Aftermarket ABS

WHITE_P

stratos wrote: »

I will agree with the argument abs is better possibly, because my abs has only ever cut in seriously twice and I have to admit the pulsing of the peddle surprised me for a second and I may have backed off a bit.

However I think not all abs systems are equal.

I did find the problem with one car I had was the abs would just cut in a tiny bit too soon, and was too slow to recover from the pulses. Abs will always slow you quicker than just jamming on, however in my humble experience some work better than others.

ABS dosen't slow you quicker, it just prevents skidding and means you don't lose steering.

Alkers

But on a wet road ABS (by not locking your wheels) will stop you much quicker than locking up the wheels and skidding to a halt, no?

WHITE_P

Simona1986 wrote: »

But on a wet road ABS (by not locking your wheels) will stop you much quicker than locking up the wheels and skidding to a halt, no?

If you brake properly in the first place you wont skid. If people had better driving skills we would not need all this electronic crap in cars today.

Alkers

WHITE_P wrote: »

If you brake properly in the first place you wont skid. If people had better driving skills we would not need all this electronic crap in cars today.

Yes, but if you slam on with ABS you will be applying the maximum possible breaking force without locking the wheels. Doing this is a bit out of the league of 99.9% of people on the roads.

WHITE_P

Simona1986 wrote: »

Yes, but if you slam on with ABS you will be applying the maximum possible breaking force without locking the wheels. Doing this is a bit out of the league of 99.9% of people on the roads.

Point taken, but should we not be trying to improve peoples driving skills, rather than giving them a false sense of security. Too many people buying cars these days think that because they are loaded with so called safety features that they will not crash, and even if they do that all these safety features will somehow save them.

With the volume of traffic on our roads these days and the fact that most road upgrades are coming years too late and taking too long to finish, people really need to improve their driving skills.

Its not that hard and if the respective bodies (RSA , Government Dept.'s) who have some input to all this were serious about bringing down the serious / fatal accident toll on our roads, they would get on with providing dedicated centres to properly teach and test peoples ability to control their cars.

It's just that in 20 odd years driving I don't think I have seen so many incidents of poor driving skills as I do typically these days, and its not just young and inexperienced drivers, most peoples standards are slipping.

Sorry rant over.

Henry Ford III

WHITE_P wrote: »

ABS dosen't slow you quicker, it just prevents skidding and means you don't lose steering.

I don't agree. ABS in normal conditions (no gravel or snow/ice) will substantially reduce stopping distances.

It's been proven many times.

Biro

Henry Ford III wrote: »

I don't agree. ABS in normal conditions (no gravel or snow/ice) will substantially reduce stopping distances.

It's been proven many times.

I agree with this, I've even done my own test with a mate, and ABS was far superior.

E92

I agree with HFIII and Biro. ABS has been shown time and time again to be safer.

And nobody could cadence brake as fast as the ABS sensor engages/disengages the brakes, and even if they could, there are so few people that can handle a car that well that for 99.9% of the public out there, ABS is much safer for them.

WHITE_P

Henry Ford III wrote: »

I don't agree. ABS in normal conditions (no gravel or snow/ice) will substantially reduce stopping distances.

It's been proven many times.

Actually your wrong it is a proven fact that it doesn't reduce stopping distance's.

See http://www.nhtsa.dot.gov/cars/problems/Equipment/absbrakes.html

"Do cars with ABS stop more quickly than cars without? ABS is designed to help the driver maintain control of the vehicle during emergency braking situations, not make the car stop more quickly. ABS may shorten stopping distances on wet or slippery roads and many systems will shorten stopping distances on dry roads. On very soft surfaces, such as loose gravel or unpacked snow, an ABS system may actually lengthen stopping distances. In wet or slippery conditions, you should still make sure you drive carefully, always keep a safe distance behind the vehicle in front of you, and maintain a speed consistent with the road conditions."

Brings me back to my point, if we improve peoples driving skills we could reduce the carnage on our roads without have to rely on equipment which could in the future become faulty in many cars as they age resulting in otherwise perfectly useable cars having to be scrapped.

ford jedi

seems to be alot of super skilled drivers on this site,have to agree with hft111 on this one abs does works well and it may give to the extra second to make that extra swerve to save someones life or your own ,every stupid crash ive seen in ireland seems to start with imediate stamiping on the brakes then staight in to the arse of the car in front. have yet to ever see anyone make a good recovery manovre

Alkers

Read your quote again
"On very soft surfaces, such as loose gravel or unpacked snow, an ABS system may actually lengthen stopping distances"

ford jedi

ok it,l take a fraction longer but you can steer it!! a car thats skiding only goes straight like the ones you see every sunday moring on the roundabouts and the bends you could take at 100mph with you eyes closed but when your skidding that just aint the case

Henry Ford III

Thanks for the back up folks.

The reason ABS reduces stopping distances in normal conditions is simple. The system applies braking power to the wheels until such time as it locks up. It then releases the brake and applies it again. Similar to cadence braking infact.

The difference is that ABS can do this 50 times a second.

Even Michael Flatley couldn't do that!

Biro

Henry Ford III wrote: »

The difference is that ABS can do this 50 times a second.

Even Michael Flatley couldn't do that!

He'd give it a fair old lash though!

WHITE_P

ford jedi wrote: »

seems to be alot of super skilled drivers on this site,have to agree with hft111 on this one abs does works well and it may give to the extra second to make that extra swerve to save someones life or your own ,every stupid crash ive seen in ireland seems to start with imediate stamiping on the brakes then staight in to the arse of the car in front. have yet to ever see anyone make a good recovery manovre

Seems to me that, there is more average or below average drivers on this site, who don't seem to want to be better drivers either. No arguement that ABS is worthwhile, but some people here seem to think that it will prevent them having an accident. Which is clearly not the case. It might if they are very lucky, but when you travel alot and see the piss poor standard of driving on Irish roads you soon realise, no amount of safety kit in any car is going to prevent alot of the accidents that happen.

Also I would say most of the pro ABS comments here come from people who learned to drive in cars that are equipped with ABS and wouldn't know what it is like to drive a car thats not fitted with ABS.

Henry Ford III

You can assess the level of peoples driving skills based on comments posted on a messageboard? :rolleyes:

Biro

WHITE_P wrote: »

Also I would say most of the pro ABS comments here come from people who learned to drive in cars that are equipped with ABS and wouldn't know what it is like to drive a car thats not fitted with ABS.

Incorrect. I passed my test in my mothers car at the time, no ABS, and bought my first car which had no ABS, owned it for 3 years and 65k miles approx, so I know what I'm talking about.

ford jedi

yes you may be right about abs/esp bas and all the rest of that stuff not been the be all and end all of driving but some peoples driving is so **** they need all the assistance they can get !!!,


the level of driving in ireland is ****,,,, people cant reverse/drive in snow /rain /wind and it wasnt as if if we dont get alot of it!!!

why does everbodys decision making levels come to a standstill when we get a bit of weather you dont see that in europe they still go flat out in all conditions

Esel

ford jedi wrote: »

why does everbodys decision making levels come to a standstill when we get a bit of weather you dont see that in europe they still go flat out in all conditions

They must all be superskilled drivers then. :rolleyes:

Omcd

Just on the suggestions made by some posters about releasing brakes after locking and finding you cant steer - make sure you know which way the wheels are pointing as you can lose track when you are turning the steering wheel and the car is just still going straight - when you release the brakes the car will instantly try to go the way the wheels are pointing - if the speed is low enough at that stage the car will spear in that direction, or if it is too high a spin or possible rollover may result.

In the case of spearing off when the speed is low enough this can be a good avoidance techique if planned and there is somewhere to go, but if not can be disaster if it takes you by surprise (and puts you under an oncoming lorry for example). First time spearing off happened to me it was a complete surprise (in hindsight not:rolleyes:) and I ended up in a ditch while trying to avoid a furry animal that ended up stuck to my front wheel anyway (lesson learned about OTT braking reactions to small furry animals) - second time it was a calculated manovure to avoid the back of car which in heavy rain from 80km/h had jammed on ABS without warning to let out a driver in front (and I thought, obviously very wrongly, I had left more than ample space between me and the other car given the conditions - another lesson learned - but cars with ABS do stop a heck of a lot quicker wet weather than those that dont - it was enough to encourage me to change the car..) in that incident when I hit the brakes and the car started skidding I then realised the car wasnt going to stop in the space available, there was oncoming traffic and a vehicle in the hard shoulder beside the stopped car, I was going too fast at that point in the conditions to swerve across the hard shoulder and make it to the bushes the other side of it before contacting the car in it or losing control, so I kept my foot on the brakes and kept it skidding straight to lose as much speed as possible, at the same time turning the wheels to the left, then at the last moment left off the brakes and this luckily achieved an almost 90 degree spear across the hard shoulder behind the car that was in it, coming to stop just nudging the bushes, rather than planted in the back of the twat dancing on the ABS. IMO, I doubt if cadence braking would have helped much in this situation as cadence braking is difficult enough for most people to do effectively in straight line, let alone in an emergency combined with tight steering manouvres.

I am also not sure pumping the brake pedal is the best way to achieve cadence braking - in most cases in my experience pumping the brake pedal actually lengthens the stopping distance and makes you look like twat (though I'm not saying I was managing to do it very well, like most of us). Instead I find the best way to achieve it is to sense out where the limit between lock up and not lock up is and keep the brake pedal consistantly applied at this point - it would seem to me this would make the car more stable especially if trying to steer at the same time. But one thing is definite, if you find yourself going around a bend too fast then doing anything that results in the wheels locking is going to take you straight off it.

Also, some cars ABS systems, from experience, do handle loose surfaces differently. I had three cars with ABS over the years - the first allowed lock up on gravel, the second wouldn't apply the brakes at all on gravel (and main dealer said nothing was wrong with it) requiring the use of the handbrake, and the one I drive now seems to be somewhere in between. Thing to note if you are driving one that wont apply brakes on gravel, be careful about pulling into gravel/loose surface laybys from flowing traffic as you will probably need to use the handbrake before you run out of space...

I think also if your shock absorbers are not great then some ABS systems tend to over react by applying ABS unnecessarily on bumpy road surfaces, and ABS aside, good shock absorbers can make the difference between surviving on a bend taken too fast or not, especially on our bumpy roads.

stratos

I agree abs will always be better than jamming on, skidding is not stopping and you have no steering. However in order for the abs to work it must release the brakes completley albeit for a split second. proper cadence braking ( and some people think this means pumping the pedal ) never lets the brakes off completley and applied foot pressure is modulated as the lock up approaches. Steering is maintained and I believe stopping distances shortened. I have seen too many crashes where the person jammed on locked up and hit the car in front, when no braking and steering would have avoided the problem.

Again maybe some abs is better than others. but i know in my own case my car released the brakes a micro second to soon. I have steered a number of non abs cars over the years with cadence braking through accidents. Where the guy behind me jammed on and rammed on in.

Good braking keeps you just inside the squeal zone, your tyres start to squeal just before adhesion is lost, unfortunatley at this point your abs valve releases brake pressure and the computer starts thinking about it.

However if you have the presence of mind to keep the squeal and steer you may survive to post again. If you brake beyond the squeal you will lock up and all is lost unless you have abs.

For my own part I don't like abs or traction control for normal driving these gadgets are fine .

WHITE_P

ford jedi wrote: »

yes you may be right about abs/esp bas and all the rest of that stuff not been the be all and end all of driving but some peoples driving is so **** they need all the assistance they can get !!!,


the level of driving in ireland is ****,,,, people cant reverse/drive in snow /rain /wind and it wasnt as if if we dont get alot of it!!!

why does everbodys decision making levels come to a standstill when we get a bit of weather you dont see that in europe they still go flat out in all conditions

Couldn't agree with you more!!!

My point is if everyone is relying on things like ABS etc. to sort it all out for them when things go wrong, then driving skills / standards are only going to get worse, not better, and no amount of safety kit in a car is going to resolve that particular problem.

WHITE_P

From the last posts by OMCD and Stratos, they seem to be the some of the few that get "IT". Improved driver skills will be more beneficial to road safety than electronically controlled devices fitted to cars which can and with time will eventually become faulty.

BostonB

Dream on. The reality is the vast majority of people will never be able to manage something like proper cadence braking or pumping the pedal.

blackbox

I've been driving for quite a while, and having driven both, feel much safer with ABS.

This is mainly on narrow country roads, where you can be forced to put the left wheels onto the grass when you meet oncoming traffic. In this situation, without ABS, the left weels lock up and you th instinct is to lift off to restore traction. However this means that you are not making full use of the traction that is availble to the two wheels still on the tarmac.

With ABS each wheel is controlled independently and it can maximise the braking on each.