Archive for the ‘Driving’ Category
Monday, January 5th, 2009
Today was a day for gear changes and roundabouts, some dual carriageways and national speed limit single carriageways in the pitch black freezing cold. Kev was trying to get me more confident and less slightly dangerous on roundabouts which is good as I find them shockingly confusing, particularly if I need to do a gear change coming up to them.
Lifehack has an article on making decisions under preasure, which I think probably covers the broad techniques I should be using to make sure I am better at roundabouts than I am at the moment.
Specifically - know the situation, know the outcomes and commit to the task at hand.
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Monday, December 22nd, 2008
First lesson in two weeks, for that matter I don’t get another lesson for two weeks either. I feel a little stuck with the driving to be honest, each lesson seems similar to the previous lesson, it is possibly a mix of the law of diminishing returns and fustration at doing the same thing over and over again.
Took a look at the Burgess Hill Test Center the website still says no information available, and I can’t seem to select any times or dates on the “book a test” page on direct.gov. Never mind, hopefuly will be able to book a test at some point in 2009!
Anyway, as I said no more lessons for two weeks because of Christmas, will update again then for sure.
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Monday, December 8th, 2008
So today was the 48th hour of driving a car, we didn’t do anything new one emergency stop at the end after being chased round by a 4×4 for a bit, should have guessed that was going to happen after Kev had said he wanted me to do an emergency stop.
Trying to perfect manoeuvres on difficult roads (read steep), was quite interesting trying to do a three point turn on a large hill. One thing that is slightly concerning me is reversing into parking spaces in supermarkets and the such. I am not sure why I would want to reverse into a parking space when I could just go in forwards and then put the shopping in the boot, it just seems like something that might be useful at some point.
Anyway, no lesson next week Kev is going Christmas shopping.
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Monday, December 1st, 2008
Emergency Stops…
…DON’T LIKE
My head is buzzing after doing my first four emergency stops, it isn’t the emergency stops that I don’t like it is being in charge of a car after doing one, also having your mate shout “STOP” in your left ear, has a somewhat negative Pavlovian conditioning effect on the enjoyment of driving.
So as with my earlier posts I am going to try and write down the procedure for doing an emergency stop, as with previous posts this is my memory of what to do, not official. Please take advise of a qualified driving instructor (like Kev) before trying this.
- Instructor/Examiner shouts STOP in your left ear ;-).
- Press down the brake, then the clutch (this is for an ABS car).
- As you are doing to try and lock out your arms and push yourself into the chair to avoid being thrown forward.
- In the event of rear wheels drifting out, steer into the same direction as the the drift. f.ex. if you drift right, steer right.
- Put on the hand break.
- Change to first gear.
- Look over both shoulders (left and right…).
- Move off slowly and carefully.
Chances are if you are anything like me your head will be buzzing, this would probably be a good time to pull over and compose yourself.
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Monday, November 24th, 2008
Today was another chance to go through my driver record, Kev got to tick off a few more of the boxes which is always a nice feeling. I am definitely suffering from a case of diminishing returns when it comes to driving, Kev and I had a discussion at the end of the lesson about trying to get more polish on my driving rather than learning any new skills.
My driver record now looks like this:
Independent
Cockpit Checks, Safety Checks, Controls & Instruments, Safe Positioning, Mirrors - Vision & Use, Signals and Pedestrian Crossings. (7 in total)
Seldom Prompted
Moving Away & Stopping, Anticipation and Planning, Use of Speed, Other Traffic, Junctions, Roundabouts, Turning the Vehicle Around, Reversing, Parking, Darkness, Weather Conditions. (11 in total)
Prompted
Dual Carriageways, Legal Responsibilities, Environmental Issues, Security (4 in total)
Not Covered / Not Known
Passengers & Carrying Loads, Emergency Stops (2)
I agree with all of that, Emergency Stops have not been covered at all yet, and we haven’t spent enough time on Dual Carriageways to make any really judgment. The little box on the bottom right is a little hard to gauge as they are all covered in the theory test (not sure why they are on the drivers record really).
Annoyingly enough the Brighton and Hove test centers are closing on the 8th of January and don’t appear to have any free slots to book a test so it looks like I am going to be booking my test in Burgess Hill in February. Gives me plenty more time to practice!
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Monday, November 17th, 2008
Today was quite a lot of driving around and a couple of manoeuve, based upon the deficiency in my driving last week. The majority of it went well, both turning round in the road and reverse parking worked well, it helped me greatly to look back over my notes and refresh my memory.
The other major thing we worked on was gear changes approaching junctions, particularly my lack of them! I have a tendency to forget to change gear and try and do roundabouts at 15mph in 4th gear or something equally daft. We decided that this was because I am pre-occupied with understanding the situation, and thus I forget to go through all of the essential steps when approaching a junction.
I am getting there, slowly but at least I feel like I am driving. Kev discovered that the Brighton and Hove DSA test centers are closing in January meaning we (and all Brighton and Hove students) will have to drive to Eastbourne or Burges Hill to take their test, adding a good 20-30 minutes travel to and from the test centers. Never mind eh.
Lastly the car started smoking as we pulled up, it had possibly been smoking before that. It appears that part of the high preasure water system had burst leaving the radiator with little or no active cooling. Feel sorry for Kev he has only got the car back from the garrage recently.
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Monday, November 10th, 2008
So today was a mock test, one of several before I take my actual test. We drove down to the test center in Brighton Marina where Kev explained the test to me, how majors and minors worked and what would score as what. I still haven’t done emergency stops so we could not cover that, other than that it seemed pretty much as I had read and expected.
Kev got me to do three manoeuvres, the first was turning round in the road, which I did, not without hitting the kerb (I forgot to steer when reversing) so that was a major. Reverse parking was difficult as it was pitch black and my steering was off at best so Kev had to intervene as I was misjudging the position of the car rather seriously. Reverse round the corner went better, however I hit the kerb again as I overcompensated - all three would be easier in the daylight so I am not overly concerned about them.
My general driving wasn’t that bad, in a couple of places I was slow to move off, and my use of mirrors and the MSPSL routine left something to be desired, particularly after making a mistake.
In the end I had 4 majors and 13 minors, which isn’t too bad - it does show how important plenty of practice is.
So, next week should be more practice. In the mean time I have bought myself a copy of Focus’s Driving Test Successs - Practical Simulator which seems okay, not really that close to actual driving although I think it is helping me learn the sequences.
Going to give myself tonight off to watch Spooks and maybe play a little Team Fortress 2 or EVE Online (Who have their winter expansion released tomorrow).
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Monday, October 27th, 2008
I had another ‘funny feet’ day today, not as bad as two lessons ago however. I was being a little hasty trying to move off - this is part of becoming more confident we think, I am no longer able to crawl away without any gas on the flat as I am bringing the clutch up much faster. This means I have to adjust my technique sligtly by putting on the gas and then bringing the clutch up, this is often coupled with taking the hand brake off. It is a lot to think about at once, but I picked it up well.
I was proud of my turning round in the road, I managed it without prompting, questioning myself or hitting the kerb, thus I only had to do it once, much nicer on my legs. Reversing round a corner in the dark was hard work as I kept loosing the kerb, had to try it three times before I managed it. Didn’t do great on the last try either.
I am still happy with my progress! Next lesson same time next week!
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Monday, October 13th, 2008
Today was another funny driving lesson my feet weren’t quite right, and I kept doing silly things made a bit of a mess of turning round in the road and didn’t get reversing round a corner quite right. One of the things I was doing particularly wrong was putting the clutch down while breaking, for some reason I have it stuck in my head that clutch goes down when slowing down, rather than just before I come to a stop. Kev got me too take my foot of clutch pedal when driving and rest it on the side (which has done wonders for my ankles) it also delays me putting the clutch down.
The second thing I had problems with today was again braking, I was a little heavy on the brake which probably comes down to anticipation or not as my case is.
I learn’t something about roundabouts though, if I scan round the roundabout in a clockwise direction when approaching/stopped at the roundabout I check the most important thing last, i.e. traffic from the right.
There were many more little things, Kev seems to think that after the current block of lessons are up I probably won’t need another full block before I am ready to take my test. Scary stuff.
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Monday, October 6th, 2008
So, today went much better than last week. We did quite a nice loop of the area I am contemplating taking a GPS with me next time and leaving it logging on the back seat so that I actually know where I have actually been. Maybe I will do that when I have passed my test, could be a little distracting if it started beeping at me.
I got two major things from my lesson today; first being that after last week driving isn’t that bad after all, the second is that speed limit signs should be seen on both sides of the road like a gate.
The above example is taken from the A259 (actually it is flipped along the horizontal axis for the sake of clarity) moving towards Peacehaven in a 40 zone, passing a side road that is national speed limit before moving into a 30 zone.
What I did was see the national speed limit signs and speed up, in my head I had seen the signs but not really thought about it too careful, what I need to remember is speed limits are like gates you have to pass through them for them to take effect, i.e. if I had been turning left up the side road I would have passed through the national speed limit gates.
Another lesson next Monday.
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