They walk among us...again

On Mon, 03 Sep 2012 11:16:02 -0400, Arif Khokar >
wrote:

>On 9/2/2012 6:42 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
>
>> AFAIK the federal safety standard for steering wheel interlocks
>> specifically requires that they cannot be put into lock position
>> unless they are placed in park first.
>
>I didn't know that. My experience has been that if the gear shift was
>not in park or neutral, the key could not be removed from the ignition
>(maybe because it couldn't be turned to the lock position necessary for
>removal).

That's correct, you can't remove the key but you CAN turn the key to
the off position. You just can't turn it past off to lock. That was
purposely done that way so that the interlock would NOT result in
people who turned their cars off winding up with the steering wheel
locked.

On Wed, 29 Aug 2012 20:11:47 -0700 (PDT), Harry K
> wrote:

>Recent clip on evening news. Runaway car with stuck gas pedel, driver
>on phone with dispatch. Goes on for a long time and she reaches 120
>passing cars on the shouilder etc. Dispatch finally tells her to pull
>up on the gas pedal and step on brake at same time!!!
>
>Neat trick. I couldn't reach my gas pedal an still control the car at
>120 on my best day.
>
>Neither of the morons thought of the simple solution TURN IT OFF,
>STUPID!
>
>Harry K


Just watched the video again and noticed something interesting.... The
woman claimed she had put the emergency brake on and it didn't help.
She also said something about the brakes and one would presume she
tried braking. The announcer, not the woman, claims she couldn't
shift out of drive.. but nowhere do we hear the woman say that.

As we see the SUV roll to a stop from the cop dash cam video there is
no smoke at all as you might expect of the emergency brake had been on
for several miles at 100+ mph. The woman stated that when she pulled
the accel pedal up the vehicle slowed down real fast. Why would it do
that if there were no brakes applied?? But the oddest thing to me was
that as the SUV is seen coming to a stop and the woman getting out you
see it start to roll again and the cop jumps in, you see the brake
lights come on, and it jerks to a stop. The lack of any smoke from
the brakes, and the fact that they seemed to work normally for the cop
makes me think she had not even tried hard braking to get the SUV
stopped and that she never fully applied the emergency brake. From my
armchair I'd have to chalk this up to basic stupidity on the part of
the woman - she shouldn't need to be told to pull up on the pedal and
it's inconceivable that she could not have simply put it in neutral
or just shut the engine off.

On 9/3/2012 3:13 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
> On Wed, 29 Aug 2012 20:11:47 -0700 (PDT), Harry K
> > wrote:
>
>> Recent clip on evening news. Runaway car with stuck gas pedel, driver
>> on phone with dispatch. Goes on for a long time and she reaches 120
>> passing cars on the shouilder etc. Dispatch finally tells her to pull
>> up on the gas pedal and step on brake at same time!!!
>>
>> Neat trick. I couldn't reach my gas pedal an still control the car at
>> 120 on my best day.
>>
>> Neither of the morons thought of the simple solution TURN IT OFF,
>> STUPID!
>>
>> Harry K
>
>
> Just watched the video again and noticed something interesting.... The
> woman claimed she had put the emergency brake on and it didn't help.
> She also said something about the brakes and one would presume she
> tried braking. The announcer, not the woman, claims she couldn't
> shift out of drive.. but nowhere do we hear the woman say that.
>
> As we see the SUV roll to a stop from the cop dash cam video there is
> no smoke at all as you might expect of the emergency brake had been on
> for several miles at 100+ mph. The woman stated that when she pulled
> the accel pedal up the vehicle slowed down real fast. Why would it do
> that if there were no brakes applied?? But the oddest thing to me was
> that as the SUV is seen coming to a stop and the woman getting out you
> see it start to roll again and the cop jumps in, you see the brake
> lights come on, and it jerks to a stop. The lack of any smoke from
> the brakes, and the fact that they seemed to work normally for the cop
> makes me think she had not even tried hard braking to get the SUV
> stopped and that she never fully applied the emergency brake. From my
> armchair I'd have to chalk this up to basic stupidity on the part of
> the woman - she shouldn't need to be told to pull up on the pedal and
> it's inconceivable that she could not have simply put it in neutral
> or just shut the engine off.
>
Cool. So I can disable the throttle return spring on my CBR600F4i and
scream down the freeway at 157 mph and not get a ticket?

The woman should lose her driving license for incompetence, and/or
reckless driving.

Too bad DHS did not stop her with a Hellfire missile for her act of
Domestic Terrorismâ„¢.

Of course, if the vehicle had a sensible manual transmission and/or kill
switch, this would not be an issue.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731°N, 83.985007°W
Post Free or Die!

On 8/29/2012 10:11 PM, Harry K wrote:
> Recent clip on evening news. Runaway car with stuck gas pedel, driver
> on phone with dispatch. Goes on for a long time and she reaches 120
> passing cars on the shouilder etc. Dispatch finally tells her to pull
> up on the gas pedal and step on brake at same time!!!
>
I would have told the stupid woman to run into an overpass pier.

> Neat trick. I couldn't reach my gas pedal an still control the car at
> 120 on my best day.

120 mph is not that fast - only a 3-2 downshift at the end of the main
straight at my favorite track.

--
Tºm Shermªn - 42.435731°N, 83.985007°W
Post Free or Die!

"richard" > wrote in message
...
> On Wed, 29 Aug 2012 20:11:47 -0700 (PDT), Harry K wrote:
>
>> Recent clip on evening news. Runaway car with stuck gas pedel, driver
>> on phone with dispatch. Goes on for a long time and she reaches 120
>> passing cars on the shouilder etc. Dispatch finally tells her to pull
>> up on the gas pedal and step on brake at same time!!!
>>
>> Neat trick. I couldn't reach my gas pedal an still control the car at
>> 120 on my best day.
>>
>> Neither of the morons thought of the simple solution TURN IT OFF,
>> STUPID!
>>
>> Harry K
>
> Your solution is not possible in today's cars.
> Many cars today can not simply turn off the engine while in gear.
> It may be possible though to shift into neutral.
> And by turning off the engine, how then do you have breaks let alone
> steering?

Should be able to shift to neutral without having to push on the shifter
button (for floor shift anyway). Some of the shift arrangements include
zigzags or sport shift gates, so those may require a button push. Better to
shift to neutral and let the engine RPMs bounce off the rev limiter than
overheat the brakes trying to overpower the acceleration.

Apparently, from the news coverage I watched, the 911 operator told the
driver to shift to neutral and the driver replied they couldn't get it to
move. Not sure what convoluted shift arrangement may exist in the vehicle
but in the ones I've driven without zigzags or sport shift gates it was just
a simple push forward from D to N and also reverse was a locked shift (so no
danger of shifting from D to R without a button press past N).

At least 911 is now telling drivers to shift to neutral.

"John David Galt" > wrote in message
...
> On 2012-08-29 20:11, Harry K wrote:
>> Neither of the morons thought of the simple solution TURN IT OFF,
>> STUPID!
>
> Turning off most cars locks the steering wheel.

If the ignition switch is moved to Lock. However, in the case of push button
engine on/off the various positions of an ignition switch would be mostly a
moot point.

"Ashton Crusher" > wrote in message
...
> On Wed, 29 Aug 2012 20:11:47 -0700 (PDT), Harry K
> > wrote:
>
>>Recent clip on evening news. Runaway car with stuck gas pedel, driver
>>on phone with dispatch. Goes on for a long time and she reaches 120
>>passing cars on the shouilder etc. Dispatch finally tells her to pull
>>up on the gas pedal and step on brake at same time!!!
>>
>>Neat trick. I couldn't reach my gas pedal an still control the car at
>>120 on my best day.
>>
>>Neither of the morons thought of the simple solution TURN IT OFF,
>>STUPID!
>>
>>Harry K
>
>
> Just watched the video again and noticed something interesting.... The
> woman claimed she had put the emergency brake on and it didn't help.
> She also said something about the brakes and one would presume she
> tried braking. The announcer, not the woman, claims she couldn't
> shift out of drive.. but nowhere do we hear the woman say that.
>
I recall in the news coverage the woman said she couldn't get it (the
shifter) to move?

> As we see the SUV roll to a stop from the cop dash cam video there is
> no smoke at all as you might expect of the emergency brake had been on
> for several miles at 100+ mph. The woman stated that when she pulled
> the accel pedal up the vehicle slowed down real fast. Why would it do
> that if there were no brakes applied?? But the oddest thing to me was
> that as the SUV is seen coming to a stop and the woman getting out you
> see it start to roll again and the cop jumps in, you see the brake
> lights come on, and it jerks to a stop. The lack of any smoke from
> the brakes, and the fact that they seemed to work normally for the cop
> makes me think she had not even tried hard braking to get the SUV
> stopped and that she never fully applied the emergency brake. From my
> armchair I'd have to chalk this up to basic stupidity on the part of
> the woman - she shouldn't need to be told to pull up on the pedal and
> it's inconceivable that she could not have simply put it in neutral
> or just shut the engine off.

Depends on the strength of the parking brake. Some will fully lock the
wheels, while others will act as less than normal braking action. Some of
that also assumes no factory defects in the parking brake adjustment.

On 9/3/2012 4:03 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
> On Mon, 03 Sep 2012 11:16:02 -0400, Arif Khokar >
> wrote:
>
>> On 9/2/2012 6:42 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
>>
>>> AFAIK the federal safety standard for steering wheel interlocks
>>> specifically requires that they cannot be put into lock position
>>> unless they are placed in park first.
>>
>> I didn't know that. My experience has been that if the gear shift was
>> not in park or neutral, the key could not be removed from the ignition
>> (maybe because it couldn't be turned to the lock position necessary for
>> removal).
>
> That's correct, you can't remove the key but you CAN turn the key to
> the off position. You just can't turn it past off to lock. That was
> purposely done that way so that the interlock would NOT result in
> people who turned their cars off winding up with the steering wheel
> locked.

I tested this out with a MY 2012 car with an automatic transmission. I
wasn't able to remove the key from the ignition when the car was in any
gear other than Park. I wonder how such a requirement applies to cars
with manual transmissions. I assume it's still possible to remove the
key and lock the wheel while the car is in motion.

On Sep 3, 5:54*pm, Arif Khokar > wrote:
> On 9/3/2012 4:03 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Mon, 03 Sep 2012 11:16:02 -0400, Arif Khokar >
> > wrote:
>
> >> On 9/2/2012 6:42 PM, Ashton Crusher wrote:
>
> >>> AFAIK the federal safety standard for steering wheel interlocks
> >>> specifically requires that they cannot be put into lock position
> >>> unless they are placed in park first.
>
> >> I didn't know that. *My experience has been that if the gear shift was
> >> not in park or neutral, the key could not be removed from the ignition
> >> (maybe because it couldn't be turned to the lock position necessary for
> >> removal).
>
> > That's correct, you can't remove the key but you CAN turn the key to
> > the off position. *You just can't turn it past off to lock. *That was
> > purposely done that way so that the interlock would NOT result in
> > people who turned their cars off winding up with the steering wheel
> > locked.
>
> I tested this out with a MY 2012 car with an automatic transmission. *I
> wasn't able to remove the key from the ignition when the car was in any
> gear other than Park. *I wonder how such a requirement applies to cars
> with manual transmissions. *I assume it's still possible to remove the
> key and lock the wheel while the car is in motion.

For thiat I can only go by my 89 F150. The key will not go into lock
or be removed without pushing a button on the column - basically a
two-handed operation.

Harry K

On Sep 3, 1:13*pm, Ashton Crusher > wrote:
> On Wed, 29 Aug 2012 20:11:47 -0700 (PDT), Harry K
>
> > wrote:
> >Recent clip on evening news. *Runaway car with stuck gas pedel, driver
> >on phone with dispatch. *Goes on for a long time and she reaches 120
> >passing cars on the shouilder etc. *Dispatch finally tells her to pull
> >up on the gas pedal and step on brake at same time!!!
>
> >Neat trick. *I couldn't reach my gas pedal an still control the car at
> >120 on my best day.
>
> >Neither of the morons thought of the simple solution TURN IT OFF,
> >STUPID!
>
> >Harry K
>
> Just watched the video again and noticed something interesting.... The
> woman claimed she had put the emergency brake on and it didn't help.
> She also said something about the brakes and one would presume she
> tried braking. *The announcer, not the woman, claims she couldn't
> shift out of drive.. but nowhere do we hear the woman say that.
>
> As we see the SUV roll to a stop from the cop dash cam video there is
> no smoke at all as you might expect of the emergency brake had been on
> for several miles at 100+ mph. The woman stated that when she pulled
> the accel pedal up the vehicle slowed down real fast. *Why would it do
> that if there were no brakes applied?? *But the oddest thing to me was
> that as the SUV is seen coming to a stop and the woman getting out you
> see it start to roll again and the cop jumps in, you see the brake
> lights come on, and it jerks to a stop. *The lack of any smoke from
> the brakes, and the fact that they seemed to work normally for the cop
> makes me think she had not even tried hard braking to get the SUV
> stopped and that she never fully applied the emergency brake. *From my
> armchair I'd have to chalk this up to *basic stupidity on the part of
> the woman - she shouldn't need to be told to pull up on the pedal and
> it's inconceivable that she could not *have simply put it in neutral
> or just shut the engine off.

The really suspicious part is that to pull up on the pedal she would
have had to _take her foot off the stupid gas pedeal)_.

Harry K