In the C8 with trailer attached on Friday, I was joining the A1 northbound at Leeming Bar. Because the slip road there is only slightly longer than a fully-grown articulated truck, there are give way marks before you get to the slip, where you have a good view of traffic coming at right-angles to you. The road is solid in 2 lanes at 55-60 mph and you couldn't drop a suitcase between the vehicles. Not wanting to spoil someone's day with a bonnet full of rusty trailer, I wait. An X5 lurches to a stop inches behind the trailer. Toot toot after a few seconds. I take a long look at the empty trailer to see if anything is hanging off. Toot toot. I glance at no. 1 son who was riding shotgun, and ask him if I'd missed a gap while I was checking the trailer. Toot toot - longer blasts this time. Son shakes his head; he's embarrassed. Dad, the motoring guru, is getting hooted at. Still the traffic is solid. More long blasts. I make my move when there is a suitable gap. The X5 swings straight into lane 2 causing some flashing lights and general ire and tries to nail it past me, but, with inexorable Karma, the traffic in lane 2 is slowing...
Now the questions. Does blowing your horn make gaps in the traffic appear? Assuming that the driver in front is a dozy old git (me), does the horn strip off a few years and sharpen my reflexes? Did the driver of the X5 not think that use of the horn might make me get my sandwiches or newspaper out, just out of badness?
I suppose it's remotely possible that he didn't see the Give Way triangle next to me, or the dotted lines on the road.
Answers on a postcard please. And thank you for the therapy, I feel better now.
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It's a BMW, so what did you expect?
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Hawkeye - sadly 'morons' of this type are now more common place on the roads we too have to use.
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What you have to remember is that if the person behind you wants to get infront of you, you must move out of the way asap. if they are driving a BMW, the cars should part like the Red Sea. Being in a hurry gives you priority dont ya know.
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There are various suggestions as to what BMW actually stands for.
Belligerent moronic wan*er does often seem to fit the bill.
(With apologies to all the nice people who drive them.)
Edited by Optimist on 07/07/2008 at 13:48
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I had one pass me this morning in the village in a 30 zone past a school with kids crossing the road. 330d saloon. Strange that more often than not, they are the make riding your bumper, maybe its fumes from the interior plastics or something.
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I'm yet to witness an X5 driver show signs of intelligence and patience and utter contempt to everything and everyone on or off the road. I've had them tailgate me, blast passed and then had them slam on their brakes cus they caught someone up who was travelling at sub-light speed.
It's not just X5 drivers either who hoot, I had one sad person behind me at the fuel station yesterday, I had filled up, paid and had just got back into my car when hoot hoot, some sad person with a caravan. For some reason the shock of the hoot sent me into auto-slow motion, had to do a full cockpit check and inspection before being able to start the car just in case the hooter attack had upset the car !
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I had one sad person behind me at the fuel station yesterday I had filled up paid and had just got back into my car when hoot hoot some sad person with a caravan.
Get out and ask them what the matter is. Perhaps they've spotted something the matter with your car.
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some sad person with a caravan.
Tautology, surely?
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Strange that more often than not they are the make riding your bumper maybe its fumes from the interior plastics or something.
But easily dealt with in the same way as any other tailgater, by slowing right down. :-)
I even managed to get an M3 driver nicked (at what must have been well over 100 mph) on the M40 once with this technique. It was about 10 years ago, and I still smile when I think of him standing on the hard shoulder with a burly traffic officer, gesticulating wildly and shaking his fist at me as I gave him a cheery toot while passing.
It really took me a mile to get past that artic, and genuinely didn't realise that when I eventually moved over we were but half a mile from a police ramp that, at that time of the morning, stood a 90% chance of being manned. Just slipped my mind.
Cheers
DP
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Did it have X5 in the number plate anywhere?
I love playing a game on the motorway. Guess wheher the next X5 or X3 I see has those characters in the number plate.
I usually get at least 80% right.
Muppetts the lot of 'em.
Apologies to any real muppetts out there.
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X5's - Q7's - Cayenne's
Its a good job I can't afford one because I might be tempted. But then I'd have to live with the stigma as it does appear that 99% are driven by suicidal maniacs intent on taking you with them.
MPZ
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Bet it had the compulsory drug-dealer style ultra-low profile tyres and bling rims - anything more ludicrous on a 4x4 is hard to imagine.
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You're forgetting the chrome running boards. :-)
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the other idiot driven vehicle I saw yesterday on the M25 was the Range Rover Sport.
Most seemed to be blasting in the outside lane, only to come racing up the backside of the car in front (who could go no further cos of the 50mph limits posted).
The driver was probably burning half a tank just braking and accelerating.
Stoopid chuffer.
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I seem to be alone here in quite liking the Cayenne given the sort of car it is. My impression is that it is genuinely capable, although very thirsty. I have seen several being well and briskly driven on the road. And I don't mind the way it looks, a lot better than an X3 or X5.
However my neighbourhood is full of the things and they probably aren't ideal London cars. I saw one being unusually badly driven the other day, by a woman, hesitant, poor signalling, taking up more room than it needed (and that is already saying something actually).
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It's the numbskulls hooting me when I linger at the edge of a yellow box junction with a blocked exit that make me fume.
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Got one of these junctions coming out of Weston, joining the A370. Despite the give way markings, it joins a dual carriage way (should be duel carriageway). Reckon about 10% of drivers realise they have to give way.
Worse one for me was driving along the dc approaching the junction, saw a 307 stopping to give way for me to pass (nothing behind me and was virtually on top of them), when the Mondeo following them overtook on the cross hatching to join about 3 inches in front of me.
Then gave me a load of abuse for my use of horn and lights- instictive reaction as was such a close call. Had not been watching him, as was second in line and was half expecting to get cut up by the Peugeot.
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i have several tunnels near me and there seems to be a new game toot in the tunnel drivers just blast their horns for no reason freaked me out the first couple of times i encountered it i was driving normally and reasonably so i thought there may be a problem with my car so i pulled over to check it out wasnt impressed when someone told me its a game
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Did it have X5 in the number plate anywhere? >>
It wasn't X5 LUD, was it?
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>>Get out and ask them what the matter is.
I did once. The red, apoplectic look he had, must have raised his blood pressure way beyond safe limits. He was then forced to follow me at 1MPH below speed limit. He then started to overtake at the junction where I was turning right! Perhaps I should have indicated a tad earlier. ;>)
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There is seldom anything to be gained by entering into a dialogue with an annoying driver. It won't usually be a meeting of minds.
I always hope they will quickly turn off my route or go faster or slower than me and get lost. You don't want them buzzing round you like gnats.
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There is seldom anything to be gained by entering into a dialogue with an annoying driver. It won't usually be a meeting of minds.
Spot on, yet again Lud. A meeting of one and one half minds, perhaps ?
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Another slightly different aspect to this thread.
Recently, driving in London down a side street at the end of which was a 'T' juction to join a main road, I pulled up behind a stationary, very large Japanese 4x4 which was indicating a left turn. I am quite patient so waited and waited nothing happening. As I could see no traffic passing on the main road ahead of the 4x4 to prevent it from entering the road I gave what I thought was a polite toot to say 'are you aware that there is traffic behind you'. No response so I continued waiting. By now there were several cars behind me and one of them was less patient and gave very prolonged blasts on his hooter.
The door to the 4x4 opened and down jumped a young person with one of those ski caps pulled down to his eyebrows and the look on his face showed real anger. I decided that he didn't want to discuss the situation so I to slide to the offside of the road to go around the keep left sign and get the hell out of there.
Often wonder what was the outcome.
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Buddy of mine witnessed, in the sixties, a bunch of hoods in a gold Rolls-Royce reverse at speed into a line of tooting citizens in Gerrard Street (now pedestrianised and Chinese, then a narrow street with parked cars both sides and Ronnie Scott's old club in a basement) shunting four or five together in a welter of broken glass and bent wings, then drive away laughing.
Yobs were yobs in those days, know what I mean?
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Lady Docker, or offspring?
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Hawk,
As you say, these are give way junctions, simple.
I often wonder if these X5 fellas join roundabouts in the same way.
The problem, I think, is slip road conditioning.
Some drivers assume that because they are joining a big road at angle, they can do so every time by accelerating hard.
The shorter the slip road, the harder you need to accelerate.
Obvious, innit?
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Get out and ask them what the matter is. Perhaps they've spotted something the matter with your car.
Give me a break !
Edited by MikeTorque on 07/07/2008 at 23:50
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Get out and ask them what the matter is. Perhaps they've spotted something the matter with your car.
Wasn't there an incident where a young man in a minivan was confronted by a man behind him in a 4x4 at a junction, with the result that the young man died? The name Kenneth Noye seems to ring a bell.
Edit - Here it is: news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/712160.stm
Edited by jbif on 08/07/2008 at 12:36
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Lady Docker or offspring?
I assume that's a joke, but it's wide of the mark. Lady Docker had coachbuilt Daimlers with gilded brightwork and extra gold-leaf stars all over the body in one case.
These people were driving a metallic gold Rolls-Royce V8, and they were hoods. West End heavies, Kray/Richardson/Curly King types.
Lady Docker wasn't a yob. She was more the WAG type before its time.
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In my experience, the flashier the motor , the less patient,competent the driver!!
There`s a bloke who lives nearby who works for a rental firm and brings a different vehicle home every night, usually a merc or bm and if he has his mate with him , he HAS to wheelspin away and he doesn`t like being behind anybody!!
oh to be a trucker..........!
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And oh, not to be the unfortunate who buys the ex-rental cars.
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