61.5mpg lifetime - 82mpg in recent months

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Just to weigh in with my two cents:
1) I liked the picture.
2) Sometimes people react to criticism of others with hostility because they see the same traits in themselves and feel guilty about it. I know I do that sometimes. Your picture comments on ego, yes, but also on driving safety. To those who disagree that it's safer to drive with your hands on the wheel, then I'd be interested to see any safety studies or DOT reports to that effect. [side note: A childhood friend of mine had a deaf brother, and her mother would sometimes drive us home from school. I always felt uncomfortable because she would drive the van with her knees or elbows so she could sign her words as she spoke. At least she had a reasonable reason for driving that way- most people don't. They just don't take vehicle safety very seriously.]
3. Sure, some people need big cars/SUVs/trucks. They have lots of kids or they haul stuff around. In my area, though, most drivers are commuters, driving by themselves to an office job. I once spent a summer day when I was driving around counting all the light trucks that went by to tally how many of them were being used to carry anything in the bed, and only about 10% had any cargo- just a personal observation, nothing remotely scientific about it. I would guess that the rate is much lower for SUVs, but it's harder to see inside them.
4. One of the big reasons I hear from friends and acquaintances about why they drive or would want to drive SUVs has always been 'better safety.' I try to point out that having so many more big cars on the road makes any given accident more dangerous for all drivers (simple physics- the energy released by a collision relates to the momentum of the moving object, which is mv^2, so higher mass = more destructive), and they reply that it might be more destructive for the person they hit, but at least it's safer for them. Aside from the terrible, short-sighted selfishness of this, the claim has been completely debunked. See today's article in the New York Times about vehicle safety.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/03/business/03auto.html

One critical sentence: "A report last month by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration found that S.U.V.'s also had the highest death rate for their own occupants of any broad class of vehicles."

These are just my reactions to your picture and the responses it provoked, for what they're worth.

I wonder if the higher death rate for SUVs is related to increased roll-over risk?

Maybe two years ago there was a news report of an SUV roll-over. I think they said there were 9 people in this 5 passenger Expedition. This is very common out here, especially with people that live on Indian reservations. They're poor people, but their tribe gives them money (or is it just vehicles?) to live. They buy these SUVs to carry around their large families. They still live in shacks, but they're driving $40K vehicles! Anyways, back to the story. This particular Expedition rolled over, and the only person left alive was the single-digit-age girl. I think she was 8 or 9. She was the only one seatbelted in.

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Being serious, I think part of the rollover risk is many SUV drivers assume the posture pictured, resulting in a slightly delayed response time, then overturning, then rollover.

Once I was stupid enough to mock this and overturn. Spinning out and going backwards at 60mph is a sobering experience. It's a minor miracle there was no collision. If feel certain if I was in an SUV doing this, I'd rollover.

Again, I was stupid to have done it.

61.5mpg lifetime - 82mpg in recent months

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"fanatic" is what the lazy call the dedicated

My mother once fit herself and my entire little league baseball team into a 1973 VW bug. However, there were no child passenger safety laws in effect in the mid-1970s. There are now.

Well, your arms certainly shouldn't be fully extended when you're driving.

http://www.mpi.mb.ca/English/dr_tips/driver_position.html :

You should be sitting far enough away that your arms are slightly bent. This allows for better control in surprise situations. Of course, some drivers may have to move the seat forward to reach the pedals and then tilt the seat back into the correct position.

http://www.marylandmva.com/Resources/DL-002B.pdf

Sit as far away from the steering wheel as practical. Try to maintain

10-12 inches from the steering wheel hub to the chest.

http://www.emcins.com/ps/losscontrol/driving_tips.htm

It is a general rule that the seat should be positioned so your wrist is at the top of the steering wheel with your arm fully extended. If your vehicle is equipped with an air bag, the seat should be positioned so that the closest part of your body is at least 10 inches from the steering wheel to avoid injury in the event of air bag deployment.

The first thing I do is move the seat bottom to where I can comfortably move my foot from gas to brake without having to move my leg/knee. Then I adjust the seat back to get that slight elbow bend. Something I thought was really cool with these newer cars is the telescoping steering wheel. It makes it easier to have a more upright/laid back position and still have the best arm position.

Something else that I learned in driver's ed a long time ago and what's being taught in driver's ed today: instead of the old 10 and 2 o'clock hand positions, with the advent of the air bag, drivers should now use a 9 and 3 o'clock hand position.

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The legal warnings on the airbag seems to have done a disservice. They make it seem if you have your arms a little bent, you are dangerously close to the airbag.

61.5mpg lifetime - 82mpg in recent months

Best Run >
www.cleanmpg.com

"fanatic" is what the lazy call the dedicated