Chandigarh roads to hell: ‘Potholes reduce life of automobile, hit mileage’

Talking to Chandigarh Newsline on how bad roads affect the vehicle, he said, “Potholes in the road cause wearing of tyres and reduce the life of the automobile considerably. At the same time, it leads to probability of accidents. If one tyre wears out more, it can lead to a blowout and eventually to a serious accident.”

Prof Singh said bad roads affected the vehicle mileage too. “For example, on a plain road, a vehicle can move up to 20 kilometres with one litre of petrol but if the road surface is uneven, the same average is reduced to even up to 10 kilometres.”

Significantly, he said that bad roads hit the vehicle alignment as well which is an important key to quality of drivability and safety.

“Due to potholes, when jerks are applied, that disturbs the edges of the wheel. In case of four-wheelers, forces are balanced in two ways — one is static balancing and the other is dynamic balancing. In case of static balancing, forces are balanced and in case of dynamic balancing, forces and couples both are balanced. So when there is a bad road, both forces and couples are disturbed badly. Ultimately the vehicle alignment is disturbed,” he added.

Prof Singh asserted that there is a huge impact of bad roads on the suspension of the vehicle.

“Suspension and springs in the vehicle are meant to absorb jerks or shocks. Basically they are there only to prevent the passengers from feeling the jerks and impact on the road. On a plain surface it is easy but in case of pits, suspension and springs are disturbed and weakened. As a result, they transmit the shocks to the passenger,” he said.

The former head of the department said that if the vehicle was in constant contact with potholed roads, its life was reduced to a great extent. Economically, it can lead to higher repair bills as well.

“Also, life of chassis of the vehicle will be reduced. Not just this, there is going to be an environmental impact. This will also impact health of people because one will move slowly due to potholes and it will add to pollution. In case of two-wheelers, the balancing becomes really risky on a potholed road,” he said.