In terms of chances, you are right that your chances of being involved in an accident on the m'way are much higher just by using the thing BUT the chances are you'll be killed if a vehicle hits you whilst outside of your protective cage...
I found an article saying that 250 people a year are killed on motorway hard shoulders, equating to 1 in 9 motorway deaths. I find this hard to believe - this implies that 2500 people are killed yearly on the motorways.
Looked again, it's 250 KSI. Another article (dated 2000), says 12 are killed every year, which puts the number of deaths overall at 108 per year.
So there you have it : Your chances of being killed on the motorway are
1:9 if you're stopped 8:9 if you're moving.Pete.
Please stop trying to do risk calculations you're obviously not suited to it.
Motorway fatalities per year are usually around
60 car drivers, 50 car passengers, 20 bikers, 30 goods vehicle drivers and 30 pedestrians.
I'm not disputing that (i'd be pretty stupid to!), what i'm saying is that you're probably less likely to be involved in an accident if you're sat on the hard shoulder, compared to actually driving along the motorway.
Not if the cars with passengers on motorways average around 2 passengers per driver.
I know alot about priorities. A person stuck on the hard shoulder is in far more danger than they realise.
Pete Smith mumbled:
You mean if I have 9 goes on the motorway I'm going to get killed during eight of 'em? Good job I'm a better than average driver, innit!
In article , Conor writes
The clueless, the mechanically incompetent, the physically weak, the panic-stricken, those who think manual effort is undignified, etc., etc.
"Nick Finnigan" mumbled:
Not sure they do though. Possibly around a Bank Holiday!
How about the person who, for the first time, discovers he cannot remove a wheelnut without bending the supplied brace? In that case, I had a pump with me and pumped up the tyre, travelled about 250 yards, did the same again and reached a tyre place. I now have an extending wheelbrace in the car!
Tom.
Actually, it was exactly that I was thinking about. The wife can't do it and neither can Mum. Neither could manage jump leads either...hands not strong enough to open the clips. I can think of several drivers I know who couldn't manage for a variety of reasons like that.
At a rough guess I'd say 1 in 20 drivers couldn't manage easily.
I like free services like that. Took my Fiesta van into the local Ford RapidFit for a brake checkup, with the symptoms being that the brake pedal travel was a bit far. They came out with a quote for something like £32 per tyre for a set of new tyres (which were needed) plus £7 for valve, balance and disposal. And that was plus VAT, and for budget tyres. I got a set from Bracknell Tyre + Battery for £38+vat fully inclusive.
Regarding brakes, they told me I needed new front discs and pads, and surprisingly said the rear shoes were fine (about half worn). I had inspected the front pads myself and knew they were low, but getting the rear drums off is a bit of a pain, so it was nice that someone else did it for me!
Peter
That's Life - or not, as the case may be.
Christ on a bike! Am I missing something here or are you just being argumentative for the sake of it? What is your fundamental problem with, and I paraphrase, "many people won't be able to change a wheel?"
Lets think about this for a bit shall we? Here's my list of groups who'd need assistance.
Many women[1]; the elderly; those with back problems; those who've had QuakFut tighten the nuts to 300Nm; people stuck in the middle of nowhere with no light at night; those with an o/s gone on the hard shoulder.
I think that's at least the 1 in 20 the previous post mentioned and I'm sure there are others[2].
Conor mumbled:
No, like I said, roughly 1 in 20 drivers is probably not physically capable of changing a wheel. There's a hell of a lot of elderly or disabled drivers out there, you know.
For example, my wife's not strong enough to lift a wheel and her hands aren't strong enough to get the wheel trim off and she doesn't have the coordination to get a lever behind it to pop it off. She can't lift the bonnet to get at the jack anyway 'cos she can't lift it high enough to get the prop under it. Even if she could, she'd have immense trouble placing the jack and winding it up and getting the nuts back on their studs afterwards would take for ever. Then she wouldn't be strong enough to manage the wheel-brace, and even a long extension wouldn't help 'cos she can't balance well enough to get one foot onto it.
It ain't stupidity, it's disability.
The people whos wheelbrace has snapped on over tight wheel nuts!!!!
Classical paradoxical injunction !
Tom Saul raved thus:
::: "Conor" wrote: :::: "AstraVanMan" mumbled: :: :: :::: Quite. And anyway, not everone /can/ change a wheel. :: ::: Apart from those physically disabled, why not? :: :: How about the person who, for the first time, discovers he cannot :: remove a wheelnut without bending the supplied brace? In that case, :: I had a pump with me and pumped up the tyre, travelled about 250 :: yards, did the same again and reached a tyre place. :: I now have an extending wheelbrace in the car!
Or those who, when their new car gets it's first flat, go to change the wheel onlt to find the dealer supplied wheelbrace fits the three standard wheel bolts but not the locking bolt key :o( Brand new car too, with all the kit supplied by the dealer. Lol, I got the dealer to come out and change the wheel *and* got the guy to leave his wheelbrace...
Abo
John Laird raved thus:
:: On Mon, 11 Aug 2003 13:17:07 +0100, "Makhno" wrote: :: :::: There should be more engineered "pull-ins" to the side of the hard :::: shoulder with a small stretch of armco, for emergencies. It would :::: be sensible to have them next to the emergency phones for the :::: 0.000001% who don't have a mobile ;-) ::: ::: The only reason I bought a mobile was because I broke down, made it ::: to an AA phone box, and found the thing wsn't working! ::: Fortunately, I made it to a service station. :: :: The AA still *have* phone boxes ?! I have an old key somewhere, but :: I thought they'd gone the way of the ark. :: :: I've broken down twice in recent years on motorways. It is most :: definitely *not* a fun place to be - even with a floor mat draped :: over the barrier my bum was numb in minutes, and the road noise is :: terrible, even on a slip.
Agreed. My mates and I were coming back from Monsters of Rock when our old Tranny van broke down on the M1. It was baking sunshine with no shelter - the van shadow was being cast on the o/s of the van so we couldn't sit there. I had a go at bodging the van (It was my mate's, and I'd bodged it so many times from roadside breakdowns the whole van was basically one big roadside repair!), but to no avail.
Abo
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