Captain Caveman 76:
Shetland given amber warning for 100mph gusts - BBC NewsLorry blown over on M6 and luton van blown over on the Forth Bridge. Stay safe people.
Not a man enough driver
Immigrant:
098Joe:
Just crack on and drive to the conditions, the electronic aids on modern trucks are quite effective, and surely it is not the end of the world if you do get snowed in.I could rather do well without the Electronic Aid
You should be driving in F1 if you can control a truck without abs etc better than one without.
Disagree, to my mind ABS is the most overrated, dangerous ■■■■■■■■■■■■■ out there, its a crutch for ■■■■■ driving should be replaced by a pointed stick in the middle of the steering wheel, when you really need fine break control (feathering) then ABS kicks in and you HAVE NO BREAKS. The other aids like traction control are useful though.
chicane:
Disagree, to my mind ABS is the most overrated, dangerous piece of [zb] out there, its a crutch for [zb] driving should be replaced by a pointed stick in the middle of the steering wheel, when you really need fine break control (feathering) then ABS kicks in and you HAVE NO BREAKS. The other aids like traction control are useful though.
It would be an interesting experiment to compare both, ABS only activates when a wheel stops rotating so even with it you should be able to feather the brakes without it intervening.
When will they start employing real men to drive
bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-30739506
^^ is that what they call a lorry in Scotchland??
chicane:
Disagree, to my mind ABS is the most overrated, dangerous piece of [zb] out there, its a crutch for [zb] driving should be replaced by a pointed stick in the middle of the steering wheel, when you really need fine break control (feathering) then ABS kicks in and you HAVE NO BREAKS. The other aids like traction control are useful though.
well if you are intelligent enough you can plan your breaks quite easily, of course if your not very intelligent then you might think that your brakes don’t work
green456:
chicane:
Disagree, to my mind ABS is the most overrated, dangerous piece of [zb] out there, its a crutch for [zb] driving should be replaced by a pointed stick in the middle of the steering wheel, when you really need fine break control (feathering) then ABS kicks in and you HAVE NO BREAKS. The other aids like traction control are useful though.well if you are intelligent enough you can plan your breaks quite easily, of course if your not very intelligent then you might think that your brakes don’t work
Think you mean ‘braking’ and under normal circumstances I’d agree with you, but if you get of the nice ploughed and gritted streets, ‘A’ roads and motorways and onto the ‘B’ and unclassifieds you may find things a wee bit different, that’s where experience, planned and ‘cadence’ braking comes in. Have a nice day 
If you’re driving on icy roads then ABS or not, braking is the last thing you want to be doing!
If you need to brake, except for the final few feet of a stop then you’re driving too fast for the conditions, no ifs, no buts.
chicane:
green456:
chicane:
Disagree, to my mind ABS is the most overrated, dangerous piece of [zb] out there, its a crutch for [zb] driving should be replaced by a pointed stick in the middle of the steering wheel, when you really need fine break control (feathering) then ABS kicks in and you HAVE NO BREAKS. The other aids like traction control are useful though.well if you are intelligent enough you can plan your breaks quite easily, of course if your not very intelligent then you might think that your brakes don’t work
Think you mean ‘braking’ and under normal circumstances I’d agree with you, but if you get of the nice ploughed and gritted streets, ‘A’ roads and motorways and onto the ‘B’ and unclassifieds you may find things a wee bit different, that’s where experience, planned and ‘cadence’ braking comes in. Have a nice day
Why would you cadence brake with abs? That’s what abs does, tens of times of times every second. You’re just fighting abs using cadence braking.
No you wouldn’t use cadence braking with ABS be a waste of time, guess I’ve been driving one kind of vehicle or another for way too long, started steering an old MF35 before I could reach the pedals so dad could fork the hay and neeps off the trailer to feed the cows so I’ve been driving vehicles on and off road for 50 odd years (Modern tractor with fully loaded silage trailer can be over 30 tonnes). With experience you can feel when you have at least some grip and when you didn’t. That’s why I reckon that ABS is mostly a crutch for carp driving, in normal driving conditions you should never need it and when conditions are crap its a bit of a chocolate fireguard.
Observe, Anticipate, Plan, Execute.
Well last night I was on the A9 and the snow got the better of me. I think I was doing everything right, I was empty other than maybe a tonne of empties on board which I had placed over drive axle. Struggled to get up the hills at slochd, traction control was kicking in, even with diff locks engaged, but managed to get up when at least one van didn’t, but coming down, unit and trailer started sliding around, I tried to keep speed down to bare minimum using as little braking as I could. Due to a couple of heart in mouth moments in the decent, I decided at this point that enough was enough, I felt if I pushed on, I would be explaining to my boss why I had put his new 64 plate wagon in a ditch, so pulled into a suitable layby where I was not going to be a hazard or have something go into me and phoned in. They asked me if it was that bad, but stated it was my discretion and not to put me or other road users at risk. 15 minutes later, 2 x snow ploughs came through and scraped most of the snow off and I then felt I could continue, got bad again round Dalwhinne through Drummocter, but the vehicle was behaving so felt safe enough to push through it.
pepsifarr:
Well last night I was on the A9 and the snow got the better of me. I think I was doing everything right, I was empty other than maybe a tonne of empties on board which I had placed over drive axle. Struggled to get up the hills at slochd, traction control was kicking in, even with diff locks engaged, but managed to get up when at least one van didn’t, but coming down, unit and trailer started sliding around, I tried to keep speed down to bare minimum using as little braking as I could. Due to a couple of heart in mouth moments in the decent, I decided at this point that enough was enough, I felt if I pushed on, I would be explaining to my boss why I had put his new 64 plate wagon in a ditch, so pulled into a suitable layby where I was not going to be a hazard or have something go into me and phoned in. They asked me if it was that bad, but stated it was my discretion and not to put me or other road users at risk. 15 minutes later, 2 x snow ploughs came through and scraped most of the snow off and I then felt I could continue, got bad again round Dalwhinne through Drummocter, but the vehicle was behaving so felt safe enough to push through it.
Sounds like very good driving to me, sometimes knowing when not to proceed can make all the difference.
Every situation is different but sometimes braking can be your friend better than engine braking, although light engine retardation is not a bad thing keeping the brakes warm and braking the trailer can help. Watch auto transmissions that can’t balance power and traction as well in these conditions and use manual if possible.
I realise the above sentence makes me appear to know what I’m talking about but to be honest i don’t, its just a matter of feeling the traction available and driving within the limits of it, then gunning the bugger up any steep inclines 
Problem with gunning it up inclines is that if you lose momentum all you end up doing is compacting the snow into ice and polishing the ice, just watch the footage of car drivers every time it snows. The problem then comes when you fail to make it up and have to try and back down with no grip or worse gravity takes over and you slide back down with absolutely no control 
In the late seventies I did a night trunk from Manchester to Birtley and Durham, one winter in particular the public services where on strike and no gritting was done. It was a very bad winter, probably 78/79, the roads were a lot quieter then and what seemed to happen was trucks would compress the snow and melt it then it would freeze, when I felt the unit loosing traction I would often run on the fresh snow on the hard shoulder. The important thing in driving on any sort of slippy stuff is to not make any sudden changes, even changing gear can start the wheels spinning, anticipation!!