NSW motor vehicle licence at 75year old

[Ian]

The statistics that we're presented with often don't tell the real story of actual risks. For example young people are over-represented in the driving statistics fatality rate. However when you base your statistics on actual risk per unit of exposure ie the amount of travel that people actually do, the high risk drivers are the elderly. 

Essentially young people drive a lot and they tend to drive with full cars. People older than 70 don't drive near as much however they're over-represented in the accident statistics per unit of travel.

And yet in Victoria you now require something like 200 hours or 5 weeks of 9-5 driving to get your provisional license. And yet there are no controls of the actual higher risk group. 

Another ignored risk is that young drivers generally get better over time and older drivers get worse.

[facthunter]

Of course older drivers get worse. Thats like saying women only have babies, but most of the oldies eventually lose their licences because of what some doctor determines, give up after hitting the front gate or have a stiff neck etc. Don't bundle them into a single group  or category..  Nev

[sfGnome]

Unfortunately, age (be it older or younger) is a very broad brush way to classify risk. My father was as sharp as a tack until the day he died, and he would have been a totally safe driver (if only he hadn’t been blind!). My mother, on the other hand, became so unsafe that the only person who would drive with her was dad, and then only because he couldn’t see the oncoming cars…

 

Who among us didn’t do some really dumb things when we were young and bulletproof, and every day we are one all day closer to admitting that we can no longer be safe in the air or on the ground. The one thing that we can be sure of is that in any discussion like this, it will be someone else that has to improve. 

[turboplanner]

17 hours ago, Thruster88 said:

Sudden increase in turbo boost was to much for the track conditions. Early model with no traction control or traction control turn off, experienced driver would have been able to execute a nice drift.

 

Dashcam videos are educational in the same way as aircraft accident reports, they allow us to see what really causes accidents.  

I read that a bit differently to you. My version was that th driver tightened the turn and the rear end started to come round. He did steer into the skid, but nowhere near enough, and when it had slowed enough for the tyres to grip, it follow the path of the steer tyres straight off the road. Advanced driving courses teach skid control and spectacular emergency stopping, and I thnk it's great to build in the instinct for it, but it does take a long time to avoid over-steering. 

 

[old man emu]

1 hour ago, Ian said:

And yet in Victoria you now require something like 200 hours or 5 weeks of 9-5 driving to get your provisional license.

That also applies in NSW. The problem that I see is that student drivers tend to do one hour 200 times. There is no published material that guides a student driver through the learning process. It is said that one can qualify for a pilot's licence in 40 hours. Could you get the required competency doing a TIF forty times?  No way, Jose! Your instructor has a published syllabus to follow, at least to early post-solo. After that the lessons can be shuffled to account for external conditions, but you will still complete each item in the syllabus.

 

I am going to title my book for student drivers Don't waste time learning to drive. One of the greates time wasters I see is a student driver driving between major cities on quality highways. That might get the hours logged, but very little if anything is learned. Also, how many times do parents let student drivers drive away from the Motor Registry with the ink still wet on their Learner's Permit? Bloody dangerous.

[turboplanner]

2 hours ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

Wow, I was just thinking of the problem in high school terms.

How much sideways force does a tilted ( wheelbase and weight and height of c of g ) car need to move the resultant ( gravity plus inertia) force beyond the wheelbase? ( eg if the c of g height was 1m and the wheelbase 2m ,  then the car would overturn when the resultant ( weight plus centrifugal force ) reached 45 degrees. 

I don't think that's too hard, not after being taught how to do it.  The point is, you will be safer if you understand the forces acting... 

Here's another...  suppose some joker put a hidden ski-jump on the road and the car suddenly found itself going vertical. How high would it go for ( a) 40 kph and (b) 120 kph? ( answers are 6.3m and 57m ) This is simply  converting kinetic to potential energy. I reckon anybody who could not understand this, when taught properly, could never  understand the effect of excessive speed. Sure, it is simplified in that air resistance, for example, is ignored.

( There was a ford falcon in Darwin which was wrapped around a pole at about 7m height, and the suburb was flat... the driver was a 20 year-old soldier who died. How did he manage this?  No prize for the answer.)

It's been many years since I heard someone talking about "tipping over"; in addition to your equation components, you have to include Roll Centre which these days we can design to be below ground level, Roll stiffness (torsion bars) which keep today's cars (a ball of playdough dropped from a 10 story building) hugging the inside of the wheelbase for all but ditches, gutters and other "trips".

 

A tip over today usually produces minor injuries. In a speedway crash I analysed where the driver tripped on the safety fence and flipped end over end 11 times so fast that I had to step the video through frame by frame to count them, he took part in the next heat with the same car. Last year I saw a driver who'd gone to sleep on a 100 km/hr freeway, hit and knocked down a large light pole which sent him end over end, at one point with the nose of his car pointing directly down about 2 metres above the road, then slammed down on the driver's side onto the road and slid along demolishing Armco. The car styed on its RHS, the following driver jumped in the left window and hauled him out, and he didn't have a mark on him. From frangible feet on the pole, collapsible end to the armco, airbags which saved him bashing his head on the fround, seat belt , anti intrusion bars, it was a lesson in how far we've come in road safety design.

 

So tip overs not usually a problem without solid objects like trees.

 

A similar, repeating accident is the load of young people, driver either unlicensed or minimum training, takes a bend too fasty and slides sideways into the large trees planted right where sliding cars go. Usually fatal to 1 or all. That's the one where education could most reduce the numbers.

 

Your ski jump seems a bit unrelated, but people will always write to newspapers pointing out the combined speed of two cars exceeding the speed limit etc, and it never seems to change the understanding. A London study on 40 km/hr zone fatals a few years ago found most of the fatals occurring under the speed limit, despite a healthy lot exceeding the speed limit by a big margin. So far that hasn't been acted on, but it probably relates to the faster people drive the more they concentrate vs the slower they go the more they get distracted and miss seeing that person darting out.

 

 

 

[spacesailor]

I,m Old & self taught for driving. 

 Lower 10% of IQ.

I think I couldn,t get that high, in that ' university derived test ' that caters for " interlectuals .

POOR  education should Not be allowed to run ' everything '.

Over sixty years without causing a crash ! .

BUT

That last crash I was in , as ' rear seat  ' passenger.  Knocked me for six.

My number teo daughter complained about my driving .

So I told her to go with her older sister , who I consider a HOON, Alway racing up to the lights .

Tailgates all the time ! , ( snapped her arcilles tendon  ) . Driving too fast too close .

And scares the poo out of me .

BUT

has a very high IQ and education , passes most tests with ease .

Her son drives around  " Eastern Creek Sports " complex most weekends .

In his home built race car , 

But me , lower education,  means no RAA maintainance perks for my home built HummelBird.

spacesailor

[facthunter]

A direct Tip Over is unlikely these days where the track is wide and the centre of gravity relatively low. it's usually got to slide and hit something like the kerb. Most slides include aquaplaning and leaves ,oil on the road, gravel etc.. If you have OLD and treadless tyres the grip can be very low and aquaplaning more likely. Topping a hill at speed can unload the grip on the road as  can stuffed shock absorbers. You can see quite a few vehicles with underdamped wheels bouncing on the road. Who does a walkaround to check the tyres are notobviously Low and wonders when the car won't make the turn at the first corner?  Nev

[spacesailor]

You should do the opposite to what Other,s tell you

Big good tyres on the front, and skinnier tyres on the rear !.

When the Sheet hits the fan & you are going too fast for the conditions. 

Knowing those rears will let go  ! Leavinng you with the fronts " steering " you in a Known drift .

Becomes second nature. 

BUT

The others say " good front tyres are mandority " for safety .

spacesailor

[onetrack]

Spacey, you're asking for trouble having different size/width front and rear tyres. It always gets me how manufacturers can get away with those deadly, skinny, "temporary" spare wheels? They're simply an accident waiting to happen.

[turboplanner]

5 minutes ago, onetrack said:

Spacey, you're asking for trouble having different size/width front and rear tyres. It always gets me how manufacturers can get away with those deadly, skinny, "temporary" spare wheels? They're simply an accident waiting to happen.

Are they ever; and they have a very low speed limit, but I've seen cars p[arked with the tread worn off, so some people just leave them on and don't worry about a replacement tyre.

[facthunter]

80km/hr or 80 k. Shouldn't be permitted really It's only for the vehicle to hit the road cheaper, and save boot space, but that doesn't work when you try to put the full sized tyre somewhere. Nev

[turboplanner]

I've got one at 40 km/hr

[spacesailor]

Two passed my house , this week  !!!!!.

Running on flat tyres, & noise of the rims grinding on the road .

Saving space for the groceries.  With out a spare or a jack !.

spacesailor

[facthunter]

Sydney's wild West. Nev

[spacesailor]

More like Sydney,s Dam potholes .

My daughter lost an almost new tyre , squashed it over the rin splitting both sides of tyre.

No patches for sidewall holes.

spacesailor

[Geoff_H]

A month ago I went through one of the monster potholes in Sydney's castle hill. it damaged the drivers side front and rear tyres.  Front tyres are a different size to rear tyres, so I had to buy 4 new tyres.  $2000.  I also got the experience of driving on run flats at 80km/hr, the vehicle was controlable, but would not have been at any faster speed.

[Bruce Tuncks]

Good point Geoff, I have assumed the friction is sufficient to cause overturning and not sliding. Sliding ( by intuition ) would occur with a gravel surface and overturning on bitumen... The rav 4 I know well was on bitumen, turning right onto a road where the camber and the slope was already in the overturning direction, and the occupants were mightily surprised when it rolled. I reckon they shouldn't have been so surprised.  But as you suggest, this is a weakness in the question.

I would like friction to be used for other questions too, like stopping distances with locked brakes on different surfaces. These would be simply weight times coefficient of friction times distance equalled the initial kinetic energy. Highly simplified I know, but still amazing results to some.

 

[Bruce Tuncks]

Spacy, I hereby declare you to be much smarter than some might think.  But I must relate how this guy at work pulled over a young woman who was driving on bare rims, only to be threatened with a charge of molestation if he didn't go away. He went away and she continued on with the bare rims.

[turboplanner]

9 hours ago, spacesailor said:

More like Sydney,s Dam potholes .

My daughter lost an almost new tyre , squashed it over the rin splitting both sides of tyre.

No patches for sidewall holes.

spacesailor

Very interesting; are these potholes abour 400 mm diameter, and located along the vehicle tyre lines, and quite often in rows of four or five with one deep pothole, the others not so bad, and often including  the start of one as a smaller diameter of top seal peeled off?

[BrendAn]

These stickers are available in Victoria. 

[BrendAn]

I heard VicRoads are considering repairing potholes now because there is a shortage of beware rough surface signs .😁

[turboplanner]

10 minutes ago, BrendAn said:

I heard VicRoads are considering repairing potholes now because there is a shortage of beware rough surface signs .😁

Problem is I think our industry might be causing them. Similar patterns are appearing in several different parts of Victoria, a LOT of vehicle damage is occurring in Melbourne. We've lost 1 tyre/suspension damage and I've read of about 50 others. This is not usual.  The original thoughts were that Covid/Dept Transport were not repairing roads/Dan the Crossing Man not spending money on repairs, but then the traditional types of damage would be occurring. Would be interesting to see if this pattern extends to NSW. If so we have to look at PBS and double loaded tippers which carry weight that Mr Dunlop never dreamed of.

[onetrack]

The constant wet weather and regular flooding of roads in Victoria and NSW is probably the biggest single factor in the proliferation of potholes. The adhesion between the asphalt and the underlying road base is substantially lowered with continuous wet road conditions, which makes the asphalt lift.

Once a small piece of asphalt lifts, it's only a matter of a short time of repeated hammering by thousands of tyres and the small pothole becomes a big one.

 

Cracks in asphalt with road movement (and road formations do flex regularly under heavy loads), leads to water ingress that gets in between the asphalt and road base, and that is how and where the majority of seal adhesion failure occurs.

In the old days, the highways depts would send road workers out with a watering can of hot liquid bitumen, that they would pour onto asphalt cracks, to prevent water ingress.

Constant cost reductions, and the dangers of working amongst heavy traffic travelling at high speed, has seen this job largely disappear.

[BrendAn]

6 minutes ago, onetrack said:

The constant wet weather and regular flooding of roads in Victoria and NSW is probably the biggest single factor in the proliferation of potholes. The adhesion between the asphalt and the underlying road base is substantially lowered with continuous wet road conditions, which makes the asphalt lift.

Once a small piece of asphalt lifts, it's only a matter of a short time of repeated hammering by thousands of tyres and the small pothole becomes a big one.

 

Cracks in asphalt with road movement (and road formations do flex regularly under heavy loads), leads to water ingress that gets in between the asphalt and road base, and that is how and where the majority of seal adhesion failure occurs.

In the old days, the highways depts would send road workers out with a watering can of hot liquid bitumen, that they would pour onto asphalt cracks, to prevent water ingress.

Constant cost reductions, and the dangers of working amongst heavy traffic travelling at high speed, has seen this job largely disappear.

All true. But we have had the same problem long before these wet years. I think cost cutting is a problem. Not enough money allocated for road maintenance. Especially since dan the man has been the dictator . He thought he could sell out to China and let them repair everything. Luckily the libs quashed his plans.