Are transport trucks hard to see from the drivers seat of the average car?

No.

That ain’t it Squeek. It’s exactly what you think it is.

So they are easy to see?
Then why do people pull out like they didn’t see me?

Well, if you have a really big blind spot….

I think the reason people don’t see you is because of a lack of intelligence rather than a lack of vision.

Not if you have your mirrors adjusted properly.

@SQUEEKY2 They don’t see you? Keep in mind that 25% of all drivers on the road are impaired by drugs, alcohol, or other.

In the last month I’ve had a transport truck pull into oncoming traffic directly in front of me after misjudging a right turn and another stop traffic across a 4 lane road when he ran his trailer into a concrete pole, stopped, and got out with the rig still across all 4 lanes.

Stuff happens.

I’d guess it’s more likely that an average driver doesn’t understand that your stopping distances are much longer than theirs while your control and visibility are much less. It’s been years since they’ve sat in a big truck.

@funkdaddy don’t get me wrong there are some very bad transport drivers as well, and as for those drivers they have probably never sat in a big truck.
We had a driver use one of those emergency cross over lanes on the freeway once, you know the ones cops and ambulance use he did this with a 2 trailer rig, brought traffic to a stop, when the boss found out he gave him a week off for it.

I worked for a trucking insurer for many years. People have the stupidest excuses for why they cut off transports.

My favourite (not) was one that came up many times. Well, they’re big, they must have really big brakes.

People are effing stupid.

My dad taught me about trucks ’ blind spots 40+ years ago , before I really drove. It’s important to understand that. I like the signs on trucks that say ’‘if you can’t see my mirrors’, I can’t see you’’. Those seem to help some people.

When I started at the trucking insurer they still ran a trucking school. We all went out for a day at the school as part of our company orientation. It was a useful experience to spend a couple of hours in a transport – see the idiocies the drivers are regularly faced with.

Then again, I’also had reason to call some of our insureds’ safety departments and report some of the safety hazards I witnessed.

They want to be in front of you because trucks are slow to get going and have a lower legal speed? Not that I would but that’s the reason I would cut out in front of a truck

In my personal experience the problem is with truck drivers not seeing the little cars they tower over. Trucks have huge blind spots in the areas immediately around them.

Apparently the Autopilot on the Tesla could not see the white truck in front of it. The vision system confused the turning truck with the sky. The first autopilot fatality.

Sometimes, yes. I can think of two times when 18-wheelers are difficult to see:

1) In or after a rain, where the tires of the truck are putting out so much spray (and they don’t have the rubber tire guards behind the tires) that my windshield is so full of spray that I can’t see more than a couple of feet in front of me. This is usually when I have slowed down in the rain but the truck driver has not – he’s at high speed and barrelling through.

2) When a trucker is tailgating me or another trucker. You know he’s there but he’s so close that I can’t see the size or dimensions of the truck.

Hard to see? In my experience no.

All of my cars have excellent outward visibility (measured in degrees, the higher the number the better. Bear in mind that they are older designs (‘93, and two ‘96s) The greenhouses in all have thin roof pillars and expansive stretches of glass.

Also, when my car’s interiors were designed the hip point (The place good designers start when configuring a car’s cockpit was carefully considered). Proper hip point location influences visibility, driver comfort and stability and lowers the car’s center of mass. I’ve driven many cars in my line of work and it’s obvious many manufacturers aren’t giving this crucial point much consideration, at least not lately.

With a correct seating position and properly adjusted mirrors I get very good visibility without the need to lean forward and with a minimum of head turning. http://www.caranddriver.com/features/how-to-adjust-your-mirrors-to-avoid-blind-spots

US Federal regulations for newer cars is chipping away at this advantage. Roof pillars have become annoyingly thick in order to house airbags, and more recently because of a new regulation that requires that a car’s roof be able to support the weight of a car in the case of a rollover. (Nobody seems to care that this raises a car’s center of mass and compromises performance in the worst possible way).

The upshot of all this? The Fed has given up on the notion of active safety and is gradually turning cars into rolling vaults for accident prone, email reading, reflex challenged idiot commuters.

Drive well designed hardware, employ good seating and mirror adjustments, put down that latte and good luck.

I expect part of it is just lack of awareness, and another part is lack of understanding of what big trucks are like to drive.

Big trucks tend to be fairly responsibly driven and seem relatively predictable in most cases, and many drivers have no idea what the limits are for truck braking or visibility, or what can happen when trucks need to brake or swerve or when they lose control.

Some drivers seem to relate to a highway like most cars are relatively stationary obstacles, and to try to drive around/through them assuming they aren’t going to change their behavior much.

So I think trucks occur to some people as just large obstacles that aren’t likely to seem to do much, and don’t realize that there’s much risk with them.

Also just in general, I think people who haven’t recently been involved in an accident or scary situation tend to assume that driving is safe, and disengage their awareness and aren’t thinking much about safety, or are thinking about it in limited ways.

Even with how bad many human drivers are, as someone who has designed and programmed AI’s, I think it’s insane that people are positive about adding auto-pilots and robot cars.

Hey @BellaB , I had a lady think she didn’t have to dim her headlights for transports because we are high up and it shouldn’t bother us.
Another person asked me why do big truck go so slow up hills it’s quite annoying.
I have had a lot of people do an unsafe illegal pass just to get in front of me,only to slow down and drive 10 to 15kph slower than I was traveling why do they do that????
As a trucker for the last 25years I expect everyone in front of me to do something stupid, and you know the sad part they haven’t let me down yet.
We all make mistakes on driving from time to time and the thing that sets out a good driver from a fucking moron is a good driver learns from their mistake and doesn’t do it again morons just keep doing them over and over and over.

^^ “Lack of awareness.”

Oh yes indeed.

Anyone that can’t tell just by looking at one that a semitruck is a challenging vehicle to pilot involving significantly greater mass and requiring greater input to control should be required to take the bus.

All truck drivers are, at lest technically, professionals and almost all that I’ve encountered have driven like one.

Of all the operators I have driven around, those behind the wheel of a semi are the ones I trust most.

@SQUEEKY2 What kind of routes do you do?

Too many people on the road have no idea about the common sense things that come with a truck that size. They just assume that you can accelerate, maneuver, brake and even park as easily as they do in their VW rabbit. If you think people are idiots, nothing will validate that belief like driving for a living. There’s a restaurant I visit that’s a hangout for drivers from of a major towing outfit. Lunch there is always a session on horrors and stupidities on the road.

@SecondHandStoke I am what we call a line hauler, a set run and home every day but long days.

Sometimes I think every student driver should have to spend at least two hours in a transport before they get licensed, just to see what it’s like up there.

The most useful thing at transport school was in the lot when they parked a car next to the transport in a position no one could see when they were in the driver’s seat. mmmmm yeah, those cars just aren’t visible.

Convex mirrors over the years have helped a great deal with blind spots but they are still there.
What gets me is car drivers that will travel right beside you,right at your drive tires for miles and miles,like they find the hum relaxing or something.

@SQUEEKY2 – suppose that’s the case. Does the truck driver have any obligation to ease the dangerous situation? Or does the truck driver do nothing, and blame the smaller vehicle?

@elbanditoroso how would the trucker ease that sort of situation?
As long as we are doing the posted speed limit, are we supposed to slow down and hope the idiot then gets in front?
I think when going for your car license there should be a bit on how to deal with transport trucks, example the weight and length, they need more room to stop and turn then your average car.

@SQUEEKY2 – yes, if you are in an unsafe situation, then you SHOULD slow down. You’re bigger.

Let’s assume that the car driver is driving legally as well. Why should the smaller vehicle have to give way to the bigger one with professionally trained driver? Seems like you have some responsibility as well.

@Stinley If you pass a truck and have to suddenly cut in, suddenly, presumably due to an oncoming car , then you didn’t leave yourself enough room to pass safely.

@Luckyguy The solution to that seem pretty simple. Start installing electronic identifying beacons in the new cars, and make them available for purchase on old cars.

@elbanditoroso people who do shit like that are utterly mindless. The don’t think, period. If he’s along side of you then at one time he was going faster than you, but then backed off to match your speed because he needs someone else to tell him how fast to go. I promise that if @SQUEEKY2 slowed down, the guy would slow down too. If he ever finally realized how much slower he was going, he’d then jet out, move over, and plant himself in front of the truck, probably going really slow.
And then when Squeeky went to pass him, he’d speed up to match his speed again and stay right beside him, just on the right side this time.

I mess with people who do that to me. I’ll run them up to 90 then watch them freak out when they realize it. Squeeky can’t do that, though.

Totally right there @Dutchess_III ,it amazes me how car drivers will do an unsafe pass to get in front of me then just to slow down and go slower than I was traveling, another thing is when I do follow these morons for awhile and they catch up with a car going slower than them,they seem to be in no rush to pass that car driver, why the panic to get in front of the big truck but none to pass another car driver?

@Dutchess_III I was answering the “pull out” of a junction bit. I must have ignored the “cut me off” bit as I was not exactly sure what that means. I thought they both meant the same thing. Your explanation of overtaking and coming back in front too soon is helpful.

I rarely overtake unless there are two lanes on my side, so don’t have much experience of this. I would have thought that if you are going fast enough to overtake, then coming back in front of a vehicle shouldn’t be a problem because of the relative speeds. What’s happening to cause a problem? Do people slow down dramatically?

Some people do. Some people are just idiots, really. If they try to pass when there isn’t really enough time, then suddenly they’re looking at an on coming car in their lane, and then they have to smash back into the right lane as soon as possible.

We saw a wreck a couple of weeks ago where a lady had cut a semi off and whacked into his left front fender when she cut back in too soon. And this was on a 4 lane. IDK. Maybe there was another truck flying up her butt and she felt she needed to get back immediately.

As far as pulling out in front of a semi..I see your point. If I had enough time and knew I could accelerate fast enough (ie: pedal to the metal) that it wouldn’t really cause a problem if I pulled out a little earlier than I normally would, yeah. I might do that.

Another pet peeve is people who don’t leave a nice, huge gap between yourself and the car in front of you you, like 200 feet. Too many people seem to think they need to be up in the middle of the pack which scares the hell out of me. A person tries to pass, suddenly needs to get back in, but there is no damn room between the cars to do it.
I came around a wide curve once, into what would have been a head on with another car because he was passing a line of about 6 cars, not a one of them had much more than a car length between them. I saw his face, I saw him desperate trying move back in but he couldn’t.
I whipped over to the shoulder and the whole mess swept past me. I had 3 kids with me.
He shouldn’t have tried to pass. But I blame the drivers of the other cars just as much. The contributed to an already dangerous situation.

Another is passing on a two lane when they only have a couple of minutes to their destination. Geez. Just fall back and chill for a second.