[rks]

Originally Posted by suman

To each his own RKS but - is that the Santro you are referring to that can do supposedly safe swerves at 140+?, I'm outta here before I lose it altogether & crack up.

No offense meant.

Look at my avatar. And better we stop this discussion with you still in a laughing mood. This thread is not about Santro.

[HappyWheels]

Dadu, are you still there?

Got confused as to where is that we were talking about here!

Dadu, When do you plan to take the vehicle to the work shop? Better get it checked asap; read another thread where a Indica was back banged and the owner thought it was just a minor hit, till he took it to the work shop where they found the entire interior of the crash guard damaged.

[gd1418]

No it doesn't mean off the road and I own a Safari as well. It only ensures that these errant moronic drivers stay put in their place and don't do a 'Dadu' to me..

Originally Posted by finneyp

Does that mean off the road? And you own a Scorpio, rite?

I very clearly mentioned the word 'errant'. If to keep them in place I've to become a bully then so be it..:-)

Originally Posted by Steeroid

Bully! Now I understand why certain threads come up here.

[smsrini]

Dadu,

Thank God, you and your family came out safe and sound from the incident.

Sometimes inspite of all precautions we cannot avoid such incidents. It is difficult to predict the moves of other drivers, esp. trucks without signals.

Take care and Drive safe.

[dadu]

I have done some indepth visual and operational inspection myself and do not find any problem, windows opening properly(these will stall first if the door gets a dent into inside), side cladding still seated in place (no gaps), no loose/damaged component noise while driving over bumps etc etc.

But I definitely plan to get the touchup done on the claddings.

Originally Posted by HappyWheels

Dadu, When do you plan to take the vehicle to the work shop? Better get it checked asap; read another thread where a Indica was back banged and the owner thought it was just a minor hit, till he took it to the work shop where they found the entire interior of the crash guard damaged.

[benbsb29]

Originally Posted by rks

On the Mumbai Pune Expressway I do sustained high speeds, including high-speed overtakes, only because I have a relatively small maneuverable vehicle that can swerve at 140+ speeds and there is enough swerving space. Even then I watch the overtaken vehicles very carefully.

rks, while we can all be experts, there maybe one chance where even we commit a mistake. At speeds of 140+, no matter how maneuverable our car is, the magintiude of error gets highly amplified and the results of the same are something which God forbid may ever happen to anyone.

[dadu]

Let me put forth some research here since we are discussing the speeds and its effect.

Crash risk

Speeding increases the risk of a crash and the severity of the crash outcome.

Speed(km/h) - Risk relative to 60 km/h

65 - Double

70 - 4 times

75 - 11 times

80 - 32 times


Risk of a casualty crash at speeds greater than 60 km/h, relative to travelling at 60 km/h, where the speed limit is 60 km/h.






Source

[WhiteKnight]

Originally Posted by dadu

I immediately brake hard and instinctively moved the steering slightly to the left to avoid a direct hit (my wifey told me speedo was at 120).

I was concentrating on the braking, road and handling the safari and then I hear a "thud" on my left, realising that the rear gave way to the left upon hard braking

Dadu, may be I am too observant, but good to know anyway.

I notice that you brake hard and turn slightly to left. But your Dicor's rear stepped out to left too. Normally this should have happend to right-not left. Unless your left rear tyre locked up first. Bad sign no 1

Bad sign no 2- You did not take a hard turn (You didn't have any space), still there was a rear lock up.

Please check your brake bias and brake setting, it doesn't look good to me.

[dadu]

At first looks even I was wondering how'd this happen but looking at the scratch marks again, IMO, the whole vehicle swerved to the left(like a drift) with the front slightly more due to the steering effect(more dent on the cladding of the front door start), otherwise the whole left side should have got dented with apprx the same depth, which also means that perhaps the rear tyres locked up later than expected.

Once I heard the noise I let go of the brakes and turned the wheels slightly into the opposite direction, again instinctively.

Even I was expecting more rear damage than front, but it isnt.

Originally Posted by WhiteKnight

Dadu, may be I am too observant, but good to know anyway.

I notice that you brake hard and turn slightly to left. But your Dicor's rear stepped out to left too. Normally this should have happend to right-not left. Unless your left rear tyre locked up first. Bad sign no 1

Bad sign no 2- You did not take a hard turn (You didn't have any space), still there was a rear lock up.

Please check your brake bias and brake setting, it doesn't look good to me.

[rks]

Originally Posted by benbsb29

rks, while we can all be experts, there maybe one chance where even we commit a mistake. At speeds of 140+, no matter how maneuverable our car is, the magintiude of error gets highly amplified and the results of the same are something which God forbid may ever happen to anyone.

You are right, of course. I made that remark only in the sense that *in principle*, if a high-speed emergency were to occur that requires swerving, then I would be happier with a small, light, maneuverable car than with a big, heavy sedan or SUV. I did not mean to imply that one can happily swerve around at those speeds with impunity. It is definitely fraught with all kinds of dangers and one should anticipate and avoid such emergencies if one wishes to sustain 140+ speeds.

[madan80]

when i was going to bangalore a few weekends back something very similar happend, there was a truck on the extreme left, quite far off.. and it appeared to be going very slowly... and there were a few on the middle lane and the right lane was free.. I was doing about 120.. and was going comfortably, when suddenly the middle trucks decided to overtake eachother and move into the right lane... i had released the acc, and started braking, then i realised that that the trucks have taken up the middle and left right lanes. Since i was still doing about 100, moved to the left lane, and was going... and to my horror realised that the truck on the left lane had broken down...
slammed on the brakes, shifted gears to 2nd (from 5th) and pointed the car left (off the road).

Was pretty relieved when the palio stopped - on the road- with enough manuvering distance - without any wheel locks...

[bblost]

Riding my tBird doing speeds of about 110+.
four lane straight road, great visibility.

A good distance away, a 8 seater stops.
Old lady gets down, starts crossing the road.

My friends riding almost 30 feet behind me honk.

Lady stops comes back towards the 8 seater.

She is now right in front of me.

Slam my brakes and I can feel the road whizzing out.

There is about an inch or two left between me and the lady.

My mud guard had dug into my crash guard and I still have that dent.

Thanked my stars, took off, stopped a few meters away as I realised I was too shaken up to continue riding.


The best thing to do and do and do is practise.

[BaCkSeAtDrIVeR]

Originally Posted by WhiteKnight

I notice that you brake hard and turn slightly to left. But your Dicor's rear stepped out to left too. Normally this should have happend to right-not left. Unless your left rear tyre locked up first. Bad sign no 1

Bad sign no 2- You did not take a hard turn (You didn't have any space), still there was a rear lock up.

Probably my ignorance, but can you / somebody please explain the words in bold?? I understand that if a vehicle brakes hard and is turned towards left, the vehicle should move towards the right??

Won't bad sign No 2 be eliminated if the vehicle had ABS??

[1100D]

Originally Posted by WhiteKnight

I notice that you brake hard and turn slightly to left. But your Dicor's rear stepped out to left too. Normally this should have happend to right-not left. Unless your left rear tyre locked up first. Bad sign no 1

What probably would have happenned, given Dadu says that the car drifted sideways, is that, he initially swerved left while applying brakes at the same time, the rear momentarily stepped out to the right. Dadu applies correction by swerving to the right, at which moment the vehicle starts sliding to the left. The tail Could have fishtailed all the way towards the left but then car gets stabilized by the guard rail. The front left part hits the guard rail first, cos if the rear hit the guard rail, there would be scratches there.

The incident he says happenned very fast, so he might have forgotten about having done the steering correction part. Infact it was hugely because of that he was actually saved from what could have been a big incident.

[WhiteKnight]

Originally Posted by BaCkSeAtDrIVeR

I understand that if a vehicle brakes hard and is turned towards left, the vehicle should move towards the right??

I was refering to rear-end stepping out to right due rear wheel lock up.

Originally Posted by 1100D

The incident he says happenned very fast, so he might have forgotten about having done the steering correction part. Infact it was hugely because of that he was actually saved from what could have been a big incident.

Thank you. Reading your explanation along with dadu's comments clears most of my questions.

Everyone goes through such experiences. Good news is that we all are alive to tell the story. Driving in India every day reminds me that God is very much there, working 24x7