seen this?

Because you had ignored the red-triangle traffic light sign posted serveral hundred yards from the lights and continued on at the limit?

As soon as I see that sign, or can see the lights, I'll lift off regardless of the posted limit.

The VR's were all 15 degree 12v engines, the current 2.8 V6 is a 24v 15 degree unit. I'm not sure but I think the R32 is still a 15 degree model as it still only has the one cylinder head. So I guess it's technically a V-Reihenmotor (Inline V).

Aren't current ones 3.2?

Only the R32 the rest are 2.8 and they dropped the R a few years back when they changed the engine design to a 24v unit. Though for now the Mk5 isn't getting any V6 units the top of the line will be a 2L 150PS FSI engine in the GT or a

V-Reihenmotor

R32 is 3.2 (probly why its called a 32?)

Ok, to be able to stop within any arbitrarily short amber period from green to red, you'll have to be doing about 8 mph.

As soon as you see a "traffic lights in half a mile" sign, you slow to about 8 mph, even though it is a dual carriageway with 70 mph speed limit, like you just said? Must be, er, interesting. But very law abiding, not like all those nutters roaring past with their horns blaring despite it being a built up area. I'll have to try that and see how it works. Should I wear a hat? ;)

You said that they were timed so you could safely stop from 40mph..... I very much doubt I ever do more than that when there are traffic lights around. OK, so the timings were wrong, but you really shouldn't be doing more than 40mph through a controlled junction like that.

I would guess that's why it's called R32. There currently aren't any other R models to compare with. When I said the V6's are 2.8 I was referring to the normal V6 models not the R32's sorry I wasn't more clear about that. Considering the R is the symbol for VW Racing formally VW Motorsport I wouldn't expect there to be many models bearing the badge I can only think of the one VW Motorsport "production" car that was the 16v G60 limited but that was actually built by the Motorsport technicians.

That is what I meant to say :). Stopping distances quadruple when speeds double. It's something or otherly proportional in maths speak :).

What about just carrying on going - before the adjustment was the amber light showing long enough to carry on at 60mph and get through the lights? If so, then that would be the better option, but if it's touch and go the red light camera does induce panic braking, when in fact it would have been perfectly safe to carry on through at 60mph even if the driver was to *just* cross the line the second the lights turned red.

Anyway, which road are you talking about here? I know West London reasonably well, and can't think of many 60mph zones off the top of my head (depends how far out you're going though).

Peter

The lights going across the junction were timed for 60 mph, yet that was a 30 zone.

And you don't know they set it for forty either, you said you slow down for traffic lights implying that you can stop regardless of the amber interval. You didn't say you assume they're all set to 40 and when I drive around the country I definitely do assume that the traffic lights have a delay consistent with the speed limit that road is set to. I would be surprised if the planning committees are not told to set them that way, too, for extremely obvious reasons.

If I come to lights in a 30 zone, I don't speed up to 40 so as to go through the lights at the correct speed, I make sure I'm not going too fast so that I can stop if the lights go amber, and I have a "committed" point where the lights are changing too late for me to expect to stop, it's a simple law of motion, in order to come to a halt, you decelerate and travel a distance over the time it takes:

v = u + a * t s = u * t + 0.5 * a * t^2

If you are travelling at 20 meters per second, and can decelerate at 0.5 gravities, you take four seconds to come to a halt assuming you get the full half g right to the end.

During that time, you will travel a distance of 40 meters. If the speed limit is 40 (around 20 meters per second for the sake of simplicity) you need an amber interval of about four seconds (20 m/s is 5 m/s^2 times 4) and should decide to brake if you are more than 40 meters from the line. If you are nearer than 40 meters, you will travel over the line before you stop and should go through the lights rather than attempting to stop. If the amber interval is only one second, you will jump the lights up to three seconds later and can only stop if you are travelling at 8 mph (5 m/s = 5 m/s^2 times 1) with 2 - 3 yards to go before you reach the line, about a car's length. And even then, I can wind the amber interval down to half a second or less, although you'll still have the opportunity to stop the car without jumping the lights as you can stop in a car length anyway so my camera can't see your rear numberplate.

So, you have to decelerate to about 8 mph to ensure that you are able to stop at the lights when they are arbitrarily set to have intervals which don't correspond to the speed limit.

Either that, or you drive an inordinately long car like an artic and consider it appropriate to stop blocking the junction, but keeping your rear plate the correct side of the traffic lights thus not technically jumping them (or not getting caught, at any rate.)

Or, you drive like anyone else, at the speed limit unless there is some reason not to. If you're slowing down for the lights, you're hampering traffic flow by increasing the time you, and the cars behind you, are obliged to wait. If the lights are set to too long an interval, they're hampering traffic flow because the cars will wait longer than necessary. It's not rocket science and traffic lights do not exist as a way to slow down the traffic, they exist to speed up the traffic by controlling which cars have the right to get on with their journey.

That's how it should be, sure, once you pass a certain point you are committed to going over as you can't stop anyway. I was on the point of going for it, but hadn't quite got there, so I stopped. As it happened, the lights were red before I reached them, and the car on my left who I had been overtaking, got flashed.

I thought, that can't be right, and investigated why it happened. And, if the lights change at just the right moment, even cars doing 40 or 50 would get caught or would park across the junction, (the latter wasn't happening.) There was an interval from one car to the next, a few cars lengths, so the lights didn't catch someone every time they changed, but I counted several flashes in quite a short time, maybe five minutes.

Er, not sure. I know exactly where it is. Come off the M4 one junction nearer to London than Heathrow and turn southbound, I think it may be the gyratory system but don't quote me on that. The road goes through that section across a roundabout and into a residential area, might be Hounslow, where it's thirty, and there are a procession of lights set to 30 (well, 40 in fact, to allow some leeway) and then bends off and speeds back up towards Feltham, to the east of Heathrow airport.

Very clear black diagonals on a white circle, on all the fast bits, and clear

Remind me where you live so I can avoid the area.

If you don't see a light-controlled junction as a potential hazzard, and back off to a more appropriate speed, then I'd suggest you are a danger to all others around you.

It's absolutely unthinkable for me to sail through a set of lights (even on green) at the limit, when the limit is set at 60mph.

LOL!!!!!!!!!

an artic :)

but good use of maths there, put like you've put it there shouldn't be any reason why you can't stop at a set of lights if the amber stays amber for the length of time it needs to

and as for the "not doing 60 mph through traffic lights", what about the ones on a roundabout round the M25? you can sail through them easily at 60+, so why not?

Because there might be some other f****it also doing 60mph round there.....

that's the Hayes by pass :) (or the parkway if you are going south) the M4 is 60 mph there the road it goes onto is 50 mph south and north bound the lights that you go across after the motorway cross a 50 mph road with a

The parkway, and then the causeway, which were black stripe when I was using it, and which was a fair while ago. Mind you, the M4 was also 70 at the time, and didn't have a bus lane, so there's clearly been some changes.

I don't recall being able to go especially fast around that roundabout, but then the usual thing was to queue up for some time just to get off the M4. Then there was the phasing of the lights at the bottom, which meant you didn't really get the chance to go quickly, and often had the problem of people in the left hand lane staying in the left hand lane all the way round, which made being in the correct lane a bit difficult.

In the end I found I could come up the M3 instead and get to the same place in considerably less time, so the A312 was really only necessary when the M25 was chocka around the M25 / M4 junction heading south, in which case it was sometimes worth taking the M4 instead of trogging around to the M3.

Jesus, I hope you wear the "motorists hat" so that everyone can make allowances for you.