(Genuine Question! I'm hoping that at least one tractor driver will reply!)
Is there some kind of code that Tractor drivers use to communicate with the cars behind them on public roads?
Specifically, if you've been behind the tractor for a while and unable (in your opinion) to overtake safely, then the tractor starts to indicate right continually, without slowing or turning, is he trying to tell you that the road is clear to overtake? No hand signals as a further clue and no visibility of oncoming cars while this is happening.
There's a Hampshire based tractor that I've been behind a few times that's done this.
I'm not sure I'd want to trust his decision anyway, so is there some way to communicate thanks, but no thanks?
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Things have been a bit quiet at work today so I am getting to respond to so many of these today! I used to work on several farms before my uni days and a nice fattening office job and so hope the following two points are of help/good advice:
Firstly, tractors do not have self cancelling indicators. Even modern day tractors with luxuries such as air-con (honestly) are still damn noisy in the cab. Couple that with a dusty and dirty dashboard which the lights don't shine through very well on, particularly in the day, and when you're trying to drive 20 tons of machinery+grass or whatever down the road, tis a little easy to forget that you've left the indicators on as I did it many times.
Secondly, a good friend of mine after sitting behind a tractor and getting more and more annoyed about the 15 mile an hour and his permanently on right indicator decided to stick his foot down and blast past it. At this point the tractor driver HAD decided he was turning right into a field and my mate ran into his front wheel and completely knackered his Mazda 323 (not himself fortunately). It took a long time in the courts to prove the tractor driver was at fault and even then he admitted he hadn't even bothered to indicate anyway so had no clue the indicator was on.
I personally would pull over most of the time if there was a build up of cars behind me but if you're a bit of a git or have had a bad day, there is something quite pleasurable from watching a trail of irate drivers going mad behind you as you calmly trundle along at 18mph!
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friend of mine drives tractors locally. He tells me that he must pull over every six miles to let traffic past.
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Definitely not in the highway code that one. In fact most tractors would never be driven more than a couple of miles from the farm - Does he do a lot of transporting over quite large distances? Perhaps he's just being nice and just when that trail of several hundred cars behind him has reached critical mass he lets them all by!
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As a current tractor driver I advise you never take any notice of a signal you think they might be giving you. As Dan has said there is so much else to distract driving a tractor we have no idea which lights are on.
You wouldn't be confused behind me anyway....no indicators! I look behind from the open cab and get eye contact with the following driver, make a vauge signal with one finger and then swing off in the least likely direction. It's the way we're trained. ;-)
Where's Micky? H H
David
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Dave,
Speaking of where's Micky, whats happened to Dai Watchalowski?
S
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Bogus = Fecker = Lady Lonsdale, etc.
HJ
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I see...blimey, looking back at all those old posts, he/she was certainly busy some days then.
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He/She always reminded me of that character in the Simpsons, the comic shop owner.
Jonathan
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