SkiingInABlueDream

Two questions, spurred by a recent pre-sense warning in my car, along with another recent thread.
1. I have two pre-sense settings in my car: An on/off check box and a "quickness" setting for the warning (early/medium/late/off). Question: What's the difference between disabling pre-sense in the first option (the check box) and setting "off" in the early/medium/late/off option?

2. Does anyone else think pre-sense is useless? In 3.5 months Ive had this car, it's issued warnings maybe 3-4 times total, and every time was when I was intentionally crawling on the bumper of the car in front of me because that driver was inappropriately left-lane blocking. Besides being incredibly startling, the last thing I need is my car distracting me to the dashboard when Im laser focussed on a rear bumper <1 car length ahead, ready to brake aggressively in case that person ahead decides to be even more of a douche than Im being. Not to mention keeping aware of whats behind me so that *I* dont get rear ended if I need to panic brake.
I turn the system off - I think pre-sense isn't designed for driver's like me.

gguy

VM

So let me get this straight - YOU were creating a dangerous situation by being inappropriately close to the vehicle in front of you? And you're upset that a safety system is... interfering with your 'careful management' of the dangerous situation that you are intentionally creating?

Frankly, let me go on a bit of a rant:
1) If the vehicle in front of you, as is increasingly the case, is a 'tall vehicle', then quite frankly, from an A4, you can't see what's in front of them, so you have no idea why they are driving the way they are. Even if the vehicle in front of you is the same height as you, there may be other things blocking your view. Nothing pisses me off more than being honked at because someone behind me doesn't realize that there's a pedestrian/cyclist/etc that THEY can't see that I am trying to avoid hitting. It's very easy to be judgmental and impatient when you can't see what the other driver is seeing. Also, if _I_ do something reckless to appease some impatient idiot behind, and that reckless act hurts someone - guess what, it's my *** on the line. (I have long believed that people who honk should be liable if the person being honked at proceeds to hurt someone, but that's another story)
2) Is there any reason you can't maintain a reasonable distance, go into the next lane, and pass this person? Even if arguably passing on the right is not exactly ideal, it's likely no less illegal than what you were doing and probably safer.
3) There are plenty of other distractions that could interfere with your little ticking time bomb. What if, say, your phone rings at exactly the wrong time and the ringing distracts you for long enough to mess with your careful distance management and you rear-end the person in front of you who happened to slow down further to make a left turn?

I can only hope that some day you are driving behind James Bond and he has a button to make some spikes fall out of his car and right under your tires... or maybe his friends can lift your car with a helicopter and drop you off a cliff...

VM

Or get the adaptive cruise control... which has a way of lowering stress/anger/etc at slower drivers in front because you largely don't need to take any action in response to them.

(That being said, it can lead to the opposite situation. I've sometimes looked down at my virtual cockpit and been shocked at how slowly I was going [in the right lane], whereas in a car without adaptive cruise I would have passed those people long ago...)

StKnowhere

SkiingInABlueDream

LOL, nice!

One of these days I'll learn not to post stuff on the internet when I'm feeling flippant! I should be raked over the coals for this thread, no doubt.

SkiingInABlueDream

Well, yeah pretty much. But really, in that situation the dashboard warning is actually increasing risk due to distraction. Now the auto-braking function (assuming my car has it, which IDK) did not activate. So maybe I'm not actually thaaaat close.


In response to your specific points:
1: I dont do what you describe, in any of those situations you describe. Tailing tall vehicles in a low vehicle is pointless. And if you can't see what's in front of the vehicle in front of you then there's no basis to assume that the driver is a rude left-lane blocker. So I dont make that assumption. And you dont see many pedestrians or cyclists on highways.
2: If there are other lane(s) available to pass and get on with my business then yeah I do that. It's not about inciting road rage for fun.
3: Yes, antagonistic tailgating incurs risk above the normal risks in driving on the road. One would be foolish to think otherwise. That's also why I dont do it very often. And yes I know it only takes one F up.

James Bond would never be part of a rolling roadblock. He's much too smart and polite. :-)

StKnowhere

SkiingInABlueDream

Nice video! And yes I've done a few HPDE's. From '05 to '07 I did two 2-day events at each of Watkins Glen and New Hampshire Speedway in the WRX. The Glen was faast and NH is tight. Very rewarding and in fact it did more or less completely eliminate my desire to try to drive at 10-tenths on the street. That's not to say I dont occasionally enjoy apexing at sub-tire-squeal speeds on clearly open roads, but yeah my HPDE experiences were eye opening!

irenesbob

I am not always a super fan of your posts, but on this I see your point. In my car 3 or 4 times I have had some nanny device slam on my brakes when I was sort of quickly backing up in a tight area. Once I was trying to make U-turn and get out of a crowded parking lot where a delivery truck without notice just stopped dead ahead of me and started slowly delivering product to a shop. I did this not only to get out of there myself, but to get out of the way of the drivers behind me who might see my balding head and think “this old fart will be there forever, I’m stuck here for half an hour.”
As I backed up carefully but with a quick jab at the throttle, watching the mirrors and the rearview cam (and with a pedestrian outside showing me with his hands how many feet I had left before hitting the side of the building) the car decided to slam on the brakes, shaking the whole car and making a noise like an impact. The first time it scared the stuff out of me. These “safety” systems I believe are designed to make up for driving deficiencies of the typical dulled almost-drivers we too frequently see at the wheel these days. Anyone who is actually in control of their vehicle does not need a lot of them. Some are great assists and guides, but jamming on the brakes when I was three feet away from the building and totally planning what to do next was really ****ty.
On the interstate today I was amazed at the number of drivers (both directions) who had no headlights on in a blinding downpour with a dark, overcast sky. In NY you must put headlights on when it is raining enough to warrant wipers. In the midst of this every few miles there was a cop parked with their radar on (yes, I have a detector though I don’t speed) waiting to catch a speeder but totally ignoring the dozens of cars (probably 1 in 3) that zipped past them with no headlights on. To me, no headlights in heavy rain is much more of a dangerous thing than a little speeding. End of my rant lol