Lot of people just rush into their cars and start hitting the road without any form of check or inspection. Ordinarily, you are expected to inspect your car to be sure of no harmful objects or infants around it. This is often a safety check before driving and smart way of preventing an unwanted incident.

It is also possible to be conversant with the blind spot around or sides of your vehicle but you might not know that one spot you should be on the lookout for is the ground at the front and rear of your vehicle.

1. Preventive car maintenance

You will able to avoid some costly repairs or replacements if you keep your car in a good condition even before the general maintenance is carried out.

2. Adjusting the seats

The position of the driver’s seat is essential to how stressful or exciting driving could be. You should make yourself comfortable behind the wheel by adjusting the seat properly to give you easy access to the pedals. This should be about ten inches from the steering wheel, without any need to strain your legs.

How to adjust your driver's seat

3. Seatbelt safety

It is important you fasten the seatbelt whenever you are driving. This shouldn’t apply only to you but other occupants of your car. This will prevent possible injury from head collision. There is also provision of safety belt for infants too, catering for diversity in weight and height.

4. Appropriate wears

You should make yourself comfortable as much as possible before getting behind the wheel. You do not want to expose yourself to too much heat by putting on thick clothes like sweater or even jacket. When you feel too warm or hot, you should remove it to enjoy your driving experience.

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5. Dashboard

One of the most important things to note as a new driver or even an experienced one is to get overly familiar with every control, gauge and lights on the dashboard. You need to have a grasp of how to operate them and their relevance to driving. To do this, you need to familiarize yourself with owner’s manual of your car. You should know that many of these controls might vary based on manufacturers’ intuitive and choice of design.

To be a smart driver, you need to familiarize yourself with the every button on the dashboard

When you know these controls well enough, they will come handy in some urgent situations. It wouldn’t be difficult deploying them or searching for them during emergency situation as you would have gotten accustomed to them.

6. Parking brakes

It could be a bit challenging using parking brakes that are placed on the floor of the car since you might need to stress yourself in making use of it. It usually comes very handy when the brakes fail. The pedal is often distant to the left and lower compared to the regular brake pedal. You would need to make use of your left foot to access it, mostly not used by people for floor pedals, hereby making a bit difficult to do rapidly.

To get a good hand on this, find an empty lot for parking for a good practice. Make a start from one end to the other while you push on the gas pedal for few seconds. Push the parking down rapidly after letting on, without using the other brake pedal. You need enough room in the parking lot to be able to do this effectively.

If the parking brake is placed on the floor, you need a bit of practice in an empty parking lot to use it properly

7. High beam light

Another challenging task you might encounter when you sit behind the wheel, set to hit the road is turning the Highbeam light ON/OFF. This is very important for your safety especially during a winding road during night driving. This light will serve as a signal to other road users or motorists of your presence on the road. Make sure you get yourself in tune with the proper way of making use of this high beam lights.

8. Hazard lights

This is the not the everyday light you deploy while driving except on emergency situations such as faulty engine or transmission problem, which would require you to stop on the road. You need to familiarize yourself with the location of the hazard light in your type of car in any case you might need it urgently. Another safe thing to do is inspecting the hazard light occasionally to know if it is still in perfect condition.

Knowing how to use the hazard light properly and quickly would put you safe on the road during emergency

9. Objects that are unsecured

Objects like cups, bottles and even pens could easily get under the gas or brake pedal while on the road. This could put you in a bad situation while behind the wheel or even lead to road mishap. You need to secure these objects firmly to prevent rolling over while driving. You can get small container from an auto stores to properly secure these objects in your car. Your safety on the road should be your topmost priority.

10. Registration and insurance

You would be shocked that locating your registration number or insurance papers might put you in a bit of drama when you fail to find it in the glove box. To avoid such unnecessary trouble especially from the police, you should keep it behind your seat, inside the unused compartment there. You can also get your hands on document holder for easy accessibility.

Driving is sure an adventure that would excite you especially if you are a newbie but you should pay attention to all these highlighted points before you turn the ignition key or hit the switch.

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