UPS frightened of the snow?

[Michael Chare]

A UPS van has now failed to deliver my hard drive on three successive days.

On each of these days the postman has delivered my mail and there was one day before that when he came with the milk as well.

[Tim W]

Michael Chare wibbled on Thursday 14 January 2010 17:43

One of the smaller couriers managed to get to me when I wasn't even sure if

*I* wanted to be driving (and I'm not fundamentally squeamish about ice). The bloke had a real can-do attitude (he'd parked in the main road which was slightly less icy and was doing on foot deliveries for the last few hundred yards in many cases). I gave him hearty congratulations on making the effort.

[The Natural Philosopher]

modern FWD vans are pretty crap at traction. and modern drivers have no skill anyway.

[Bruce]

All UPS vans are rear wheel drive.

[Usenet Nutter]

Guy driving a Tuffnalls wagon 10 days ago when snow was at its worst was moaning about the auto box they had .

[dennis]

He is correct, I have been driving a smart and the box is awful for snow and ice. You have virtually no control over which gear its going to use or when its going to decide to change gear.

[JimK]

doesn't it have "1" and "2" as well as "D" like other autos? Presumably it's a "flappy paddle" auto-clutch jobby that thunks for itself?

JimK

[Piers Finlayson]

Wouldn't be the Liverpool depot would it? They essentially refused to deliver to me when there _wasn't_ snow, and continually gave false reasons for not delivering on their web status page. I no longer order from CPC as a result (or get it delivered elsewhere).

Our drive is completely impassable to non-4wds at the moment. Our letter box is as the top of the drive, but vans need to come down to the house deliver parcels. I've put a plastic crate out next to the letter box while the snow persists, and all the delivery guys so far has spotted it and used it rather than either not deliver or come down the drive and get stuck. We are pretty rural, so this is fairly safe (famous last words!).

[dennis]

No.

It has a gear stick that does up and down when you push or pull it. But you can't select anything other than 1st to start off and it changes down even if you don't touch the shifter.

[Rod]

A dustcart has now failed to to collect my rubbish on five successive weeks. (Last collection was 8th December. 2009.)

On each of these weeks the postman has delivered my mail (on at least one day). And we have had City Link, HDNL and parcel deliveries as well.

To be fair, the operators have picked up our recycled cans and plastic, and our paper, somewhat erratically. I have heard that they have had lots of problems with the dustcarts and operatives slipping down roads. And I believe them considering that even within the town we have had formal road closures put up by police. But I really would like the bin emptied before we run out of room. (We tend to have modest amounts of 'black bin' rubbish, thank goodness. Not true of some others in the area who have overflowing bins and uncountable black bags strewn across the pavements.)

So council waste department [1] can't work because council transport can't clear the roads. Great.

[1] Albeit the collection itself is performed by contractors.

[The Medway Handyman]

I've been pleasantly surprised by my Kangoo, not had much trouble at all. Mind you, I've driven through a few bad winters.

[The Medway Handyman]

Paramedic daughter has had a lot of trouble in the Mercedes diesel automatic ambulances. Got stuck several times, but due to the good old British wartime spirit, every time she got stuck half a dozen people suddenly appeared from nowhere & shoved/shovelled till she got moving.

[geoff]

In message , Michael Chare writes

Oh really? my heart bleeds

DHL were meant to pick up a consignment on the 22nd dec

they didn't

they decided not to send their drivers out on the 23rd and 24th

I spent 1/2 hour on the 4th and 5th of this month trying to get through, eventually getting through in the 6th and again they didn't pick up

On the thursday they said they would pick up on friday the 8th jan

and, f*ck me, they actually managed it

I also use CityLink, APC and fastway all of whom have fallen apart over the xmas period

The problems that exist are that they have been affected by cutbacks and having laid quite a lot of drivers off because of the economic downturn they had to take on a lot of temps for the xmas period, depots have been snowed in and they still have a bit of a backlog, they have had to cease operations at certain points and recall their drivers owing to pressure from their inscos

Get a bit real you winger

[geoff]

In message , "dennis@home" writes

A bad workman blames his tools dennis

Stay at home dennis - make the roads safer for the rest of us

[The Natural Philosopher]

our auto freelander has been a total doddle to drive.

I've never had LESS hassle on ice.

and it can be manually shifted..ish if you care to .

[The Natural Philosopher]

Or learn left foot braking.

[geoff]

Not quite that bad, but they still haven't collected since the new year

The problem seems to have been patchy depending on depot (e.g. Manchester was snowed in for some time, then flooded)

[dennis]

Go on then explain how left foot braking is going to help in an automatic rear wheel drive car!

[The Natural Philosopher]

You can control the torque to the rear wheels and the load presented to the gearbox by using brakes and throttle simultaneously. Old police driving technique.

That's the way to get going on snow. Use the brake like a clutch, release it slowly and you wont get wheelspin. Acts a bit like a limited slip differential.

On corners, apply brakes with left foot, and apply accelerator: car will kick down. Very useful on entering a corner to avoid a mid corner downshift as you power out.

If you don't want to use the front wheels for braking, use the handbrake.

>

[Tinkerer]

Forty years ago, when I was a Post Office driver, we were given two 360 cubic foot vans with automatic gearboxes. One guy started to use left foot breaking and that was fine until he had to move a non auto van to make room in the garage to get his van in. Reversed it up, repositioned, shot forward at a rate of knots, lifted left foot, pushed down on clutch pedal and created new entrance into the garage.