Adrian wrote:

Chris Tolley (ukonline really) gurgled happily,
sounding much like they were saying:

Since the 1960s car control has improved tremendously from power
steering through ABS brakes, yet the Highway Code still has the
stopping (thinking/braking) distances of old. I would like to see
these distances recast for modern cars with two tables, one for dry
conditions and one for wet.

The tables will continue to be current until all non-"modern" vehicles
are removed from the roads.

Even though the vehicles to which they are relevant are a _tiny_
minority of those on the roads - and they are wildly optimistic for
other vehicles?

This may come as a shock to you, but the tables never had anything to do
with real performance. They are a simple mathematical model linking the
speed in mph with the stopping distance in feet. Anyone with GCSE maths
should take no more than 2 minutes to deduce the formula that is used..

Sure. But the formula was based on a roughly representative family car of
the period - the 105E Anglia, allegedly.

The formula is far too simple to be based on anything real. It no doubt
gives and always gave a safety margin. But until every relevant vehicle
has ABS and other suitable gizmos, revising the table only serves to
create a misleading impression of safety. The poster I was responding to
initially clearly has a sufficiently misleading impression of his own
abilities already.


--
http://gallery120232.fotopic.net/p9683800.html
(153 330 at Cark and Cartmel, Jul 1995)