What did(n't) you learn in driver's ed?

[Necros]

Here’s another link: http://www.turnfast.com/tech_driving/driving_steering.shtml

The proper grip of the steering wheel starts with the hands at the 9:00 and 3:00 positions. Contrary to the 10 and 2 o’clock positions you probably learned in driver’s school, you have greater range of motion and control with your hands in the 9 and 3 o’clock positions.

I actually WOULD be interested in a physiologist’s opinion about which muscles come into play when.

We should race! Mmm…350z vs. RX7…

[Necros]

And another one: Welcome to Michelin CA: Start Your Tire Journey | MICHELIN

The Advantages of Shuffle Steering

* Both hands stay on the wheel at all times.
* The hands never cross over or get jammed on the wheel. (Whatever technique you've used, **try and reposition your hands so they are close to nine o'clock and three o'clock when cornering.**)
* The driver is able to steer without leaning and losing contact with the seat back.
* There is less flailing around of arms than in hand-over-hand so the driver retains a better sense of where the wheels are pointed. This is especially significant during skid recovery.
* The driver retains the stability to feed the wheel back to center after a turn, rather than letting it slip through the hands. 

Maybe I should ask for a cite wherein someone says 10-and-2 is the best, because I haven’t found any.

[Skywatcher]

I took driver’s ed in Louisiana when I was 16. First car I ever drove was a little blue Chevy wagon in the school parking lot, then a gold Oldsmobile Omega on the street. In other words, they taught how to drive an automatic. My dad had me drive his '79 Rabbit around the local warehouse district every Sunday morning so I could learn a manual. Learning to drive that Rabbit got me out of my jackrabbiting habit.

I didn’t learn to parallel park until about five years ago, taught myself with the help of a website, I think it was How Stuff Works but they don’t have a Parallel Parking page anymore. Dad tried to teach me how to parallel in front of our house, using a couple of objects to represent the cars I’m supposed to end up between, but it didn’t work.

[marymargaret]

Not to over-correct in case I go off the road.

[Kiminy]

I actually did learn most of the stuff here in driver’s ed. Most valuable was the fact that you don’t want to start turning the wheel until you are nearly to the lane you want to turn into. I’ve always made nearly perfect 90-degree turns at intersections.

@PoorYorick

What I didn’t learn in driver’s ed: Never trust someone else’s turn signal.

This was a gimme. In the area I learned to drive (North Carolina Appalachians), it was considered “courteous” to turn on your turn signal if the car ahead of you turned on theirs, to let the driver behind you know why everyone was slowing down. While my parents did explain the stupidity of this rule (they both learned to drive in California), it meant that you just had to wait until a car started actually turning to know if the turn signal meant anything.

Driver’s ed did not teach me to drive a stick-shift. However, since most of the cars my family owned at the time were stick-shift, my parents taught me early. However, the big thing that I did NOT learn in driver’s ed was how to use a manual shift/clutch to stop a car when the brakes gave out. Going downhill. On a mountain. With lots of curves. (In Driver’s Ed, the official method of stopping if the brakes didn’t work was to try to sideswipe the side of the mountain, but I’m wondering if any of the teachers had ever tried it.) When this actually happened to me in an old Honda Civic, I was VERY grateful to have a manual transmission. I now own my first automatic transmission, and I still wonder how on earth I could stop the thing if the brakes gave out, especially since there aren’t really any mountains here…

My sister DID learn in driver’s ed that you should never take your hands off the steering wheel. Unfortunately, she must have missed the day where they taught her how to use the hand-over-hand method to turn the steering wheel, because the first time she had to turn a corner by herself, she did it without removing her hands from the wheel. She also missed the talk about how you are supposed to stop at a red light to check traffic before turning right on red, so in the same turn where she did not let go of the steering wheel, she was actually whistling through a red light, barely even slowing down. I was in the back seat at the time, but our mother, in the front seat, nearly had a heart attack and made sister stop the car as soon as it was safe to do so, to deliver these two basic lessons to her.

[GorillaMan]

@Kiminy

In the area I learned to drive (North Carolina Appalachians), it was considered “courteous” to turn on your turn signal if the car ahead of you turned on theirs, to let the driver behind you know why everyone was slowing down.

I’m wondering if maybe you misunderstood, or were mistaught. In many places, turning on your hazard lights is a normal way to let high-speed traffic behind you know they need to brake for a hold-up ahead.

[commasense]

@Necros

Maybe I should ask for a cite wherein someone says 10-and-2 is the best, because I haven’t found any.

I, uhhh, have one here somewhere… where did I put that… Let me get back to you on that.

Keep in mind that you and I have been talking more about, and citing sources dealing with, track driving, whereas the OP was oriented to street driving. The 9-3 position is pretty much standard on the track, so there will be little support for 10-2 on racing oriented sites. And now that airbags have become an issue, no one will recommend it on the street side, either. So I suppose I might as well give it up.

Anyway, would you agree with me that, street or track, 8-4 is not as good a position as 9-3? And that putting your hands there because of concerns about the airbag is kind of like telling someone never to go outside because they might be hit by lightning? Those are my main points.

@Necros

We should race! Mmm…350z vs. RX7…

I just checked the map, and it looks like Blackhawk Farms Raceway is almost exactly halfway between us. Or we could do Road America. Head on over, and e-mail me when you get there!

[commasense]

@Kiminy

I now own my first automatic transmission, and I still wonder how on earth I could stop the thing if the brakes gave out, especially since there aren’t really any mountains here…

Use the handbrake (probably not very effective heading down a mountain) or ram the transmission into Park. It won’t be pretty, but it beats dying.

[Necros]

Yeah, I think we agree. This: http://www.modacar.com/Merchant2/graphics/00000002/spa_383.jpg
is the steering wheel I use in the rally car. The natural hand position may be a little lower than 9-and-3, but not much.

I think most people’s driving would be improved, not by changing from the 10-and-2 position, but by actually putting hands on the freaking wheel. 5-and-7, with the knees, is not recommended by any serious authority I know of, racing or otherwise. I also see a whole bunch of grabbing the 10 position with the right hand, whilst the right arm is lying against the wheel. Cell phone at the head is normal position for the left hand.

I’d love to do Road America sometime. We only have a little track called Second Creek here. It would be nice to hit up a real track.

[Kiminy]

@GorillaMan

I’m wondering if maybe you misunderstood, or were mistaught. In many places, turning on your hazard lights is a normal way to let high-speed traffic behind you know they need to brake for a hold-up ahead.

Oh, no. No doubt about it. Imagine a line of four or five stopped cars on a normal two-lane road, all with their left blinkers flashing. First car finally turns left when oncoming traffic permits. The remaining cars turn off their turn indicators and continue straight on. I was even told by the locals that this was the custom. It happened mostly with left-turn blinkers, since it was meant to let the people behind you know why the traffic was stopped.

[pinkfreud]

My driving instructor spent so little time teaching parallel parking that I flunked that portion of my state driving exam. Passed everything else 100%, but got docked five points for clumsy parallel parking. Although this didn’t keep me from getting my license, it disturbed the anal-retentive “gotta be perfect” self-image that I had at the time.