Posted by Alex J [173.245.54.16] on Wednesday, October 31, 2018 at 15:42:49 :
In Reply to: Re: Under-truck Driveline video - Carryall with Allison 1000 posted by Kevin in Ohio [172.68.65.189] on Wednesday, October 31, 2018 at 13:13:26 :
Yes, I LOVE driving this thing! Once I get the noise squared away I'll be driving it as often as possible. It rides REALLY nice, steers very well and responsive, and the brakes are great! I need to back off my rear proportioning a little more yet because it still likes to howl the rears during a hard brake and downshift. The Allison gets too excited to help during an emergency stop so between the engine braking and rear 3/4 ton Chevy disc calipers, it locks those 38.5" radials like nothing to it. I have a proportioning valve that I am slowly adjusting to find the sweet spot. The hydroboost is quite the amazing animal. Perfect pedal feel for the size of the truck and I am beyond proud of myself with the results of all these systems and their performance. The hours of math, daydreaming and delicate execution have paid off for sure! My face hurts from smiling after driving it around! I have only gotten a handful of waves actually; people around here don't seem to get excited about stuff like this in the way they do in other parts of the country, not really sure what the deal is. I honestly think so many people in the "city" are distracted and don't even notice it. And when they do...see next paragraph.
The one thing that has bothered me the most though, is in regards to people turning out in front of me. I visually watch them view the truck until it comes into a near field of view, much too close to safely or politely turn out in front of it, and then they make a hurried face, pulse the brakes and then decide to go anyways. I can literally read in their expressions as they think "Hey, look at that old truck!... Wait... old truck... Old trucks are slow... I don't want to get stuck behind that old truck that is most certainly going to be going slow... But look, Its gotten closer, ohh no... its too late now... but I bet I can make it.. no, no I can't... Yes, no, yes, no... OHHHH GO GO GO!" And they pull out RIGHT in front of me, hence why I know how good the brakes are... BUT THE WORST YET is...their next thought and action of
"Ohh wait. Its an old truck, why am I in a hurry, I'm just gonna ride along the speed that my subconscious thinks he would be going and I'll now take this opportunity to stare in my mirror to try and figure out what that thing is, meanwhile not paying attention to anything in front of me and I'll end be nearly rear ending another vehicle that is performing a similar manuever in front of both of us because we ARE NOW GOING SLOW LIKE AN OLD TRUCK WOULD!".
That... that is driving me crazy. The blatant disregard for the unknown stopping ability of the vehicle and assumption that its old and slow. I know this is the fact, because I literally followed a person into a parking lot that did this to me, and when I parked, they circled around and said "Thats a cool truck!" and my response was.. "Then why the F*C% did you pull out in front of me and make me lock up the brakes??!?!" and his response was "Because its old and you were going super slow." I just shook my head at him and asked him to "next time, don't assume anything and don't pull out in front of something old, or big... not everybody has the same brakes as your Ford Explorer."
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