4 bizarre driving myths which are really harmful, plus 1 that is simply silly

Some myths about vehicles and driving are incorrect, however principally innocent. For instance, some folks imagine it’s worthwhile to heat up your engine on a chilly morning earlier than driving, or that conserving your automobile idling for a couple of minutes makes use of much less gas than turning it on and off once more. Whereas these aren’t true, the one actual injury is to your pockets.

However different myths will not be solely false — they are often downright harmful. Listed here are 4 of these myths, plus a bonus one which may not harm you, however might positively take a toll in your private sense of favor.

Hold your palms on the ten and a pair of o’clock positions on the steering wheel

Improper for 2 causes, each harmful

Generations in the past, earlier than vehicles had energy steering and wanted bigger steering wheels, holding the steering wheel on the ’10 and a pair of’ place was taught as a result of it was believed to provide extra leverage and higher management. This concept continues to be in vogue, maybe as a result of instructing somebody to drive is a generational exercise, and this concept was handed from father or mother to baby over time.

Right now we imagine that holding the wheel on the ‘3 and 9’ place offers larger management, in addition to lowering the possibility of the palms crossing the middle line when turning the wheel. That is true, however there’s one other hazard lurking in your steering wheel itself.

Steering wheel airbags and the chance of degloving damage

Your automobile has an airbag in the midst of the steering wheel that may deploy at over 180 mph throughout a crash, even at a average velocity. Whereas it may save your life, it may additionally trigger extreme damage if it hits you throughout deployment. When your palms are at 10 and a pair of, they, and your forearms, are nearer to the middle of the wheel than the three and 9 place. This will get worse if the collision occurs if you are turning the wheel.

The accidents to your palms or forearms are sometimes known as degloving, and please do not google this. You’ll change into a pedestrian. Some say even the ‘3 and 9’ place is just too harmful, and we should always maintain the wheel on the ‘8 and 4’ place. This, nonetheless, offers much less management, so persist with the ‘3 and 9,’ however maintain your thumbs on high of the wheel.

Utilizing your telephone hands-free whereas driving is secure

Simply because it is authorized does not make it secure

Credit score: Volkswagen

Some folks can multitask, and a few can’t. However even the best multitaskers meet their match utilizing a cellular phone throughout driving, particularly for texting. It was shortly declared unlawful to take action, and shortly after, all of us had voice-control, hands-free freedom to name and text while we were driving. In most locations, that is authorized.

However legality doesn’t make a factor secure. Smoking is authorized, rock-climbing is authorized, and petting somebody’s reactive canine can be authorized. If you find yourself legally having a telephone dialog or texting whereas driving, your consideration is split between watching the highway and vehicles round you, and the telephone. Complete hands-free security is a fable.

Driving underneath the velocity restrict on the freeway is safer

Do not be that individual

We all know the decrease the velocity throughout a collision, the much less extreme the results. So there’s a fable that the slower you drive, particularly on a freeway, the safer you’re. This idea would maintain in case you have been the one automobile on the freeway, however you by no means are, and that’s the place the issue is available in.

When everybody on the freeway goes at 55 mph, the relative place between vehicles is static. No one will get nearer to the automobile in entrance, and the automobile behind will maintain its distance. Once you all of a sudden introduce one automobile that drives at 45 mph, the static security is disturbed. Vehicles eager to drive at 55 mph must brake for the slower automobile, which causes a series response behind them. Drivers will begin taking possibilities to get across the sluggish automobile, inflicting much more upheaval.

And also you, pondering you’re secure at 45 mph, can be on the middle of this flurry of chaos, and subsequently extra prone to be concerned in any accident you trigger by driving slower than the remainder. The identical precept applies to those that persist with the velocity restrict within the quick lane.

4WD or AWD all the time retains you secure

By no means an alternative choice to widespread sense

Credit score: Honda

A four-wheel-drive (FWD) automobile has the power to traverse tough, uneven, slippery, or very steep terrain. Extra vehicles immediately have all-wheel-drive (AWD), which supplies traction to all 4 wheels completely or when the highway situations require extra grip. This results in a false sense of safety, and that’s very harmful. These driving 4WDs assume they will drive wherever, and people with AWD more and more imagine it is the identical as 4WD, and to allow them to additionally drive wherever.

Whereas each these techniques improve the quantity of traction on slippery or uneven surfaces, neither will prevent in case you hit an icy patch on a nook, or runoff water on the freeway. The parable is that double the grip will all the time maintain you secure, whereas the truth is that the one option to maintain your self secure is to all the time use your widespread sense.

Driving a purple automobile prices extra

Not harmful, however a fable that has to go

Credit score: Toyota

Insurance coverage on a purple automobile prices greater than every other colour. Cops will pull you over simply because your automobile is purple. Why? As a result of many quick vehicles are purple. Ferraris are normally purple, as are many Porsches and Mustangs. So will shopping for a purple Corolla will set you aside as a highway demon within the eyes of the insurance coverage business, in addition to the police?

Not true. Your insurance rate is just not decided by the colour of your automobile, however by components like automobile make, mannequin, engine dimension, and value. The final price of repairing this type of automobile, and its statistical security document additionally come into play. Some vehicles usually tend to be stolen, and insurers will even take a look at the age and driving document of the driving force.

Cops care much less concerning the colour of your automobile than the way you drive it. If you’re dashing or weaving, or leap a purple gentle, they’ll pull you over no matter colour automobile you’re in.