How fast would you drive...
Discussion
As I was crusing along the M4 back to London today I started thinking 'how fast would I drive if there were no speed limits on our motorways?'
I felt alert (my concentration was good), traffic was light for the most part, the road was dry, no chance of black ice at 14*c, visibility was good, my car's top speed is somewhere around 170mph (with brakes and handling to suit), but super unleaded is £1.45 a litre!
So what speed would you generally drive at in those conditions if we had no limits as per parts of the German Autobahn network?
I felt alert (my concentration was good), traffic was light for the most part, the road was dry, no chance of black ice at 14*c, visibility was good, my car's top speed is somewhere around 170mph (with brakes and handling to suit), but super unleaded is £1.45 a litre!
So what speed would you generally drive at in those conditions if we had no limits as per parts of the German Autobahn network?
Probably the same as I do now, around the 80-90 mark. I do sometimes do economy runs when I'm not in a rush and set the cruise at 60mph. Also comes without saying that when it rains I usually stick around the 70-75 mark and sometimes lower if the rains really bad.
Biggest problem on our roads is people not adjusting their speeds to the current conditions.
Biggest problem on our roads is people not adjusting their speeds to the current conditions.
140-150mph with no-one else around.
100-110mph with little other traffic.
90mph in light traffic.
depends on the car as well. I don't like being at the maximum capability of a car, I always like to have a bit more should I really need it, so max speed depends on what the car feels comfortable with.
100-110mph with little other traffic.
90mph in light traffic.
depends on the car as well. I don't like being at the maximum capability of a car, I always like to have a bit more should I really need it, so max speed depends on what the car feels comfortable with.
Through the day it would be hard to get above 90mph on the DCs I tend to drive on, at night 125mph would do, when the roads are empty, top speed is 147mph. If I was saving petrol I wouldn't want to blast along but saying as I only do short sections of DC I wouldn't worry about it too much.
Never going to happen though, not a progressive enough nation to ever implement something like that. Even turning some traffic lights off at night is too much to even consider, hence why I seem to find myself sitting like a t
t at traffic lights in the dead of night that only seem to go red as I approach, even when there is no one driving for miles around!
Never going to happen though, not a progressive enough nation to ever implement something like that. Even turning some traffic lights off at night is too much to even consider, hence why I seem to find myself sitting like a t
t at traffic lights in the dead of night that only seem to go red as I approach, even when there is no one driving for miles around!Videos like this one tend to put me off driving at ridiculously high speeds...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dI5ewOmHPQ
80 is a steady enough cruise for me these days.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dI5ewOmHPQ
80 is a steady enough cruise for me these days.
About 80-90mph The fuel consumption goes up exponentially after 60-70mph as theres a pretty solid wall of air built up and I dont wanna excessively waste fuel and wear. If really pushing it 110-120mph max, car would be too close to its capability limits after that and I couldnt rely on it to behave predictably if something unexpected occured.
Anyone posting 150mph etc is daydreaming, you would be bored and skint of it in a matter of months.
Anyone posting 150mph etc is daydreaming, you would be bored and skint of it in a matter of months.
Dr Interceptor said:
Videos like this one tend to put me off driving at ridiculously high speeds...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dI5ewOmHPQ
Yeh them random concrete blocks can be a right bhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dI5ewOmHPQ
dProbably the same for me too, 70-80. My car is geared quite short so it revs high (4k at 80mph) and makes a load of racket, especially as the sound proofing is stripped out on the cups. The fuel economy also drops right off above 80 and driving I'd rather save fuel for the fun bits of road.
I posed the question just as much to get an insight in to the affect of fuel prices on driving behavior as to a how fast people thought was safe.
As I was driving along at a speed I felt comfortable at (and one that I felt I wouldn't get banned for if I got caught) I started to think how much faster would I want to go if there was no limit and 1) have to keep my concentration at the level needed to maintain this speed & 2) see my mpg drop from c.20 to close to single figures?
So to those who say they would do 120, 130, 140, 150mph, would you seriously do this consistently for a 2-3 hour journey?
As I was driving along at a speed I felt comfortable at (and one that I felt I wouldn't get banned for if I got caught) I started to think how much faster would I want to go if there was no limit and 1) have to keep my concentration at the level needed to maintain this speed & 2) see my mpg drop from c.20 to close to single figures?
So to those who say they would do 120, 130, 140, 150mph, would you seriously do this consistently for a 2-3 hour journey?
Efbe said:
140-150mph with no-one else around.
100-110mph with little other traffic.
90mph in light traffic.
depends on the car as well. I don't like being at the maximum capability of a car, I always like to have a bit more should I really need it, so max speed depends on what the car feels comfortable with.
This for OP's car. If i'm in my car i'll cruise at 80-85 as this is where the car feels happy, however if i'm driving the M3 it's happy to cruise at 120mph in 6th, so depends on the car. 100-110mph with little other traffic.
90mph in light traffic.
depends on the car as well. I don't like being at the maximum capability of a car, I always like to have a bit more should I really need it, so max speed depends on what the car feels comfortable with.
Chris Stott said:
So to those who say they would do 120, 130, 140, 150mph, would you seriously do this consistently for a 2-3 hour journey?
A 2 hour journey at 70mph is significantly quicker at 150mph. 
But yeah, certainly driving at 120mph isn't a big deal in a lot of modern cars for a reasonably experienced driver. It's a lot less stressful than what F1 drivers do for 2 hours.
My old Z28 would cruise at 130 but the simple fact is that it's not just a question of speed limits, it's the lack of speed awareness by other plodders on auto-pilot and the real danger comes from inattentive people who will not even consider such speeds and WILL pull out in front of you.
Seen it too many times.
Seen it too many times.
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