IML: Imperials economy, and safty, as well as rude driver inhibitor...
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IML: Imperials economy, and safty, as well as rude driver inhibitor...
- From: "Wm. R. Ulman" <twolaneblacktop@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 15:46:21 -0800
Title: Message
Joe
Machado wrote: I told them no body would dare to get
in front of us as they would die. Its the real
thing. Maybe the real name for Imperials is Luxury Performance
Economy Car.
I drive my Imperial daily, and on the freeway too all
the time. When traffic is real bad, and that is everyday around here, I
always try to leave enough room to stop if required to do so suddenly, and
quickly. As we are all aware, Imperials are not new cars, and with any and
all discussion aside about brakes, and assuming your Imperial's brakes operate
in tip top shape, our cars will not stop as fast, or in as short a distance as
virtually ANY new car. Plus, we have lock up to consider in real panic
stops, which luckily have been rare, but have happened.
My cars, in my experience with all my Imperials, '62
Crown 4dr & '60 vert with Lockheed Dual Center Plane Full Contact
Brakes exclusive, of course, to Chrysler, and my '63 Custom 4dr & current
'66 vert with the more modern, standardized, Bendex brakes, which by the
way both have had the self-adjusting brake kits installed, which the '60 &
'62 did not, and could not have, each has had the rear end cut loose, and
go sideways, not fishtail, but, well, you know, just cut loose, which
creates a hazard to cars in the lane next to you as well as in
front. Anyway, I drive defensively, and like an adult (95% of the time),
and have the insurance rates to prove it, but you know how it goes: your in
traffic, and people will suddenly cut you off to gain one half a car length
toward their end destination, usually little zippy, nimble cars, such as Honda,
or Toyota, in example.
Well sometimes, at least here in Seattle, if a person
is in bumper to bumper slow moving traffic, and is on either side, and puts on
their signal to move into my lane I will be gracious enough to back off a bit,
and let them do so, and get the polite "wave" of thanks. Sometimes though,
you get some jerk, or jerkette, who feels as if by putting on their signal, that
action instantly overrides your right to remain in your spot, and with very
little room between me and the car just in front, like less then 5 feet in heavy
traffic, they just start to merge right on in when I'm right there! As if
I am just going to brake and passively let them rudely push their way in.
I have been known to, on occasion, lay on the horn, push the gas, and
assert my position. To date, none of these perpetrators has followed
through in this little exercise in playing "Chicken", and hit me, or merged into
me as it would be stated in the police report, but have retreated in haste,
often with quite expressive hand gestures, some I recognize as a well know
international symbol, and some flailing some communication I can't
decipher. Perhaps they were speaking in ASL (American Sign
Language). If the top is down, sometimes I can hear there verbal
communications of gratitude in my letting them know I was in the spot they
wanted to take over. I have heard these words of thanks in many different
languages as Seattle is a very culturally diverse city, and has people from many
different lands. They then know that the set of headlights they saw in
their mirror was not a figment of their imagination, but was actually just a
portion of a whole car of 20 feet, and not another Mazda, or Focus. If a
real emergency, God forbid, were to occur, and I hit someone, you can bet I
won't just hit it, I'll be going through it. I really hope that never
happens. I have been rear ended before though, in my '63 and that was not
pretty. No damage to my car, just hair line scratches on my bumper, but
her car was totaled. Got my bumper re-chromed out of it
though!
Drive safe, and be well
all,
Bill Ulman
Seattle, WA
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