lanemeyer

Can't believe I didn't get pulled tonight, I'm so conditioned to ignore the V1 laser warning in the city I blew off 2 15 second bursts before I had a visual and tapped the brakes. Got lucky. ****er was literally leaning out the window pointing it back into traffic from the shoulder near North Ave. southbound. The pigmobile was facing south. Not very subtle but he had me.

shortyq

I've been commuting LSD for 20 years now, and have seen laser on LSD for quite some time (at least 3 years). The laser units used to be traded between different districts. It must be downtown's turn. Laser is tough in heavy traffic, since it's a point and shoot, then chase affair. More often than not, I see them north of Montrose where the pickins are sweeter.

FYI, those darn audi rings and that chrome grill are what give laser it's target acquisition.

Scott J

robtro

actually... i found this out. i used to be a cop, in hawaii - which is an all laser state. this is one of the reasons why their front licence plate law is extremely heavily enforced.

when i got back here to chicago last year i found out that its the goal to have illinois become an all laser state as well... im not sure how true this is, but it sounds about right. a lot of the suburban PD's around me (NW burbs) have at least 1 LTI 2020 unit for training, the FTOs (field training officers) are rotating it around in patrol shifts to get everyone certified on them.

a misconception about laser: its not as easy and perfect as everyone thinks. when you look through the sight there's a single red dot that you have to align with a reflective point on the car, which can take several tries to get an accurate reading. laser is actually quite a bit more difficult than a radar, for obvious reasons, in fact i hated using them.

if a cop is good, he'll clock you quicker than you can say four rings. my suggestion, dont put a front licence plate on your car. that way there's almost a 100% change there will be several re-shoots before there's an accurate reading. i hear people say that the cant clock a car going away from you. that's wrong too - the only difference is that the laser shows a negative reading instead of 56mph, it'll say -56mph. heh, some of them even print reciepts out that can be used in court, we had to submit them with the tickets.

all in all, i hate laser. there's my morning rant.

shortyq

One of the patrol officers for LSD owns an audi I service. She hates it too. The only time it's really an effective tool, is with 'chase' doing the work for the shooter. She equated it to shooting a dog, then chasing it down to give it a ticket.

The problem of no front plate in Chicago is that it's a great revenue generating parking ticket. I tried the plate in the windshield thing, that doesn't work well. But in the egg shaped audis, blacked out chrome and no plate is almost an invisible target, put more simply, there are easier targets to tap.

Laser works on reflection, the brighter the metal (read rings and chrome) or the bigger the reflective footprint (front plate), the quicker the acquisition.

More Laser trivia: Your friends at Geico Insurance have a program in place that underwrites the cost of laser units to police departments nation-wide. Are you in good hands?

As I'm sure Robtro knows, just about all stationary radar units (that includes all of CPD's k-band units) can get you coming or going, and the CPD k-40 units can also get you coming or going while on the roll, and most of the LSD units are the dual head read type, so confused cops are hard to find on LSD. Best rule of thumb, if you can see him at all in front or behind you, he has your speed.

Scott J
'91 v8
'84 RS2URQ Project
'85 FJ1387 Yamaha

lanemeyer

and thankfully rarely drive on LSD, except in the wee hours of the morning. This is the first run in I've had with laser in the city.

lanemeyer

WTF? Did you pimp that line from Pres. Bush?

robtro

bush pwns.

DaveyKid

Good luck figuring it out though.

Cameron

Front plate is laser's favorite target.

Cameron

... my Lambo got hit with laser awhile back.

90mph or so on I-90... for some reason, he didn't chase.