4 bizarre driving myths which are really harmful, ...

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

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

Maintain your palms on the ten and a couple of o’clock positions on the steering wheel

Mistaken 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 couple of’ place was taught as a result of it was believed to present extra leverage and higher management. This concept remains to be in vogue, maybe as a result of educating somebody to drive is a generational exercise, and this concept was handed from dad or mum to little one over time.

At this time we consider that holding the wheel on the ‘3 and 9’ place provides higher management, in addition to decreasing the prospect 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 danger of degloving harm

Your automobile has an airbag in the midst of the steering wheel that can deploy at over 180 mph throughout a crash, even at a average pace. Whereas it may save your life, it may additionally trigger extreme harm if it hits you throughout deployment. When your palms are at 10 and a couple 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 when you are turning the wheel.

The accidents to your palms or forearms are usually known as degloving, and please do not google this. You’ll turn out to be 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, nevertheless, provides much less management, so persist with the ‘3 and 9,’ however preserve your thumbs on prime of the wheel.

Utilizing your cellphone hands-free whereas driving is secure

Simply because it is authorized does not make it secure

Credit score: Volkswagen

Some individuals can multitask, and a few can’t. However even the best multitaskers meet their match utilizing a cellphone 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 also be authorized. When you find yourself legally having a cellphone dialog or texting whereas driving, your consideration is split between watching the street and vehicles round you, and the cellphone. Complete hands-free security is a fable.

Driving underneath the pace restrict on the freeway is safer

Do not be that particular person

We all know the decrease the pace 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 concept would maintain if you happen to had 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 person will get nearer to the automobile in entrance, and the automobile behind will preserve its distance. While you all of a sudden introduce one automobile that drives at 45 mph, the static security is disturbed. Vehicles desirous to drive at 55 mph need to brake for the slower automobile, which causes a series response behind them. Drivers will begin taking probabilities to get across the sluggish automobile, inflicting much more upheaval.

And also you, considering you’re secure at 45 mph, will likely be on the middle of this flurry of chaos, and due to this fact extra prone to be concerned in any accident you trigger by driving slower than the remaining. The identical precept applies to those that persist with the pace restrict within the quick lane.

4WD or AWD all the time retains you secure

By no means an alternative to frequent sense

Credit score: Honda

A four-wheel-drive (FWD) automobile has the flexibility to traverse tough, uneven, slippery, or very steep terrain. Extra vehicles at the moment have all-wheel-drive (AWD), which provides traction to all 4 wheels completely or when the street circumstances require extra grip. This results in a false sense of safety, and that’s very harmful. These driving 4WDs suppose they’ll drive anyplace, and people with AWD more and more consider it is the identical as 4WD, and to allow them to additionally drive anyplace.

Whereas each these programs enhance the quantity of traction on slippery or uneven surfaces, neither will prevent if you happen to hit an icy patch on a nook, or runoff water on the freeway. The parable is that double the grip will all the time preserve you secure, whereas the truth is that the one solution to preserve your self secure is to all the time use your frequent 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 some other shade. 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 street 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 worth. The final price of repairing this sort of automobile, and its statistical security report additionally come into play. Some vehicles usually tend to be stolen, and insurers may also have a look at the age and driving report of the motive force.

Cops care much less in regards to the shade of your automobile than the way you drive it. In case you are dashing or weaving, or leap a purple mild, they are going to pull you over no matter shade automobile you’re in.