Sitting here at Discount Tire

[Graves]

The most common complaint today seems to be sliding around on snow and ice. Apparently, if you have new tires you just won't slide on snow and ice.

Try working on commercial equipment for a living. Evidently 9/32 of tread is bald because the snowy roads are slippery.

[Graves]

We need a new law that says...

Darwinism exists for a reason, we should not stand in the way.

Hmm.

[SAnd]

...DRL if mandatory will become common place and all the advantages they give will be lost . just like the 3rd brake light. this will of course have the largest effect on motorcyclist since the whole reason they have the headlight on anytime they are running is to increase safety by making them stick out. once they are just a light in a sea of lights.. blam no more safety advantage.

There is another safety aspect to running with lights on in daytime. Having your lights on make a vehicle flat out easier to see. It isn't that you "stick out" of the crowd, it's that in some driving conditions you disappear into the background. With lights on your car sticks out of the background, not out of the other cars. I don't think the safety aspect of running with lights on will decrease over time.

[tmleadr03]

Sounds worse than it is. Something or other 'Blizzaks' mounted on the cheapest rims they could source for my Nissan Titan, which has some relatively odd tire or lugnut size or something. The rims were $140/per.

The tool is not the TPMS tool itself. It is some sort of pig-tail device specific to the Nissan. I guess you hook it into the auxiliary harness on the truck, and then into your higher-priced tire reset gizmo. Without using it, the tire sensors lose their registration after you turn off the car. Whatever it does can't be worth $200, since you can simulate it's effects with a paper clip and setting your tires to four different pressures.

Looks about right.
http://www.tirerack.com/snow/preferredpackages.jsp

[ChadAmberg]

As this NHTSA study shows ( from 1998) the effectiveness of the Third Brake light had fallen from 36%( during testing) to 4% by 1995.

The Long-Term Effectiveness of Center High Mounted Stop Lamps ...

The study does not speculate why ( not that I saw during a quick read at least) but here my opinion .. when it was uncommon it stuck out and people noticed once it became commonplace it lost it's effectiveness because it became "normal"

DRL if mandatory will become common place and all the advantages they give will be lost . just like the 3rd brake light. this will of course have the largest effect on motorcyclist since the whole reason they have the headlight on anytime they are running is to increase safety by making them stick out. once they are just a light in a sea of lights.. blam no more safety advantage.

Look at all the cars where the third brake light are automatically on flashers now. I admit to noticing them while not ever "noticing" normal 3rd brake lights consciously anymore.

[Ridge]

I tend to focus on 3rd brake lights more because they seem to last longer than the side brake lights. Also it could be because I'm looking through the car in front of me to watch the visible brake lights of the car in front of them.

[clublights]

Look at all the cars where the third brake light are automatically on flashers now. I admit to noticing them while not ever "noticing" normal 3rd brake lights consciously anymore.

And How long till we stop noticing those ?

This is another pull over from the motorcycle world .. tho not a standard thing or regulated I know guys that have been putting modulators on bike brake lights since the 90's at least.

I tend to focus on 3rd brake lights more because they seem to last longer than the side brake lights. Also it could be because I'm looking through the car in front of me to watch the visible brake lights of the car in front of them.

Same here .. and will mess me up when they have a burnt out one LOL !!

I think I spend more time looking at the car in front of the car I'm behind then the car in front of me .. and boy do I hate cars that I can't see around ( cargo vans with no windows some SUV's or anything with super dark tint and too wide to see around)

[Gman]

Was behind a car last week that had only 1 side out of the 3 brake lights that worked...and they loved to tap the brake pedal. It looked more like they were signalling than slowing.

I like DRLs. There are enough people not paying attention. They're busy doing something else, they just happen to be driving.

TPMS hasn't bothered me and has been more helpful than a hindrance, particularly on my current sedan with low profile tires. When I get my tires replaced, I have the TPMS sensors serviced at the same time.