40 mph my ass

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Merida

New Member
Location
Oxshott
I was casually cycling home from the shops the other day on my road bike, I had a hoodie trackie bums and a messenger bag full of booze and rice on. A renault clio approached me from behind and the passenger wound down the window and shouted at me over the wind 'mate you now your doing 40 mph right?', now bearing in mind I was on a 3% hill going down and it was wet and I wasnt pushing particularily hard and I wasnt wearing aero clothes I found what he said very hard to believe, however upon glancing through the window the speedo in the car was registering about 37-8 mph. I thanked the occupants of the clio and then raced ahead of them to get through the level crossing in time. I am still at a loss to understand how this is possible, unless the french make very innaccurate speedos which is entirely possible given the state of their cars.

At the end of the day Im just happy that not all drivers are mindless prats, and I was impressed with the respect that they gave me :smile:
 
That was some tail wind ;) IIRC, I think car speedos are allowed to read over not under, they can make the driver seem faster than they actually are but not slower.
 

screenman

Legendary Member
Sorry mate but you are a total muppet, if you were close enough to look inside the car and see the speedo whilst doing that speed you should be banned from the road.

Internet speed alert.

Apologies if the joke has gone right over my head.
 

Tyke

Senior Member
MPH or KPH, 40 kph is about 25 mph and a car can be up to 10% out and still be legal.

Agreed you should not be able to read a speedo from the near side at that speed without being a danger to yourself and others.
 

Moodyman

Legendary Member
I think HLAB has it bang on. Car speedos are deliberately designed to read more than actual. Something to do with building in a safety margin with speed cameras, driver error etc.
 
OP
OP
Merida

Merida

New Member
Location
Oxshott
Sorry mate but you are a total muppet, if you were close enough to look inside the car and see the speedo whilst doing that speed you should be banned from the road.

Internet speed alert.

Apologies if the joke has gone right over my head.
Truly I dont believe I was doing that speed at all, and as for passing close to the car window the driver didnt give me much choice! I dont think he understood that a pothole could send me flying, fortunatley I know the road very well and it has an excellent surface. I was entirely expecting him to whizz past me like most drivers do but he just hoverred alongside me and decided to have a chat.
 

col

Legendary Member
Cars have 3 mph difference to true speed, check it on a sat nav, you will see. So travelling at 33 is really 30. And I doubt you were doing 40, as I was pushing as hard as I can down a local steep hill and only reached 40, you sure the numbers you saw werent KPH? Some cars show those numbers more than MPH.
 

screenman

Legendary Member
I still struggle to see how you managed to read the speedo without actualy leaning inside the car, on the Clio the speedo is set well back behind the steering wheel.
 
Cars have 3 mph difference to true speed, check it on a sat nav, you will see. So travelling at 33 is really 30. And I doubt you were doing 40, as I was pushing as hard as I can down a local steep hill and only reached 40, you sure the numbers you saw werent KPH? Some cars show those numbers more than MPH.

While I have a few doubts about this tale. It is certainly possible to achieve 40+mph downhill. I have done 50+ coming down from Kilhope Cross in the Pennines, and I wasn't the fastest in the group.
 
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