Whistler Pro-78 Radar Detector on a Road Trip

[Stealthcb]

So the fam and I took the SUV up to Water World in Denver today. I talked the wife into using the Pro-78 on the way. We mounted it low on the center of the windshield and plugged it into the lighter.

Only one radar encounter on the way up and that was with a State Trooper headed the opposite direction running C/O. Don't know how far out we got the signal since I didn't see him, but we had about 5 seconds warning around a bend.

Oh, and there was the unmarked state patrol black Charger R/T that paced us the whole way.

.

On the way home -- HOLY CRAP the smokies were out in FORCE! In the first twenty minutes of our southbound leg, we ran across two LEOs running MOVING C/O going the opposite direction, one of them a cycle cop. Pro-78 alerted with several seconds to respond each time, and warning would have been longer had there not been a 4-foot concrete barrier between the lanes.

THen the big encounter.

We got a 4-bar Ka hit that lasted for two bleep cycles, then died. I told the wife it was probably another RD. But as we rounded a bend about five seconds later, she said, "Cop!" and the Pro-78 went to full alert on Ka.

Sure enough, sitting on the right-hand side was an unmarked cruiser. The kicker -- it was shooting AWAY from us.

So we had a .3 mile, around-a-bend, FORWARD FACING alert. Plenty of time to slow down before he shot us in the fanny.



We ran into three more LEOs on the way home, too. One Statie shooting laser up an off-ramp (no alert -- too far away), one further down with a customer, and another on the OTHER side at the same point as that guy, also with a customer.

[wilnevrbbiased]

Sounds like a lot of excitement.

[Stealthcb]

Originally Posted by wilnevrbbiased

Sounds like a lot of excitement.

The trip home sure was. On the trip up, it was funny to watch all the dipsticks who refused to pass the trooper even though he was doing 5-under. LOL.

[TSi+WRX]

^ I never understood why people do that..... If the cruiser is under-PSL, without lights/siren, there's really no need to back up traffic....

Maybe the people who didn't want to pass, legally, had out-dated plates/stickers.

[Stealthcb]

Originally Posted by TSi+WRX

^ I never understood why people do that..... If the cruiser is under-PSL, without lights/siren, there's really no need to back up traffic....

Maybe the people who didn't want to pass, legally, had out-dated plates/stickers.

Haha! Could be. I know sometimes the staties here do it in bad weather to establish the safe speed of traffic. I fall in behind them when they do that -- nothing like a light-and-siren snow plow!

[TSi+WRX]

Originally Posted by Stealthcb

Haha! Could be. I know sometimes the staties here do it in bad weather to establish the safe speed of traffic. I fall in behind them when they do that -- nothing like a light-and-siren snow plow!

^ You'll soon start to hate this, too, my AWD friend.

It's a distinctly unsettling feeling to see the police/safety vehicle ahead struggling to maintain the speed that it's trying to set - and even moreso upsetting to know that you're stuck in a pack of cars which are not nearly as well equipped as you to handle the weather (and seeing them squirm and slide side-to-side, while you're tracking sure-footed ahead).

Most frustrating, when you otherwise know that you can just leave the pack behind, and be much, much safer, on your own.

[Stealthcb]

Yeah, unfortunately, the wife can't find a way to budget in snow tires for the MS6 this year. She's trying to pay off debt AND get us a vacation. I will probably have to find a used tire place and try to eek out a year from a used pair of winter tires.

[TSi+WRX]

^ I keep forgetting - are your stockers pure summers?

[Stealthcb]

They're M + S rated. Reviews are mixed. Tire Rack recommends no winter driving on them, but some of the folks who have used them say that in light snow, they do just fine. Apparently, the tread is OK for snow, but the compound hardens too much under 30 degrees.

[TSi+WRX]

^ In that case, I'd bet that as long as you were conservative enough in your driving, you'd do fine.

There's a lot of tires/tire-reviews like that in the Subaru community, too (i.e. RE92), and it always seems that the more aggressive/spirited drivers - as well as careless ones - are the ones who complain the most, while those who maintain enough of an interval and are more conservative seem to do just fine.

I'll be keeping my fingers crossed for ya!