by sherlock » Thu Feb 14, 2013 8:37 pm
Hi everyone, posting this on behalf of my daughter who has had 5 lessons so far.
Her instructor is teaching the stopping procedure as being, out of gear and then handbrake on. I am an advanced driving instructor with the ambulance service and have always taught make the car safe first by handbrake applied, then out of gear next.
I've spoken to him tonight to try and understand why he would be teaching this way, and he states that for the purposes of a test it doesn't matter. I explained that if you don't apply the handbrake first to make car safe, and are only holding it on footbrake and get rear ended, the first thing that happens is that your foot slips off the footbrake, the car jumps forward and potentially knocks over a child.
I wonder whether I need to look at some retraining - last course 3 years ago, but even then system of car control was specific in the method to be used as being handbrake first then out of gear.
Any advice would be appreciated.
Thanks.