For driving instructors or those thinking about becoming a driving instructor.
DorWey
Driving School - Pull -
Push Steering
This page is available as part of Lesson 1 and is also a 'How To Operate It' page.
When steering, the hands should normally be at the ten-to-two or quarter-to-three position on the steering wheel. Quite often when driving you just need to turn the wheel a little which means that you don't have to shift your grip very much, if at all. The faster the car is travelling the less steering required.
At lower speeds, whilst turning around sharp bends or carrying out a turn in the road for example, you will have to turn the wheel more and on some occasions to full lock*. When turning the wheel this much you should imagine that a vertical line runs down through the centre of the wheel and your hands shouldn't cross over it. To avoid this we use a technique called Pull - Push steering.
The animated diagram should give you some idea how it works. As you watch the animation you can see the left hand pulling down the wheel as the right hand slides down to meet it. When the hands arrive at the bottom of the wheel the grip is swapped. The right hand now pushes the wheel up whilst the left hand slides up to meet it. At the top the grip is swapped again for one final pull down to the bottom. At the end of that you will have achieved full left lock. Obviously for a turn to the right the procedure is reversed. In other words you start pulling down with the right and sliding down with the left.
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The
steering technique looks deceptively simple but on the first lessons it can
trip people up quite lot and may require some time (and time is your money) spent
practising it before we can move on. Part of the problem is that you will have several tasks to deal with
simultaneously and it is impossible to concentrate on just one item. Therefore I recommend
very strongly that, before your first lesson, you
practice this technique over and over at home. Use a large plate or circular
tray. If it helps, imagine that you are drying the rim with a tea towel as you
rotate it through your hands.As you can see, if you move your hands fully from top to bottom on the wheel you can achieve full lock with just a few PULL-PUSH-PULLs. I sometimes find that people are doing tiny little movements and to achieve full lock requires many pull-push-pull-push-pull-push-pull-push.......
Always remember that as the car turns a corner the back wheel will take a short cut. The sharper the corner the more the short cut. This means that if you steer so that the front wheel just misses the kerb the rear wheel will most likely hit it. The problem is made worse if you are too near the kerb on the approach. So, (if safe) keep your distance from the kerb as you drive towards the turn and then only turn when the front of your car is in line with kerb in the minor road - see diagram.
Sharp corners will require a lot of steering so you don't want any excessive speed. If you have the car travelling too fast you just won't be able to get the steering in. Look at the diagram. If the driver had applied too much gas as she/he went into the turn the car would have gone wide and over the centre line. If the driver starts applying too much gas halfway around the turn, where most of the steering has been applied, the car will be heading towards the pavement before there is time to correct the steering!
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Golden Rule If you have a lot of steering applied keep the speed down until the steering is almost back to neutral! |
* Full steering lock is when the steering wheel will not turn any further. On most cars this will mean the wheel will have turned one and a half turns, as in the animation. (Confusingly, steering lock can also mean the ant-theft device that locks the steering wheel from turning.)
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Copyright Information - January 2002. The copyright of this web site and the downloads found within (apart from third party material) belongs to its author, Paul Pearson ADI - DorWey Driving School. Material may not be reproduced or used in any form or by any means, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from the author. The diagrams and information found on this page are for the exclusive use of DorWey Driving School clients. If any driving instructor or driving school wishes to use any of the material found on this page they must first contact DorWey Driving School.
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