How do you deal with tailgaters?
Discussion
Dsdans said:
A hard dab on the breaks tends to send the message though.
doogalman said:
I will often just slow down.
Both of these will almost certainly antagonise the situation and if it does escalate or result in an accident, put you in the wrong also.Ignore them and at the first safe to pass opportunity move over in the road a little and let them pass.
2 types of tailgaters - passive and aggressive.
Passive, I am sure, simply drive at a gently increasing speed until they come up one car length behind the next vehicle, and sit at that exact distance so long as each is going the same way, doing whatever the car in front does, without question or thought. If the car in front turns off, start to to gradually increase speed until the next one. You can't do anything about these except manage your gap in front so as not to have to brake too hard, to give them time.
Aggressive, you can have fun with, without looking aggressive back.
Select the gear below what you'd normally be in for the limit so your car is nice and responsive to throttle changes. Speed up to 2 or 3 mph over the limit. Watch aggressive TG speed up to close the small gap. As they come up, let off the throttle so you slow to maybe 2 mph below the limit. Watch their bonnet dip as they have to jump on the brakes. As soon as you see this, back up to 2mph above the limit, and open a gap again. There's no obvious brake checking going on, it just looks like you're trying to stick to the limit (badly) and the TG is just totally out of sync with you. Most of them get fed up after 2 or 3 rounds of this and give up and drop back.
Passive, I am sure, simply drive at a gently increasing speed until they come up one car length behind the next vehicle, and sit at that exact distance so long as each is going the same way, doing whatever the car in front does, without question or thought. If the car in front turns off, start to to gradually increase speed until the next one. You can't do anything about these except manage your gap in front so as not to have to brake too hard, to give them time.
Aggressive, you can have fun with, without looking aggressive back.
Select the gear below what you'd normally be in for the limit so your car is nice and responsive to throttle changes. Speed up to 2 or 3 mph over the limit. Watch aggressive TG speed up to close the small gap. As they come up, let off the throttle so you slow to maybe 2 mph below the limit. Watch their bonnet dip as they have to jump on the brakes. As soon as you see this, back up to 2mph above the limit, and open a gap again. There's no obvious brake checking going on, it just looks like you're trying to stick to the limit (badly) and the TG is just totally out of sync with you. Most of them get fed up after 2 or 3 rounds of this and give up and drop back.
defblade said:
Aggressive, you can have fun with, without looking aggressive back.
Select the gear below what you'd normally be in for the limit so your car is nice and responsive to throttle changes. Speed up to 2 or 3 mph over the limit. Watch aggressive TG speed up to close the small gap. As they come up, let off the throttle so you slow to maybe 2 mph below the limit. Watch their bonnet dip as they have to jump on the brakes. As soon as you see this, back up to 2mph above the limit, and open a gap again. There's no obvious brake checking going on, it just looks like you're trying to stick to the limit (badly) and the TG is just totally out of sync with you. Most of them get fed up after 2 or 3 rounds of this and give up and drop back.
Aha this is what I sometimes do, use engine breaking as well. Works so well and after just a few cycles of ever so slightly slowing down, speeding up, slowing down they seem to back off.Select the gear below what you'd normally be in for the limit so your car is nice and responsive to throttle changes. Speed up to 2 or 3 mph over the limit. Watch aggressive TG speed up to close the small gap. As they come up, let off the throttle so you slow to maybe 2 mph below the limit. Watch their bonnet dip as they have to jump on the brakes. As soon as you see this, back up to 2mph above the limit, and open a gap again. There's no obvious brake checking going on, it just looks like you're trying to stick to the limit (badly) and the TG is just totally out of sync with you. Most of them get fed up after 2 or 3 rounds of this and give up and drop back.
Does anyone notice a difference in how often they’re tailgated with what car they’re driving? I feel like I don’t often see SUV’s being tailgated as much as smaller cars. Maybe because of the rear view, someone tailgating an SUV doesn’t seem as intimidating and therefore people are less likely to try if it doesn’t work?
Honourable Dead Snark said:
Aha this is what I sometimes do, use engine breaking as well. Works so well and after just a few cycles of ever so slightly slowing down, speeding up, slowing down they seem to back off.
Does anyone notice a difference in how often they’re tailgated with what car they’re driving? I feel like I don’t often see SUV’s being tailgated as much as smaller cars. Maybe because of the rear view, someone tailgating an SUV doesn’t seem as intimidating and therefore people are less likely to try if it doesn’t work?
Unless you have an EV/PHEV which will activate brake lights with sufficient deceleration from regen braking with no touch of the brake.Does anyone notice a difference in how often they’re tailgated with what car they’re driving? I feel like I don’t often see SUV’s being tailgated as much as smaller cars. Maybe because of the rear view, someone tailgating an SUV doesn’t seem as intimidating and therefore people are less likely to try if it doesn’t work?
Honourable Dead Snark said:
Does anyone notice a difference in how often they’re tailgated with what car they’re driving?
Yes massively. I’ve had my Boxster for well over a decade now. Doesn’t do many miles at all and I honestly don’t drive it any differently to how I drive my other cars on the commute/school run etc, but you just can’t go for a quiet drive in it.I used to say I could make better progress in my boring grey Octavia 2.0 diseasal as no one batted an eyelid, tailgated, sped up when being overtaken etc. I’ve had someone overtake me in a 30 limit (single carriageway) when driving it and I wasn’t driving below the speedlimit - never happened in any other car I’ve been driving.
Even my 2 Golf Rs attracted less attention (1 was an wagen admittedly) and definitely the 135 as even I struggled to tell it apart from 116/118 etc. it’s not just me as SWMBO took it out for the first drive ‘post hibernation’ this year and despite driving it like she would her Superb estate, complained upon her return about people wanting to ‘race’ etc. I dread to think what it’s like if you own a GT3/4/turbo etc with a nice big wing and in a bold colour.
Edited by cslwannabe on Sunday 23 June 23:10
Edited by cslwannabe on Sunday 23 June 23:14
Edited by cslwannabe on Sunday 23 June 23:16
defblade said:
2 types of tailgaters - passive and aggressive.
Passive, I am sure, simply drive at a gently increasing speed until they come up one car length behind the next vehicle, and sit at that exact distance so long as each is going the same way, doing whatever the car in front does, without question or thought. If the car in front turns off, start to to gradually increase speed until the next one. You can't do anything about these except manage your gap in front so as not to have to brake too hard, to give them time.
Aggressive, you can have fun with, without looking aggressive back.
Select the gear below what you'd normally be in for the limit so your car is nice and responsive to throttle changes. Speed up to 2 or 3 mph over the limit. Watch aggressive TG speed up to close the small gap. As they come up, let off the throttle so you slow to maybe 2 mph below the limit. Watch their bonnet dip as they have to jump on the brakes. As soon as you see this, back up to 2mph above the limit, and open a gap again. There's no obvious brake checking going on, it just looks like you're trying to stick to the limit (badly) and the TG is just totally out of sync with you. Most of them get fed up after 2 or 3 rounds of this and give up and drop back.
Years ago i had one of those passive tailgate you mention persistently close for mile after mile. Thet werent interested in passing. Slowed down a bit, they just kept same distance. Speed up. Same. Passive, I am sure, simply drive at a gently increasing speed until they come up one car length behind the next vehicle, and sit at that exact distance so long as each is going the same way, doing whatever the car in front does, without question or thought. If the car in front turns off, start to to gradually increase speed until the next one. You can't do anything about these except manage your gap in front so as not to have to brake too hard, to give them time.
Aggressive, you can have fun with, without looking aggressive back.
Select the gear below what you'd normally be in for the limit so your car is nice and responsive to throttle changes. Speed up to 2 or 3 mph over the limit. Watch aggressive TG speed up to close the small gap. As they come up, let off the throttle so you slow to maybe 2 mph below the limit. Watch their bonnet dip as they have to jump on the brakes. As soon as you see this, back up to 2mph above the limit, and open a gap again. There's no obvious brake checking going on, it just looks like you're trying to stick to the limit (badly) and the TG is just totally out of sync with you. Most of them get fed up after 2 or 3 rounds of this and give up and drop back.
I may have started running much closer than normal to the verge (which they bizarrely copied) and leaving it late to move right for obstacles.
Once they had bounced over a protruding kerb they hadnt seen coming, they backed off for the remaining 5 miles before I turned off.
Lots of 20 MPH zones where I live, a lot of people seem to ignore them.
I must be getting old as I find myself driving at the speed limit virtually everywhere now, it just makes for a much more relaxed driving experience.
Nothing makes me stick to the speed limit more than an SUV stuck to my bumper. This goes double in a 20 limit, you can almost feel their rage.
I must be getting old as I find myself driving at the speed limit virtually everywhere now, it just makes for a much more relaxed driving experience.
Nothing makes me stick to the speed limit more than an SUV stuck to my bumper. This goes double in a 20 limit, you can almost feel their rage.
Vincecj said:
Tailgating is now very popular in Wales. See it happening every day.
Yep, 20mph is such a gulf in speed from 30mph, it feels like you are at walking pace. My town has been a trial run for the new 20mph limits for a year or so before the new limit came in nationwide. so you'd think the people round here would've adjusted by now, but no, it seems to be polarised, so you either get people doing 20mph in national speed limit zones, or idiots tailgating and aggressively overtaking in heavily built up areas where a 20mph limit is actually sensible.I have to admit, when you are in a slight hurry and following someone actually sticking to 20mph it really does feel frustratingly slow. I can see how mouth breathers default to this kind of driving.
Specifically where blanket 20mph limits have been imposed, unless it’s somewhere genuinely ‘high risk’ such as outside a school or so on, I generally do what everyone else does and drive somewhere in the 25 - 28ish sort of range; essentially what a competent driver would previously have known subconsciously was safe and reasonable in a 30. Yes it’s over the limit, obviously, but enforcement is thankfully minimal and it seems to be generally accepted that few people actually drive at 20. Driving at 20 is not only desperately tedious and, for the main part, completely ridiculous, it also requires quite a degree of effort not to creep over as it’s such an unaturally slow pace. I think that’s why so many people get p*ssed off when the car in front is religiously sticking to it, although of course that’s not an excuse to tailgate like a twit.
Edited by Southerner on Monday 24th June 09:07
Southerner said:
Specifically where blanket 20mph limits have been imposed, unless it’s somewhere genuinely ‘high risk’ such as outside a school or so on, I generally do what everyone else does and drive somewhere in the 25 - 29ish range; essentially what a competent driver would previously have known subconsciously was safe and reasonable in a 30. Driving at 20 is not only desperately tedious and, for the main part, completely ridiculous, it also requires quite a degree of effort not to creep over as it’s such an unaturally slow pace. I think that’s why so many people get p*ssed off when the car in front is religiously sticking to it, although of course that’s not an excuse to tailgate like a twonk.
Feels like a great way to pick up three points on your licence.20, 30 and 40mph zones make for easy pickings for mobile speed cameras.
Deep Thought said:
Southerner said:
Specifically where blanket 20mph limits have been imposed, unless it’s somewhere genuinely ‘high risk’ such as outside a school or so on, I generally do what everyone else does and drive somewhere in the 25 - 29ish range; essentially what a competent driver would previously have known subconsciously was safe and reasonable in a 30. Driving at 20 is not only desperately tedious and, for the main part, completely ridiculous, it also requires quite a degree of effort not to creep over as it’s such an unaturally slow pace. I think that’s why so many people get p*ssed off when the car in front is religiously sticking to it, although of course that’s not an excuse to tailgate like a twonk.
Feels like a great way to pick up three points on your licence.20, 30 and 40mph zones make for easy pickings for mobile speed cameras.
Sounds daft, but before you set off, just point the rear-view mirror up and don't use it and then don't even worry or think about the cars behind you. All I ever used it before was for looking at the driver behind me anyway. Makes journey's way less stressful if you are going to drive to the speed limit.
This seems to be getting worse recently. It's more frustrating when you're in a train of cars and can't go anywhere with a prick behind sat 2 feet from the bumper. If they are blatantly taking the piss I'll knock my hazard lights on a couple of times. This often works but not always. Often people are just so stupid that they creep up to the rear of your car and don't even realise how close they are until you have to brake hard.
I also do what the highway code advises and keep a bigger distance from the car in front so that I'm not having to jump on the brakes if they stop - you then get said tailgater thinking you're slowing down on purpose to piss them off so they get closer.
90% of the time though, if and when the road opens up and you're on a NSL stretch they disappear in your mirror. I think the 40mph everywhere brigade are the worst offenders.
I also do what the highway code advises and keep a bigger distance from the car in front so that I'm not having to jump on the brakes if they stop - you then get said tailgater thinking you're slowing down on purpose to piss them off so they get closer.
90% of the time though, if and when the road opens up and you're on a NSL stretch they disappear in your mirror. I think the 40mph everywhere brigade are the worst offenders.
Southerner said:
Driving at 20 is not only desperately tedious and, for the main part, completely ridiculous, it also requires quite a degree of effort not to creep over as it’s such an unaturally slow pace. I think that’s why so many people get p*ssed off when the car in front is religiously sticking to it, although of course that’s not an excuse to tailgate like a twit.
Fortunately there are few non-town centre 20mph limits in my area (in town centres with stop start 20 mph is fine) but there is now a village where the speed limit for whole of the one mile length through the village has recently changed from 30mph to 20mph limit. There is no particular reason for the limit, as the roads are wide with no parked cars on it, and no schools or other reasons to make things more hazardous for the residents. It just seems that either the residents had someone important lobbying for it or the council had to have one of these zones somewhere.Anyway people get very very very cross if you do 20mph through it, which I do by simply flicking on the adaptive cruise control at that speed. It is a very dull three minutes to travel that mile, particularly as the car has level 2 automation kick in when the cruise control is on, so no need to steer, accelerate, or brake, just sit there watching the steam coming out of the ears of the drivers behind.
And ironically it seems to be the locals who live in the village who get the most cross about it (identified by them turning off into one of the many residential side roads that lead nowhere else).
Should I go faster - well frankly if I was the police it would be the first place I would set up a mobile speed trap, as lots of straight line visibility and lots of places to hide, so no thanks, I will just be bored for three minutes.
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