Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

[Mega]

VERY Bad news!
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...ts-881401.html

Your going to get 55MPH back again!
Mike

[metalman]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

VERY Bad news!
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/wo...ts-881401.html

Your going to get 55MPH back again!
Mike

funny! first run a housing bubble. then when it busts, slow the traffic and turn off the lights. that'll fix it! finally, an gov't even more stupid than ours!

[Slimprofits]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

Hate to admit it, but I've become a wimp when it comes to speeding, especially on the "gantlet" section of Highway 101 between Willits and Santa Rosa, California on which the state police prescence is strong.

I bought a two-door coupe, V6, Accord in the fall '06 and than wracked up two tickets within the next year. Took traffic school online (what a joke!) to reduce one point and have dialed back from averaging 75 on smooth sections to staying at 65.

Also have taken to the hypermiling tactics. The other day, traveling downhill and south on the 101, I drove five miles in legs of two and three miles in neutral.

[c1ue]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

B,

You should know, by CA law you can request a 12 hour driver safety class in lieu of a ticket - even if you've had one 8 hour class in the last 18 months.

You can only have one of these every 12 months though.

Look it up in the CA vehicle code - you will need to specify it in front of the judge.

I've successfully employed it and all without a lawyer, in fact I am responsible for a traffic judge in the CA wilds putting it into practice for the first time.

[Slimprofits]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

C1ue,

I screwed up and didn't attend traffic school after the first ticket, missed the deadline.

[nitroglycol]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

funny! first run a housing bubble. then when it busts, slow the traffic and turn off the lights. that'll fix it! finally, an gov't even more stupid than ours!

Well, if the purpose of this is to deal with a housing bubble, this is indeed extremely stupid. If the purpose is to reduce fuel consumption, though, it's a bold move.

[c1ue]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

B,

Well, unless your insurance was seriously affected, not a big deal.

3 years and its gone.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

Well, if the purpose of this is to deal with a housing bubble, this is indeed extremely stupid. If the purpose is to reduce fuel consumption, though, it's a bold move.

Fifty-five MPH never saved a bit of fuel.

I can remember having to brake going downhill instead of coasting downhill; this was when the U.S. had a 55 limit, strictly enforced. Upon leaving West Yellowstone and going into Idaho, the cops used to sit at the bottom of the long grade, and there they would write tickets for coasting. Tickets for saving fuel!

Needless to say, the 55 limit in the U.S. was a racket used by cops to shove people around and to rob travelers on the highway. No-one liked the 55 except for the eco-frauds and the cops, but it took years of agony before the 55 was finally quashed.

More than once, I fell asleep at the wheel driving 55, once ending up in the median of an interstate highway. The 55 never saved lives either; traffic safety was another lie about the 55 limit.

To-day, the only jurisdiction still in love with snail driving is British Columbia. Here in B.C, there are 50 and 60KPH limits (32MPH and 38MPH limits) on most rural roads on Vancouver Island. The odd freeway, and they are rare in B.C, has speed limits of 90KPH ( 56MPH ), again strictly enforced.

Spain and British Columbia are ruled by eco-nuts, and this is the result.:rolleyes:

[nitroglycol]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

Fifty-five MPH never saved a bit of fuel.

This chart suggests otherwise (apologies for the units):

Furthermore, in Spain the lower speed limits will have much less downside than the same limits would have in Canada or the US, because the country is much smaller and cities much closer together.

Interesting too to note the variation in optimal speeds. Most of them seem to have a plateau or a bimodal distribution, but the Cutlass has basically only one peak - at 55 mph (90 km/h).

[c1ue]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

Steve,

Wind resistance is a non-linear function.

If you don't believe me, then try face planting while water sking - first at 10 mph, then at 20.

At 30, the water attains the consistency of concrete.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

Steve,

Wind resistance is a non-linear function.

If you don't believe me, then try face planting while water sking - first at 10 mph, then at 20.

At 30, the water attains the consistency of concrete.

Driving 70MPH for most of the way from Watsonville, Cal. to Victoria, B.C. I burned exactly $90 US in fuel, for a distance driven of 1000 miles. Here in the Victoria area, I drive 18miles round-trip between Langford and East Sooke, and my cost is $3.50 for the round-trip.

My car is a Toyota Echo. Fuel costs are $1.419 per litre in Victoria, and in the U.S. early in July, the fuel costs averaged around $4.399 per US gallon.... You do the math.

Remember, my speeds were 70MPH coming up to Victoria, and my speeds here in the Victoria area for my round-trip to get groceries are 32MPH to 38MPH with one stretch of road at 50MPH. I do not warm my car up before driving it, and I coast as much as possible. In delayed traffic, I shut the engine off immediately. I try to accelerate as little as possible, and I drive in the highest gear possible without severely lugging the engine.

My quick mental calculation is something like 30 MPG in Victoria, and something like 42 MPG on the trip. But you do the math.

The poor gas mileage in Victoria I attibute to three things: 1.) Ethanol is in the gas in BC to satisfy the eco-nuts, and ethanol has less energy in it as a fuel than does gasoline; 2.) The automatic choke makes short trips fuel inefficient; 3.) The low speeds demanded by the eco-nuts in BC are fuel inefficient.

[nitroglycol]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

The poor gas mileage in Victoria I attibute to three things: 1.) Ethanol is in the gas in BC to satisfy the eco-nuts, and ethanol has less energy in it as a fuel than does gasoline; 2.) The automatic choke makes short trips fuel inefficient; 3.) The low speeds demanded by the eco-nuts in BC are fuel inefficient.

1 and 2 are quite plausible actually. Depending on how your car is geared, the particular speeds may be very critical. Look at the plot for the Supra on that chart, for instance. At a constant speed of 70 mph, it indeed gets better mileage than at 38 mph... but it's better still at 60, and best of all at 25.

[c1ue]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

Steve,

I don't know Victoria at all, but it certainly sounds like you are comparing highway driving vs. city driving.

Next time you take that trip, try this instead: Fill tank and drive 70 MPH one way. Fill tank again, then 50 MPH back.

Notwithstanding the Prius' official city MPG being higher than highway MPG, regenerative braking captures only a portion of momentum and the jury is still out as to how these systems hold up over time. I suspect that number simply ignored the battery state. Plus I'm fairly sure all cars with regenerative brakes also have friction brakes; generator needs and stopping needs rarely coincide.

It may very well be that once lifetime expenses are taken into account, that a hybrid with a regenerative braking system is actually a net financial loss well past $7 gas range.

[Starving Steve]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

1 and 2 are quite plausible actually. Depending on how your car is geared, the particular speeds may be very critical. Look at the plot for the Supra on that chart, for instance. At a constant speed of 70 mph, it indeed gets better mileage than at 38 mph... but it's better still at 60, and best of all at 25.

Even if modern aero-dynamic vehicles were more fuel efficient at 25MPH than at 70MPH, a point which I doubt, I don't want government pushing me around and telling me how I have to drive.

As a small boy in northern Minnesota, my family taught me why Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal saved America from starvation. When I lived in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, I learned how democratic socialism had saved the people on the Cdn Prairies from starvation, not only during the Depression, but right up to the end of the 1950s. How is it then that in B.C. and in Spain now, socialism has come to mean intrusive environmentalism and hostility toward drivers--- to the point of instituting snail-driving?

How is it that a candidate running for president of the United States who promises affordable healthcare for all, apparently has an environmental agenda which is hostile to oil drilling and the atomic energy industry? How could a Democrat be hostile to any energy development which might lower the cost of living and help people to survive?

And then we have Al Gore and his drowning polar bears.... What is he doing in the Democratic Party? Who gives a sh*t about polar bears and the junk science of global warming? Shouldn't Democrats be concerned about people making a living and being able to survive, not polar bears?

[renewable]

Re: Spain:- Lights out/Speed limts cut!

And then we have Al Gore and his drowning polar bears.... What is he doing in the Democratic Party? Who gives a sh*t about polar bears and the junk science of global warming? Shouldn't Democrats be concerned about people making a living and being able to survive, not polar bears?

A 1 meter rise in sea levels would inundate 15% of Bangladesh for example, increasing starvation in the region. You may not care about Bangladeshi people, but you may care about increases in your federal tax to pay for flood defenses in places like Florida, Maine & Louisiana.

You describe global warming as junk science. Which particular component of the enhanced greenhouse effect theory do you disagree with?
1) Non-anthropomorphic CO2 causes a greenhouse effect
2) Man has increased the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere
3) An anthropomorphic increase in CO2 causes an enhanced greenhouse effect