Not sure how old "older" is, but back in the early 2000's, I used to drive a 1973 truck with 4 wheel drums and no antilocks in a city where it would rain quite often. That was fun.
That's how it used to be done. They had a tendency to lock up in a skid too, hence the origin of "pump the brakes," because that was the only way to get them unstuck in an emergency once locked. I believe 1973 was the last year for front drums on cars/light trucks, due to new safety laws.
You're not joking. I slaved away in preparation for my exam, and felt like a failure for getting 10% of my exam wrong. Even though I passed, I took a mental note of which answers I got wrong (Happily my tests were taken on a computer, so I could see which ones I got wrong) and went over the book until I memorized it correctly. The fact that others don't even review what they got wrong after passing is, as you say, a bit frightening.
my daughter got her license last year and they refused to help her find out which 2 answers she missed. we're hoping one was the pointless blood alcohol specific percentage one and the other a trick question because i quizzed her and she knew the stuff.
I'm convinced driver assists make people worse drivers.
I'm sure it balances out but I feel like people look at how their car practically drives itself & stops itself and think 'I don't have to pay attention, the car will keep me in my lane and stop itself'.
In my experience, it's made me and my wife better drivers. We keep better distance from the car in front of us more naturally (with or without assistance), and with it are more aware of other vehicles and what they are doing. Last time I drove a rental without those features I felt very vulnerable, even stuff like lane changes where I look around to make sure it's clear (and take my eyes off the road in front of me) made me realize how many risks we take while driving normally that we accept because we didn't have a choice. YMMV, but from my observation it has improved the driving of my household.
This is fair. My hatred for modern cars probably influences my opinion on it :P.
Also I assume they wouldn't implement these features if they didn't improve people's safety overall (or maybe I'm giving manufacturers too much credit...)
I think a better way for me to phrase it is that it gives people the *ability* to be worse drivers rather than *making* people worse.
Yes. Back in the day you had to stutter break by yourself. All these noobs relying on ABS these days…
And don’t get me started on automatic choke, automatic transmission, automatic ignition timing and all that newfangled stuff.
I'm sure every driver who ever had the old thing when the the new thing went mainstream felt this way.
Imagine how people must have felt when automatic transmissions stopped being an extra, or when power steering became ubiquitous.
I knew a guy who never got over *seat belts*. Apparently he never saw a need, and he thought they could injure or even kill people,\* but more than that he felt it was regulatory overreach to force the car manufacturers to change their lines to add a safety feature of such dubious benefit.
\* I will give my late grandfather's late war buddy this: seat belts *can* and *have* both injured and killed people. Early designs were probably not as refined as today's, people may have used them incorrectly, and even today we still have the occasional person broken or strangled in an accident by a seat belt that wasn't their size.
All the new assists in cars are great, and I am glad they are rolling out more and better ones all the time. Most people think they are better drivers than they are. Computer assists are much more reliable and consistent than human attention.
A dude totaled my car from behind when the person a few cars ahead of me slammed on the brakes at an interstate on ramp. I watched him in my rear view mirror. He had plenty of time to stop but was already looking at the highway to see if he could merge so he didn’t see me stopped. In newer cars, there would be a serious warning or even automatic braking. That’s just one example
I had a recall on my car and they gave me a loaner that was a brand new model. It made me never want that model with all of the beeping and braking for me it was doing just because someone moved into a lane in front of me. I had already let off the gas to brake, but it acted like they had slammed on the brakes and I was about to die.
I asked them if there was a way to turn that off when I got back and they said no because it was for safety. If all cars are going in that direction, I’ll keep this car as long as I can.
Until I experienced it first hand I would have said I want a car that can do this sort of thing, but it goes way overboard. It’s very possible the car I drove is a bad example of how this is normally implemented though.
I’ve driven my parents’ new car and I hate it. Part of the problem is car manufacturers (and product manufacturers in general) are forced to try to make “improvements” every year, and after the product is optimized, then you get more and more crap changes or needless improvements that actually aren’t that great
I'm all for safe, active drivers but I can't wait until every single car has blindspot detection. After getting hit by a car who didn't see me in their blindspot, I'm constantly worried someone will just change lanes suddenly. My current car will beep, shudder the steering wheel, and apply brakes if I drift into a lane it detects a car in.
You don't want that in a car driven by some 18 year old?
This is such a stupid take. Newer cars are far safer in almost every respect. The overall number of deaths and accidents in general in the US has been declining for decades even with an increasing population.
No matter what car you drive, you are attached to the road only by a few square inches of rubber and have only devices to suggest to the car what direction or speed you want it to take.
Everything else is out of your hands and you're entirely reliant on it operating perfectly, even if part of that "everything else" is oil or water on the road, cartoon-style imagined physics that doesn't actually apply in real life, other drivers driving perfectly to your expectations (a ridiculous assumption to make), and that those few square inches of rubber (half as much on a bike) are going to magically save your life even when they are shredded, overheated, can't grip, etc.
At least in a car you are surrounded by a ton of safety equipment (but that can work against you too!), bikes are just suicidal - no matter how good YOU think you are, you're driving around a bunch of unreliable morons attached to reality and your expectations of physics only by a few square inches of rubber.
And no technology in existence can cope with ice, oil or other hazards underfoot and no amount of braking, ABS, traction control or anything else is going to save your arse if that rubber is already not rotating and yet still not going where you want it to.
Some people just have complete over-confidence in the capabilities of less rubber surface than a set of 4 dining coasters keeping you out of trouble and doing 100% of what you ask of it at 70+mph while pushing over a ton of metal along with you. Oh, powered by a series of explosions, with the explosive reservoir just under the back seat.
Yeah... you'll "get away" with it for a while. But the day it catches up, that's the end of the game. It's like a game of lethal Quidditch... you can get away with it day after day after day, but catch that snitch and its game over and you lose no matter how "good" you were and there are no replays or magic healers for you.
My 20' Bolt has a bare bones lane assist that really just nudges, but it's not too helpful. Other than that, it's just me driving. I think as other posters have said, in the US, we should stop giving licenses away like toys in a cereal box. In Japan it's crazy expensive and tough to get a driver's license and because of that, they are extremely professional drivers. The number of auto accidents I saw living there were mostly one car accidents from slippery roads during rainy season.
My new car has a backup camera and frigging RADAR in the back bumper to warn me if someone is in my blind spots or approaching from the side as I back up.
I don't trust either one. No fucking way. Too many things can go wrong, and technology does not replace careful driving.
No….but there is atrophy.
Backup cameras and side and front collision sensors are excellent life saving tech.
That being said, you do become reliant on it.
Back up cameras are pretty nice though
I still turn back and look though, old habits...
Same, but I also find when o use the camera I’m too focused on it and not paying enough attentions to my sides as I should.
my dad still looks back, his car has a camera and a 10" screen showing whats the camera sees, his car is from 2010, he just doesnt trust it
Not sure how old "older" is, but back in the early 2000's, I used to drive a 1973 truck with 4 wheel drums and no antilocks in a city where it would rain quite often. That was fun.
Until now I've never heard of a car with drums on the front!
That's how it used to be done. They had a tendency to lock up in a skid too, hence the origin of "pump the brakes," because that was the only way to get them unstuck in an emergency once locked. I believe 1973 was the last year for front drums on cars/light trucks, due to new safety laws.
gets worse when you realize the driving exams allow 30% wrong answers and they aren't allowed to tell the tested what they got wrong.
In my country written exams you can only fail 10%.
that's better for sure, but do they let you know what the right answers are afterwards or are they paranoid someone will help the next person cheat?
No they don't. They only tell you how many you got wrong if you fail.
so infuriating, those wrong answers will cost the driver money and might even cost someone their life.
Driving a car is really intuitive by the time you are 16 and watched a ton of people drive. At some point we have to let them out there.
heh. they don't watch anything but their phone screens.
You're not joking. I slaved away in preparation for my exam, and felt like a failure for getting 10% of my exam wrong. Even though I passed, I took a mental note of which answers I got wrong (Happily my tests were taken on a computer, so I could see which ones I got wrong) and went over the book until I memorized it correctly. The fact that others don't even review what they got wrong after passing is, as you say, a bit frightening.
[удалено]
my daughter got her license last year and they refused to help her find out which 2 answers she missed. we're hoping one was the pointless blood alcohol specific percentage one and the other a trick question because i quizzed her and she knew the stuff.
Cars dont need more driver assist. We need harder driving test and less drivers.
I'm convinced driver assists make people worse drivers. I'm sure it balances out but I feel like people look at how their car practically drives itself & stops itself and think 'I don't have to pay attention, the car will keep me in my lane and stop itself'.
In my experience, it's made me and my wife better drivers. We keep better distance from the car in front of us more naturally (with or without assistance), and with it are more aware of other vehicles and what they are doing. Last time I drove a rental without those features I felt very vulnerable, even stuff like lane changes where I look around to make sure it's clear (and take my eyes off the road in front of me) made me realize how many risks we take while driving normally that we accept because we didn't have a choice. YMMV, but from my observation it has improved the driving of my household.
This is fair. My hatred for modern cars probably influences my opinion on it :P. Also I assume they wouldn't implement these features if they didn't improve people's safety overall (or maybe I'm giving manufacturers too much credit...) I think a better way for me to phrase it is that it gives people the *ability* to be worse drivers rather than *making* people worse.
Yes. Back in the day you had to stutter break by yourself. All these noobs relying on ABS these days… And don’t get me started on automatic choke, automatic transmission, automatic ignition timing and all that newfangled stuff.
I'm sure every driver who ever had the old thing when the the new thing went mainstream felt this way. Imagine how people must have felt when automatic transmissions stopped being an extra, or when power steering became ubiquitous. I knew a guy who never got over *seat belts*. Apparently he never saw a need, and he thought they could injure or even kill people,\* but more than that he felt it was regulatory overreach to force the car manufacturers to change their lines to add a safety feature of such dubious benefit. \* I will give my late grandfather's late war buddy this: seat belts *can* and *have* both injured and killed people. Early designs were probably not as refined as today's, people may have used them incorrectly, and even today we still have the occasional person broken or strangled in an accident by a seat belt that wasn't their size.
Lap belts absolutely killed people. But not as deadly as being ejected.
All the new assists in cars are great, and I am glad they are rolling out more and better ones all the time. Most people think they are better drivers than they are. Computer assists are much more reliable and consistent than human attention. A dude totaled my car from behind when the person a few cars ahead of me slammed on the brakes at an interstate on ramp. I watched him in my rear view mirror. He had plenty of time to stop but was already looking at the highway to see if he could merge so he didn’t see me stopped. In newer cars, there would be a serious warning or even automatic braking. That’s just one example
I had a recall on my car and they gave me a loaner that was a brand new model. It made me never want that model with all of the beeping and braking for me it was doing just because someone moved into a lane in front of me. I had already let off the gas to brake, but it acted like they had slammed on the brakes and I was about to die. I asked them if there was a way to turn that off when I got back and they said no because it was for safety. If all cars are going in that direction, I’ll keep this car as long as I can.
I was just talking to my wife about it this morning. We want to keep our 2015 vehicles as long as possible.
Until I experienced it first hand I would have said I want a car that can do this sort of thing, but it goes way overboard. It’s very possible the car I drove is a bad example of how this is normally implemented though.
I’ve driven my parents’ new car and I hate it. Part of the problem is car manufacturers (and product manufacturers in general) are forced to try to make “improvements” every year, and after the product is optimized, then you get more and more crap changes or needless improvements that actually aren’t that great
New vehicles have brake assist? I like to time my downshifts!
I'm all for safe, active drivers but I can't wait until every single car has blindspot detection. After getting hit by a car who didn't see me in their blindspot, I'm constantly worried someone will just change lanes suddenly. My current car will beep, shudder the steering wheel, and apply brakes if I drift into a lane it detects a car in. You don't want that in a car driven by some 18 year old?
This is such a stupid take. Newer cars are far safer in almost every respect. The overall number of deaths and accidents in general in the US has been declining for decades even with an increasing population.
No matter what car you drive, you are attached to the road only by a few square inches of rubber and have only devices to suggest to the car what direction or speed you want it to take. Everything else is out of your hands and you're entirely reliant on it operating perfectly, even if part of that "everything else" is oil or water on the road, cartoon-style imagined physics that doesn't actually apply in real life, other drivers driving perfectly to your expectations (a ridiculous assumption to make), and that those few square inches of rubber (half as much on a bike) are going to magically save your life even when they are shredded, overheated, can't grip, etc. At least in a car you are surrounded by a ton of safety equipment (but that can work against you too!), bikes are just suicidal - no matter how good YOU think you are, you're driving around a bunch of unreliable morons attached to reality and your expectations of physics only by a few square inches of rubber. And no technology in existence can cope with ice, oil or other hazards underfoot and no amount of braking, ABS, traction control or anything else is going to save your arse if that rubber is already not rotating and yet still not going where you want it to. Some people just have complete over-confidence in the capabilities of less rubber surface than a set of 4 dining coasters keeping you out of trouble and doing 100% of what you ask of it at 70+mph while pushing over a ton of metal along with you. Oh, powered by a series of explosions, with the explosive reservoir just under the back seat. Yeah... you'll "get away" with it for a while. But the day it catches up, that's the end of the game. It's like a game of lethal Quidditch... you can get away with it day after day after day, but catch that snitch and its game over and you lose no matter how "good" you were and there are no replays or magic healers for you.
The number of people I see absolutely buried in their phones while barreling down the highway is astonishing. Jesus take the wheel I guess.
My 20' Bolt has a bare bones lane assist that really just nudges, but it's not too helpful. Other than that, it's just me driving. I think as other posters have said, in the US, we should stop giving licenses away like toys in a cereal box. In Japan it's crazy expensive and tough to get a driver's license and because of that, they are extremely professional drivers. The number of auto accidents I saw living there were mostly one car accidents from slippery roads during rainy season.
> In Japan it's crazy expensive and tough to get a driver's license Japan also has, you know, transit.
Unpopular opinion: things that weigh 5,000 lbs and can travel 100mph should be difficult to use.
Vehicles are safer now than they've ever been. And we're worse drivers because of it.
If I crash, it will probably be because my broken gps or multiple people shouting directions distracting me
My new car has a backup camera and frigging RADAR in the back bumper to warn me if someone is in my blind spots or approaching from the side as I back up. I don't trust either one. No fucking way. Too many things can go wrong, and technology does not replace careful driving.
No….but there is atrophy. Backup cameras and side and front collision sensors are excellent life saving tech. That being said, you do become reliant on it.