My Anti-Tailgating device works :)

The BBQ Pit
1

I pit tailgaters, if i didn’t respect my car so much, i’d slam on the brakes, tailgaters are friggin’ annoying and should be beaten with a tire iron

tonight on the drive home, i had some moron in a Toyota tailgating me on the off-ramp to Exit 6 off I-89 (the world’s longest off ramp, it’s about 5 miles long), tailgaiting me so closely i couldn’t see his headlights

tapping the brakes didn’t get him to back off, neither did brake-checking, the guy was a fucking hemmorhoid, so i stepped up to the next level…

i grabbed my 400,000 candlepower spotlight, and shone it out the passenger side window, moving it around, slowly turning the light towards the back of my car, then shut it down, as the lamp dimmed, i turned it back towards the rear decklid, so the idiot could see the filament cooling…

as soon as he saw the spotlight, he backed right off, easily dropping back 3-5 car lengths, and stayed back until i left the off ramp and pulled onto the main road into town

all i needed to do was give him a “warning shot” out the side window and the moron backed off, i guess he realized i could have easily blinded him with a quick flash of the light, and he didn’t want to take chances

even if i was to shine it out the rear window, it would be for no more than 2 seconds, just enough to startle him, not long enough to blind for an extended time

and before anyone asks, there was nobody else on the road, no one coming towards me, no one following the asshole who was tailgating me, if there was anyone else on the road, i wouldn’t have used the spotlight

and just in case the asshole tried anything funny, i was prepared to defend myself…

luckilly, my little “warning shot” defused the situation nicely

now, to develop an anti-tailgating system that works during the day as well…

mount a cup behind each rear wheel well and fill it with large gravel, marbles, or ball bearings, have a release switch in the drivers area, when you hit the switch, it releases the payload, hopefully damaging their headlights, paint, and in best case scenario, the windshield

fill the cups with flour for instant “smokescreen”, or nails to flatten their tires

find some way of using expired, soggy paintballs to splatter on the windshield

for vehicles with a rear window wiper/washer, find some way to have the washer fluid spray on the tailgater’s windshield

find some way to create an EMP to fry the tailgater’s cars electronics

there’s got to be something that can get these morons to back off…

2

Doesn’t gradually slowing down work?
I always tell myself I will do this if it happens to me, whenever the issue comes up.

Drive at a normal speed, until it becomes obvious someone is up your arse, then just gradually slow down until they get the message. If the message is not got even when completely stopped, deliver the message using the gift of a fork in the eye :smiley:

3

MacTech, I like the way you think! :smiley:

What I’d love to have for nighttime tailgaters, especially the ones that flash their high beams when you refuse to get out of their way: A rear-window mirror. One that would lie flat, out of the way, until one button press sends it springing up to reflect the cretin’s headlights back in his or her face. Bwa-hahahahahahaha!!!

4

One of those LED marquee things, mounted in the back glass. It’d be great for so many other things, but you could have a preset message or four for those tailgating assholes. Example: “WOULD YOU LIKE TO SIT UP FRONT WITH ME?”

5

I do that as well, i figure if the tailgater is pissing me off by tailgating, i might as well piss them off as well, make them take longer to get to their destination, i’m in no hurry…

if they tried to get violent, try to run me off the road, good luck, my car is very nimble and i spend time in empty parking lots honing my emergency maneuvers, i know what my car is capable of doing, and more importantly what it’s not capable of doing, i can easily outmaneuver them

perfect example, a few months ago, while i was driving home from work, an idiot was tailgating me on a narrow, 2 lane road (route 100B in central Vermont), i was happily driving the speed limit (this road is heavily patrolled and has lots of areas for the Donut Patrol to hide, i tapped the brakes, asking him to please back off, he ignored me 3 or 4 times, finally he went to pass me, as he came alongside my car…

a deer crossed the road…

we both slammed on our brakes, the deer crossed, the asshole then shot in front of me, pulled back into my lane…

and SLAMMED ON HIS BRAKES…

i quite calmly flicked the steering wheel to the left, then the right, zipped around him and continued on uninterrupted…

until he began tailgating again, i decided to cut my losses, pulled over, let the asshole pass, noted his plate number (while i was giving him the middle finger salute) and proceeded to call the state police and report a reckless driver, i can only hope that he was pulled over and lost his licence

he can count himself lucky i didn’t have my .357 in the car with me, i wouldn’t have used it against him offensively, but if he decided to get out of the car and become physically threatening, i’d have no problem defending myself

(gotta love the fact that Vermont doesn’t require a permit to carry a concealed firearm, and on top of that, Vt has one of the lowest crime rates in the nation, imagine that… :wink: )

6

hmm, what about that “one way mirror” window tint, that stuff would work, right?

<evil grin>

7

Yes, but only if you have a vertical rear window, like with trucks and such (in which case, you have little to fear from brights, as they won’t be high enough, except in special cases, to blind you). If you have a car, with a sloped rear window, the brights will just be reflected upward. Sorry.

8

Is it possible this guy might have thought you were a cop? That may be why he so eagerly started to behave.

With regard to your other solutions, I’ve often thought of doing the same things. The trouble is though, what about all the other drivers whose cars get the same remedy as the offender? Nails, marbles or ball-bearings on innocent cars would make me a bigger asshole than the one I’m trying to punish.

(Personally, I would love to see some sort of device that would shoot a projectile into the offender’s radiator. He doesn’t see it happen, no innocent party is damaged, and he slowly comes to a major-league halt.) :smiley:

9

Or, failing that, what EddyTeddyFreddy said! :wink:

10

possible, i was thinking the spotlight may have looked like the beam from a police cruiser, however it was coming from the right of the car, and how many police cruisers are bare-bones '02 Dodge Neons? :wink:

11

I don’t remember where I read this…it may well have been on these forums, some time ago. But I do remember reading about an engineer who rigged up a button in his car that turned the reverse lights on even when the car was moving forward. I loved the idea but couldn’t help thinking how many people would overreact and swerve when the car they were tailgating suddenly seemed to go into reverse.

12

and that would be a bad thing?, heck i’d like to mount a set of off-road driving lights with “Illegal Skyburner” bulbs in them on the rear bumper, aimed right at “tailgater level”, or maybe find a way to make a mounting rig and firing system for my paintball marker, pop trunklid, paint tailgater’s windshield…

geez it’s late, [Tor Johnson]Time for go to bed![/Tor] :wink:

13

I believe it was Dave Barry who wrote about the ultimate tailgating solution. Some of the locals installed a cannon in the back of a hatchback and wired up the trunk/hatch to pop open. When they were tailgated, they’d push a button, the hatch would open, and the tailgater would find themselves staring down the barrel of a cannon. I believe these pranksters had even bought some fuses and would light them…

14

I’d be happy with a toy gun type thing that stuck a suction cup arrow on the offender’s windshield. Complete with a little message flag.

Or maybe I just watched too many Bugs Bunny cartoons.

15

Tentacle Monster, may I just say that great minds think alike. I’ve had that very same idea for a few years now. Right down to the preset messages. A few buttons readily available on the dash,

“Hey, I’d best give that arsehole a no.4…”

I’d also use it for more benign purposes like flashing “Thanks for letting me in!” messages.

Seriously though, to the OP, stuff like that is tempting, but these days it’s a good way to get yourself shot. Be careful doing that sort of stuff. It’s not worth it.

16

Not as often as you’d think (for me anyway). I usually slow down to about 10-15 mph for about a quarter mile or so if tapping the brakes has no effect. This doesn’t often work for me. They just continue to tailgate when I speed back up. I made the mistake of coming to a stop once and the guy actually hit me, backed up, and then took off around me. And wouldn’t you know it…he had no rear plate. No way I could catch him in the car I was driving.

There have been a couple of times where the guy would get around me, slam on the brakes, and then get out of his car and come after me. Now I keep a big iron bar in the car (for, you know, checking the tires…yeah) but it’s really mostly for show…I don’t want to have to use the thing. Just showing it usually works but these days you can never tell just how dangerous that guy might be (or how big a gun he’s got) so I just look for the nearest place to get out of the way.

I hate tailgaters.

17

God forbid you should just let the assh*le pass you instead of escalating the situation.

(Yeah yeah, I know, it’s impossible to let somebody pass you on that exit ramp – if somebody’s car breaks down, the ramp is always shut down for a couple hours. And if you immediately pull over witout escalating the situation, the tailgater might take that as an invitation to fight you. And now that you think about it, you were going slow enough that he could have passed you if he wanted to so he was obviously looking for trouble. Whatever.)

18

Actually, many, many years ago, I learned something. Nobody tailgates you when you’re carrying a cannon! :smiley: My boyfriend had bought a 7/8ths scale replica of a civil war cannon, and we were carrying it home in the back of a friend’s pick up truck. Not only did no one tailgate us, we made the day of a ten-year old boy when we pulled up along side him and his father at a stoplight.

CJ

19

I definately like the way you think. I actually leave for work on time and drive at a safe speed, so I’m tailgated ALL THE TIME. I used to pull over and let people pass, but fuck it- I’m driving the legal limit (over by a bit, but I’ll be damned if I’ll do 60 in a 45 because some jackass behind me is late). They can pass illegally or just fucking wait for an opening and pass. I HATE tailgaters.

20

Fumbliong about with a spotlight (and attempting to aim it to hit or nearly miss a target to your rear) while in charge of a moving vehicle could be quite dangerous in itself, possibly creating more of a risk than the tailgater.

Most tailgaters are assholes and I prefer to let them pass so they can go ahead and find a ditch to swerve into, rather than presenting a risk to me by keeping them behind; wherever possible, slow down and let them pass at a suitable place, for that sake of your own safety. Not terribly satisfying in terms of immediate retribution, I’ll admit, but staying alive is a higher priority in my book.