Gas, and fuel-efficient cars, is this true? (1 Viewer)

[Erik.Ha]

Not all SUVs are created equal...

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...ntstory.jsp&1c


(I LOVE MY ML)

 

[Drew Bethel]

The point is that you presented incomplete data to support your point.

 

[Todd Hochard]

If you remove the 20-year old drivers involved in the rollovers of Corvettes and Camaros, they go off the list.

 

[Christ Reynolds]

very true. there is no way for these lists to incorporate the types of drivers these vehicles have. a big reason why volvos and buicks dont flip over as much as camaros is the drivers behind the wheel. i dont see too many old people driving conservatively in a camaro, and i dont see too many young people driving like assholes and hot-dogging it in volvos. a car should never flip over unless a driver does something wrong, unforseen road circumstances are the exception. these lists also cannot incorporate the false sense of confidence that a driver has when driving an suv. the vehicles themselves arent the factor, the idiot drivers are.

CJ

 

[Steve Schaffer]

The average soccermom is cruising down the freeway at a conservative 60 mph, well within safe speed for planned maneuvers in her Expedition, swerves suddenly to avoid a muffler or some other UNPLANNED obstruction that's in the middle of her lane, Expedition flips over and several occupants are killed.

Same lady in Accord swerves to avoid muffler, Accord doesn't flip over, nobody killed.

It's as simple as that. The SUV is just as safe as the Accord driven intelligently and within it's limits during normal driving. It's when the unexpected happens and the driver reacts instinctively that the SUV becomes more dangerous. All the careful defensive driving in the world goes out the window in panic situations, and that's where the SUV falls down.

Equating auto safety only with the vehicle's battering ram capability and plethora of airbags is a fallacy.

 

[BrianW]

No disagreement here, Lew. I should have been clearer. I don't expect hydrogen's bond to oxygen atoms to yield in one direction, but not the other, any time soon. Rather, I was referring specifically to shale oil which, through some ingenious nanobot or organic enzyme technology (for instance), may eventually be extracted without having to burn more oil than we get out of the shale in the process. In that case, just getting it out of the ground is the challenge, not developing an impossible energy cycle. It may actually be just a matter of time. (And money.)

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I remember a Honda sports car concept design (on paper only - no show car) that was a hybrid that used an "ultra-capacitor" instead of a battery. It has since disappeared, and I can't find any trace of it. Does anyone know of any development efforts to incorporate capacitors into hybrid vehicles?

 

[BrianW]

Wow, this conversation has sure taken a different turn.I've always placed a lot of importance on accident avoidance and buy my cars accordingly. (Did I mention that I drive a CRX? ). Perhaps that is fallacious on my part, but I see no reason to change my ways, especially when I think of all the accidents I've been able to successfully avoid in my thirty years of driving.

Again, this is anecdotal data. Please disregard.

 

[Mike Lenthol]

In many years of driving I have never had to swerve to avoid anything, that's what safe following distances are for. I was rear ended though. I was clipped on the front. I was broadsided, reducing my seat to half its width. Those are real world situations, running slalom between squirrels and mufflers is not, at least from my experience and everyone I know.

 

[Erik.Ha]

Sorry, but legally, your scenario doesn't hold water.

Neither driver should "Swerve" at 60 mph on a freeway to avoid a muffler or other similar obstruction. 1. If you are following at a safe distance, at a safe speed, (employing the "3/6/9 second rule", i.e. you should allow three seconds between yourself and the car in front of you, 6 seconds in inclement weather, and 9 seconds in bad weather which is plenty of time to safely change lanes or slow down should your lane be obstructed. This works out to 288/575/864 feet at 65MPH... My ML is rated at 60-0 in 183 feet...leaving me an extra hundred feet to spare... you should be able to stop using the "flinstone method" at these distances) objects WILL NOT DROP FROM THE SKY IN FRONT OF YOU, to the point you have to "SWERVE" to avoid them... If you are obeying the rules, a simple, non-dramatic, blind-spot checked, lane change should suffice to avoid the obstruction. In the RARE instance there is an object such as a muffler in the road that you CANNOT avoid despite adhering to the 3/6/9 second rule, (i.e. both blindspots ocupied by other vehicles, and a non-operating brake system, or it DOES literally fall from the sky) the proper action legally speaking is to slow down as much as is safely possible and to STRIKE THE MUFFLER with your vehicle, which would cause minimal damage to your vehicle. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES should you BLINDLY yank the wheel of an automobile in an unsafe manner or cause a vehicle to travel in a direction you have not visually cleared first... To do so means you are not in control of the vehicle and are driving in a negligent manner per se. This is drivers ed. 101.

This is not a difficult concept to learn. It simply means hammering into a young driver to NEVER yank that wheel. This is how I learned to drive, and I followed the rule my entire life. I have had a couch fall off the truck I was following, with no ill effects (I merely changed lanes safely and kept going), and had a 2x4 fly off a truck I was following on a windy day (I had no where to go, and I watched the 2x4 arc through the air right towards my open window, which it came through at 60 mph striking my left arm, dislocating my shoulder and nearly breaking my arm... But I never swerved, or took my hand off the wheel... I kept my composure, exited the freeway, and threw up on the side of the road...

 

[Mike Lenthol]

Erik.Ha, I really doubt it is 183, it should be on the order of 140 or lower. The misconcpetion noted several times in this thread is that heavier vehicles are harder to stop, the reality is most light trucks and SUVs are comparable to sedans in stopping distance. Look it up folks.

They roll, ok that’s true. But they do not have inferior braking by any means.

 

[Erik.Ha]

Mike... I stand corrected... It is 130... 183 is the SEVENTY to 0 braking distance...

 

[Mike Lenthol]

For reference a brand new 2004 Honda Accord, an epitome of family sedans, is also rated at 130ft braking distance. Almost all decent SUVs and trucks stop under 140 these days.

Typical cars you see on the road:
Midsize sedans:
2004 Honda Civic Ex 145 ft
2004 Acura TSX 137 ft
2004 Acura TL 141 ft
2004 Nissan Maxima 137 ft
2004 Jaguar XJ8 131 ft

SUVs:
2004 Nissan Armada 130 ft

 

[Todd Hochard]

You needn't worry. In 1994, my wife was rear-ended by an Accord traveling at nearly 50mph (she didn't so much as tap the brakes). She hit my wife, who was stopped at a light, with enough force to knock my wife's car into a new Prelude, which was knocked into the back of a Dodge RAM pickup, which was knocked into the back of a Chrysler Minivan.

She walked away (well, had to climb out of the sunroof), and had a stiff neck for a week or so.

 

[Lew Crippen]

Actually that is not true Mike. Check out insurance rates for cars like Corvettes.

 

[Dave_Brown]

I'll agree to that statement. And in the event that a cute little bunny or squirrel should happen to dart out in front of me, I'm gonna crush that little critter and feel bad about it later before I would swerve out of my lane and risk a greater accident then some road kill. I may tap my brakes to give it a sporting chance to clear the road, but that's as far as it goes.
Besides, if I'm in my big ol' gas guzzling-easy to flip over truck or SUV, odds are I can probably safely roll over said furry bunny or muffler with hardly a hitch.
So for those of you worried about playing freeway dodge ball, perhaps you are at fault for all those dangerous swerves and lane changes because your car is to low.....

 

[Drew Bethel]

>>Neither driver should "Swerve" at 60 mph on a freeway to avoid a muffler or other similar obstruction. 1. If you are following at a safe distance, at a safe speed, (employing the "3/6/9 second rule", i.e. you should allow three seconds between yourself and the car in front of you, 6 seconds in inclement weather, and 9 seconds in bad weather which is plenty of time to safely change lanes or slow down should your lane be obstructed. This works out to 288/575/864 feet at 65MPH... My ML is rated at 60-0 in 183 feet...leaving me an extra hundred feet to spare... you should be able to stop using the "flinstone method" at these distances) objects WILL NOT DROP FROM THE SKY IN FRONT OF YOU, to the point you have to "SWERVE" to avoid them... If you are obeying the rules, a simple, non-dramatic, blind-spot checked, lane change should suffice to avoid the obstruction. In the RARE instance there is an object such as a muffler in the road that you CANNOT avoid despite adhering to the 3/6/9 second rule, (i.e. both blindspots ocupied by other vehicles, and a non-operating brake system, or it DOES literally fall from the sky) the proper action legally speaking is to slow down as much as is safely possible and to STRIKE THE MUFFLER with your vehicle, which would cause minimal damage to your vehicle. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES should you BLINDLY yank the wheel of an automobile in an unsafe manner or cause a vehicle to travel in a direction you have not visually cleared first... To do so means you are not in control of the vehicle and are driving in a negligent manner per se. This is drivers ed. 101.

 

[Erik.Ha]

Thanks for making my point... It isn't the Vehicle's fault, it's the driver's. There isn't a vehicle safety system that has ever been designed, or will ever be designed that can overcome the laws of physics, when the person behind the wheel is determined to disobey them.

 

[Philip Hamm]

And you point was....

That since SUVs tend to topple during emergency maneuvers, causing accidents that would have been avoided in cars, people in SUV drivers should just battering ram right through emergency situations? Most drivers first insticnt is to avoid situations, not just drive through them.

Way off topic though.... Time to let this thread die off.

 

[Erik.Ha]

Sorry Philip... You missed the point entirely, or, you have an agenda that wont allow you to see it.

The point is, there is NO REASON a safe driver EVER needs to swerve to avoid an accident, or "battering ram through it" as you so ridiculously put it. Leave enough distance, drive at a safe speed, put down the cell phone and the make-up mirror, and driving becomes a lot less dramatic.

Stop blaming a vehicle for the idiocy of those driving them.

What you seem to be arguing is "since some people drive SUVs unsafely, nobody should be allowed to drive them." By that argument ALL MOTOR VEHICLES SHOULD BE PULLED OFF THE ROAD THIS SECOND, because there are morons driving every type of vehicle made, from mopeds and bicycles, to garbage trucks and airplanes, and everything in between.

 

[Todd Hochard]

Stick a fork in this one, it's done.

Some people will have to be dragged kicking and screaming toward new technologies and better ideas. It's always been that way, and I expect it always will be.