A study that was done for the insurance industry about ABS has a different purpose than one done for the general public. When the study is done for the industry, it is to help the industry figure out whether to give higher or lower premiums for cars with ABS. Because the study found that the negative efffects (more likely to get rear-ended) balance out the positive effects (less likely to rear-end someone else) there was no effect on insurance premiums for ABS.

BUT...

As a consumer, I would far rather be in an accident where I am not at fault than one in which I am. The effect on *my* premiums, after the hypothetical accident, would be much better. So disregarding what a study for insurance companies says, I'll take the ABS. I wasn't specifically looking for ABS when I checked out the tC, but I was glad it had it. So far, I still am.

 

^^^^^^^
well said, i could not agree with you more

 

Completely?
They do something called quantitative research. They look at real world statistics (in which real world factors are considered), compute the number of accidents without ABS involved and then they look at accidents with ABS involved. This is standard research practice: they take a control group (without ABS) and a test group (with ABS). They then compare numbers to the total population of ABS cars and non-ABS cars and find the proportional numbers that allows them to make direct comparisons. This is standard procedure in sociological quantitative research, they don't need to mention this because it's a given this is what they do.

Direct tests (with trained drivers and a closed track) are qualitative. They are not done in the real world, they measure discreet things. ie. stopping distance. The fact is these tests cannot not tell you how things will go in the real world because they don't consider enough factors. They need to consider all the factors to know what is actually going on.

Like I said, it's to create a control group. Basic scientific method.

Their study is too many variables to explain why things happen, true. Which is why when they try to explain why, they can only speculate. But research such as this is meant not to explain but to prove whether something happens or not. In this case, the question is if cars with ABS are less prone to accidents than non-ABS equipped cars. (and their answer is most probably no, which we already knew.)

Like I said, qualitative research does not find trends. It tries to find why the trends are the way they are. This is where you strip out the factors, test them, and see if they are the reason for why things happen.

You cannot ignore surveys just because you don't like their findings. You can after you examine them and find faults. You haven't found faults, you just don't understand the method.

You misinterpreted.

And besides totally ignoring the word "run" and that the word "off" is used as a preposition, you seriously think off-road incidents are numerous enough to offset on-road incidents? Afterall, your interpretation of the federal study makes it sound like as many people drive off-road as they do on. Remember the federal study said the overall benefits are balanced by the overall drawbacks.

If you slam on your brakes, you're likely to instead of hitting someone in front of you, someone hits your rear. The logic is simple: if you come to a more sudden stop (thanks to ABS), the higher risk you have of someone hitting your rear because their reaction time is diminished.

Which the Insurance Institute did cite. Two (federal studies and GM's studies) of them, and they conclusions correlate with their own findings. Also, you cannot selectively discount the drawbacks as if they couldn't possibly happen if so and so happens. You need to prove that first with more detailed study, which you haven't provided yet.

 

But still...
The goal of research like this is to find an answer to one simple question. And like I said, that one question here was whether cars with ABS were less prone to accidents than those without. Just because they work for insurance companies doesn't mean it has no relevance to anyone outside the industry.

Also, federal studies for the most part agree with insurance institute studies.

On a side note, some insurance companies do give out ABS discounts. Not mine however.

It's all about how an insurance company determines fault. Rear-ends are not always the fault of the guy behind. But it's much harder to determine the guy up front was at fault, I'll give you that.

 

1. "This is standard research practice: they take a control group (without ABS) and a test group (with ABS). They then compare numbers to the total population of ABS cars and non-ABS cars and find the proportional numbers that allows them to make direct comparisons."

Their group without ABS is not a control group, because they cannot identically re create the senario for the cars with ABS to compare them equally. Like i said earlier, there are way too many variables to account for such as the reflexes of the person driving, hand eye coordination, road conditions, visibility, etc.
Basically this test cant say it has a control. If this was a true study with a control group, a senario could be set up with the specifications set out so that identical results could be achieved.

2. They need to consider all the factors to know what is actually going on.

What other factors are you refering to. The website that i posted in one of my previous links had results of non ABS and ABS cars that had braking distances measured with the exact same driver on the exact same roads. I dont know what other factors you are refering to.

3. Like I said, it's to create a control group. Basic scientific method

Yes, a real study has a control group, but you cant compare the stopping distance of a non ABS car on pavement, with that of an ABS car on snow. I dont see any control group in this experiment.

4. Like you said, "Their study is too many variables to explain why things happen, true. Which is why when they try to explain why, they can only speculate."

A true study does not speculate. It weeds out the variables, and compares one to one. It lays down the facts, and interprets them.

5. "But research such as this is meant not to explain but to prove whether something happens or not"

Tell me this, if you are able to prove whether something happens or not, shouldn't you be able to explain it.

6. You cannot ignore surveys just because you don't like their findings.

I'm not ignoring the survey because i dont like their findings, i ignore it because i dont believe that their research methods are sound.

7. You misinterpreted.
And besides totally ignoring the word "run" and that the word "off" is used as a preposition

Buddy, if my interpretation of this is wrong, then i have no idea what this means at all. If you could explain this then i would really appreciate it.

8. In one of your earlier posts you say "Yet, we drive our cars in the real world, not on tracks, and in the real world we shift fender damage from the front to back. The extra ABS stopping power doesn't amount to much."

Yet on your earlier post you say "...you're likely to instead of hitting someone in front of you, someone hits your rear. The logic is simple: if you come to a more sudden stop (thanks to ABS), ..."

I dont get it. First you say that the extra ABS power doesn't ammount to much, then you say that because of ABS you can come to a more sudden stop, which is what i have been saying all along. If ABS power doesn't ammount to so much, then why would all of these people be rear ending us more often.

9. You need to prove that first with more detailed study, which you haven't provided yet.

http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/vrtc/ca...T4FinalRpt.pdf

If this 67 page study isn't detailed enough for you, then i dont know what you consider a detailed study to be.

Lastly, can you show me the full study that you claim your data from. I would like to look over their testing proceedures, results and final conclusions with my own eyes.

 

This is where principles of probability come to play. Now you would have a point if they took a small sample of data. However, they didn't. With a sufficiently large sample size, the probability of a certain factor being present in a test group will resemble the probability of that factor being present in the total population of the study. Principles of probability dictate that as the sample size get larger for each group, the percentages of where a certain factor was present become more and more similar between the groups. Ie, if 15% of all accidents involve ice of some sort, then as the sample sizes grow larger you'll eventually find each group (control and test) will have something close to a 15% chance of ice as a factor. Most likely neither group will ever be exactly at that 15% figure, but that's where statistical tools like margin-of-error come into play.

Think of coin flips. Chances of getting one or the other side is 50/50. If you flip a coin three times, you're gonna have one side come up more than the other. The more often you flip the coin, the closer you'll get to a 50/50 split on heads and tails.

The exception would be if a certain factor was tied or connected to the test factor in some way, ie, if only SUVs were only the only type of cars that could have ABS. But such factors can be dealt with, ie you then would only compare SUVs.

You're thinking of qualitative research, ie experimentation. Qualitative is not the only valid research method available.

Here's one factor: howabout the presence of other cars? It's alot different to know that you're going to hard stop here at this point than say than to do so when a car stops in front of you and your begin to doubt you can survive the next minute. The latter situation, a real-life situation, is much more stressful.

Another factor: the proficiency of the drivers. Most drivers are not going to be well trained as those who conducted the test. The report you cited stated there was nothing wrong functionally with ABS systems. It works as designed.

I looked at the report, and it never tests the human factors. It speculates on it. It states people should train and practice using ABS. Well, you know what, that's a design flaw. ABS can work as designed but the design could be faulty to begin with. If people are not going to routinely practice hard braking and if that is a requirement for ABS effectiveness, then it's the fault of the design of ABS.

There are no experiments in quantitative research. You're hung up on qualitative research as the only possible scientific method of research. Quantitative or statistical research find general trends out in a large sample accounting for factors discovered and undiscovered, something experiments cannot hope to do.

Your study speculated out the wazoo on the human factor, and could not come up with an answer as to why other studies could come up with different conclusions. Yet I'm in no position to call it not a "true" study...it was a study that answered its own question satisfactorily and is to me as valid as the insurance institute studies.

A study that speculates on the central question it asks in the beginning is not an effective study, right. But the studies I quoted answered their central questions definitively. Big difference.

Newton could prove gravity exists but could not explain why or how it works. It took Einstein to explain how it works something like 400 years later. That is the nature of science. Existence and explanation are two distinct questions.

Because the objective is to avoid any collision, not to only avoid only frontal collisions. It doesn't amount to much cos your fenders are still bent. It made a difference, true, but it's not much of one.

And I thank you for bringing this up. My response to that survey in a nutshell is gonna be paraphrased from what I wrote above:

So they proved that ABS functionally works as designed. However, they didn't prove that people know how to use ABS right or that the driving population can eventually learn to use ABS to the point where it becomes effective and significantly drop accidents across the board. Like I said, they have a gaping huge hole in the study in that they neglect the human factor. If ABS is a tool and works as a tool, what good is it if people don't know how to use this tool?

Well, you will first need to understand what the purpose of those procedures are first. Next, go to the Insurance Institute FAQ and check the references. Since I'm going by the study summary on the FAQ and what I know about statistical research, I'm estimating their methods. But if you can access these studies off the Internet, godspeed. The studies I found that they referenced require a subscription.

 

wow, my ADD will not let me read this whole thread, lol.

 

Now you would have a point if they took a small sample of data. However, they
didn't. "

How do you know how many people were used? You said yourself that ..."Since I'm going by the study summary on the FAQ and what I know about statistical research, I'm estimating their methods." So you dont really know how many people they used, and i could have a point if they took a small sample as you said. ( We wont know unless we get the origional artice.)

"Here's one factor: howabout the presence of other cars?"

The presence of other cars does not effect ABS. ABS doesn't know if there are other cars there or not. It either works, or it doesn't.

"It's alot different to know that you're going to hard stop here at this point than say than to do so when a car stops in front of you and your begin to doubt you can survive the next minute. The latter situation, a real-life situation, is much more stressful. "

I understand your whole real world vs. track argument. But again, the point is that ABS doesn't know where it is, and it works the same everywhere.

"It states people should train and practice using ABS. Well, you know what, that's a design flaw. ABS can work as designed but the design could be faulty to begin with"

This is not a design flaw, in fact, when i went to driving school not only did they teach us about ABS and how it worked, but took us out in their empy driving lot, and had us engage it so that we knew what it felt like. Just because you dont know how to use something doesn't mean that it is the machines fault. My dad's favorite quote is, "It's the fool, not the tool."

"Your study speculated out the wazoo on the human factor"

The human factor has nothing to do with whether ABS works, it has to do with how efficiently it can be applied to a senario in the "real world".

"Newton could prove gravity exists but could not explain why or how it works. It took Einstein to explain how it works something like 400 years later."

Big difference, i dont think we can even compare these two. First of all, Newton didn't invent gravity (as ABS was invented), he discovered it. I think that a human should be able to explain something that he himself invented. Discovering something is completely different.

"Because the objective is to avoid any collision, not to only avoid only frontal collisions"

But the whole point of this discussion is whether or not ABs works. ABS can not help the person in back of you from slamming into you, but it can help you not hit the person in front of you.

"So they proved that ABS functionally works as designed. However, they didn't prove that people know how to use ABS right or that the driving population can eventually learn to use ABS"

Yet again, "It's the fool, not the tool." ABS works, just because people dont know how to use it doesn't mean that it doesn't or cant work. If people were to educate themselves on how to use an instrument, they would be much more profficient at using it. Example - I give my grandma a brand new computer, she doesn't know how to use it or even turn it on. Is it worthless just because she doesn't have the knowledge to use it? No! Same deal with ABS

Since I'm going by the study summary on the FAQ and what I know about statistical research, I'm estimating their methods.

So really you dont know what their methods were or what specifics were gathered. What you have is a summary from which to go by. I dont think you have enough information from your source to be able to form an opinion. Atleast i can not form one based on your source without seeing all of the facts. I have tried to find them on the internet, but as you said i need a subscription. I think the only way this can be decided is if one of us somehow gets a hold of those papers.

 

Something this study doesn't account for is how many accidents were avoided because the vehicles had ABS.

To me it's about knowing the limits of your vehicle. If you're driving a car without ABS, you should know the point you can push it to before the braking will cause the tires to lock. In an ABS-equipped car, it's about knowing how far you can push until the ABS will engage and "hinder" you. When you go past that point, then you fall into the ABS "safety net"...

It can't just be a weather issue alone, or it would seem like there would be a much larger outcry from the driving public in all the cold-weather regions and I don't get the sense that Detroit and Japan are shoving these expensive systems down our throats against the wishes of most people.

 

Ok, I am spending way too much time refuting your arguments because they are woefully uninformed. I would love to recap everything I learned in school but... actually I lied, that was sarcasm. Please take your issues to your nearest statistics class or social sciences research and method class because you're not just denying this study, you're basically denying all statistical research.

True, I'm assuming they're using standard statistical research models. And you know, that's the logical conclusion.

Wrong. Even your study you quoted noted that ABS effectiveness is tied to the driver. There are many reasons for failure, they only established it was not a mechanical failure.


Drivers don't work the same anywhere. A tool is only as effective as the person using it.

And what about the poor souls who don't go to class? Shouldn't the system be designed for them as well?

Well, I don't believe in something just because it rhymes. Certain tools are better than others, and one way to judge is usability--or the ability for any fool to use it.

You're kidding me. You understand ABS doesn't just work on it's own, it requires human input right?

This is incredible. Look, search the entire thread and find an instance where I said the word "invent," let alone "Newton invented gravity." You yourself said nothing about inventing anything, I don't know how you could think I could even imply that. Your leaps of logic so incredibly bad I don't know where to start.

No, my whole point of my discussion is to say it's not automatically stupid to criticize ABS. Again, read carefully.

 

Yes, it does not directly take that into account directly. However, there are ways to get around that. We're assuming the probability for ABS cars and non-ABS cars to encounter near-crash situations to be the same. If that is true, then we can compare the rate of accidents between ABS and non-ABS cars to determine if ABS makes a difference between the two groups.

 

ok i need to quit this thread. "woefully uninformed." ew. someone beat the ____ out of me when I say that. dammit, I need to get pointdexter out of my system.

mother____er. mother____er. mother____er.

ok better now.

 

True, I'm assuming they're using standard statistical research models. And you know, that's the logical conclusion.

Yeah, logical to you maybe, but you have no proof of this.

"A tool is only as effective as the person using it"

Less effective in the "real world" maybe, but not to those who know how to use it

"And what about the poor souls who don't go to class? Shouldn't the system be
designed for them as well?"

Thats not my problem, if they took the time to get to know how their cars worked, they would be better off.

"Your leaps of logic so incredibly bad I don't know where to start. "

I was commenting on your use of comparing Newton and Einstein to ABS brakes.

"No, my whole point of my discussion is to say it's not automatically stupid to criticize ABS. Again, read carefully."

I didn't automatically criticize ABS, i have my source, and believe it over yours which doesn't provide any facts.

"I would love to recap everything I learned in school but"

and just for the record, what school did you go to, and what was the highest level of education you recieved. ABS works period. bow down to me

 

deez nuts university. home of the fighting *********.

 

yeah, thats what i though. Your argument reflects your level of competence. Bow Down

 

Once again: You can ask your dealership to deliver you a car without ABS. Most likely, they will not be able to, or simply refuse to.

You could also take your car to a local mechanic, after purchase, and ask them to remove your ABS for you.

ABS has become a standard feature, much like seatbelts, or turn signals did in their day. I assume not everyone was more than willing to accept the new trend, and to this day, people refuse to wear seatbelts.

In summary: You most likely will not be able to find a car dealership who will sell you a Scion tC without ABS.

You may argue all you like over the effectiveness of Anti-Lock Brakes, much as you could argue the pros and cons of Seatbelts, or turn-signals... But the fact remains, there is a minimal to nonexistant chance of you being able to purchase a new car without any of these features.

If you do not like Anti-Lock Brakes, I suggest you try purchasing a car made prior to the year which ABS was added as standard equiptment. Otherwise, you are wasting your time arguing the effectiveness of feature which will come installed on the Scion tC, should you decide to purchase it, whether you like that feature or not.

Additionally, using Occam's Razor: Is it more likely that all car makers install Anti-Lock Brakes because they are a safety feature which lowers the possibility of lawsuit by the drivers of their cars, or because ABS is more profitable, and car makers simply do not care about the comfort of their customers, and have installed an inferior system in every car on the market to satisfy state and national government demands, even though the system is vastly inferior to that of non-ABS brakes?

That being said, I suggest that anyone who wishes to drive a car without ABS do so, and let Natural Selection take its' course.

 

Why not just drive slower when the weather is crappy? you in a hurry to get somewhere when its 12 degres and snowin? take some time and get out earlier and drive carefully. that would make sense but that would be too easy.

remember its only a car. ABS is good when you know how to use it. if you really didnt want ABS youve would have purchased a car without ABS. but that would be too easy too

well i wish you luck and drive carefully!!

 

Glad it took you just a few weeks for your input..... Did you read any of the previous posts? Or if we're lucky, part 1 even? I've heard this one already. I should have originally posted the original thread in the Northeast forum.....or somewhere they have a good amount snow and there IS elevation. Really kind of tired of hearing the same reponses from owners down South or way out West that I should slow down in the snow. I know how to drive, mom, really....and like I've said at least twice already, I really like my tC. I guess the next time I have an opinion I should make sure it'll fly nationwide......



[/b]

 

.......hey, tires are good.

 

this is a Nationwide ahem world wide Public forum

anyway, i used to live in NY. i only lived here for a few months. so i know how the NY Nor-Easters work out. so just because my location is in NC doesnt mean that some of us here on the boards arent from other icy places.

if youve been driving for 10+ years and had cars With ABS, why would you buy one when you know every year around this time its gonna get snowy and icy out on the roads.

what are you lookin for in responses in this thread?

are you lookin for people to comfort you in your angar and dispair?
are you lookin for people here to say "yeah ABS does suck!!"
or are you lookin for someone here to feel your pain?

wouldnt it make sense to purchase a car without ABS? i know you like your tC and your welcome anywhere to express your opinion but you gotta expect that people are gonna agree/disagree.

my last car didnt have ABS and from my experence i could have done a lot better with ABS. and it was a 2001 car.

is their something in particular you would like us all to say to your ABS issues so we can get a better idea on why your so un happy about a braking system that helps people that cant drive like us.

also put this in the back of your mind. a good percentage of americans just buy/lease cars to drive to work and back and could care less to rotate their tires or fill up their own washer fluid bottle (i now this i was in the business) they only care about price and how it drives. ABS is standard equiptment in most cars. deal with it. the world isnt gonna end

just drive carefully. we dont want to see any ScionLifer get hurt or killed because we all cars and we are all lookin out for your safty. well at least i am

if its too icy to drive out drive slower or watch the weather channel