HOYA SWALLOWS PENTAX !

In article , William
Graham wrote:

"Roger" wrote in message
...
On 21 Dec 2006 11:11:19 -0800, "acl"
wrote:


Ken Lucke wrote:
In article , acl
wrote:

jeremy wrote:
mechanical build quality had deteriorated noticably. Just like new
cars.
Better fuel economy and more amenities, at the expense of less sheet
metal
and smaller overall size.

So, basically, you prefer cars with lots of sheet metal and large
size?


Damn straight _I_ do. Sheet metal, true internal structure (not just
some flimsy suppoorts for the outer skin), and large size. I'd take
high strength composite fiber/plastics (NOT fiberglass!) if they ever
start making cars with them (oops, sorry, that was an inadvertent cue
for RichA to enter the thread with his obsession), but until then, I
want METAL around me. The more the better.

Ever seen a serious wreck? Ever been in one?

Yes, I've been in one from which I was lucky to get out alive. Can't
say it changed my view (if anything, it enhanced my opinion that how a
car handles is more important than how robust it is). I agree that if a
tank hits me then it's better to be in another tank, though.

About 5 years ago I had one of those immortal teenagers in his
invincible SUV come shooting out of a driveway with all 4 burning. Two
solid lanes of oncoming traffic on the left and trees to the right.

I only left about 12 feet of skid marks before sticking the nose of my
Trans Am into the side of that GMC Jimmy. He was going fast enough
to spin me through the oncoming traffic and into a bank parking lot.
The GMC turned 90 degrees and stopped about 30 feed down the left turn
lane.

It put the right front tire almost into the seat on that side. The
firewall was back against the bottom of the dash all the way across
and I wrapped the steering wheel around the column. The car stopped so
quick all the antennas bent over flat against the body.

Even bending that steering wheel I was unhurt. Punchier than after a
6-pack on an empty stomach, but unhurt. The kid in the SUV ended up in
the hospital with a broken shoulder or collar bone. The only thing
that save his life was that massive door pillar on the Jimmy.

However the air bags, seat and shoulder harness and that car body
folding up (plus being missed by all that oncoming traffic) is the
only reason I'm alive.

I also fly high performance airplanes. The interesting comparison is
insurance rates and vehicle value. The more you drive the higher your
rates due to exposure, but the more you fly the lower your rates due
to time building competency.



From 1979 to 1996, I worked as a professional, full time paramedic (in
Portland, OR and other places), and the last 6 years was also a
firefighter. I've _seen_ (and sometimes had to scrape up) the
difference in outcomes.

Sorry, but to hell with fuel economy... with the millions of people on
the road in this country who merely know "how to operate a motor
vehicle" as opposed to actually knowing how to _drive_ their vehicles
(and there is a HUGE difference between those two skillsets), I want a
tank around me, if possible. Again, damn straight I prefer a vehicle
with some substance to it rather than today's tin cans that a wrinkle
in the sheet metal causes major loss of body integrity and strength
(literally).


If gas would get up to $5 a gallon we might be able to do something
about that.

We worry about the dangers of all kinds of devices and demand
protection. Then we go out and kill off between 40,000 and 50,000 a
year on the highways and chalk it up to the cost of doing business.

Well, we have very different priorities in cars, I must admit.

Any time you take a car out it's a risk. There is a calculated risk
associated with virtually every action we take. I'm willing to take
the higher risk associated with the smaller car, or flying an
airplane.

I drive a 4WD SUV for a lot of things and my wife's Hybrid when it's
available. I doubt I'm any safer in the SUV with all the *stuff* I
throw in back. Plus in either car I usually have a couple of cameras
in the right front seat. One with a Short to medium wide range zoom
and the other with a 200 to 500 zoom.

My first wife (many, many years ago in another life) lived because she
was thrown out of a car in a wreck. You would never get her to wear a
seat belt, even though the odds are far in favor for doing so. Had I
not had a seat belt on when I hit that SUV it would have been quite a
ride. One deputy with a kind of lop sided grin asked, "did you have
your seat belt on". I replied "I sure wouldn't be walking around like
this if I hadn't".

But I had a friend who walked away from an accident where his engine ended
up where his lap would have been had he been wearing his seat belt......He
didn't think much of them either....

I am impressed, however with these formula I cars that can hit the rails at
175 MPH, fly end over end a dozen times, completely come apart at the seams
until there is nothing left of them but the cage containing the driver,
which, after he unbelts himself, he walks away from without a scratch....Why
can't they do that with the family sedan?


Because a) those cars are designed that way intentionally. b) the cost
would make the average buyer shudder, and c) how many people could you
get to wear a 5-point (or more) racing harness to drive to the local
supermarket?

--
You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a
reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating
the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the struggle for
independence.
-- Charles A. Beard

On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 09:38:55 -0700, Bill Funk
wrote:


I also fly high performance airplanes. The interesting comparison is
insurance rates and vehicle value. The more you drive the higher your
rates due to exposure, but the more you fly the lower your rates due
to time building competency.

Well, sort of.
The more you drive, the more experience you get, which lowers your
rate; try comparing an 18-year old with a 40-year old, bith driving
since age 16, both driving the same number of miles per year in the
same market.
As for the pilot, the real danger is on the ground; while any flight
might be any number of hours, there's only two ground contacts:
takeoff and landing (or crashing). So, the more you fly (the more
hours), it's reasonable to assume the number of grounds contacts
remain at two per flight, but the hours will go up with more
experience.


So what's your point? DO American insurers charge more for
high-mileage drivers? (UK insurers don't.) DO they take account
of years of experience, or just of age? DOES a pilot who flies more
miles get a lower rate? More miles per year, or more total miles in
his log book? Does more miles equate to longer journeys, fewer
landings? Why? Wouldn't it just as likely mean similar trips but
more of them?

On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 09:39:50 -0800, Ken Lucke
wrote:

You need only reflect that one of the best ways to get yourself a
reputation as a dangerous citizen these days is to go about repeating
the very phrases which our founding fathers used in the struggle for
independence.

How do you read that? As an ironic reflection that times change? And
that rhetoric shouldn't be TOO minutely analysed, once it's done its
job? Or as something else?

Laurence Payne wrote:

So what's your point? DO American insurers charge more for
high-mileage drivers? (UK insurers don't.) DO they take account
of years of experience, or just of age? DOES a pilot who flies more
miles get a lower rate? More miles per year, or more total miles in
his log book? Does more miles equate to longer journeys, fewer
landings? Why? Wouldn't it just as likely mean similar trips but
more of them?

Insurance co's here (Canada) ask what mileage you drive to work and back
and then look at your age/experience, accidents and claims history.

These factors (as well as the value of the car and where you live)
determine the rates.

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"Kennedy McEwen" wrote in message
...
In article , William Graham
writes


I am impressed, however with these formula I cars that can hit the rails
at
175 MPH, fly end over end a dozen times, completely come apart at the
seams
until there is nothing left of them but the cage containing the driver,
which, after he unbelts himself, he walks away from without a
scratch....Why
can't they do that with the family sedan?

To an extent, most of them are designed to deform protectively in exactly
the same way - hence the presence of crush zones etc. Of course, they
won't withstand a 175MPH impact with all/any passengers surviving, but the
suspension doesn't fall apart when they drive over a pothole either.
Drivers and passengers of the average family sedan wouldn't accept being
strapped into the harness by a 3 man team (drivers cannot tighten the
harness enough by themselves), wearing a HANS brace or flameproof overalls
every time they get into the vehicle either or being fit enough to
withstand 10g differential forces on their neck muscles before being given
a license every season.

There have been many technologies that have transitioned from F1 to
commercial cars, seat belts, anti-lock brakes, monocoque/unibody chassis
to name a few, but ultimately they are different vehicle types with vastly
differing requirements. One common aspect is that if you make the car
capable of going fast enough, that is as fast as some people will drive
it, and I personally don't want to see someone in my rear view mirror
approaching at 175MPH while I am stuck at traffic lights on my way home
from work.

I think I would put up with most of all that stuff if the highway patrol
would let me drive 175 mph everywhere I went, and my vehicle was capable of
it! - In general, I do like the "cage" idea and technology.....Protect the
important things....The passengers, and let the devil take all the
rest......

"David J. Littleboy" wrote in message
...

"Kennedy McEwen" wrote:

I personally don't want to see someone in my rear view mirror approaching
at 175MPH while I am stuck at traffic lights on my way home from work.

The easy way to avoid that is to not own a car. (That's one of the reasons
I ended up in Tokyo.)

Seriously, I don't understand why more people don't decide not to own
cars. The (quite rational*) decision not to own a car ought to be a
possibility, right?

*: Cars are dangerous and expensive (at the least; breathing gasoline
fumes can't be good for one). And one can buy a lot of camera equipment
for the price of a car.

David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan


Depends on where you live, and what you do, or like to do. It would be very
difficult for me to do without a car here in Salem, Oregon. We don't even
have a decent bus line that goes by my house, and most of the busses in town
stop running at 10:00 PM every day. I have to go to the next town North of
me once a week for band practice, and the next town South of me for a music
lesson every week.....Both places virtually inaccessible without my own car.
If I had to do without a car, I would have to move to the heart of a very
large city just to be able to continue my two principal hobbies.
(photography and trumpet playing) And even then, getting to and from gigs
would be very problematical. - And then, there are our four cats.......

"Laurence Payne" lpayne1NOSPAM@dslDOTpipexDOTcom wrote in message
...
On Tue, 26 Dec 2006 13:57:15 GMT, Rebecca Ore
wrote:

The infrastructure of the US is auto-centric.

Yeah. It's going to come as an even bigger shock to you guys. But
you'll cope, as we all will have to.

Yes.....I don't see any real problems, myself......Getting rid of the
gas-guzzlers might be a traumatic experience for some, but I'm sure there
will be a number of other alternatives on the horizon. I see us as being
individually transportation orientated, but not necessarily gasoline
dependent as others seem to see us. When the gas runs out, we will just take
to electric vehicles or whatever we have to do. But crowding together into
busses or trains just isn't in the cards, and I just don't see that it
should have to be. We don't think that way, and our life style isn't
designed around that sort of thing. IOW, whatever they come up with, you can
be sure of one thing.....One person will be able to leave his house in it,
and drive it to wherever he wants to go without having to be dependent on
anyone else in order to go there. Whether it burns alcohol, or peanut
shells, or runs through storage batteries, or picks up energy from the road
or whatever, it will be a one man, one destination at a time vehicle.....Of
that, you can be sure.......

Bob Hickey wrote:
"Pudentame" wrote in message
...
OTOH, my own experience indicates a smaller, more nimble vehicle allows
the driver avoid accidents he might not be able to avoid in a larger,
heavier, less maneuverable automobile. That's the
whole problem right there. Avoid, nimble, maneuverable? That's a joke,
right? I'd be happy to see "awake". I'd be happy to see "off the phone" I'd
be happy to see "make-up already done"..The limit of most peoples driving
knowledge is that soon after an accident, something will blow up right in
their face to save them. Mostly, after the crumple zone is done crumpling;
said air bag is much closer to the victim.

If you want to see a decent driver, watch for long term motorcyclists
who have survived commuting for 25+ years in a crowded metropolitan
area. When you see one of them get in a cage, you can be pretty sure
that they're not going to be causing *OR* involved in any of the
problems in their vicinity on the road.

Oh, and BTW, my 2wd standard cab shortbed Chevy pickup is small enough,
nimble enough, and handles well enough to avoid idiots on the road.
The fact that it is large enough and stout enough to provide protection
should one of said idiots manage to somehow launch him or herself
UNAVOIDABLY into my path of travel is merely a bonus.

"Laurence Payne" lpayne1NOSPAM@dslDOTpipexDOTcom wrote in message
...
On Mon, 25 Dec 2006 22:03:39 -0800, "William Graham"
wrote:

But I had a friend who walked away from an accident where his engine ended
up where his lap would have been had he been wearing his seat belt......He
didn't think much of them either....

Well, there had to be one. You really reckon this makes seat belts a
Bad Thing? Or is it merely fuel for a pro-personal-choice agenda?

Hey! - I didn't say that I was against them. I was just remembering that
guy, and why he was against them. Actually, the only thing I have aginst
them is their ****-poor design. I used to own a racing corvette.....The guy
who owned it before me raced it. It had a beautiful racing harness that
locked me to the rear firewall and offered much better protection than the
very poor spindly thin straps that they put in the new cars today. Between
my roll bar, and that racing harness, I really felt well protected in that
'vette. Most of the seat belts they put in the new cars won't keep you from
sliding under them in a real crash. But if I had that vette harness today,
the cops would be stopping me every time I went anywhere because it would
look from outside the car, like I wasn't wearing my normal seat belts. IOW,
they are not only poorly designed, but the laws that have been built up
around that poor design have now locked us into it!




I am impressed, however with these formula I cars that can hit the rails
at
175 MPH, fly end over end a dozen times, completely come apart at the
seams
until there is nothing left of them but the cage containing the driver,
which, after he unbelts himself, he walks away from without a
scratch....Why
can't they do that with the family sedan?

They do, to an extent. Crumple zones.

BTW, petrol IS $5 a gallon here in the UK. It's made no difference to
the pattern of car usage. The only thing that DID make a difference
was one week a few years back when an industrial dispute caused a
petrol famine. Somehow, everyone got most places they HAD to get. But
"convenience" trips were cut out, the roads were empty, and travel
became a pleasure. Even allowing for some necessary journeys being
postponed, there's obviously lots of scope for cutting down on car use
without life grinding to a halt.

Sure.....This is normal, and to be expected....And, had the gas crisis
continued, people would have found a way to get where they needed to go on a
more permanent basis. As I say, we here in the US are
individual-transportation oriented, and we will find a way to continue in
that mode, even if we end up each driving our own electric scooters....

David J. Littleboy wrote:
"Kennedy McEwen" wrote:

I personally don't want to see someone in my rear view mirror approaching
at 175MPH while I am stuck at traffic lights on my way home from work.

The easy way to avoid that is to not own a car. (That's one of the reasons I
ended up in Tokyo.)

Seriously, I don't understand why more people don't decide not to own cars.
The (quite rational*) decision not to own a car ought to be a possibility,
right?


Unfortunately, many of us live in places where we would not be able to
get to work, buy groceries, get to school or do just about anything else
in life without a car.

I currently have to be at work at 3:00am. It's just over 5 miles away,
slightly more than an hour walking. There's no bus service at that time
of night, and damn little at any other time. And the streets I'd have to
walk do not have sidewalks for over half that distance.

The nearest grocery store is halfway to where I work. It's just about
where the sidewalks start. So to get groceries, I'd have to buy a wagon,
or some other cart and drag it 2-1/2 miles along busy streets with no
sidewalks to the store, and then drag it back along those same busy
streets with no sidewalks to get them home. Included in this stretch is
a long hill with a blind curve going to the bridge at the top. There's
thick hedges planted along the roadside to keep people from walking
along the shoulder where there's not even a place you could dive off the
road if you had to.

There is a convenience store with limited selection (and higher prices)
within a couple of blocks of my house, and I do always walk there.

Finally, what is *not* within walking distance of my house is many of
the places I want to go to take pictures.


*: Cars are dangerous and expensive (at the least; breathing gasoline fumes
can't be good for one). And one can buy a lot of camera equipment for the
price of a car.

David J. Littleboy
Tokyo, Japan