Rule of thumb for the stopping distance

instagram viewer

The stopping distance becomes relevant when driving a car. It indicates the distance you need to brake your car from driving a certain speed to a standstill. Of course, you can come up with a complicated formula that includes properties such as the strength of the brakes, friction and speed of reaction. However, you can also use a rule of thumb that approximately describes the stopping distance.

Driving too fast is associated with many dangers.
Driving too fast is associated with many dangers.

What you need:

  • speed
  • Reaction path
  • Braking distance

The stopping distance - what is it?

The stopping distance is made up of the reaction distance and the braking distance. The reaction path is the path your car takes, from the moment an obstacle is detected to the time it reacts. The braking distance is the distance that you have covered from the start of emergency braking to complete standstill.

  • The important thing: The braking distance increases quadratically, that is, a doubling of the speed leads to a quadrupling of the braking distance!
  • This can mean a difference between life and death, especially when driving through a residential area.
  • If you drive about 50 km / h instead of the prescribed 30, you will probably no longer be able to brake in time for a child running onto the street. The consequences are fatal, as a driver you are of course fully to blame and your conscience is likely to plague you for the rest of your life.
  • You should therefore memorize the rule of thumb for the stopping distance.
    • Understanding the rules of thumb for driving licenses - it's that easy

    At first glance, young people are frightened when they take a driving license course with ...

The rule of thumb for calculating the stopping distance

  • The stopping distance is made up of the reaction distance and the braking distance. The following therefore applies: stopping distance = reaction distance + braking distance.
  • You can easily remember the formula when you go through the individual steps in the event of an accident. First, for example, a ball falls on the road and the child runs after it. As a driver, you see this and react by applying emergency braking.
  • The rule of thumb for the reaction path is reaction path = (speed / 10) * 3
  • The rule of thumb for the braking distance is braking distance = (speed / 10)2.
  • So you can see that the term speed / 10 appears in both formulas. You can remember this via a simple donkey bridge. Either you define a separate variable for this term or you come up with a story that you can use to infer the term over and over again.
  • When defining the variable a = speed / 10, you can summarize for the stopping distance: stopping distance = 3a + a2. At a speed of 50 km / h the stopping distance = 15 + 25 = 40 meters. At a speed of 30 km / h, however, the result is only: 9 + 9 = 18 meters.

As you can see, you can easily remember the rule of thumb. Alternatively, try a donkey bridge with one story to use for the term speed / 10.

How helpful do you find this article?

click fraud protection