Urbandreamer wrote:While I'm a fan of professional lessons I also think practice with a family member makes a huge difference. It's not just the extra hours, it's the different car.
Practice with a family member? Huh, I was failed in my first test (1969) because my old dad had taught me to block shift down from fourth to second, and the examiner didn't approve of the practice. I would have felt quite hard done by, but fortunately I'd given the examiner several other
excuses reasons to fail me, so I wasn't in a position to quibble.
The main problem I had with driving my dad's Mk1 Cortina was that my mum was in the back seat as well, and the two of them kept on disagreeing about what they wanted me to do and where they wanted me to go. On one memorable occasion, the wall of contradictory instructions got so bad that I nearly hit a bus. Gathering my frazzled wits, I pulled the car over to the side of the road, stopped the engine and told them quietly that they'd both failed.
![Laughing :lol:](./images/smilies/icon_lol.gif)
Things got a little easier after that.
Practising in your instructor's car is all very well as long as he's actually got the car. Two days before I was due to take my third and final test, one of his pupils wrote off his Mk2 Escort (rear wheel drive) and I had to take the test instead in a Mini which required a completely different approach to cornering. But hey, it did at least have the advantage that you could see the corners of the car! With the Escort, lining up your reverse turn had been achieved with the discreet aid of two pieces of tape on the rooflining which he hoped the examiner wouldn't spot. This was with the British School of Motoring, by the way, not some suburban privateer. I don't imagine it would happen these days?
BJ