Have you ever stopped to help someone on the road??

With a battery that dead I'm surprised you could jump it. In my experience when the battery is that discharged it acts as a resistor.
 
I've offered a couple of times. One time I was cruising down a 2-lane country road when I saw a little early 90's Ranger half on half off the road with the hood up. So I stopped and offered some help with at least getting it off the road if I couldn't get it fixed. They declined, though they were thankful to know that they could go another three or four feet to the right before they went into the ditch itself. I did help someone at high school who had their tires slashed though. Not really roadside assistance but just the same I got one donut onto the car and limped the rest of it into the auto shop so we could throw some fix-a-flat in the other. I've also given countless thousands of jumps to a friend of mine who always drove with his lights on for some odd reason and thus always left them on. My truck always starts so he'd park his Mustang where his battery was right next to mine.

I've been offered assistance too. One time I was having electrical troubles, specifically the battery cable ends were screwed. If I turned my lights on, nothing. I had to have one guy give me a push so I could get enough momentum up to get the alternator to kick in and fire the motor off. It did start. Thank god for stickshifts :p
 
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I have helped the only time I've needed to. Fortunately, I was in a Jeep Wrangler and I had pulled over to help a Jeep-full of HOT young women who were having trouble getting their top up and it had just started to rain. I know...sounds like the lead-in for a porn. Unfortunately, I helped 'em close their roof, and they drove off. Oh well.
 
What goes around comes around. I am yet to see anyone who required assistance, but if they did, I would help them. I have helped jump-start a woman's Camry in the long term airport parking though. But if I ever needed assistance, I would want someone to help. I have a Renault after all :p
 
I'm waiting for the day when someone needs towing up an icy hill or needs pulling out of somewhere. Only helped tow my dad's car a few times for various reasons.
 
With a battery that dead I'm surprised you could jump it. In my experience when the battery is that discharged it acts as a resistor.

Nah, it's possible. I've done it a couple of times when the car was so dead, even the clock had stopped. Not one light would turn on on the dashboard when you turned the key to ignition.
You connect the leads and start the 'donator' car, leave it running for about 5 to 10 minutes. Then you try to start the other car. Never failed yet. If it fails, it just needs a little more time.
This will only not work if the broken down car is either
-with the battery completely dead, as far as chemicals go, totally done for ever.
-leaking power severely somewhere.

Anyway on topic, never stopped to help someone yet cos I mostly drive on highways... you can't stop in highways unless it's completely necessary. Helping a fellow driver doesn't fall under completely necessary cos they've probably already called their insurance to come tow the car.
Besides I know too little about mechanics to help. All I could do is give someone a jump, change their wheel, fill their cooling systems with water... very basic stuff. I'd like to learn more though.
 
I've been stranded a few times before and people rarely helped, so I make a habit of trying to help people out. Most of the time people don't need any help; but I've still changed a few tires, jumped several batteries, given people coolant, given a few people rides and even towed someone's car. I'm not particularly worried about anyone fucking with me either. Mostly because if you look at my truck, you'll assume that I own nothing of value anyway.
 
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Nah, it's possible. I've done it a couple of times when the car was so dead, even the clock had stopped.

I tried to jump my parents 09 Mercedes C-Class, but we could never get it to start. Turned out it was leaking acid and that would probably be a pretty good reason why it wouldn't start. I have only helped other people jumpstart their cars, I have yet to come upon someone in distress that didn't have help already.
 
Yes, me and my friend helped a Subaru Impreza(GT in EU) owner who got stuck last winter, in the same day we helped an old lady who got her Mazda3 stuck.

I try to help as many as I can, but I always judge it before hand. I dont want to help an asshole.
 
I did two days ago. Had just finished my internship at Lackland Air force base and as I was leaving I saw an old vet and his wife with a flat tire on their Buick. They had a few recruits trying to help them, but I figured I could get it done faster. Still had my jack and impact wrench in the hatch from the race this weekend ;) Good thing I stopped as they didn't have a jack and the recruits were trying to figure out how to change a tire without one. The sad thing about it all was that everyone was amazed that a civilian would stop to help someone on base.
 
The sad thing about it all was that everyone was amazed that a civilian would stop to help someone on base.

That is sad. That's probably the safest place to stop on the planet.
 
I tried to jump my parents 09 Mercedes C-Class, but we could never get it to start. Turned out it was leaking acid and that would probably be a pretty good reason why it wouldn't start. I have only helped other people jumpstart their cars, I have yet to come upon someone in distress that didn't have help already.

I believe that was covered under:
-leaking power severely somewhere.
 
I didn't have to stop. I was on hwy 101 and the car behind me only had it's parking lights on in the dark. I tried making it so that she ended up right on my bumper, hiping maybe she'd notice that she wasn't seeing the reflection in my bumper of her lights...then I tried moving slower and then giving it some gas to put some distance between us so that maybe she'd notice how dark the road in front of her was. I also tried tapping my brake lights in rapid flashes, but that didn't work.

Finally, I grabbed a sharpie in my pocket, and a packate of papers for work (which I can reprint later) and scribbled "HEAD LIGHT" (I ran out of room for the "s") in thick letters, and tried holding it out the window while the traffic was only about 5mph. Obviously, since she didn't have her headlights on, she couldn't see it. Finally, I took out my phone, turned on the camera flash into "flashlight" mode, and shined it onto the paper, trying to keep the paper straight and stiff with my left hand, and reaching over and trying to shine my phone's light onto the sign with my right hand, all while steering with my knee (have no fear: I'm a pretty damn-good knee steerer).

Finally, she saw it, and turned on her headlights! Yay! As I changed lanes to the right as my exit approached, and continued on, with her interior lights on, smiling and waving as she drive by me.

Damn she was cute.

Dumb, but cute. :lol:
 
In those situations I flash them with my rear fog light.

You know how many people aren't even aware rear fog lights exist? "Why is that guys one brake light on? Gosh it's foggy."

I do my best to help people. It's the right thing to do.
 
You know how many people aren't even aware rear fog lights exist? "Why is that guys one brake light on? Gosh it's foggy."

I do my best to help people. It's the right thing to do.

Around here it's more like idiot drivers in European cars driving around with their fog lights on all the time because they think it makes them look pimp-yo. They have no idea that they have a rear-facing fog that is blinding everyone at every stop light.
 
Not too often. Most of my driving is on the local highways with narrow shoulders, and most of the drivers I see pulled over have either been in a collision and have it under control, there is no visible damage to their cars and they're on their phones, or crews are already there.

The last time I stopped was two years ago. My brother and I were on our way back home after work right after a huge storm hit the area. We're talking torrential rain, powerful gusts, stuff like that. Power had actually gone out at the amusement park we worked at because a transformer exploded after getting hit by lightning.

So we're driving along, the rain's long over but there's a lot of branches on the ground, so we're going slow. We're running along a four-lane boulevard when we see a car stopped ahead with its hazard lights on, and directly in front of it is a large branch. We think the guy may have hit the branch, so we pull over and offer our help.

The guy is fine, but off in the trees by the side of the road is an overturned SUV. The driver's fine, only minor injuries, and we basically spend the next half hour warning traffic about this obstacle. (Safety first! We keep two flashlights and a high-vis vest in my car's trunk, and we used them).

Turns out the SUV driver had been traveling on this road in the middle of the power outage faster than he should have, saw the branch a bit late, and panic-swerved right into the high curb, which rolled his car. Crews came, police came, everything was sorted out, and my bro and I went on our way.
 
I've been tempted on occasion, but no more than I want to shoot out the headlights of the idiots who drive around with their high-beams on all the damn time.

Also, the cops tend to frown on that sort of thing.
 
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