not as bad. It wallows in a bowl of it's own cr4p under certain atmospheric conditions.


You weren't around in the '40s and '50s, then?
There's been a slight improvement since! We had smog-lights fitted but they didn't do much good. :D


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PostPosted: Tue Jan 28, 2014 00:37 
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No, it was just a bigger problem then than it is now! Largely s a result of coal-fired homes and industry as much as anything else. Doesn't mean the problem's gone away entirely, it's just less of a problem than it was, and less visible.


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PostPosted: Tue Jan 28, 2014 00:47 
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jomukuk wrote:
Lead in petrol, what can I say ?
Oh, it´s been replaced with benzene.
Lead, ingested in relatively small amounts, causes various nervous system defects.
Benzene, ingested in almost any amount (but mainly lots) causes cancer. I remember the early years in engineering when posters warning about that were around the workshop.
So lead was replaced with benzene, and xylene.
Now, instead of lead poisoning scares, we have scares about benzene fumes from petrol stations!
Tempus: Fugit!

You shouldn't believe everything you read on Wikipedia! Benzene is present in crude oil and has always been present in petrol. They didn't "replace" lead with benzene! The permissible levels of benzene have been progressively reduced over the years as refining technology has improved.

jomukuk wrote:
Someone said we don´t eat lungs?
Yes we do. At least we do if you eat beef mince!

Not sure that's true either (although there might be some unscrupulous operators out there - if they can sneak a horse into a burger... Anyway, the Meat Products Regulations 2003 are supposed to prevent it:

"Uncooked meat products
Certain parts of the carcase of mammalian species may not be used in uncooked meat products (brains, feet, small and large intestine, lungs, oesophagus, rectum, spinal cord, spleen, stomach, testicles, udder ). However, uncooked intestines may be used as casings (for sausages , for example). "


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PostPosted: Sun Feb 02, 2014 00:04 
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Just a follow-up to this. Here are some "real life" figures taken on real cars. I trust the guys who do these measurements. I can vouch for their kit - it's full lab-grade, type-approval specification emissions gear (not MOT station stuff!) and their methodology. They use it (among other things) to get the "What Car? "real life" fuel consumption test figures that they publish when they do road tests.

"The table below shows that the average optimum speed for the top five selling cars in the UK (2011) is 46mph over an 8mph range.

You can also see that for these same vehicles a reduction in speed from 70mph to 60mph improves fuel economy by an average of 22%, but this varies from 15% on the Ford Focus 1.6 petrol and VW Golf 1.6 diesel to 34% on the Vauxhall Corsa 1.3 diesel.

Make Model Fuel Engine size Optimum speed Difference in MPG between 70mph and 60 mph
Ford Fiesta Petrol 1.25 45 23%
Ford Fiesta Diesel 1.6 46 20%
Ford Focus Petrol 1.6 50 15%
Ford Focus Diesel 1.6 42 22%
Vauxhall Astra Petrol 1.6 46 22%
Vauxhall Astra Diesel 1.7 45 25%
Vauxhall Corsa Petrol 1.2 48 19%
Vauxhall Corsa Diesel 1.3 43 34%
Volkswagen Golf Petrol 1.4 45 22%
Volkswagen Golf Diesel 1.6 47 15%

In a separate study we looked at the effect of reducing the speed limit from 30mph to 20mph and while this reduced CO2 emissions, the impact on CO2, NOx and particulates, due to changes in driving style, warrants further investigation.

While reducing speed may deliver one objective it can have a number of knock-on effects; every car has an optimum speed, 60mph is better than 70mph for fuel economy but 20mph is not necessarily better than 30mph for all tailpipe emissions. Factor in other considerations such as air quality, congestion and road safety and the picture becomes even more complex. What can be concluded however, is that robust data should be the cornerstone of any proposed changes to the rules of our roads.
"

Those findings are broadly in line with my own observations on various French cars too.
Sorry, the table formatting has gone pear-shaped and I can't fix it, but you'll get the idea!


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PostPosted: Tue Feb 04, 2014 00:02 
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Thanks Mole. (Like I said I had 'just looked it up quickly' - I had not had time to read it - sorry it wasn't good !) :(

However you have got some good facts in that statement. Have you got a link you can place here or PM me with ? Thanks.

Wasn't the depletion of uranium's increase usage, also a problem with the onset of Cat Converters (along with broken engines of course!)?

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PostPosted: Tue Feb 04, 2014 01:23 
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I'd be interested to know the various power outputs, power to weight ratios and peak torque figures for those cars because at a glance it it is suggesting to me that under powered sheds are uneconomical at motorway speeds so the motor buying public should be buying cars with proper engines to save money :D


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PostPosted: Tue Feb 04, 2014 22:07 
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SafeSpeedv2 wrote:
Thanks Mole. (Like I said I had 'just looked it up quickly' - I had not had time to read it - sorry it wasn't good !) :(

However you have got some good facts in that statement. Have you got a link you can place here or PM me with ? Thanks.


I guess there's no problem as they've put it on their website too now, so it's in the public domain!

http://emissionsanalytics.com/speed-demonisation/

SafeSpeedv2 wrote:
Wasn't the depletion of uranium's increase usage, also a problem with the onset of Cat Converters (along with broken engines of course!)?

No, they don't use uranium in cats. Rhodium, platinum, maybe palladium, I think? I'm not sure the cats caused any broken engines, but the removal of lead from the fuel caused a few problems for older cars that didn't have hardened valve seats.


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PostPosted: Tue Feb 04, 2014 22:18 
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teabelly wrote:
I'd be interested to know the various power outputs, power to weight ratios and peak torque figures for those cars because at a glance it it is suggesting to me that under powered sheds are uneconomical at motorway speeds so the motor buying public should be buying cars with proper engines to save money :D


Hmmm. I guess they'd be easy enough to look up? (just tedious)! In general, small engines do seem to see a bigger percentage drop in fuel consumption at higher speeds than a larger engine (of the same type) in the same car. I think that's just because they are close to wide-open-throttle to maintain the same speed, than the larger engine in the same car. They might, however, still be more economical in absolute terms (e.g. the big engined car might get only 15% thirstier at the higher speed, while the smaller engined car gets 25% thirstier at the same higher speed, but could still be using less fuel than the large engined car).

It's interesting to see the official fuel consumption figures for the same cars with different engine outputs. For example, PSA do a 98bhp and a 130 bhp version of the same diesel engine, but they both have the same fuel consumption and CO2 figures! That's just because of the silly European drive cycle where they both have to do the same speed and maintain the same accelerations. The speeds and accelerations are pretty modest too. The 130bhp version is an identical but "chipped" version of the 98bhp engine. If following the official drive cycle only demands (say) 75bhp as a peak power output to maintain the appropriate speeds and accelerations, the two engines will behave pretty much the same and use the same amount of fuel and produce the same amount of CO2 on the official test! It just highlights how silly the official test is. In reality, the person with the 130 horses at their disposal is likely to use them on occasions though! I'd prefer to see the drive cycle demanding various power outputs between idle and max power for each engine. That would give a fairer representation.


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PostPosted: Tue Feb 04, 2014 23:10 
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teabelly wrote:
I'd be interested to know the various power outputs, power to weight ratios and peak torque figures for those cars because at a glance it it is suggesting to me that under powered sheds are uneconomical at motorway speeds so the motor buying public should be buying cars with proper engines to save money :D

Something I've asserted for years. A car with a certain body will require a set amount of energy to move it. Once moving it will require a separate energy level to maintain motion at a set speed. My assertion is that smaller engined vehicles will require to use a larger proportion of their output for maintenance and hence use a greater amount of fuel than larger engined variants,which will be working at a higher relative efficiency. This was noticed on one Top gear program with JC in a Roomster of lowest power, and jeremy had to use a lot of throttle to keep up in his 70bhp vehicle, and hence more fuel .

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