Wife fed up with the view.

[Jocko]

My wife tells me she is fed up with the view from the front of our car. Because I am always following some truck or other! You do not need to tailgate a big truck to get the benefit of the tow behind them. Sitting two or more seconds back still gives an appreciable advantage, especially if they are travelling at 50+ mph. Also, by sitting in the lane with the trucks, I can happily match their speed without following motorists thinking it is me holding the traffic up.
What really annoys me is when I let someone in off a slip road, between me and my tow, then the ungrateful s*d sits there and doesn't pull out to pass. A Jaguar did that to me today. Joined a lane doing 45 mph and despite the outside lane being empty, sat there depriving me of the benefit of my tow.

[VicW]

Sorry Jocko but I disagree with your policy of following trucks that closely. Your view of the road ahead is obscured so that you have no early warning of what is happening ahead of you, no early sight of brake lights or indicators.
Not a good policy in my opinion, your fascination with fuel consumption has gone too far.

Vic.

[Jocko]

I always keep a sight line down the side of the truck. That way I can see what is happening ahead, and the truck driver gets a clear view of me in one mirror or the other. When I cannot see past the truck (straight road), I drop further back. The tow effect works well out to the side, the further back from the truck you are. And I have a greater stopping distance than 90% of the vehicles passing in the outside lane.

[peteo48]

I think the 2 second rule is regarded as a rule of thumb for a following distance so if Jocko maintains that it seem quite safe.

[ColinB]

I’m with VicW on this. The 2sec rule is only an approximation to the minimum following distance and has a number of assumptions (eg that the lead vehicle is going to slow progressively so the following vehicle has time to react). In fact, the stopping distance exceeds the 2 sec gap: eg at 50mph, a 2 sec gap is 147 feet, whereas the stopping ( ie thinking plus braking) distance is 175 feet. So if the truck brakes progressively and you react quickly you should be OK, but if it hits something and stops suddenly, or drops something onto the road, then provided you have sh*t-hot reactions, a dry road, good tyres, and everything else in your favour, you’re still going to hit the obstruction. Personally I prefer better odds and less stress whilst driving, the fuel saving isn’t worth it.

[ColinS]

I always try to maintain the 2 second rule distance but I am often thwarted by some clown overtaking because I have left a distance that their car can fit in .

Does anyone have experience of adaptive cruise control and how that deals with the distance?

[Jocko]

At 55 mph a truck takes 390 ft to stop (industry average) and if you include thinking distance it is about 500 ft.  Not that I would just just follow him through the carnage he has created. I am constantly sizing up my "Plan B", be it the hard shoulder or lane 2.
On the odd occasions where I am as close as 2 seconds behind the vehicle on front I am still further back than 90% of drivers. And regards loose loads. Don't follow skip lorries or low loaders. Tankers or closed artics are my vehicle of choice.

[springswood]

Thanks Jocko. I'll try it sometime but with the variable mpg I'm getting it may be hard to judge the result. Although there's some potential risk (when isn't there driving?) I expect it's less than dealing with the less than perfect lane discipline (and occasional downright madness) on the motorway. On my last trip to Manchester in busy traffic there was a young guy weaving in and out of lanes recklessly. Whilst he was tailgating me I could see him checking his phone!

[Jocko]

If you have an instantaneous mpg display on your display, select that. As you approach the rear of a truck you can see the numbers climb. On a level road, at 50 mph, I have seen 150 - 170 mpg, while following a large HGV.

[springswood]

Good point. Though the only time I've seen those sorts of numbers is coasting in neutral. Or rather between gears in one of those slooow changes  . In gear the best instantaneous mpg I get is about 100-110. Weirdly often the best figure is with my foot very lightly on the accelerator, completely off the pedal it actually drops to about 90. It's one of the things that makes me think there may be gunk somewhere in the air intake system.

[Jocko]

If you are travelling at 50 - 60 mph and you take your foot RIGHT off the throttle, what does the display indicate? My ScanGauge shows 9999 mpg as DFCO should be active.

[culzean]

At 55 mph a truck takes 390 ft to stop (industry average) and if you include thinking distance it is about 500 ft.  Not that I would just just follow him through the carnage he has created. I am constantly sizing up my "Plan B", be it the hard shoulder or lane 2.
On the odd occasions where I am as close as 2 seconds behind the vehicle on front I am still further back than 90% of drivers. And regards loose loads. Don't follow skip lorries or low loaders. Tankers or closed artics are my vehicle of choice.

If you lived in England you would have to take 'hard shoulder' off your plan B - they are no longer available on many of our motorways as part of the ( wait for it ) 'smart motorway rollout' - yes they are using the hard shoulder as an extra lane and to replace it are building 'refuge' areas about a mile + apart, painted bright yellow ( the designers of smart motorways stipulated refuge areas to be no more than 1/3 mile apart ).  We passed a couple of vehicles stranded in the new 'smart lane' yesterday on the M6 going south from Lake district, one a car and one an HGV neither of whom had made it to a refuge area...  The refuge areas will just about take one 40 foot HGV if it is parked nicely - Is this the new definition of smart....  Oh the 'smart' motorway signs were warning of 'obstruction reported ahead' long after we had passed the broken down vehicles.

[Rory]

At 55 mph a truck takes 390 ft to stop (industry average) and if you include thinking distance it is about 500 ft.  Not that I would just just follow him through the carnage he has created. I am constantly sizing up my "Plan B", be it the hard shoulder or lane 2.

I'd be thinking about the stopping distance of the truck behind you, not the one in front.

[peteo48]

At 55 mph a truck takes 390 ft to stop (industry average) and if you include thinking distance it is about 500 ft.  Not that I would just just follow him through the carnage he has created. I am constantly sizing up my "Plan B", be it the hard shoulder or lane 2.
On the odd occasions where I am as close as 2 seconds behind the vehicle on front I am still further back than 90% of drivers. And regards loose loads. Don't follow skip lorries or low loaders. Tankers or closed artics are my vehicle of choice.

Another consideration is that, as I've got older, I quite enjoy a 60 mph cruise and, by necessity, this means following HGVs for a lot of the time on the rare occasions I do motorway driving.

[springswood]

If you are travelling at 50 - 60 mph and you take your foot RIGHT off the throttle, what does the display indicate? My ScanGauge shows 9999 mpg as DFCO should be active.

That's what I was trying to say, I get usually 70 - 90 in those circumstances. My ODBII dongle on Torque Lite on the phone give a max of 255mpg but I have never seen that in gear. So I'm not getting DFCO, I just don't know why.