Is this a trend?
Discussion
A500leroy said:
no bad thing
Watching a video on the subject there are many French drivers who are applauded at the idea.Can't understand why, after all they have an 80mph top speed limit in France, so driving over 112mph should never even be an issue.
I wonder which PH'er will be the first with the magic cover all excuse of, 'Autobahn'?
aka_kerrly said:
I'm fine with this.
Look at JDM cars, they have a 112mph speed limit applied so it encourages manufactures to put in shorter gears which improves acceleration and makes the car far more enjoyable to drive!
Same here. I have no issue with this. It's a long time ago so rules may have changed since but my JDM DC5 didn't have a limiter, or if it did it was taken off before I got it Look at JDM cars, they have a 112mph speed limit applied so it encourages manufactures to put in shorter gears which improves acceleration and makes the car far more enjoyable to drive!
I also wish they would make it so cars can be put into limp mode remotely. I don't get why this isn't a thing and the safety arguments don't stack up.
Unfortunately, I think there will be more manufacturers going this way (and likely in the future to be forced by legislation to reduce the severity of collisions). For most run-of-the-mill, everyday cars, I don't have a problem with the rules. It is a sad state of affairs though for brands like Ferrari and Lamborghini. What is the point of a supercar (will likely all be electric by then) that can only go as fast as all the other cars on the roads. With batteries and added mass, they won't be fun in the corners, their acceleration will be about as fun as every other electric car, they won't have character, and now to top it all off, they can only just reach the ton.
I totally get the road safety argument, and I'm sure for the majority of road users this can only be a good thing. However, we all have different levels of risk we're willing to accept, and I'm inclined to say there are more important road safety features we should concentrate on first. No1: potholes, No2: live hard shoulders, No3: EM shields to prevent mobile use in cars, No4: breathalyser start technology, No5: sensible town council / road layout planning, No6: HVAC controls to be a button or dial rather than hidden behind 3 context menus on the center screen.
I totally get the road safety argument, and I'm sure for the majority of road users this can only be a good thing. However, we all have different levels of risk we're willing to accept, and I'm inclined to say there are more important road safety features we should concentrate on first. No1: potholes, No2: live hard shoulders, No3: EM shields to prevent mobile use in cars, No4: breathalyser start technology, No5: sensible town council / road layout planning, No6: HVAC controls to be a button or dial rather than hidden behind 3 context menus on the center screen.
LeftLake said:
I totally get the road safety argument, and I'm sure for the majority of road users this can only be a good thing. However, we all have different levels of risk we're willing to accept.
The purpose of the speed limiter is to mitigate the risk to others, not the driver of the car.NMNeil said:
The purpose of the speed limiter is to mitigate the risk to others, not the driver of the car.
I'm fine with that, and for normal roads I have no problem. However, should someone 'choose' to drive on certain types of roads (eg autobahn, closed race circuit, specific toll roads) then they should be given the option to turn this type of system off (maybe based on GPS location etc). In reality, cars will be tracked over systems like Car2X in the near future, and anything over the local limit won't be possible. I believe Volvo came out with a statement a few years ago saying their introduction of the 112mph limit was to help them reach their goal of zero deaths or serious injuries in a Volvo from 2020. People don't buy Volvo's so that other people on the road are safer, in fact quite the opposite as they are heavier and cause more damage to whomever they hit. That gets into a massive ethical debate, especially with AI involved and desperately needs governments to understand the implications and catch up. Currently, most cars are designed specifically to protect the current car's occupants, as not many would purchase anything else? (the pop up bonnets etc are purely to meet legislation - don't get me started on SUV's..)
Anyhow, bringing it back on topic, the answer to your original question is yes, they'll all be introducing this limit in the near future..
Mercedes having a moan, remember last year they run the controversial DAS system , and was allowed to keep it, I’d say that had more of an advantage than the Redbull bendy wing.
LeftLake said:
People don't buy Volvo's so that other people on the road are safer, in fact quite the opposite as they are heavier and cause more damage to whomever they hit.
That's a very outdated premise. Big, boxy, heavy Volvos were decades ago. Their cars have been built on shared platforms for years now and are built no differently to any other car that is capable of getting a five star crash rating.It'd be interesting to see statistics (they may be available on Wikipedia or even EU webpages or the Office for National Statistics) for collisions and injuries/fatalities/ damage for various speed limits.
Looking at the stock on a website like Copart can give an indication that very high speed crashes do occur, but I would estimate that most crashes in Europe occur at speeds below 100 mph or even 80 mph, so what would a speed limiter actually achieve and how would that help reduce typical daily crashes at roundabouts, traffic lights and junctions in urban areas, or even national speed limit country lane and motorway crashes?
Looking at the stock on a website like Copart can give an indication that very high speed crashes do occur, but I would estimate that most crashes in Europe occur at speeds below 100 mph or even 80 mph, so what would a speed limiter actually achieve and how would that help reduce typical daily crashes at roundabouts, traffic lights and junctions in urban areas, or even national speed limit country lane and motorway crashes?
How many road deaths involve collisions where one or more vehicles are travelling in excess of 80 mph? Such speeds are possible only on motorways and a few exceptionally good dual carriageways.
I found the following data on the RAC website. In the UK, motorways account for about 6 % of fatalities though they account for 20 % of traffic. 60 % of deaths are on country roads. Exceeding the speed limit is listed as 'a factor' in 6 % of accidents, but these involved 15 % of fatalities.
In summary, these manufacturers are just working on their image as safety oriented. There are more effective ways of saving lives.
I found the following data on the RAC website. In the UK, motorways account for about 6 % of fatalities though they account for 20 % of traffic. 60 % of deaths are on country roads. Exceeding the speed limit is listed as 'a factor' in 6 % of accidents, but these involved 15 % of fatalities.
In summary, these manufacturers are just working on their image as safety oriented. There are more effective ways of saving lives.
Peter3442 said:
How many road deaths involve collisions where one or more vehicles are travelling in excess of 80 mph? Such speeds are possible only on motorways and a few exceptionally good dual carriageways.
I found the following data on the RAC website. In the UK, motorways account for about 6 % of fatalities though they account for 20 % of traffic. 60 % of deaths are on country roads. Exceeding the speed limit is listed as 'a factor' in 6 % of accidents, but these involved 15 % of fatalities.
In summary, these manufacturers are just working on their image as safety oriented. There are more effective ways of saving lives.
But it really would be bad luck to meet a car travelling towards you on a motorway, so 80 mph head on crashes are rare, where as 2 cars on a country road traveling at 30 moh will be a 60 mph head on crashI found the following data on the RAC website. In the UK, motorways account for about 6 % of fatalities though they account for 20 % of traffic. 60 % of deaths are on country roads. Exceeding the speed limit is listed as 'a factor' in 6 % of accidents, but these involved 15 % of fatalities.
In summary, these manufacturers are just working on their image as safety oriented. There are more effective ways of saving lives.
ARHarh said:
But it really would be bad luck to meet a car travelling towards you on a motorway, so 80 mph head on crashes are rare, where as 2 cars on a country road traveling at 30 moh will be a 60 mph head on crash
By collision, I intended any impact between a moving vehicle and any object, fixed or moving, not specifically head on crashes. Beyond that, a head on crash of two vehicles at 30 mph is roughly the same as one vehicle travelling at 30 mph into a fixed, rigid wall.
Even for that case, the speed limiters under discussion control the absolute maximum of the vehicle and do not adjust to local speed limits (or the velocity of other vehicles).
The fact remains that there are better ways for manufacturers to spend their (or our) money to improve safety.
"People don't buy Volvo's so that other people on the road are safer, in fact quite the opposite as they are heavier and cause more damage to whomever they hit."
Back in the 1980s and 90s when Volvo were selling, and presumably customers were buying, the structural strength argument for the safety of their cars, their argument didn't totally stand up. In those early days of the internet, it was possible to dig out data on deaths per passenger mile for both Europe and the United States. Relying on my memory, the safest cars were the Jaguar XJ40/x300 and the VW Golf followed by E class Mercedes (not the 'S') and one of the big American cruisers. Volvo were sufficiently far down the list that I don't remember them. Interestingly, Jaguar had a problem convincing Americans of the safety of the XJ40 due to its lack of air bags.
Back in the 1980s and 90s when Volvo were selling, and presumably customers were buying, the structural strength argument for the safety of their cars, their argument didn't totally stand up. In those early days of the internet, it was possible to dig out data on deaths per passenger mile for both Europe and the United States. Relying on my memory, the safest cars were the Jaguar XJ40/x300 and the VW Golf followed by E class Mercedes (not the 'S') and one of the big American cruisers. Volvo were sufficiently far down the list that I don't remember them. Interestingly, Jaguar had a problem convincing Americans of the safety of the XJ40 due to its lack of air bags.
Peter3442 said:
"People don't buy Volvo's so that other people on the road are safer, in fact quite the opposite as they are heavier and cause more damage to whomever they hit."
Back in the 1980s and 90s when Volvo were selling, and presumably customers were buying, the structural strength argument for the safety of their cars, their argument didn't totally stand up. In those early days of the internet, it was possible to dig out data on deaths per passenger mile for both Europe and the United States. Relying on my memory, the safest cars were the Jaguar XJ40/x300 and the VW Golf followed by E class Mercedes (not the 'S') and one of the big American cruisers. Volvo were sufficiently far down the list that I don't remember them. Interestingly, Jaguar had a problem convincing Americans of the safety of the XJ40 due to its lack of air bags.
Deaths/mile is a terrible guage for the inherent safety of a car though, all it proves is a car that at the time was typically driven slowly by older men who likely cherished it crashed the least.Back in the 1980s and 90s when Volvo were selling, and presumably customers were buying, the structural strength argument for the safety of their cars, their argument didn't totally stand up. In those early days of the internet, it was possible to dig out data on deaths per passenger mile for both Europe and the United States. Relying on my memory, the safest cars were the Jaguar XJ40/x300 and the VW Golf followed by E class Mercedes (not the 'S') and one of the big American cruisers. Volvo were sufficiently far down the list that I don't remember them. Interestingly, Jaguar had a problem convincing Americans of the safety of the XJ40 due to its lack of air bags.
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