Legal or Reckless Filtering???

Originally Posted by arenalife

I usually initiate a moving filter when traffic speed drops to 20mph or so and come out of it when it gets back to 40 - 50mph

+1, though I'm not patient enough to wait for it to drop to 20, perhaps 35, but if the speed increases to 45 I'll drop back in behind a car and bide my time. As said, if your on the move at 40-45 be happy and sit still, in reality the traffic is not holding you up all that much.

People seem to be mooting 10mph as a differencial speed, which I'd agree with if traffic is standing still or slow (which I guess it is in England a lot of the time), but if it's moving at 20 mph I sometimes increase that to 15 mph and ride at 35, or if weaving rather than filtering in more spread out traffic (we have that in Scotland!), I'll take it up to 40.

I do weave, i.e, if I have a 20 seconds of having a lane to myself, I'll occupy it, then move back to the white line when I need to, I just feel safer and less likely to get sideswiped for those 20 seconds.

In Scotland we only have one stretch 3 lane motorway, and thats the M74 through Dumfries and Galloway which is probably one of the quietest motorways in the UK and doesn't suffer traffic. So we only have one choice and thats filter down the middle between lanes 1 and 2.

Originally Posted by arenalife

I usually initiate a moving filter when traffic speed drops to 20mph or so and come out of it when it gets back to 40 - 50mph

+2 or there abouts. Depends on lane width etc etc. I agree though moving through traffic is worth it just because it stoppes me getting annoyed with the traffic.

I have been in a 50 mile que on the M5 one on the way down to Cornwall. That took a while to get through. Mostly standing to 10 MPH too. I actually felt sorry for those at the back on the que

I have a little rule about filtering to stop me being silly.

Traffic moving less than 30mph I will filter no more than 10mph faster than the traffic.

If traffic is stationary I will filter at no more than 25-30mph. Even that is too fast really, as I found out last September when I was knocked off while filtering.

People filter past me while I'm on the M3 and I'm happily doing 70mph. I see this rider who seems to love weaving in and out and undertaking at about 90mph on the M3. It's only a matter of time mate.

hooligan dan??

shouldn;t that be Nancy Boy Dan?

lol - just horsin mate, i agree with ya 100%. you have to balance the often negligable benefit you gain from filtering with the potentially horific consequences.

Originally Posted by the_lone_wolf

If you averaged 45mph and the traffic averaged 40mph, 25 miles later you would arrive 4.5 minutes ahead of where you'd be if you'd sat in the queue...

meanwhile you'd have spent over half an hour trying to pick your way through traffic doing 40mph, a speed at which i doubt many would be expecting a motorcycle to come between them and the lane next door, and your chances of getting side-swiped would be about as high as they get

illegal or not, i probably wouldn't think the reward justified the risk...

Your maths is off there ... at an average of 45mph, you would complete 25 miles in 30 mins 20 seconds (4 mins 10 sec before the 40mph person), where did this filtering for an 'hour' come from !?! If you traveled for an hour you would have covered 45miles. That is 5 miles more than the 40mph person. At 40mph it will take them 7 min 30 sec to do those 5 miles ... so 1hr 7.5 mins total for the 40mph dude.

Anyhoo ... if you are going to filter, you are unlikely to bother if it only gives you +5mph ...

I ONLY filter if at >10mph differential, else as you were alluding to, what is the point?!?!

So to conclude, logically, filter at high differential or not at all!!

To be honest, unless I am totally chilled, I filter if the traffic is doing less than the legal limit for that road ...

Originally Posted by Blue_SV650S

Your maths is off there ... at an average of 45mph, you would complete 25 miles in 30 mins 20 seconds (4 mins 10 sec before the 40mph person), where did this filtering for an 'hour' come from !?! If you traveled for an hour you would have covered 45miles. That is 5 miles more than the 40mph person. At 40mph it will take them 7 min 30 sec to do those 5 miles ...

Anyhoo ... if you are going to filter, you are unlikely to bother if it only gives you +5mph ...

I ONLY filter if at >10mph differential, else as you were alluding to, what is the point?!?!

So to conclude, logically, filter at high differential or not at all!!

To be honest, unless I am totally chilled I filter if the traffic is doing less than the legal limit for that road ...

You a bit bored today or something?

Originally Posted by -Ralph-

You a bit bored today or something?

Just a stickler for detail/fact at times ... like the fact on a re-read you indeed actually said over HALF an hour .. not an hour as I read it first time (hence my 'where did you get the hour from' and the hour based calculations bit!)

Although I have noticed the error now and could correct my original post wrt the hour comment/calculation part, for comedy factor, I'll leave it in!!

Originally Posted by Blue_SV650S

Just a stickler for detail/fact at times ... like the fact on a re-read you indeed actually said over HALF an hour .. not an hour as I read it first time (hence my 'where did you get the hour from' and the hour based calculations bit!)

Although I have noticed the error now and could correct my original post wrt the hour comment/calculation part, for comedy factor, I'll leave it in!!

You really should become a maths teacher

Maybe not - mine, Piggy Deeprose, didn't have sense of humour...

Originally Posted by New Leaf

hooligan dan??

shouldn;t that be Nancy Boy Dan?

Only on Friday nights.....

[the_lone_wolf]

Originally Posted by Blue_SV650S

Your maths is off there ... at an average of 45mph, you would complete 25 miles in 30 mins 20 seconds (4 mins 10 sec before the 40mph person), where did this filtering for an 'hour' come from !?! If you traveled for an hour you would have covered 45miles. That is 5 miles more than the 40mph person. At 40mph it will take them 7 min 30 sec to do those 5 miles ... so 1hr 7.5 mins total for the 40mph dude.

lol, wut?



speed = distance / time

therefore time = distance / speed

the distance is 25 miles as quoted in the original post:

I had to do a 25 mile filter on the M1 yesterday...

@40 mph you will cover it in 25miles/40mph = 0.625hours

@45 mph you will cover it in 25miles/45mph = 0.55hours (yes i know technically 0.555 recouring but as near as dammit)

therefore the difference in time between runs at 40 and 45 mph is 0.075 hours (0.075 = 0.625-0.55)

0.075 * 60 = 4.5 minutes

QED