Beeping and bipping

Car horns

Sir, – I fully sympathise with Emer McLysaght on her experience of road rage when she beeped her horn at another car (“I inflamed the road rage situation by pretending to rub my eyes in a ‘boo hoo poor me’ taunt”, People, May 5th).

I have discovered that usually a bip is all that is needed to alert a driver that has failed to notice that the traffic lights have changed.

However, while a bip is usually given and received with reasonable courtesy, a beep, which is a more prolonged bip, can enrage the other driver.

So, how do you bip and not beep? With difficulty, usually, as car horns are not as sensitive as they might be.

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I am reminded of a Renault Dauphin I owned in the 1960s, which had two horns – a city one which bipped and a country one which beeped.

Car manufacturers, please note. – Yours, etc,

TONY CORCORAN,

Rathfarnham,

Dublin 14.