Was I caught speeding?

[SMK7]

Coming home from town today I passed a well hidden speed van on the opposite site of the road. Quickly looked at speedo & noticed I was doing 63mph & it was a sixty road. I noticed there was no side cam on the van but definitely one on the back & not sure of the front. When I was clear, I had my passenger use a Speedo app on their phone and at 63mph it was regging 60 on their app. So with the van facing the opposite direction, opposite side of the road, the app showing I should 🤞🏻 have been only doing 60 according to gps.. how hopeful is it I’m ok? 😅

[Eric Bloodaxe]

24 minutes ago, SMK7 said:

. how hopeful is it I’m ok? 😅

Pretty hopeful I would think. 

Don't know if your local force operate to the guidelines (normally 10% + 2mph) but forces do vary and some don't.  If they do, you'd be ok, plus it's highly unlikely your speedo is spot on (though some are, most overstate your speed by 3-4mph as your experiment seems to have shown).

You might want to glance at a topic I started on a similar point:

https://www.fordownersclub.com/forums/topic/119896-speedometer-accuracy/?tab=comments#comment-844005

 

[Stoney871]

You'll be fine.
63 in a 60 zone is within guidelines.

Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk

[Eric Bloodaxe]

I remembered that a motoring mag had approached various forces and asked for their policy on threshholds. As you can see PSNI stated they used the 10%+ 2mph.

Speed camera thresholds across the UK

Police force	Number of cameras	Camera activation threshold
Avon and Somerset	41	10% + 2mph
Bedfordshire	38	Would not reveal threshold
Cambridgeshire	32	Would not reveal threshold
Cheshire	15	10% + 2mph
Cleveland	4	10% + 2mph
Derbyshire	18	10% + 2mph
Devon and Cornwall	98	10% + 2mph
Durham	0 fixed	10% + 2mph
Essex	63	Don't use a standard threshold
Greater Manchester	235	Would not reveal threshold
Gwent	21	10% + 2mph
Hampshire	36	10% + 2mph
Hertfordshire	53	Would not reveal threshold
Kent	109	10% + 2mph
Lancashire	34	10% + 3mph
Leicestershire	30	10% + 2mph
Merseyside	18	10% + 2mph
Metropolitan Police/TfL	805	10% + 3mph
Norfolk	26	10% + 2mph
North Wales	28	10% + 2mph
Northumbria	55	10% + 2mph
Nottinghamshire	48	Refused to confirm if threshold exists
Police service of Northern Ireland	12	10% + 2mph
Scotland	173	Refused to confirm if threshold exists
South Wales	137	10% + 2mph
South Yorkshire	25	10% + 2mph
Staffordshire	286	Would not reveal threshold
Suffolk	4	10% + 2mph
Thames Valley	294	10% + 2mph
Warwickshire	28	10% + 2mph
West Mercia	23	10% + 2mph
West Midlands	33	Would not reveal threshold
West Yorkshire	402	10% + 2mph

[RAIDER32]

1 hour ago, SMK7 said:

I had my passenger use a Speedo app on their phone and at 63mph it was regging 60 on their app

Cars are not allowed by law to under read so they usually over read by a few mph to be sure, my phone reads me doing 3mph less than what the car says.
I say the GPS is more accurate and you're fine, even ignoring the accepted threshold.

[Linds]

A word of caution ... having checked with a third party satnav app I believe he Focus I bought new earlier this year records speed extremely accurately - it's "bang on"..  My last Focus overstated speed by about 2-3% and the Audi I had before that overstated speed by significantly more than that.  One never wants to go near the above thresholds - I did when changing from the Audi to my first Focus and got done for doing 79mph on the same stretch of road twice within one week ... felt a right prat!

[TomsFocus]

Don't camera vans only read oncoming traffic towards their rear camera anyway?  If it was facing you and on the opposite side of the road I don't think it'll even have checked your speed!

[Milkman]

Accuracy of a vehicles speedometer depends on wheel and tyre fitment, rolling circumference. The speedometer, analogue or digital is calibrated to the factory fitted wheel and tyre size which will be stated in the owners handbook.

[Stoney871]

https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/uk-news/inside-mobile-speed-camera-van-17232150

Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk

[Eric Bloodaxe]

3 hours ago, Stoney871 said:

https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/uk-news/inside-mobile-speed-camera-van-17232150

Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk
 

Very interesting article, that, Clive. Certainly confirms that they work in both directions - the vans I see in my area are always positioned so they have a clear view in both directions. My local force also often posts officers with a hand held gun in areas popular with bikers as they only have a numberplate on the back of course. Unfortunately I was still caught by one a few years back as he was targeting the rear plates of bikes and other traffic going into a 30 but he got my front plate as I emerged from the 30 and let the speed build a little too quickly, just yards from the NSL sign. Ah well, the Speed Awareness Course was very good!😀

[Stoney871]

Must admit I had a swareness course a few years back - btw police are not exempt from tickets in their own cars.
Carried out the course and discussed many topics as expected.
At the end of the course one of the course leaders pulled me to one side and said ke knew I was police (I never alluded to it at all) because I was as up to date on laws and distances as he was and made points about quoted braking distances being outdated.
The old one about using a bus length to think and stop at 30 is way out of date imo, usage of ABS and modern cars mostly having disk brakes reduces that distance by about 40%.
Of course there is no legal excuse for joe public speeding but some roads are set at a limit that does not match the road type.
Case in point here, a road in my city was 'temporarily' reduced to 30 during major road works but when completed the limit was not put back.
Thr road has never had a fatality and simple rtc statistics were low for a busy road.
The layout is even safer than it was before the works but the council quoted inflated statistics to justify making the speed reduction permanent.
To put it into context, there is a fixed camera there but is still set at 40,( I know this 100% as the camera is right near my duty station and I often run it on a blue light and never get flashed at 40mph) so obviously nobody on that road sticks to the 30 limit.
Anyone here that lives in Northamptonshire police area are lucky as they shut all the cameras down a few years ago stating that the cameras are no longer fit for purpose (they rely on mobile cameras and police vehicle mounted systems now), the boxes were left up as a visual deterrent.

Sent from my SM-G965F using Tapatalk

[TomsFocus]

1 hour ago, Eric Bloodaxe said:

Very interesting article, that, Clive. Certainly confirms that they work in both directions - the vans I see in my area are always positioned so they have a clear view in both directions.!😀

Indeed!  Now I understand why those people that were already only doing 26mph suddenly slam on the anchors when they see the front of a camera van half a mile up the road... 🤭

I don't know if you guys have the flashing smiley signs?  The ones that smile at 30 and scowl at 31?  Not sure how accurate they are but they seem to suggest that an indicated 33mph on cruise in the Golf is actually 30mph. 

 

[Tizer]

1 hour ago, Stoney871 said:

a road in my city was 'temporarily' reduced to 30 during major road works but when completed the limit was not put back.

My Local Authority is doing the same. An out of town duel carriageway has been reduced to 50 even though there are no footpaths or even houses and only one slip road in both directions and no accidents to my knowledge.

I can also confirm that speed camera vans also operate when it is dark. One operates almost daily near me on a road with streetlighting including in the evenings and early mornings when it is dark.