Towards Greater Control
| Date | 01 January 1971 |
| Author | Paul Harris |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032258X7104400112 |
| Published date | 01 January 1971 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
INSPECTOR
PAUL
HARRIS
Somerset and Bath Constabulary
Motoring Correspondent
o/The
Police Journal
TOWARDS
GREATER
~ONTROL
Research into road accidents and their prevention goes many
ways, but one influencing factor which is not publicised a great deal
is that of skidding. I know of no studies which have been done on a
national scale in relation to skidding in accidents since 1966, but
it
is
probably reasonable to assume that there has been little significant
change since then. Trends at that time were fairly steady.
Four
years ago, using information from fatal and injury accidents,
it
was shown that one third of the total occurred on wet roads.
Closer examination of the figures revealed that skidding contributed
to one quarter of the wet road accidents and one fifth of the dry
road accidents.
Put
together, these figures showed that about two
ninths of the total of fatal and injury accidents involved at least one
skidding vehicle. Inaccuracies may occur in the figures as they are
compiled from police reports and opinions often vary as to what
constitutes acontributory skid. Even allowing for this possibility it
is clear that every year many thousands of accidents result from loss
of adhesion between the tyres and the road.
Manufacturers are well aware of adhesion problems and many
advances have been made in recent years, particularly with tyres.
Improvements have been made to tread patterns allied to more
satisfactory methods of tyre construction while chemical experiments
have given us high hysteresis rubber and better tread mixes. In
parallel with this work surface dressings have received considerable
attention in order to raise friction coefficients and achieve quicker
dispersal of water. The Road Research Laboratory has carried out
extensive studies on road surfaces all over the world and has been
able to make substantial recommendations for improvement.
Unfortunately,
it
has been found that the human is only too highly
adaptable. Given improved roads, better brakes and more grip from
his tyres the driver tends
to
take advantage of manufactured benefits
by increasing his speed.
It
is a constant battle to keep improvements
ahead of the growing demands made of components. This still leaves
us with a basic
problem-for
a locked wheel condition, friction
coefficients have varied little from those we had ten years ago. This
is true whether the surface is micro or macro textured and regardless
of whether it is wet or dry. If the drivers could have maintained their
former speeds alongside the improvements in tyres and roads we
would have seen a reduction in skidding accidents. However, the
probable truth is that although the point at which a vehicle skids
January 1971 69
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