Keep failing driving test, NEED to pass, try automatic?

calleyw

It took me 6 attempts to pass my test and yes I am not the worlds greatest driver. But neither have I am the words worst either.

Why did I fail because I am shy person who suffers from nerves badly. I even use to get het up about lessons, having to go to the loo at least 2/3 times before my instructor turned up at my house.

My instructor knew I could drive and was very relaxed in the car with me.

But I just use to mess up the test with my nerves.

I think the OP is putting too much pressure on herself. So take a break from it all and try again in a month or two.

Yours

Calley

fridgeracer

1. When approaching junctions or end of roads to turn onto another road, use clutch and gears to slow down instead of riding the clutch with the brake until you come to a stop at the white lines.

2. When in traffic leave enough space between you and the car in front so that you can just see the top of their tyres.

3. Mirror, signal, manouvere on every single thing you do that involves a change on the state of the road or position of your car. i.e. if there is a strech of cycle path coming up, MSM, if there is a junction coming up, MSM, if you are going to stop to do a reverse park - you guessed it, MSM. Every single time, you should check mirrors and back mirror and turn your head around 100 times throughout the test.

4. Do not turn the wheel by crossing your arms, always shift it left or right with hands in the same position on the middle of the wheel. Crossing arms is a fault and counts as a fault each time you do it.

5. At filters turning off a main road onto a side road, it is your right of way against the cars in traffic on that side road wanting to turn onto your main road, so you are suppost to position yourself far enough to block their access to turn onto the road. This is one thing that failed me on my 1st test.

6. On narrow street roads with lots of cars parked on the side, on each side, do not weave in and out to be on the left of your side as much as you can - stay in the middle of the road. Even if there is a stretch of 50-100 yards of empty space on your side, stay in the middle, it is pointless to weave in and out when you would have to be in the middle again in a few seconds. When cars come close to you on the opposite direction, find an empty space and turn in slowly to let them past but not so far in so that you are parked, just enough to let them go.

7. If someone flashes you to let you turn out onto a road, wait 1 second and say out loud "Oh i think he is letting me go", and then IF the car flashes you again, then you go while saying "he is letting me go". This tells the examiner that you do not "expect" a flash to mean "you can go", but in this case, it did mean he is letting you go.

8. Do not turn the car fast around a corner in third gear, slow down into 2nd gear and turn in slowly every time.

9. At roundabouts, do not charge up to the white line, stop and then look to see if you can go. Look straight and across multiple times constantly as you approach (turn your head to show you are looking at both roundabout and road ahead), and if of course it is clear by the time you are near on the edge of the roundabout simply drive on without stopping.

10. If you are approaching a roundabout where there is a barrier in the middle of the road separating both lanes on the egde of the roundabout which is blocking your view of the roundabout until you come to a stop at the white lines - DO NOT charge up to it at high speed, slow right down into 2nd gear and slowly creep up to the roundabout ready to brake if there is a car oncoming. If no car is oncoming, go. Make sure you put enough gas on the accelerator otherwise petrol or diesel YOU WILL stall on a roundabout and that is a fail.

11. DO NOT drive on 30mph roads at 20 or even 25mph. If you are adamant on driving slowly, drive at 28-29mph. Slow driving annoys and frustrates other drivers which might cause them to try overtake when they should not - but that does not matter, they passed their test and you have not yet so just because you are too afraid to put your damn foot down and drive at the appropriate speed does not warrant you annoying other drivers. Slower driving shows the examiner that you are too hesitated and shows that you are a dangerous driver, because where else will you be hesitated? Probably everywhere, and hesitation is very bad. People have brakes and eyes, if you did something wrong at least they have time to stop calmly without causing accidents. Being careless will also fail you, but being bold and a bit confident wont fail you.

12. Read road markings. If says STOP, STOP!. If it says left turn only, LEFT TURN ONLY! If it says GIVE WAY that would mean = STOP your car so that you CAN GIVE WAY!

13. If you are behind a bus, DO NOT stop far enough so that you can see its tyres. Stop far enough so that you can see the street lamps ahead of you infront of the bus. This is needed so that if there is no oncoming traffic, you can overtake the bus. If you can overtake the bus and fail to do so, this shows you hesitated which is down as a fault. Just because every other idiot driver with a licence stops behind a buses' !!! does not mean you should do the same on your test - you are not ever supposed to do that, what if the bus decides to reverse and he cannot see you in your mirrors? "oh it's ok he reversed into me?" wrong... you didnt stop back far enough, good luck on an insurance claim for that, lol

14. Don't exceed the speed limit

15. Don't cross lanes on a roundabout without looking at your blind spot and indicating IF YOU happen to have picked the wrong lane for the road to turn onto that the examiner told you to turn on to. If you do not want to choose the wrong road and mess up your test, slow right down on the roundabout into 2nd gear, and creep until the lane you need to be on is clear. signal and check mirrors and blind spot and then turn. I did this on my passed test and he did not say it was a problem or mark it down as a fault either.

16. One of the most important things you can do, is find out all the test routes and drive on those roads everyday before your test. The more you are used to these roads, and know exactly what the road markings are and what the sign posts indicate, then the easier your test will be - you will be able to predict what the examiner asks you do to and be able to think ahead of what to do.

17. Reverse parking - practise it a million times on street roads where other cars are parked with small spaces between. Practising on an empty road is pointless, you will never learn the lengh and turning circle of your car this way and you will always mess up a manouvere with parked cars.

18. Turn in road / 3 pointer - do the same thing you normally would except stop and look in all mirrors and blind spots on each point that you stop and start again. If a car comes, STOP. if the car wants to go around past you, let them. If they stop to let you complete the turn, do so. But always stop - do not continue with a car approaching OR a pedestrian passing behind you on the pavement.

19. Reverse onto road. Practise it a million times on normal roads, not main roads. Always stop and look and also look in all mirrors while performing it. If a car comes, stop. If a pedestrian comes close by, stop. If a car is approaching on the road you are reversing into, stop and wait. If they let you continue, do so. If they do not, stop and wait til they are gone. Reverse as slow as you want, as long as you dont hit the pavement or go onto the other lane you will pass it.

20. Hill start - easy, just dance with the clutch and gas til you see the bonnett go up a bit and then let go of the handbrake. You must still indicate to turn onto the road if a car comes and goes by you or if one is approaching from down the road. You must still shift the wheel with hands in the middle and not crossing arms over. You must still keep the car going and not stall. You must put enough gas in on 1st gear to gain enough momentum to go into 2nd without the engine shuddering on 2nd gear, so if you have to rev it up to 2000 to 3000 revs, do it.

21. You have to be able to read a number plate from a certain distance, if you cant or struggle get glasses.

22. If the examiner asks you to SHOW him how to turn on your indicators, get into the car and perform the indicators action with your hands and fingers, i.e. SHOW = means to do it while he watches you. If he says TELL me, that means you stand there and tell him what you would do. i.e. "I would flick the indicator switch next to the steering wheel down to indicate for left and up to indicate for right". Do not then go onto tell him or show him how to use your hazard warning lights, he did say TELL ME / SHOW ME about your indicators, nothing more or less. The same goes for anything else he asks you.

23. Music off, windows down (unless its raining), air con off. Windows should be down because you will not believe how much more easy it is to notice hazards on the road. i.e. you will hear ambulance from 500 yards away. You can hear kids or pedestrians if you are doing a manouvere. You can hear if a car is coming at a blind bend or a turn onto a main road. Sound of the urban environment is your friend, use it. Put just your window down, and leave the passenger one and all other ones up. It is your car, the examiner does not have right to ask you to put it up if he / she is cold, tough for them if they dont like it.

24. If the examiner starts to get chatty while you do the test, tell them you dont want to chat it would affect your concentration. You are not experienced enough to be chatting while driving, that happens naturally after you have passed and been on the road for a long time and are used to driving generally. Chatting WILL affect your concentration because passing a driving test in the UK involves a whole load of rubbish that is never practised once you have passed. This rubbish needs concentration, general driving and manouveres do not need concentration but the stuff like MSM, blind spots, shifting wheel with hands in the same place, indicating everywhere, and so on all need this level of concentration to pass your test so do not mess up by chatting to the examiner, he will still fail you if you mess up regardless of how well you both get along.

25. Learn by your mistakes. Take your test papers from failed tests and see and learn on what you failed on and think of all those things while doing your new test, it will stop you from doing them again and think twice before putting your foot down at the wrong moment.

26. Do the test in an insructors car with dual controls. If you happen to do something dangerous and do hit someone else or someone else hits you, you have damaged either parties car and will have to deal with insurance claims. With dual clutch and brake the examiner would be able to stop you and fail you, and thats better than failing and paying a load of money out to fix someone elses car.

27. Lastly, if you do pass, please dont drive like an idiot. So many drivers think they are doing nothing wrong except when others see them they are branded as total idiots. Do not do crap like tailgating someone on any lane of a dual carriageway or even a motorway. The speed limit is 70mph, period. There is no slow or fast lane, period. If someone is tailgating you, wind your window down and stick your finger out, they can undertake you and perform an illegal move if they are so desperate to brake the speed limit to overtake you. If you want you can do what i do, fit a camera on the back of your car and take a snapshot. Send it to the police and they`ll get a fine through the post. That will teach those idiots who tailgate. Also don't drive around town like a racer, it will wreck your car fast unless it's japaneese, and you`ll have a hard time finding another 1 because the used car market is a joke with broken or damaged cars literally everywhere, even from main dealers. Keep the good car you have got for as long as you can.

28. If you have a learner driver infront of you driving slowly, do not break the law by overtaking them with oncoming traffic and do not tailgate them. If a roundabout comes up, get round them and go off and show them how its done. They`ll get the message. The more times they fail the less congestion we will have on our roads

Hope that all helps you, take care and good luck!

londonTiger

i had the same reasons for failing as you, dealing badly under pressure and getting nervous under examination. But I could drive perfectly well outside oftests.

I did pass the 3rd time, first 2 times I failed.

When I failed I kept on protesting afterwards that it's just my nerves and if I didn't feel nervous under the watchful eye of the examiner I'd pass easily.

Looking back at it, dealing with nerves is a big part of driving, especially in roundabouts and motorways and other times when other road users are not giving way or putting you under pressure. e.g. on a give way stop on a junction when the car is beeping at you to go but you've been stopped for ages.

These things will put you under pressure and if you can't deal with p[ressue well you may doing a stupid mistake and cause an accident. So I'd say being able to deal with the pressure of the test is a big litmus test of whether you're safe enough to be on the road.

wantonnoodle

I passed on my 3rd attempt. First one, I had it booked for 3pm, and spent all day getting more and more nervous. I failed in the end for undue hesitancy. There were only 2 other minors on the entire sheet, but I'd had my 3 faults for hesitancy so that failed me. Instructor said it was cleanest fail sheet he'd ever seen.

Second test I booked for early on in the day about 3 weeks later. Had the same examiner, who recognised me, and said so at the start, so that put the wobblers on that, in that I ended up with a sheet peppered with minors.

Third test, I had a couple of weeks later. I had the chief examiner for the test centre, so that wasn't a problem. Driving out of the test centre onto a narrow road, someone had parked directly opposite the exit of the test centre, so I bumped over the kerb to get out. Expecting it to go down as an instant fail, I think I just drove to get through the test having written it off there and then. Needless to say, I was gobsmacked when he told me I'd passed.

You can do it, just believe in yourself.

londonTiger

wantonnoodle wrote: »

I think I just drove to get through the test having written it off there and then. Needless to say, I was gobsmacked when he told me I'd passed.

Similar thing happened to me actually, except the outcome was a fail.

made a MASSIVE blunder at the start of the test, and failed. Then the next 40 minutes or so I drove smoothly and picked up just 1 or 2 minors. I realised I just failed so the pressure was off.

The worst part of it was that I had to wait 4 months for a retest, being based in London - it doesn't help. I think London drivers are judged more harshly - because driving skill needs to be a lot better.

Take a look at this video series, the driving test was soooo easy, hardly any traffic at all. The student was also driving too slow on several occasions who should have got minors but didn't.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkbglJkQrwU

colino

There is some amount of drivel on here and I'm sure that the same people who have, goodness knows how, been given a driving licence: "bumped over the kerb to get out"!, would be the first to complain if any other incompetent did something stupid, reckless and dangerous in front of their eyes with a dangerous weapon.
Once you pass the, very, very low standard of the UK driving test you are able to jump in to the most powerful vehicle your licence covers and thunder down the motorway (which you've never driven on before) and unless they take your licence away, your competence is never checked again.
In which other field of human endeavour would this be classed as acceptable?
You can either do it or you cant, but don't look for shortcuts, temporary fixes or workarounds. Too many middle lane, I never reverse, don't drive in bad weather unfortunates out there already.

flicks

The impression I get is that you don't need to be a perfect driver to pass the test. What you do need to do though is convince the examiner that you're confident and put him/her at ease with you while they're in the passenger seat. I am not a driving instructor or an examiner but if I got into a car with a driver who was shaking and trembling I'd be on my way out of that passenger door like a bullet from a gun! The nerves are what need conquering here OP. Clearly you are able to drive and you have no doubts about this from your post. You just need to tell yourself on the big day that you can do it. The examiner is a human being just like you who has a job to do. Just let him/her see you have confidence in your own ability and you're well over half way there.

Joe_Horner

Morganarla wrote: »

I'm not going to go into details as to why I failed my first four tests as I will no doubt be torn to shreds by some of the unkinder posters that think that because you get nervous in a driving test that you are some scum of the earth not fit to sit behind the wheel of a car.

I can sympathise with that, so I'll let them have a go at my 4 fails instead, just to show you how things turn round. Note that my tests were under the old system back in the 80s, so the points didn't add up quite the same.

I learnt to drive (as in, control a car) round fields in my early teens. That was a mixed blessing when it came to driving on road - car control was already second nature, and I wasn't likely to actually hit anything, but I had no concept of how my actions might affect other road users (read - scare the crap out of them!)

My first test was simply booked too early (on the advice of my instructor) and I failed on undue hesitancy while trying to avoid upsetting / scaring other drivers (I knew by then it could be a problem)

On my second, I pulled in behind some parked cars to allow someone to pass from the front and he promptly took my (stationary) wing mirror off before disappearing without stopping. Unquestionably his fault (the examiner said as much) but he couldn't pass me because that would amount to making an "official" judgement on the accident.

Third test decided to use my own car and the clutch failed on the way to the test centre. As it happens, dad used to own a garage which had been bought by one of his old mechanics so we stopped in there to try and get a clutch changed in record time. While there, one of Dad's old customers came in for a service of his immaculate 1950s (oval-window) Beetle and offered to lend it for the test. Hesitancy again - I was sh*t scared of marking that car!

By the 4th I just knew I was going to fail, so I did.

On the 5th I turned up in Mum's battered old Vauxhall Chevette with mud & snow tyres on the back and more patches than Granny's quilt on the sills. The first thing the examiner did was ask to see the MOT and insurance before he'd even get in it. About 1/2 mile into the test a couple of teenagers decided to run across the road in front of me, leading to the only "real" emergency stop I've ever needed to do. For some reason that relaxed me, and I passed with not a SINGLE mark on the sheet!

Since then, it's been about 27 years and over 1/3 million miles, without even a parking bump. Most of the kids at school who were taing the mickey because they'd passed first or second time had written their first car off within the first couple of years.

The point of all that is that it's entirely possible to get into the frame of mind where you will fail because you expect to. Anything that breaks that circle is a good idea at that point. In my case it was a barely road-legal car and a couple of eejuts on foot. In your case a switch to auto might do the same - even if you don't actually need the auto.

One thing I would suggest is, if you do break the spell by going auto, invest one more test fee in applying for your manual test immediately. Otherwise there's a real chance you'll never get round to it!

epninety

londonTiger wrote: »

I think London drivers are judged more harshly - because driving skill needs to be a lot better.

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

fivetide

Joe_Horner wrote: »

I can sympathise with that, so I'll let them have a go at my 4 fails instead, just to show you how things turn round. Note that my tests were under the old system back in the 80s, so the points didn't add up quite the same.

Likewise.

I passed my bike test first time so I knew all about being on a road, observation etc, but took 4 attempts in the car.

The first time, unlucky I though. A lorry pulled out in front of me. I jammed the brakes on but sadly so did the examiner, just reactions i think. He didn't beat me to it but he did fail me because "he'd touched the brake pedal". Three other minor faults

The next one failed me for not looking over my shoulder when exiting a roundabout. Now, I'd not been told to do that. I had been told to check the mirrors and the blind spot (which I did). I argued that the car was fitted with a perfectly servicable set of mirrors which I had checked every single time (I had two other minor faults that was it) and his excuse was "well i like people to look over their shoulder" Brilliant.

Test three, same bloke. Takes me down a narrow street and when we get to the end some muppet has parked opposite with cars double parked either side, it is very tight. So we inch forward and the car stops. He puts the window down (i'm already passed the car) and looks out then says carry on. I know I've failed at this point because he's "touched the brake". I bet myself and win as we get tot he end and he tells me my driving is exemplary but he's failing me because he wanted to check we were clear. I told him I knew we were clear and given we only had a few inches to play with it was always going to be close. I was very narked at this point as once again I was down a test fee, a morning off work and two hours car hire.

Forth time I thought sod it. I hired an instructor in a nearby city and had some lessons with him on roads I didn't know. I then did the test at another centre in an area I knew nothing of and waltzed it. Two minors, one of which was the right turn across traffic back into the test centre for hesitation when i didn't want to mess up at the end.

so, in summary, stick with it and possibly, try doing your test somewhere different. You won't drive the same test route your entire life and new roads might make you listen better and concentrate more instead of 'knowing where you are going'

Good luck.