This is just a brief outline to help you prepare for your first lessons and to assist in reflecting on them afterwards. If you have any questions, just text or email me.

Cockpit Drill

Before driving you need to set yourself up properly in the drivers seat to make sure you can reach all the controls and have good visibility all around, including ahead and in mirrors, along with being able to see instrument panel.

We can break this down as follows.

D – S – S – S – M 

DOORS - Make sure all doors are closed securely, including the boot.

SEAT - Adjust seat so you are close enough to reach all controls comfortably, and high enough to see clearly all around and can see all instrument panels. Remembering to adjust head restraint to give you the best protection. 

STEERING WHEEL - Adjust your position from steering wheel so you are not stretching and not too close.

SEAT BELT - Make sure your seat belt isn't twisted. Making sure all passengers under 14 are correctly wearing a belt and proper child seat as required.

MIRRORS - Make sure all your mirrors are adjusted correctly.  Remembering the difference in the type of vision in the mirrors.  Different type of glass.

Safety Checks

Before starting the engine make sure that the gear stick is in neutral and the handbrake is on. On my car with the electronic handbrake you can check it’s on by looking for the following symbol on you instrument panel

Moving Off

 When moving off, you need to make sure you are ready to go, then make effective observations all around to make sure its safe to move off. To do this we can follow POM routine. These instructions are for using the electronic handbrake in my car. in brackets I’ve added how you will use a manual handbrake.

P.O.M. – PREPARE – OBSERVE - MOVE

PREPARE – Clutch down, 1st gear, set gas, set bite, (With electronic handbrake, Make sure you don’t set the bite too high or you might release the handbrake automatically before you are ready to go, if you have a manual handbrake, then place left hand on handbrake)

OBSERVE - Looking all around starting from left to right, check all mirrors and right shoulder blind spot. Decide if a signal is necessary, the timing of this signal is important; it must be just before you move off.

MOVE - If it is safe to move off, slowly lift the clutch and apply more gas, the electronic handbrake will now release and the car will move. (With a manual handbrake you’d release it just before raising clutch further). Steer out into the road and into your normal driving position about a metre from the kerb. 

Pulling Up

For pulling up we use the MSM routine as follows

MSM (PSL) – MIRRORS – SIGNAL – MOVE (POSITION – SPEED – LOOK)

MIRRORS - Check rear and left mirror, to assess the picture behind you. Now look ahead to find a place where it’s SAFE, LEGAL & CONVENIENT (SLC) to pull up.

SIGNAL - Decide if a signal is required, if so, apply a left signal 

POSITION/SPEED - Adjust position towards kerb and reduce speed, using combination of releasing gas and applying the brake, remembering to put clutch all the way down before coming to a stop

 LOOK - Make a final check that you’ve pulled up in a SAFE, LEGAL & CONVIENIENT place.

SECURE CAR - Handbrake on, neutral, cancel signal. Relax.

After this we’ll move on to Junctions.