Idiots when towing!

Why is it that when you are towing a trailer, people feel that they must hang back behind you as overtaking lanes are coming to an end and then rocket past you after it ends, leaving you no options except to push them on to the wrong side of the road (No oncoming traffic luckily) or go off the road yourself and start collecting white posts!

And whay is the problem three times as bad if you happen to be towing a race car! In particular does every P plater on the planet think that you will be impressed when they hang beside you for ages having a look and then rocket past and off into the distance in their buggered old VS Commodore!

I spent the weekend at Phillip Island running on track with up to 49 other cars all lapping at vastly different speeds and lap times and the only traffic issues I really had were going home afterwards!

Maybe it's training. The guys at the race track obviously train with a steering wheel in their hand, the guys on the road use a beer glass and what's in their pants.

bluester i know how you feel

I get that from time to time, but i'm only towing a 30 yr old boat, or a camper trailer. I combat them by indicating early that i'm coming over, which either forces them to back off or race past (i do tend to crowd them a little too if i need to, which helps them get the message real quick)

And yup - the P platers do seem to be the worse offenders, i think thats because they have not yet learned real road etiquette, or perhaps they have not figured out what it really takes to stop a 2T+ vehicle with a 2T+ loaded trailer

Seriously, and just to set the record straight ...

I've noticed a lot of this sort of idiocy too, and as you guys know, I tow a fair bit.

My solution is to pull out of the lane early. The law states that I must keep left unless overtaking if I am more than 500m from the end of the overtaking lane. Once I pass that magic mark, my indicator comes on and I don't make any bones about moving over.

In the end, it's move over or give them license to crowd you. The assumption that a broken line defining the termination of the lane and merging point with the next lane means that the terminating lane needs to give way no matter the cost is one that seems firmly entrenched in people's minds.

It might seem a little arrogant to pull out a bit early (I am talking about driving, nothing else, so keep your mind out of the gutter) but I think safety comes first.

Actually I tend to indicate Early and move over early too, I am not adverse to putting the trailer right in front of someone to push the message "NO, Too late"

In this case the bugger who did it sat back behind me until well after I started to indicate, just sheer bloody minded impatience topush past me and not be held up when I was at the speed limit in any case.

i tow all the time too. some people must think i have super breaks or something.

You dont need a high IQ to get your licence.

Dave.

i get it all the time regardless of towing a trailer or speed you are doing. usually its just people being pushing and just have to squeeze past one more car.
sometimes you get pricks who will stay behind you then pull out and pass right at the end.
used to have one passing lane that ended at an intersection with a concrete island in the centre of the road. amazing the amount of vehicles that used to hit it LOL. had cars disappear under the front of the truck, mate had a car get stuck between the truck and the boat trailer!

will risky i push them over when i get to the end of the passing lane, even if that means they go head on into oncoming traffic. if you give in to these road thugs they will just get worse untill they kill someone.

Driving a truck is the same deal, people have this weird problem where they think if they can't see around you they have to be in front of you. It's amazing the number of drivers that just have to be ahead.

Like Tony I'll always indicate and pull out early when I see the potential for a stupid move that will end with one of us not in the right lane, the only difference is a B Double is just a tad longer so that 500 meter mark that is usually indicated by a sign (or a sign with bullet holes around here) is quite often too late to stop the idiot moves.

It is funny to see how edgy some people get when they start seeing those Overtaking Lane Ahead signs after they've been stuck behind something they can't get around for too long though. They sneak the nose out to get a glimpse up the side then when it's nearly removed they duck back in for long enough to get their courage up again, in the meantime another few cars have joined the convoy and Mr Impatient doesn't want them to think he's the one holding them up so he sticks the nose out again and keeps doing it until he eventually sees an opportunity to pass so he tramps it and the fuel gauge moves as quick as the speedo and then he pulls in as the over taking lane starts and the rest of the traffic just idly pass.

do you guys get the one that go to pass but duck into the left lane first then swerve over to the right lane?
seem to get a lot of the here. get to the start of the passing lane and instead of just going straight to right lane and passing they dive into the left lane then into the right lane like they are a race car drafting and sling shoting the car in front.

Maybe their left hand was busy in their pants and as they moved their right hand over towards the gear lever they spun the steering wheel?

KraftyPg said:

Driving a truck is the same deal, people have this weird problem where they think if they can't see around you they have to be in front of you. It's amazing the number of drivers that just have to be ahead.

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Funnily enough, I will sit behind a truck for ages and not really bother with passing. But then one too many small rocks bounce up onto the car and I think thats it. The other thing is I like to see what is ahead on the highway, not just look at this moving wall in front of me, gets a bit dangerous.

On the motorbike, thats another story, just the sheer buffeting you get following in a trucks wake, even with the "2 second rule" means I'll skip ahead when I can.

Yeah those bloody P-platers, they're the worst

Ray, there's another reason for not sitting behind trucks on highways in the Australian outback ... POK.

Trucks hit 'em and rip 'em to bits and all that's left is POK - Pieces Of Kangaroo. If you've ever had a sudden red smear mashed all over your bonnet and windscreen or entrails caught in your wheels, you know your car's been completely POKked.

I tend to sit about 5+ seconds behind trucks on the highway for that reason. The roo-bits tend to land again by that time, and I can play "dodge the body parts" rather than "duck, I hope this ain't the legs coz that'll bust the windscreen".

Edit - also chunks of retread. Nasty stuff on the paintwork.

No one wants to see other vehicle pushed into traffic or pushed off the road etc and like Tony said sitting back from any towing vehicle is always a good move, it's the idiots who want to sit right on your arse and show how impatient they are that are annoying.

As much as I've seen them on Mitsu utes without towbars (my ex supervisor has a lot to answer for) those signs that large vehicles have saying "If you can't see my mirrors I can't see you" is probably the best message following vehicles can get. There is obviously cowboys out there that make a bad name for others but even a car can hide behind a caravan when they get too close behind, behind a B Double under the right circumstances you can hide a small truck and if that driver can't see you you're more at risk that he is.

The only problem I find with the 5 second rule is that too many other people think it should be a 1 second rule, but it's no different in the city where leaving several car lengths between you and the car in front is more often let's see if we can get so close to the car in front that his towball can mate with my radiator.

On the note of buffeting while it's no doubt worse on a bike you're not alone, the old 8 Tonne FH100 I used to drive used to get thrown around something terrible by buffeting from semis and B Doubles, then add a cross wind to the mix and it's even worse. I once had a fellow motorist ring the cops because the truck was swerving in the wind and the speed was going up and down (each time the wind changed to a head on gust I'd drop from 97 to 80 with my foot still on the floor). Cops were waiting for me at the depot when I got back, luckily the copper was a mate of mine and understood how things on the road can move in the wind, he reckons the booze bus is a bad one for it, so there was no issues to contend with but buffeting isn't just for bike riders.

I know about buffeting Krafty ... last year on grand final weekend i towed my boat from SALE back to Melbourne (last time i actually towed with my falcon wagon B4 i got the Nav) and the strong winds that weekend was moving car and trailer between 0.5 to 1.0m sideways - because it was a northerly i was being pushed off the road and not into oncoming traffic.

It was the scariest drive i've ever done, and for most of the trip I struggled at only 80km/hr - and i was at that reduced speed purely for what i deemed safety reasons at the time. By the time i got back home - i had white knuckles and went right to the kitchen for a huge swig of scotch !!!!

About an hour later i was functioning again and proceeded to unpack car and boat of all our gear.

its a road with human beings there is no dout your ganna have a to smack some of these people out for endangering others

Woody, exactly the same stretch of road. It's a bugger for cross winds and it's not going to make any great difference with the highway duplication that the government seem so hell bent of paying good money for to make twice a year traffic better.

The thing that gets me is the only place there is overtaking lanes there is on downward slopes so with anything but a tail wind (which in this area Easterlies are rare) slowish vehicles struggle to keep speed on the single lane bits but are able to speed up to a respectable speed as the over taking lanes start. In some ways the duplication will assist that but considering the roads are only really busy twice a year it's just not worth the cost.

Then if you go east of Sale you've got the most boring stretch of road in the world. I've driven the Nullabor many times and it's longest straight stretch is 144ks or something yet that stretch between Stratford and Bairnsdale of less than 60ks still beats the Nallabor for boredom.

I agree with ya Krafty, I usually only go as far as Statford, and then turn north to head up into the high country.