But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
The engine running thing from deliverymen is effing maddening and should be made illegal IMO
Already is I think - a "must not" in the Highway Code.
That's debatable.
Rule 123 The driver and the environment. You MUST NOT leave a parked vehicle unattended with the engine running or leave a vehicle engine running unnecessarily while that vehicle is stationary on a public road. Generally, if the vehicle is stationary and is likely to remain so for more than a couple of minutes, you should apply the parking brake and switch off the engine to reduce emissions and noise pollution. However it is permissible to leave the engine running if the vehicle is stationary in traffic or for diagnosing faults.
The question is what is "unnecessarily". Eg in midwinter I will start my engine a couple of minutes before leaving the house, to warm it up and defrost everything, that is I would say "necessary".
Similarly if you're stepping out of the car for 30 seconds to drop a parcel then getting back is it unnecessary to leave it running? At first glance would have thought so, but on second thought given the damage stop/start can cause and the further reference to "... more than a couple of minutes ..." in the rule, then arguably a delivery person doing their job falls under necessary.
Common sense should apply here I think.
It doesn't matter what unnecessarily means, the first part of the rule says you shouldn't leave a car unattended with the engine running. The unnecessarily bit is when you are in it.
If a driver is stood next to the vehicle, have they left it unattended?
If a driver gets out, picks up their parcel they're dropping off, puts it in front of the door, rings the bell, takes a photo to show they've dropped it off and then is back in their car all within a minute and without ever leaving sight of their vehicle, then have they actually left it unattended?
I don't know incidentally, genuinely asking a question. I always switch my vehicle off if I'm leaving it, but then I'm not doing deliveries.
That's got nothing to do with the definition of "unnecessarily" is. To me unattended means not in the immediate vicinity of, i.e. next to.
So someone who pulls up to the kerb of a house, gets out, opens a door to their van, gets the parcel out of their van, puts the good down at the front door, and gets back into their van and drives off all within ~60 seconds - they've never left the immediate vicinity of the van have they?
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
The engine running thing from deliverymen is effing maddening and should be made illegal IMO
Already is I think - a "must not" in the Highway Code.
That's debatable.
Rule 123 The driver and the environment. You MUST NOT leave a parked vehicle unattended with the engine running or leave a vehicle engine running unnecessarily while that vehicle is stationary on a public road. Generally, if the vehicle is stationary and is likely to remain so for more than a couple of minutes, you should apply the parking brake and switch off the engine to reduce emissions and noise pollution. However it is permissible to leave the engine running if the vehicle is stationary in traffic or for diagnosing faults.
The question is what is "unnecessarily". Eg in midwinter I will start my engine a couple of minutes before leaving the house, to warm it up and defrost everything, that is I would say "necessary".
Similarly if you're stepping out of the car for 30 seconds to drop a parcel then getting back is it unnecessary to leave it running? At first glance would have thought so, but on second thought given the damage stop/start can cause and the further reference to "... more than a couple of minutes ..." in the rule, then arguably a delivery person doing their job falls under necessary.
Common sense should apply here I think.
It doesn't matter what unnecessarily means, the first part of the rule says you shouldn't leave a car unattended with the engine running. The unnecessarily bit is when you are in it.
If a driver is stood next to the vehicle, have they left it unattended?
If a driver gets out, picks up their parcel they're dropping off, puts it in front of the door, rings the bell, takes a photo to show they've dropped it off and then is back in their car all within a minute and without ever leaving sight of their vehicle, then have they actually left it unattended?
I don't know incidentally, genuinely asking a question. I always switch my vehicle off if I'm leaving it, but then I'm not doing deliveries.
That's got nothing to do with the definition of "unnecessarily" is. To me unattended means not in the immediate vicinity of, i.e. next to.
The spirit of the Highway Code rule is quite clear and only a serial sealioner like BR could find any issue with it.
I feel like with this latest crisis the government has crossed the Rubicon into the kind of territory where there is no way back. I wouldn't bet against a Labour majority.
If Sunak stays, I would see Labour getting a majority. If he goes, then all bets are off, as what happens next is an unknown quantity. The new leader could be better, or *gulps* worse.
Love to know who you think would be able to get middle of the road Tories more likely to vote than Sunak...
There are a few options that could get right wing UKIP voters out to vote Tory but I don't think that would help them in winnable seats..
I don't know where this narrative has come from that it's the centrist Tory voters that they need to court - presumably because Sunak is so irredeemably shit that nobody thinks they have a chance in the red wall and it's all about trying to save Guildford and Horsham. I'm also not sure that 'middle of the road Tories' are any fonder of shit political skills, failing to stop boats, and the state sucking up record levels of the country's wealth than anyone else, perhaps you can point to some data.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
The engine running thing from deliverymen is effing maddening and should be made illegal IMO
Already is I think - a "must not" in the Highway Code.
That's debatable.
Rule 123 The driver and the environment. You MUST NOT leave a parked vehicle unattended with the engine running or leave a vehicle engine running unnecessarily while that vehicle is stationary on a public road. Generally, if the vehicle is stationary and is likely to remain so for more than a couple of minutes, you should apply the parking brake and switch off the engine to reduce emissions and noise pollution. However it is permissible to leave the engine running if the vehicle is stationary in traffic or for diagnosing faults.
The question is what is "unnecessarily". Eg in midwinter I will start my engine a couple of minutes before leaving the house, to warm it up and defrost everything, that is I would say "necessary".
Similarly if you're stepping out of the car for 30 seconds to drop a parcel then getting back is it unnecessary to leave it running? At first glance would have thought so, but on second thought given the damage stop/start can cause and the further reference to "... more than a couple of minutes ..." in the rule, then arguably a delivery person doing their job falls under necessary.
Common sense should apply here I think.
It doesn't matter what unnecessarily means, the first part of the rule says you shouldn't leave a car unattended with the engine running. The unnecessarily bit is when you are in it.
If a driver is stood next to the vehicle, have they left it unattended?
If a driver gets out, picks up their parcel they're dropping off, puts it in front of the door, rings the bell, takes a photo to show they've dropped it off and then is back in their car all within a minute and without ever leaving sight of their vehicle, then have they actually left it unattended?
I don't know incidentally, genuinely asking a question. I always switch my vehicle off if I'm leaving it, but then I'm not doing deliveries.
That's got nothing to do with the definition of "unnecessarily" is. To me unattended means not in the immediate vicinity of, i.e. next to.
So someone who pulls up to the kerb of a house, gets out, opens a door to their van, gets the parcel out of their van, puts the good down at the front door, and gets back into their van and drives off all within ~60 seconds - they've never left the immediate vicinity of the van have they?
Depends on your definition of immediate vicinity
Certainly if you can't see the car anymore it is unattended. Might be interesting to see if there's any relevant case law.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
Some manufacturers just implement stop/go in the ecu without any hardware changes. Hence why starters are a consumable item in Ford Rangers.
Whoops. Serves them right for buying a Ranger though, the pickup truck for those who can’t afford a proper pickup truck.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
It's part of the reason the roads are clogged up. A large chunk of the additional mileage in the last few years, particularly on minor roads, is delivery vans.
Of course, your answer will be "mOre RoAdS".
Its the only answer, yes.
Each of those delivery vans is typically operating efficiently, businesses spend a fortune to ensure its efficient. Its the consumers who have decided that instead of going to the shops and buying everything once a week in one shopping trip, that buying an individual item when they want/need it is what they'll do instead.
Unless you want to lower customer service back to 20th century and mean that people have to travel to the shops, then we need the roads to work for people and what they're buying.
On the whole people buying less tat over the Internet would be a good thing. Better for the environment, trade deficit,health and personal finances in so many ways if people shop in person when they truly need stuff.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
The engine running thing from deliverymen is effing maddening and should be made illegal IMO
Already is I think - a "must not" in the Highway Code.
That's debatable.
Rule 123 The driver and the environment. You MUST NOT leave a parked vehicle unattended with the engine running or leave a vehicle engine running unnecessarily while that vehicle is stationary on a public road. Generally, if the vehicle is stationary and is likely to remain so for more than a couple of minutes, you should apply the parking brake and switch off the engine to reduce emissions and noise pollution. However it is permissible to leave the engine running if the vehicle is stationary in traffic or for diagnosing faults.
The question is what is "unnecessarily". Eg in midwinter I will start my engine a couple of minutes before leaving the house, to warm it up and defrost everything, that is I would say "necessary".
Similarly if you're stepping out of the car for 30 seconds to drop a parcel then getting back is it unnecessary to leave it running? At first glance would have thought so, but on second thought given the damage stop/start can cause and the further reference to "... more than a couple of minutes ..." in the rule, then arguably a delivery person doing their job falls under necessary.
Common sense should apply here I think.
It doesn't matter what unnecessarily means, the first part of the rule says you shouldn't leave a car unattended with the engine running. The unnecessarily bit is when you are in it.
If a driver is stood next to the vehicle, have they left it unattended?
If a driver gets out, picks up their parcel they're dropping off, puts it in front of the door, rings the bell, takes a photo to show they've dropped it off and then is back in their car all within a minute and without ever leaving sight of their vehicle, then have they actually left it unattended?
I don't know incidentally, genuinely asking a question. I always switch my vehicle off if I'm leaving it, but then I'm not doing deliveries.
That's got nothing to do with the definition of "unnecessarily" is. To me unattended means not in the immediate vicinity of, i.e. next to.
So someone who pulls up to the kerb of a house, gets out, opens a door to their van, gets the parcel out of their van, puts the good down at the front door, and gets back into their van and drives off all within ~60 seconds - they've never left the immediate vicinity of the van have they?
Depends on your definition of immediate vicinity
Certainly if you can't see the car anymore it is unattended. Might be interesting to see if there's any relevant case law.
I agree with that.
I regularly get deliveries from delivery drivers who leave their engine running and I don't think its an issue, if they're not staying there for more than a few seconds and never leave sight of the vehicle it makes perfect sense to me. Cars starting up is both noisier and more polluting than them idling for just a few seconds anyway. 🤷♂️
If you're going to be there for a period of time, or leave the vehicle unattended, absolutely switch it off and take your keys with you.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
It's part of the reason the roads are clogged up. A large chunk of the additional mileage in the last few years, particularly on minor roads, is delivery vans.
Of course, your answer will be "mOre RoAdS".
Its the only answer, yes.
Each of those delivery vans is typically operating efficiently, businesses spend a fortune to ensure its efficient. Its the consumers who have decided that instead of going to the shops and buying everything once a week in one shopping trip, that buying an individual item when they want/need it is what they'll do instead.
Unless you want to lower customer service back to 20th century and mean that people have to travel to the shops, then we need the roads to work for people and what they're buying.
On the whole people buying less tat over the Internet would be a good thing. Better for the environment, trade deficit,health and personal finances in so many ways if people shop in person when they truly need stuff.
I'll let you tell Mrs Roberts she's not allowed to buy things from Amazon anymore.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
It's part of the reason the roads are clogged up. A large chunk of the additional mileage in the last few years, particularly on minor roads, is delivery vans.
Of course, your answer will be "mOre RoAdS".
Its the only answer, yes.
Each of those delivery vans is typically operating efficiently, businesses spend a fortune to ensure its efficient. Its the consumers who have decided that instead of going to the shops and buying everything once a week in one shopping trip, that buying an individual item when they want/need it is what they'll do instead.
Unless you want to lower customer service back to 20th century and mean that people have to travel to the shops, then we need the roads to work for people and what they're buying.
On the whole people buying less tat over the Internet would be a good thing. Better for the environment, trade deficit,health and personal finances in so many ways if people shop in person when they truly need stuff.
Has anyone done a fact based analysis of shopping deliveries?
I strongly suspect that nearly all is stuff people will have bought in the shops anyway. But “suspect” isn’t data.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
It's part of the reason the roads are clogged up. A large chunk of the additional mileage in the last few years, particularly on minor roads, is delivery vans.
Of course, your answer will be "mOre RoAdS".
Its the only answer, yes.
Each of those delivery vans is typically operating efficiently, businesses spend a fortune to ensure its efficient. Its the consumers who have decided that instead of going to the shops and buying everything once a week in one shopping trip, that buying an individual item when they want/need it is what they'll do instead.
Unless you want to lower customer service back to 20th century and mean that people have to travel to the shops, then we need the roads to work for people and what they're buying.
On the whole people buying less tat over the Internet would be a good thing. Better for the environment, trade deficit,health and personal finances in so many ways if people shop in person when they truly need stuff.
Yes, if only people would damn-well behave the way you want them to behave, life would be so much better wouldn't it?
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
You’re assuming the vans are 1/5 full or less.
No I'm not. Each van is full. But rather than each van dropping parcels around five housing estates, each van drops all of the parcels in one estate. Same number of vans, same number of parcels, less distance travelled.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
You’re assuming the vans are 1/5 full or less.
No I'm not. Each van is full. But rather than each van dropping parcels around five housing estates, each van drops all of the parcels in one estate. Same number of vans, same number of parcels, less distance travelled.
Given that all parcel delivery firms optimise routes I suspect the distance saved wouldn't be that significant...
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
You’re assuming the vans are 1/5 full or less.
No I'm not. Each van is full. But rather than each van dropping parcels around five housing estates, each van drops all of the parcels in one estate. Same number of vans, same number of parcels, less distance travelled.
Iceberg fallacy again.
More distance travelled if the distance between depot and centralised depot exceeds the distance between estates.
Estates are closer to each other than depots tend to be.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
You’re assuming the vans are 1/5 full or less.
No I'm not. Each van is full. But rather than each van dropping parcels around five housing estates, each van drops all of the parcels in one estate. Same number of vans, same number of parcels, less distance travelled.
The vans don’t do that, generally. They are usually sized to deliver to a discrete area. Not to hop from one housing estate to the next.
The optimisation algorithms used are quite interesting by themselves. And there’s a lot of investment in improving them.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
No, its not obvious, you only think its obvious as you are superficially paying attention only to the top of the iceberg.
The iceberg effect is worth remembering for almost any business or industry. The visible bit you are seeing is only a tiny fraction of what is happening and what happens below the surface matters.
No, each van doesn't travel five times the distance. If the bulk of the distance is primarily between the depot and the relevant postcode area, then going to five neighbouring estates within the same postcode area is miniscule 'extra' mileage. Being efficient getting from A to B is the bulk of the relevant efficiency, not from B1 to B4.
I can get 4 different deliveries to my house in the same day. But if those 4 deliveries are coming from 4 different places - and if those vans are all filled with drop offs near to me - then each of those vans is operating efficiently.
But they wouldn't be coming from four different places if there was a monopoly provider.
Remember that almost all of the courier drivers you see are contractors who work for themselves, not for the courier company. The notion that vans/cars are not full is fanciful - the driver only gets paid by making deliveries.
That isn't to say that it could be economised. Your postie covers a patch, and an amalgamation of all of the 3rd party contractor drivers could have the same result. At the moment all of them could all drive to the same places at the same time - which is madness.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
You’re assuming the vans are 1/5 full or less.
No I'm not. Each van is full. But rather than each van dropping parcels around five housing estates, each van drops all of the parcels in one estate. Same number of vans, same number of parcels, less distance travelled.
Given that all parcel delivery firms optimise routes I suspect the distance saved wouldn't be that significant...
You're all assuming urban. The inefficiency of the "free market" and libertarian approach is much greater for partly town, partly rural areas. I can see it on the tracking maps - all the vans go off into the middle of nowhere for a few deliveries each.
It's coming up to the one year anniversary, later this month, of the last time Labour *didn't* have a double-digit lead in any UK/GB opinion poll.
That in itself is a strong indicator of what is likely to happen, David. I always think that a small steady lead is much more convincing than a sporadic one with high peaks. Actually Labours lead is large and long-lived. I just can't see people changing their mind in droves nearer the day.
Sorry, but I think the Tories are cuffed this time.
I saw your post about the odds. You and I know we won't often find much value in a 1/2 to shot, but I'm a bit more bullish than Mike on this one. I know he's a Pro and we both respect his opinion, but the latest fiasco has persuaded me that a Starmer Majority Government must be all of a 75% probability.
So I'm nibbling at the current odds, and hoping that I can soon start betting on some seat numbers.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
It's part of the reason the roads are clogged up. A large chunk of the additional mileage in the last few years, particularly on minor roads, is delivery vans.
Of course, your answer will be "mOre RoAdS".
Its the only answer, yes.
Each of those delivery vans is typically operating efficiently, businesses spend a fortune to ensure its efficient. Its the consumers who have decided that instead of going to the shops and buying everything once a week in one shopping trip, that buying an individual item when they want/need it is what they'll do instead.
Unless you want to lower customer service back to 20th century and mean that people have to travel to the shops, then we need the roads to work for people and what they're buying.
Yes, each delivery business is operating its fleet as efficiently as it can. But that is not looking at the whole picture, where there are multiple fleets, all following each other round on duplicated routes. That's where the inefficiency comes from.
Anyway, I am dropping this now. It has been great to resurrect a topic from eight years ago!
I feel like with this latest crisis the government has crossed the Rubicon into the kind of territory where there is no way back. I wouldn't bet against a Labour majority.
I think there is a way back if the Tories have a change of leadership.
However since that's improbable, then Labour majority should be odds-on IMHO.
A new leader could change the situation, so if there’s very little chance of victory now, you can see why you might want to roll the dice on a new leader.
But I think a new leader would be unlikely to help. (1) The party would be ridiculed for having yet another new leader. (2) Who? Most of the likely candidates would be even worse than Sunak. (3) If there is a good new leader out there, do you have any faith that the party membership, or even the MPs, would pick them? (4) A new leader isn’t going to make the cost of living suddenly improve, or stop schools failing down, or mean you can get an appointment with a GP. The polls aren’t terrible for the Tories because people dislike Sunak; the polls are terrible because the country is in a poor state. Putting lipstick (a new leader) on the pig won’t get you very far.
On topic, while I'd be wary of backing Labour for a majority at the 1/2 odds available at present (at best), I do think it's well over a 50% chance.
Remember that the 2019 Con voters included a lot of first-time Con voters, motivated by Brexit and Corbyn. One of those is 'done', and while done quickly it was not done well, and the other is history. On top of which, the Tories have been an absolute shambles in office, Ukraine and - to a degree - Covid apart. It is entirely reasonable to think that many of the DKs will just sit it out.
The comparison with 1997 is instructive. The Labour vote only increased by around 2m but the Tory one dropped by some 5m. I think it's entirely plausible that something similar will happen next year (though of course Labour is starting this next election way further back than it did under Blair).
Set again that, a lot of the Conservative voters of 2019 must be incredibly soft- as you've said.
And compared with here and now, the last days of Major were a model of competent and humane government.
(The question is whether the party will fall apart over everything in the way that Team 97 did over Europe. Conservatives don't do imminent defeat well, in general.)
Yes, my last point was that while the 1997 comparison may be valid in many ways, even if Starmer makes as many gains as Blair, he'd only end up with a majority in the forties. FWIW, I think it's quite likely that Labour will make that many gains, in part because they have a soft opposition to go at in Scotland too (though Rutherford & Hamilton West will be an interesting and important test of that theory).
Rutherford and Hamilton a popular music hall duo perhaps?
The other thought on the joys of the free market vs a monopoly. Currently we have choice. And all the choices are equally shit. None of the private couriers are clearly better than any other - all have dramatically bad failings.
What is worse, consumers have zero choice which is used. If you order from Lego, its going to be DPD. Regardless of how terrible DPD are. And all seem to follow each other to impose the same crapola policies and restrictions - a cabal with no actual competition.
So why not make Royal Mail the monopoly carrier. At least if shit happens you can shout at your local postie. Mine says people complain to him about courier drop screw-ups as well...
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
It's part of the reason the roads are clogged up. A large chunk of the additional mileage in the last few years, particularly on minor roads, is delivery vans.
Of course, your answer will be "mOre RoAdS".
Its the only answer, yes.
Each of those delivery vans is typically operating efficiently, businesses spend a fortune to ensure its efficient. Its the consumers who have decided that instead of going to the shops and buying everything once a week in one shopping trip, that buying an individual item when they want/need it is what they'll do instead.
Unless you want to lower customer service back to 20th century and mean that people have to travel to the shops, then we need the roads to work for people and what they're buying.
On the whole people buying less tat over the Internet would be a good thing. Better for the environment, trade deficit,health and personal finances in so many ways if people shop in person when they truly need stuff.
It can be better for the environment if people buy online. Sending the goods to a person will use less energy than sending the goods to a shop + sending the person to the shop + person/goods returning home.
"Laughing gas will be categorised as a class C drug and made illegal by the end of the year, the UK government has announced.
Possession of nitrous oxide, also known as NOS, will carry a sentence of up to two years in prison. Laughing gas is one of the most commonly used recreational drugs by 16 to 24-year-olds. Heavy use can lead to a range of illnesses including nerve-related symptoms. Supply of nitrous oxide for recreational use is currently banned - but possession is not."
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
If you want to be positive on the Conservatives, it's not unreasonable to assume that they get two-thirds of both the DK/WV and the Reform vote. In that case, they're getting about 70% of their previous vote out. Add a bit for new voters and switchers to Con (yes they do exist), and that works out at about 32-33%.
Which - especially if there's some anti-Conservative tactical voting - is probably not quite enough to prevent a Labour majority.
"Laughing gas will be categorised as a class C drug and made illegal by the end of the year, the UK government has announced.
Possession of nitrous oxide, also known as NOS, will carry a sentence of up to two years in prison. Laughing gas is one of the most commonly used recreational drugs by 16 to 24-year-olds. Heavy use can lead to a range of illnesses including nerve-related symptoms. Supply of nitrous oxide for recreational use is currently banned - but possession is not."
If you want to be positive on the Conservatives, it's not unreasonable to assume that they get two-thirds of both the DK/WV and the Reform vote. In that case, they're getting about 70% of their previous vote out. Add a bit for new voters and switchers to Con (yes they do exist), and that works out at about 32-33%.
Which - especially if there's some anti-Conservative tactical voting - is probably not quite enough to prevent a Labour majority.
That will hearten them enormously, Robert.
Have you copied in Conservative Party Head Office?
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
It's part of the reason the roads are clogged up. A large chunk of the additional mileage in the last few years, particularly on minor roads, is delivery vans.
Of course, your answer will be "mOre RoAdS".
Its the only answer, yes.
Each of those delivery vans is typically operating efficiently, businesses spend a fortune to ensure its efficient. Its the consumers who have decided that instead of going to the shops and buying everything once a week in one shopping trip, that buying an individual item when they want/need it is what they'll do instead.
Unless you want to lower customer service back to 20th century and mean that people have to travel to the shops, then we need the roads to work for people and what they're buying.
On the whole people buying less tat over the Internet would be a good thing. Better for the environment, trade deficit,health and personal finances in so many ways if people shop in person when they truly need stuff.
Has anyone done a fact based analysis of shopping deliveries?
I strongly suspect that nearly all is stuff people will have bought in the shops anyway. But “suspect” isn’t data.
There’s going to be an argument that driving to the shops to buy a pair of AA batteries definitely happens now, so having a driver with an EV deliver the whole road’s silly items is a good thing.
Against that, there’s drunk and stoned shopping online, as well as completely sober but silly and impulsive crap that gets bought from browsing Amazon and eBay.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Good God, what a luddite! Why don't you just switch the stop/start off if you hate it so much?
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
The engine running thing from deliverymen is effing maddening and should be made illegal IMO
Already is I think - a "must not" in the Highway Code.
That's debatable.
Rule 123 The driver and the environment. You MUST NOT leave a parked vehicle unattended with the engine running or leave a vehicle engine running unnecessarily while that vehicle is stationary on a public road. Generally, if the vehicle is stationary and is likely to remain so for more than a couple of minutes, you should apply the parking brake and switch off the engine to reduce emissions and noise pollution. However it is permissible to leave the engine running if the vehicle is stationary in traffic or for diagnosing faults.
The question is what is "unnecessarily". Eg in midwinter I will start my engine a couple of minutes before leaving the house, to warm it up and defrost everything, that is I would say "necessary".
Similarly if you're stepping out of the car for 30 seconds to drop a parcel then getting back is it unnecessary to leave it running? At first glance would have thought so, but on second thought given the damage stop/start can cause and the further reference to "... more than a couple of minutes ..." in the rule, then arguably a delivery person doing their job falls under necessary.
Common sense should apply here I think.
It doesn't matter what unnecessarily means, the first part of the rule says you shouldn't leave a car unattended with the engine running. The unnecessarily bit is when you are in it.
If a driver is stood next to the vehicle, have they left it unattended?
If a driver gets out, picks up their parcel they're dropping off, puts it in front of the door, rings the bell, takes a photo to show they've dropped it off and then is back in their car all within a minute and without ever leaving sight of their vehicle, then have they actually left it unattended?
I don't know incidentally, genuinely asking a question. I always switch my vehicle off if I'm leaving it, but then I'm not doing deliveries.
That's got nothing to do with the definition of "unnecessarily" is. To me unattended means not in the immediate vicinity of, i.e. next to.
So someone who pulls up to the kerb of a house, gets out, opens a door to their van, gets the parcel out of their van, puts the good down at the front door, and gets back into their van and drives off all within ~60 seconds - they've never left the immediate vicinity of the van have they?
Why would stopping and restarting the engine take any more time?
Not a cloud in the sky. More of a breeze than yesterday and the temperature down a couple of degrees.
Our towels dried in no time.
I have spent the past four days reading "Reservoir 13" by Jon McGregor. I recommend it. A very different style of writing, intermingling the seasonal flow of nature with the narrative. I think I'll have to look out for more of his work.
If you want to be positive on the Conservatives, it's not unreasonable to assume that they get two-thirds of both the DK/WV and the Reform vote. In that case, they're getting about 70% of their previous vote out. Add a bit for new voters and switchers to Con (yes they do exist), and that works out at about 32-33%.
Which - especially if there's some anti-Conservative tactical voting - is probably not quite enough to prevent a Labour majority.
I still think that the road to a Labour majority runs through Scotland. It’ll be very tight to get there without significant gains north of the border.
The other thought on the joys of the free market vs a monopoly. Currently we have choice. And all the choices are equally shit. None of the private couriers are clearly better than any other - all have dramatically bad failings.
What is worse, consumers have zero choice which is used. If you order from Lego, its going to be DPD. Regardless of how terrible DPD are. And all seem to follow each other to impose the same crapola policies and restrictions - a cabal with no actual competition.
So why not make Royal Mail the monopoly carrier. At least if shit happens you can shout at your local postie. Mine says people complain to him about courier drop screw-ups as well...
Same goes for electricity, gas, water, railways, car-parking apps(!)...
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
I’ve honestly never had a problem with it - it just works. Clutch down, engine starts before you have time to do anything else, off you go. There’s a light on the dash to tell you that it’s decided to turn the engine off.
On fuel savings, well it saves me ~£100 / year in vehicle tax, so there’s that to be taken into account too
If you want to be positive on the Conservatives, it's not unreasonable to assume that they get two-thirds of both the DK/WV and the Reform vote. In that case, they're getting about 70% of their previous vote out. Add a bit for new voters and switchers to Con (yes they do exist), and that works out at about 32-33%.
Which - especially if there's some anti-Conservative tactical voting - is probably not quite enough to prevent a Labour majority.
I still think that the road to a Labour majority runs through Scotland. It’ll be very tight to get there without significant gains north of the border.
If you want to be positive on the Conservatives, it's not unreasonable to assume that they get two-thirds of both the DK/WV and the Reform vote. In that case, they're getting about 70% of their previous vote out. Add a bit for new voters and switchers to Con (yes they do exist), and that works out at about 32-33%.
Which - especially if there's some anti-Conservative tactical voting - is probably not quite enough to prevent a Labour majority.
I have a gut feeling - nothing more - that whereas we've historically (since 92) assumed a 'shy Tory' vote hidden in the DK/WV, there'll be a 'shy anti-Tory' vote this time - the disaffection among Tory voters has got so far down into the core that there are solid Tory voters who can't even quite admit to themselves that they will be changing this time.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Good God, what a luddite! Why don't you just switch the stop/start off if you hate it so much?
Far too technical for me, Ben. I can just about operate the automatic windows.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
The reason behind it, is to save fuel on the standard test that determines the official fuel efficiency figure, and by extension the tax rates that apply to the car. Even some modern Ferraris have it.
If such a system is on for the official test, it has to be on by default when you switch on the car, and disabled manually by the driver every time.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
The reason behind it, is to save fuel consumption on the standard test that determines the official fuel efficiency figure, and by extension the tax rates that apply to the car. Even Ferraris have it.
If such a system is on for the official test, it has to be on by default when you switch on the car, and disabled manually by the driver every time.
Thank you.
I'll have Mrs PtP look into it as soon as she returns from London.
Our car only does the auto switch off thing when in neutral with the hand brake on. Even then, it hardly ever seems to bother.
People sat parked up with their engine running for no good reason are the ones who need sending to a re-education camp. Do they still think they need to get out and crank a starting handle each time, hence too difficult to switch off and back on?
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Good God, what a luddite! Why don't you just switch the stop/start off if you hate it so much?
Luddism is strong on PB; as is the ownership of cars that seemingly don't work.
Our car only does the auto switch off thing when in neutral with the hand brake on. Even then, it hardly ever seems to bother.
People sat parked up with their engine running for no good reason are the ones who need sending to a re-education camp. Do they still think they need to get out and crank a starting handle each time, hence too difficult to switch off and back on?
Ah, there I am with you, Sandy.
I live opposite a school and the number of parents who sit there with their engines on....
Off topic: One more potential disaster for you to worry about: "A significant increase in Asian hornet sightings in the United Kingdom is raising alarm because of concerns that the hornets could ravage local bee populations.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Good God, what a luddite! Why don't you just switch the stop/start off if you hate it so much?
Far too technical for me, Ben. I can just about operate the automatic windows.
Look for a button that looks like this. And press it once when you get in the car.
Edit: I don't know why I'm telling you this - better to let Stop/Start do its thing and help the environment.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
The fuel savings from it are significant depending on how the vehicle is used. Up to 10% in heavy traffic. It's woke nonsense to disable it.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Good God, what a luddite! Why don't you just switch the stop/start off if you hate it so much?
Far too technical for me, Ben. I can just about operate the automatic windows.
Look for a button that looks like this. And press it once when you get in the car.
Edit: I don't know why I'm telling you this - better to let Stop/Start do its thing and help the environment.
Thanks, Ben.
That looks like the button the dog chewed off, but I think I know where it is.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Has a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving - something you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
Edit: It was an old Citroen that had the starter motor fail - many years ago - not this one.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Good God, what a luddite! Why don't you just switch the stop/start off if you hate it so much?
Luddism is strong on PB; as is the ownership of cars that seemingly don't work.
For balance, our car (a Kia Rio, bought second hand) has run trouble free for three years so far.
Cut and paste from twitter but worth it for the stupidity of Jacob
Ben Bradshaw @BenPBradshaw Hilarious Tory on Tory exchange in Commons just now. Rees-Mogg complains to dep Speaker about limited debate on Govt’s Levelling Up Bill. Penny Mordant points out the programme motion was agreed in May when Rees-Mogg was Leader of the House. 😂
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Good God, what a luddite! Why don't you just switch the stop/start off if you hate it so much?
Luddism is strong on PB; as is the ownership of cars that seemingly don't work.
For balance, our car (a Kia Rio, bought second hand) has run trouble free for three years so far.
No issues with ours, apart from the minor reversing oops by the wife this morning...
Two Toyota hybrids, so engine cuts in and out all the time. No issues at all. Lovely to drive.
Off topic: One more potential disaster for you to worry about: "A significant increase in Asian hornet sightings in the United Kingdom is raising alarm because of concerns that the hornets could ravage local bee populations.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
Re: deliveries and delivery vans, situation in USA is very similar as described this thread in UK.
United States Postal Service (USPS) is successor to old-school US Post Office as founded by Ben Franklin.
As with Royal Mail, USPS does a HUGE business these days delivering packages for Amazon and other delivery services. Though the latter continue to also have a HUGE presence.
Personally, ALWAYS strive to have my own packages delivered by USPS.
Why? Because USPS workersare FAR more efficient, courteous, reliable, better trained and managed, you-name-it.
Whereas Amazon & etc. are as apt to leave your package in a puddle or worse.
Plus USPS workers do NOT drive like something out of a Mad Max sequel. Or park in the roadway of major arterials and the like, which is standard procedure for the cowboys of Amazon etc.
Last winter, during an ice storm, while walking home from the grocery store, had to wait about five minutes on an idiot driving an Amazon truck, who was attempting to proceed uphill on road surface slicker than greased catshit. Clear from the get-go (at least to my feeble ken) that this was Mission Impossible with that delivery van. After revving (and presumably burning) the engine many times, he final saw reason. I then had to wait a few more minutes while he got turned around. Was waiting because I was afraid the dumb SOB was liable to run me over!
Four stars for Blanche L and his like on this side of the Atlantic AND the Pacific!
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
I think we’re learning that Stop/Start is dangerous wokism. Ban this sick filth!
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
It seems to me that Starmer recognises the point raised by OGH. His reshuffle and recent policy shifts are all aimed at shifting voters from the DK/Won't column to Labour.
The alternative strategy would be to rely on depressed Tory turnout and enthusiasm from the Labour core. But we've seen that fail in the recent past, and it isn't terribly credible coming from a base as bad as Corbyn left him in 2019.
Blair came in on a wave of enthusiasm Starmer enthuses no one. Turnout could be stunted compared to the last GE
A wave of enthusiasm that saw turnout drop by over 6%?
I blame myself for this. Went for a slap-up Mayday lunch with an old friend and by 6pm we were both too pissed to go home and vote. Viewed the Adoration of Saint Tony through a monumental hangover that has never really gone away.
On that night in 1997 I went to a General Election party where the intention was that you took a drink for each seat the Tories lost. It rapidly became clear that this was a very foolish idea.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
I have that on my Toyota, together with lane following. I first got given one as a hire car for my 2019 US trip, and it reduces the workload in driving considerably. After 7000 miles around the US, which it made super-easy (I could even turn round and feed the dog in the back seat while the car continued to follow the road), I returned to my British manual and I knew right away it had to go. Not slowing down by itself when there was traffic ahead on the motorway was the deal breaker.
Now I have my Toyota at home, yet for last year’s US trip I got given a hire car without lane following, and my driving was all over the place. It must have taken me a couple of weeks to get used to the car not doing most of the steering, during which I found myself in a few situations that in Europe would probably have been accidents; fortunately in the states there’s more time and space to take avoidance. Which may well presage a big problem if people ever start to get used to self-driving cars…
Spain’s football association fired Jorge Vilda, the coach of the national women’s team, amid a scandal over the country’s football chief kissing a player.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
I have that on my Toyota, together with lane following. I first got given one as a hire car for my 2019 US trip, and it reduces the workload in driving considerably. After 7000 miles around the US, which it made super-easy (I could even turn round and feed the dog in the back seat while the car continued to follow the road), I returned to my British manual and I knew right away it had to go. Not slowing down by itself when there was traffic ahead on the motorway was the deal breaker.
Now I have my Toyota at home, yet for last year’s US trip I got given a hire car without lane following, and my driving was all over the place. It must have taken me a couple of weeks to get used to the car not doing most of the steering, during which I found myself in a few situations that in Europe would probably have been accidents; fortunately in the states there’s more time and space to take avoidance. Which may well presage a big problem if people ever start to get used to self-driving cars…
True but there'd be more accidents if we ever have to go back to double-declutching too. Fortunately, that's not going to happen either.
The other thought on the joys of the free market vs a monopoly. Currently we have choice. And all the choices are equally shit. None of the private couriers are clearly better than any other - all have dramatically bad failings.
What is worse, consumers have zero choice which is used. If you order from Lego, its going to be DPD. Regardless of how terrible DPD are. And all seem to follow each other to impose the same crapola policies and restrictions - a cabal with no actual competition.
So why not make Royal Mail the monopoly carrier. At least if shit happens you can shout at your local postie. Mine says people complain to him about courier drop screw-ups as well...
The "why not" is because Royal Mail is a dysfunctional organisation with an industrial relations playbook borrowed straight from the 1970s and that could barely optimise a route around Toytown, whereas DPD is moderately competent and tends to deliver things promptly, undamaged and to the correct address. Our Royal Mail posties are great, in true "poor bloody infantry" style. Their generals aren't.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
Completely O/T but I noticed that Evan Ferguson has pulled out of Ireland’s team for upcoming matches with a knee injury.
If I was a conspiracy theorist I would point out that he has played 3 games for Ireland and if he plays a 4th then he cannot change to play for another national team he would be eligible for such as England where he might have a higher profile and earning capacity.
I do not believe however that football is a cynical game and so this certainly won’t happen.
Peter_the_Punter asked: "Do the Boy Scouts not object to that name?"
The name change from "Asian" to "Northern" was made by entomologists, most likely to keep "Emperor" Xi and company happy, or, I suppose I should say, less unhappy.
Spain’s football association fired Jorge Vilda, the coach of the national women’s team, amid a scandal over the country’s football chief kissing a player.
Spain’s football association fired Jorge Vilda, the coach of the national women’s team, amid a scandal over the country’s football chief kissing a player.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
The fuel savings from it are significant depending on how the vehicle is used. Up to 10% in heavy traffic. It's woke nonsense to disable it.
I am grumpy about pretty much everything which has happened in car design since about 2008. Mostly innovations seem to be fixing problems which weren't problems to begin with - push button ignition, for example, or electric handbrakes. But I rather like automatic stop start. It irritates me greatly that people sit in traffic (or indeed parked) with their engines idling. I think it is done because of a pervasive belief that it takes a lot of fuel to turn your car on and off so it's more efficient to sit with it idling. I don't know if this was ever true, but it isn't now. (It does take a disproportionate amount of fuel to turn your engine on from cold, but you only do that once. And aside from the fuel saving, by turning your car off when its stationary, you avoid spewing out NO2 at passing pedestrians. Getting a car to do all this automatically is a big win, in my view.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
ACC is the dog's bollocks.
It is. I am not so keen on the Lane Control though - seems to have a mind of it's own. ;-)
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
It can be selected as semi-automatic if you want to play with the gears, although the clutch(es) are fully automatic.
I have no problem with the concept of S/S if the starter/battery are up to it. I'd definitely keep it enabled in a manual car and do re-enable it sometimes in urban traffic although not if there are many roundabouts.
I'm not sure I'd like ACC though - you need at least something to keep you awake. Besides, it is only as efficient as the car in front, which often isn't very. You still get auto-braking in most cars now (although it is very last minute and you'd probably still hit things).
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
Progress - some people don't like it.
Such folk are disproportionately represented on PB.
I imagine them driving their manual cars around towns at 37mph (so their car doesn't blow up), fiddling with their chokes when nobodies looking, before stopping off at the bank with their passbooks to deposit a £5.01 donation in cash to the Stop Ulez In Rural Bedfordshire Now pressure group.
If you want to be positive on the Conservatives, it's not unreasonable to assume that they get two-thirds of both the DK/WV and the Reform vote. In that case, they're getting about 70% of their previous vote out. Add a bit for new voters and switchers to Con (yes they do exist), and that works out at about 32-33%.
Which - especially if there's some anti-Conservative tactical voting - is probably not quite enough to prevent a Labour majority.
2/3rds of current DK/WVs eventually deciding to both vote and then vote Conservative is well overstating it when Opinium currently have only 45% of 2019 Conservatives saying that they'll vote the same again and 12% of them intending to vote Labour.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
ACC is the dog's bollocks.
It is. I am not so keen on the Lane Control though - seems to have a mind of it's own. ;-)
It's bloody brilliant on my Audi. Although I only turn it on for large roads.
Re: deliveries and delivery vans, situation in USA is very similar as described this thread in UK.
United States Postal Service (USPS) is successor to old-school US Post Office as founded by Ben Franklin.
As with Royal Mail, USPS does a HUGE business these days delivering packages for Amazon and other delivery services. Though the latter continue to also have a HUGE presence.
Personally, ALWAYS strive to have my own packages delivered by USPS.
Why? Because USPS workersare FAR more efficient, courteous, reliable, better trained and managed, you-name-it.
Whereas Amazon & etc. are as apt to leave your package in a puddle or worse.
Plus USPS workers do NOT drive like something out of a Mad Max sequel. Or park in the roadway of major arterials and the like, which is standard procedure for the cowboys of Amazon etc.
Last winter, during an ice storm, while walking home from the grocery store, had to wait about five minutes on an idiot driving an Amazon truck, who was attempting to proceed uphill on road surface slicker than greased catshit. Clear from the get-go (at least to my feeble ken) that this was Mission Impossible with that delivery van. After revving (and presumably burning) the engine many times, he final saw reason. I then had to wait a few more minutes while he got turned around. Was waiting because I was afraid the dumb SOB was liable to run me over!
Four stars for Blanche L and his like on this side of the Atlantic AND the Pacific!
Indeed. Hermes were so bad that their name was mud and they had to change it, in the UK, but they still chuck stuff over the garden fence and claim it was left in a safe place. Meanwhile in Germany at the weekend I noticed that Hermes is still going strong as a brand, and unlike the UK where they employ random people off the street with beat up old cars, in Germany they have uniformed staff delivering from liveried vans.
The other thought on the joys of the free market vs a monopoly. Currently we have choice. And all the choices are equally shit. None of the private couriers are clearly better than any other - all have dramatically bad failings.
What is worse, consumers have zero choice which is used. If you order from Lego, its going to be DPD. Regardless of how terrible DPD are. And all seem to follow each other to impose the same crapola policies and restrictions - a cabal with no actual competition.
So why not make Royal Mail the monopoly carrier. At least if shit happens you can shout at your local postie. Mine says people complain to him about courier drop screw-ups as well...
The "why not" is because Royal Mail is a dysfunctional organisation with an industrial relations playbook borrowed straight from the 1970s and that could barely optimise a route around Toytown, whereas DPD is moderately competent and tends to deliver things promptly, undamaged and to the correct address. Our Royal Mail posties are great, in true "poor bloody infantry" style. Their generals aren't.
DPD is, of course, owned by the French state.
Whereas a big slice of Royal Mail is owned by some czech billionaire bloke?
Completely O/T but I noticed that Evan Ferguson has pulled out of Ireland’s team for upcoming matches with a knee injury.
If I was a conspiracy theorist I would point out that he has played 3 games for Ireland and if he plays a 4th then he cannot change to play for another national team he would be eligible for such as England where he might have a higher profile and earning capacity.
I do not believe however that football is a cynical game and so this certainly won’t happen.
I thought that but from what I heard on SSN earlier, he reported for duty to the FAI and their medics ruled him out, rather than vice versa. But I might have misinterpreted that.
🔵TAMWORTH: there are rumours Chris Pincher will resign as an MP in the next day or so and not go through with the likely humiliation of the Commons voting to suspend him, and then a recall petition. That would enable by-elections in both Mid-Beds & Tamworth on 12 October."
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
No, its not obvious, you only think its obvious as you are superficially paying attention only to the top of the iceberg.
The iceberg effect is worth remembering for almost any business or industry. The visible bit you are seeing is only a tiny fraction of what is happening and what happens below the surface matters.
No, each van doesn't travel five times the distance. If the bulk of the distance is primarily between the depot and the relevant postcode area, then going to five neighbouring estates within the same postcode area is miniscule 'extra' mileage. Being efficient getting from A to B is the bulk of the relevant efficiency, not from B1 to B4.
I can get 4 different deliveries to my house in the same day. But if those 4 deliveries are coming from 4 different places - and if those vans are all filled with drop offs near to me - then each of those vans is operating efficiently.
But they wouldn't be coming from four different places if there was a monopoly provider.
Yes they would. Currently you have goods coming from all over the country, do you think they should all be in the same place? Would that be more efficient?
Take Widnes, in Liverpool City Region but in Warrington's postal area for the Royal Mail. There are sorting offices in Liverpool and Warrington.
If someone from Widnes orders a good from a business in Liverpool it is more efficient to send a full van from Liverpool to Widnes to drop off those goods.
What do you propose instead? Send the van from Liverpool, through and past Widnes into Warrington to have the goods resorted in Warrington before being sent out for a second time back into Widnes?
Off topic: One more potential disaster for you to worry about: "A significant increase in Asian hornet sightings in the United Kingdom is raising alarm because of concerns that the hornets could ravage local bee populations.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
It can be selected as semi-automatic if you want to play with the gears, although the clutch(es) are fully automatic.
I have no problem with the concept of S/S if the starter/battery are up to it. I'd definitely keep it enabled in a manual car and do re-enable it sometimes in urban traffic although not if there are many roundabouts.
I'm not sure I'd like ACC though - you need at least something to keep you awake. Besides, it is only as efficient as the car in front, which often isn't very. You still get auto-braking in most cars now (although it is very last minute and you'd probably still hit things).
Well, like all these features, you are welcome to turn it off. It's a godsend on long motorway journeys, believe you me.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
Well said.
I remember making the point about the inefficiency of multiple parcels vans right here a number of years ago, only to be castigated by the capitalist herd, telling me that I didn't understand the efficiencies of the free market.
Because multiple parcel vans are efficient. They mean that you can get whatever you want same or next day far quicker than getting it posted via Royal Mail.
If the alternative is instead of having a private parcel van that's doing 30-40 deliveries all in the same postcode area is each of those people makes a trip to the shops, then that's less efficient.
Nonsense. Five vans driving around five housing estates, delivering 20% of the parcels to each is a ridiculous set up when the alternative is one van delivering all of the parcels on each estate.
Why? If each van is full when it departs its depot, then the same number of vans is needed either way.
If the five vans are eg coming from five different depots, then how is it more efficient to unnecessarily move the goods to the one central depot, resort the goods yet again, then send out five vans still as a secondary step, now from another hub? How does that actually improve matters?
Sometimes what may seem inefficient above the surface can actually be supremely efficient below the surface, or vice-versa.
It's obvious. Each van travels five times the distance. More time, more fuel, more traffic. And there wouldn't be five depots with a single integrated delivery system.
Sometimes a well run, well regulated monopoly is best. Avoiding unnecessary duplication is a good thing.
No, its not obvious, you only think its obvious as you are superficially paying attention only to the top of the iceberg.
The iceberg effect is worth remembering for almost any business or industry. The visible bit you are seeing is only a tiny fraction of what is happening and what happens below the surface matters.
No, each van doesn't travel five times the distance. If the bulk of the distance is primarily between the depot and the relevant postcode area, then going to five neighbouring estates within the same postcode area is miniscule 'extra' mileage. Being efficient getting from A to B is the bulk of the relevant efficiency, not from B1 to B4.
I can get 4 different deliveries to my house in the same day. But if those 4 deliveries are coming from 4 different places - and if those vans are all filled with drop offs near to me - then each of those vans is operating efficiently.
But they wouldn't be coming from four different places if there was a monopoly provider.
Yes they would. Currently you have goods coming from all over the country, do you think they should all be in the same place? Would that be more efficient?
Take Widnes, in Liverpool City Region but in Warrington's postal area for the Royal Mail. There are sorting offices in Liverpool and Warrington.
If someone from Widnes orders a good from a business in Liverpool it is more efficient to send a full van from Liverpool to Widnes to drop off those goods.
What do you propose instead? Send the van from Liverpool, through and past Widnes into Warrington to have the goods resorted in Warrington before being sent out for a second time back into Widnes?
How is that "more" efficient?
Ever seen the network for one of the couriers? It's hub and spoke as well.
🔵TAMWORTH: there are rumours Chris Pincher will resign as an MP in the next day or so and not go through with the likely humiliation of the Commons voting to suspend him, and then a recall petition. That would enable by-elections in both Mid-Beds & Tamworth on 12 October."
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
I think the problem is that my car:
1 - Is a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox 2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving, which you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
1. DSG is fully automatic, not semi-automatic. 2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
ACC is the dog's bollocks.
It is. I am not so keen on the Lane Control though - seems to have a mind of it's own. ;-)
Lane control makes driving easier by reducing your workload in ways you generally don’t notice, which is why it could be seen as somewhat insidious. It allows you to get away without paying steering so much attention, especially on motorways and other clearly marked roads without sharp bends. I’ve had my car four years now, and just twice it has tried to kill me by following the wrong set of road markings, most dramatically in Germany where the car tried to follow some old road markings straight into a concrete wall, that had been laid across where the motorway used to run; just briefly, but enough to wake me up.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
They should buy vehicles designed for stop/go operation, with appropriate battery/starter/ignition systems. The technology’s been in cars for a decade now - although I always turn it off as well, don’t trust it to suddenly fire up the engine on the throttle as the lights go green in front.
I always turn mine off. In fact, I've a mind to hacking the car to turn it off permanently (apparently it is only a single bit flip).
It has a habit of turning the engine off when coasting to a junction - particularly roundabouts. I lose power steering and cannot pull out swiftly if required. It is thus quite dangerous.
Also, after having had an unexpected starter motor failure in the middle lane of the M62, I don't even like turning the engine off when stuck in a queue on a main road unless it is a 'people wandering about the central reservation' type stoppage.
I wonder how yours is implemented? The Start/Stop on ours will only kick in if the vehicle is in neutral & the clutch up. Put the clutch down again & it starts the engine before you’ve got first gear engaged. It’s surprisingly natural in use.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
My car works the same as your, Phil, and I hate it (the cut-out system, not the car...it's fine otherwise.)
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
The fuel savings from it are significant depending on how the vehicle is used. Up to 10% in heavy traffic. It's woke nonsense to disable it.
I am grumpy about pretty much everything which has happened in car design since about 2008. Mostly innovations seem to be fixing problems which weren't problems to begin with - push button ignition, for example, or electric handbrakes. But I rather like automatic stop start. It irritates me greatly that people sit in traffic (or indeed parked) with their engines idling. I think it is done because of a pervasive belief that it takes a lot of fuel to turn your car on and off so it's more efficient to sit with it idling. I don't know if this was ever true, but it isn't now. (It does take a disproportionate amount of fuel to turn your engine on from cold, but you only do that once. And aside from the fuel saving, by turning your car off when its stationary, you avoid spewing out NO2 at passing pedestrians. Getting a car to do all this automatically is a big win, in my view.
I have this in my new(ish) car (a cherry red Golf GTI if anybody's interested). At first it spooked me because I'd think it wouldn't start again and I'd have a few seconds of utter terror to get through esp if sitting at the high octane, superserious junction at the top of Hampstead High St. But after it had bounced back no problem about 100 times (just by me pressing on the brake pedal) I relaxed and I quite like it now.
Off topic: One more potential disaster for you to worry about: "A significant increase in Asian hornet sightings in the United Kingdom is raising alarm because of concerns that the hornets could ravage local bee populations.
BTW, it has occurred to me that setting up traps and checking on them would be a good project for Boy Scouts, assuming you still have them.
(In the US, it is now politically correct to call them "Northern Giant Hornets".
Do the Boy Scouts not object to that name?
Haven't been the Boy Scouts in the UK since, I don't know, 1965 or so? Plain Scouts.
Are there Mountain Scouts too?
On hornets, we saw a European one at the weekend, first time in ages - can't even remember when I last saw a hornet. My daughter almost sat on it at an RHS garden Not spotted any of them there foreign ones.
Off topic: One more potential disaster for you to worry about: "A significant increase in Asian hornet sightings in the United Kingdom is raising alarm because of concerns that the hornets could ravage local bee populations.
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
Progress - some people don't like it.
Such folk are disproportionately represented on PB.
I imagine them driving their manual cars around towns at 37mph (so their car doesn't blow up), fiddling with their chokes when nobodies looking, before stopping off at the bank with their passbooks to deposit a £5.01 donation in cash to the Stop Ulez In Rural Bedfordshire Now pressure group.
First they came for the incandescent light bulbs and, I did not speak out.
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
Progress - some people don't like it.
Such folk are disproportionately represented on PB.
I imagine them driving their manual cars around towns at 37mph (so their car doesn't blow up), fiddling with their chokes when nobodies looking, before stopping off at the bank with their passbooks to deposit a £5.01 donation in cash to the Stop Ulez In Rural Bedfordshire Now pressure group.
What does it say about me, that when I read this, I want to hold up a sign saying “Down with this sort of thing” ?
🔵TAMWORTH: there are rumours Chris Pincher will resign as an MP in the next day or so and not go through with the likely humiliation of the Commons voting to suspend him, and then a recall petition. That would enable by-elections in both Mid-Beds & Tamworth on 12 October."
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
Progress - some people don't like it.
Such folk are disproportionately represented on PB.
I imagine them driving their manual cars around towns at 37mph (so their car doesn't blow up), fiddling with their chokes when nobodies looking, before stopping off at the bank with their passbooks to deposit a £5.01 donation in cash to the Stop Ulez In Rural Bedfordshire Now pressure group.
What does it say about me, that when I read this, I want to hold up a sign saying “Down with this sort of thing” ?
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
Progress - some people don't like it.
Such folk are disproportionately represented on PB.
I imagine them driving their manual cars around towns at 37mph (so their car doesn't blow up), fiddling with their chokes when nobodies looking, before stopping off at the bank with their passbooks to deposit a £5.01 donation in cash to the Stop Ulez In Rural Bedfordshire Now pressure group.
First they came for the incandescent light bulbs and, I did not speak out.
But The Crown should own it, rather than the government - “Royal” shouldn’t just be a deceptive trademark
It should be an NPO near monopoly; it could price itself cheap enough to take out all of the competition
I already deliver loads of Amazon parcels because we’re cheaper than getting their own drivers to do it
We’re obliged to deliver to every house on our routes every day; why have five more vans visiting your street every day delivering parcels?
Every other delivery van I’ve seen on my post routes has always left the engine running while they deliver their parcel. Why do they do this? Starting an engine takes one second
500-800 CCA to start a diesel engine. That is a lot of load on the battery/voltage reg if you are doing it a hundred times a day. I'd leave it running.
Polluting the streets as you do, very nice of you
The stop/start damage is a thing. There is also a spike in pollution when you start an ICE. Catalytic converters take time to warm up etc.
This is nicely solved by electric delivery vehicles which don’t mind such usages patterns.
I assume Hermes Evri* are the greenest delivery company as they appear not to stop, but just lob the parcel through the vehicle window in the vague direction of your (if they're having a good day) house as they go past?
*replace with most hated courier as appropriate, if anyone hates one more than Evri
Funnily enough our Hermes/Evri delivery service is superb but that is 100% down to the great bloke that covers our area - he's brilliant. Unfortunately, whenever he goes on holiday we get the service Evri-one else does and it's utter chaos.
He now warns us when he's going on holiday and Mrs. P. takes a 'holiday' from eBay.
Yeah, to be fair we also had a very good Herme's deliverer for a few months pre-Covid. I'd forgotten about that. Would always deliver somewhere sensible and make an effort. Probably moved on to better things, I guess.
Besides that, in my neighborhood, I also see trucks belonging to private carriers such as FedEx and United Parcel Service. (The UPS drivers just got a very good contract.) And even an occasional DHL truck.
The debate about stop-start systems is instructive. My 2009 i30 airport car has no automation beyond the choke. You want to stop/start you switch it off. So it means sitting at traffic lights with the engine pointlessly running.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
Progress - some people don't like it.
Such folk are disproportionately represented on PB.
I imagine them driving their manual cars around towns at 37mph (so their car doesn't blow up), fiddling with their chokes when nobodies looking, before stopping off at the bank with their passbooks to deposit a £5.01 donation in cash to the Stop Ulez In Rural Bedfordshire Now pressure group.
First they came for the incandescent light bulbs and, I did not speak out.
Buying fluorescent ones for domestic use became illegal last week, I believe?
Comments
Certainly if you can't see the car anymore it is unattended. Might be interesting to see if there's any relevant case law.
I regularly get deliveries from delivery drivers who leave their engine running and I don't think its an issue, if they're not staying there for more than a few seconds and never leave sight of the vehicle it makes perfect sense to me. Cars starting up is both noisier and more polluting than them idling for just a few seconds anyway. 🤷♂️
If you're going to be there for a period of time, or leave the vehicle unattended, absolutely switch it off and take your keys with you.
Not worth my skin.
I strongly suspect that nearly all is stuff people will have bought in the shops anyway. But “suspect” isn’t data.
Any implementation that cuts the engine out altogether during normal driving is broken, surely? (Excepting the normal case where the ECU cuts fuel to the engine when you run downhill - all the usual driver aids like power steering & brake assist still work in that case.)
More distance travelled if the distance between depot and centralised depot exceeds the distance between estates.
Estates are closer to each other than depots tend to be.
The optimisation algorithms used are quite interesting by themselves. And there’s a lot of investment in improving them.
That isn't to say that it could be economised. Your postie covers a patch, and an amalgamation of all of the 3rd party contractor drivers could have the same result. At the moment all of them could all drive to the same places at the same time - which is madness.
Sorry, but I think the Tories are cuffed this time.
I saw your post about the odds. You and I know we won't often find much value in a 1/2 to shot, but I'm a bit more bullish than Mike on this one. I know he's a Pro and we both respect his opinion, but the latest fiasco has persuaded me that a Starmer Majority Government must be all of a 75% probability.
So I'm nibbling at the current odds, and hoping that I can soon start betting on some seat numbers.
"How France lost control of Gabon
Africa's latest coup is a tale of colonial collapse
By William Finlator"
https://unherd.com/2023/09/how-france-lost-control-of-gabon/
Anyway, I am dropping this now. It has been great to resurrect a topic from eight years ago!
But I think a new leader would be unlikely to help. (1) The party would be ridiculed for having yet another new leader. (2) Who? Most of the likely candidates would be even worse than Sunak. (3) If there is a good new leader out there, do you have any faith that the party membership, or even the MPs, would pick them? (4) A new leader isn’t going to make the cost of living suddenly improve, or stop schools failing down, or mean you can get an appointment with a GP. The polls aren’t terrible for the Tories because people dislike Sunak; the polls are terrible because the country is in a poor state. Putting lipstick (a new leader) on the pig won’t get you very far.
What is worse, consumers have zero choice which is used. If you order from Lego, its going to be DPD. Regardless of how terrible DPD are. And all seem to follow each other to impose the same crapola policies and restrictions - a cabal with no actual competition.
So why not make Royal Mail the monopoly carrier. At least if shit happens you can shout at your local postie. Mine says people complain to him about courier drop screw-ups as well...
Possession of nitrous oxide, also known as NOS, will carry a sentence of up to two years in prison. Laughing gas is one of the most commonly used recreational drugs by 16 to 24-year-olds. Heavy use can lead to a range of illnesses including nerve-related symptoms. Supply of nitrous oxide for recreational use is currently banned - but possession is not."
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66718165
It saves bugger all fuel and it can be dangerous. Since the engine is quiet normally you don't always know when it has switched itself off, nor can you tell the difference between deliberate cut-out and a genuine stall. Panic can result.
Who ever dreamed up such a dumb idea?
Which - especially if there's some anti-Conservative tactical voting - is probably not quite enough to prevent a Labour majority.
Have you copied in Conservative Party Head Office?
Against that, there’s drunk and stoned shopping online, as well as completely sober but silly and impulsive crap that gets bought from browsing Amazon and eBay.
I see no benefit in leaving it running.
Our towels dried in no time.
I have spent the past four days reading "Reservoir 13" by Jon McGregor. I recommend it. A very different style of writing, intermingling the seasonal flow of nature with the narrative. I think I'll have to look out for more of his work.
On fuel savings, well it saves me ~£100 / year in vehicle tax, so there’s that to be taken into account too
If such a system is on for the official test, it has to be on by default when you switch on the car, and disabled manually by the driver every time.
I'll have Mrs PtP look into it as soon as she returns from London.
People sat parked up with their engine running for no good reason are the ones who need sending to a re-education camp. Do they still think they need to get out and crank a starting handle each time, hence too difficult to switch off and back on?
I live opposite a school and the number of parents who sit there with their engines on....
Seethe.
This year, British officials have reported at least 22 confirmed sightings of Vespa velutina, mostly in southern England. That was up from two last year and two in 2021."
source$: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/09/05/uk-asian-hornet-honeybees-deadly/
If the experience here in the Pacific Northwest applies, you should be able to cope with these pests fairly easily. (Officials ask people to report sitings, set up traps to locate the nests, and then destroy the nests.) https://agr.wa.gov/departments/insects-pests-and-weeds/insects/hornets/reported-sightings
BTW, it has occurred to me that setting up traps and checking on them would be a good project for Boy Scouts, assuming you still have them.
(In the US, it is now politically correct to call them "Northern Giant Hornets".
Edit: I don't know why I'm telling you this - better to let Stop/Start do its thing and help the environment.
That looks like the button the dog chewed off, but I think I know where it is.
1 - Has a semi-automatic (VAG DSG) gearbox
2 - Has auto-coasting on lifting the accelerator
So technically it is in neutral with the clutch up even though it is still moving - something you wouldn't normally be doing with manual gears.
I prefer to have the auto-coasting than the auto-cutout , so I have to disable the latter. I suspect it is a bug that VAG don't know how to fix, because the auto-cutout is EU mandated.
Edit: It was an old Citroen that had the starter motor fail - many years ago - not this one.
Ben Bradshaw
@BenPBradshaw
Hilarious Tory on Tory exchange in Commons just now. Rees-Mogg complains to dep Speaker about limited debate on Govt’s Levelling Up Bill. Penny Mordant points out the programme motion was agreed in May when Rees-Mogg was Leader of the House. 😂
Two Toyota hybrids, so engine cuts in and out all the time. No issues at all. Lovely to drive.
2. Adaptive cruise control (if you have it) is your friend here. When in heavy traffic it will follow the car in front, slow when it does, speed up when it moves away, stop if the car in front stop, and stop the engine, then re-start the engine when the car in front begins to move again. I wish I'd had ACC when I was commuting along the M62 every day - I could have got an extra 30 mins of sleep every morning on that commute.
Happily there are only a couple of sets of lights between me and the airport so it isn't an issue. But for those of you who drive these dino cars why on earth would you not welcome the S/S system doing its thing?
Less fuel burnt. Less crap pumped into the atmosphere. What is there to dislike?
United States Postal Service (USPS) is successor to old-school US Post Office as founded by Ben Franklin.
As with Royal Mail, USPS does a HUGE business these days delivering packages for Amazon and other delivery services. Though the latter continue to also have a HUGE presence.
Personally, ALWAYS strive to have my own packages delivered by USPS.
Why? Because USPS workersare FAR more efficient, courteous, reliable, better trained and managed, you-name-it.
Whereas Amazon & etc. are as apt to leave your package in a puddle or worse.
Plus USPS workers do NOT drive like something out of a Mad Max sequel. Or park in the roadway of major arterials and the like, which is standard procedure for the cowboys of Amazon etc.
Last winter, during an ice storm, while walking home from the grocery store, had to wait about five minutes on an idiot driving an Amazon truck, who was attempting to proceed uphill on road surface slicker than greased catshit. Clear from the get-go (at least to my feeble ken) that this was Mission Impossible with that delivery van. After revving (and presumably burning) the engine many times, he final saw reason. I then had to wait a few more minutes while he got turned around. Was waiting because I was afraid the dumb SOB was liable to run me over!
Four stars for Blanche L and his like on this side of the Atlantic AND the Pacific!
I mean Kimi Badenoch as PM ….
Now I have my Toyota at home, yet for last year’s US trip I got given a hire car without lane following, and my driving was all over the place. It must have taken me a couple of weeks to get used to the car not doing most of the steering, during which I found myself in a few situations that in Europe would probably have been accidents; fortunately in the states there’s more time and space to take avoidance. Which may well presage a big problem if people ever start to get used to self-driving cars…
Spain’s football association fired Jorge Vilda, the coach of the national women’s team, amid a scandal over the country’s football chief kissing a player.
DPD is, of course, owned by the French state.
If I was a conspiracy theorist I would point out that he has played 3 games for Ireland and if he plays a 4th then he cannot change to play for another national team he would be eligible for such as England where he might have a higher profile and earning capacity.
I do not believe however that football is a cynical game and so this certainly won’t happen.
The name change from "Asian" to "Northern" was made by entomologists, most likely to keep "Emperor" Xi and company happy, or, I suppose I should say, less unhappy.
I have no problem with the concept of S/S if the starter/battery are up to it. I'd definitely keep it enabled in a manual car and do re-enable it sometimes in urban traffic although not if there are many roundabouts.
I'm not sure I'd like ACC though - you need at least something to keep you awake. Besides, it is only as efficient as the car in front, which often isn't very. You still get auto-braking in most cars now (although it is very last minute and you'd probably still hit things).
I imagine them driving their manual cars around towns at 37mph (so their car doesn't blow up), fiddling with their chokes when nobodies looking, before stopping off at the bank with their passbooks to deposit a £5.01 donation in cash to the Stop Ulez In Rural Bedfordshire Now pressure group.
@tomorrowsmps
🔵TAMWORTH: there are rumours Chris Pincher will resign as an MP in the next day or so and not go through with the likely humiliation of the Commons voting to suspend him, and then a recall petition. That would enable by-elections in both Mid-Beds & Tamworth on 12 October."
https://twitter.com/tomorrowsmps/status/1698753111106433440
Take Widnes, in Liverpool City Region but in Warrington's postal area for the Royal Mail. There are sorting offices in Liverpool and Warrington.
If someone from Widnes orders a good from a business in Liverpool it is more efficient to send a full van from Liverpool to Widnes to drop off those goods.
What do you propose instead? Send the van from Liverpool, through and past Widnes into Warrington to have the goods resorted in Warrington before being sent out for a second time back into Widnes?
How is that "more" efficient?
On hornets, we saw a European one at the weekend, first time in ages - can't even remember when I last saw a hornet. My daughter almost sat on it at an RHS garden
I did not speak out.
Besides that, in my neighborhood, I also see trucks belonging to private carriers such as FedEx and United Parcel Service. (The UPS drivers just got a very good contract.) And even an occasional DHL truck.
(Fun story: In at least one location, Amazon uses mules to deliver packages: https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/nation-now/2023/08/02/amazon-mules-deliveries-grand-canyon-phantom-ranch/70518269007/ )