I just saw the new AAMI ad with people flexing their safe driving, one of them said I always do head checks before changing lanes.
Are head check actually safe because you’re literally taking your eyes completely off the road to check your blind spot. Wouldn’t it be easier just to adjust your mirror to see the blind spot.
How is head checking any different to checking your phone? Checking the phone is probably safer
Adjusting mirrors in this fashion was first suggested in a paper published 30 years ago by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) as shared earlier by gaosong2101 and I’m quite surprised at the lack of knowledge about this technique in this thread - to me it’s old news.
Start there and for a TLDR try budgetdirect:
The SAE-recommended method aligns the rear-vision and side-vision mirrors in a way that eliminates the blind spots at the four o’clock and eight o’clock positions.
It’s terrifying watch this video and seeing an instructor driving with his head turned the other way.
A real instructor would show how to position the mirrors to avoid blind spots
Mate you're obviously convinced that head checks are unsafe. If you are confident in your driving without doing head checks, that's up to you. But best to accept that the majority of drivers do use head checks, and they will continue to be taught to learners and required to get a provisional licence.
Adjusting your mirrors properly eliminated blind spots. That’s a fact.
Outdated teaching systems. Go into any defensive driving school and they’d tell you to not do headchecks.
What a great idea look over your shoulder for 2 seconds while driving 100km/hr. That’s only 50-100 metres of driving blind.
Checking the phone will distract you, you will be more alert with head check,
You will drive 50-60 metres fully blind if you do a head check. As dangerous as checking your phone
You only check for a second and only when safe to do so
You will drive 50-60 metres fully blind if you do a head check.
You must count more slowly than you drive.
If you're travelling at 100 klm p/h, you travel about 28m per second.
https://www.xconvert.com/unit-converter/kilometres-per-hour-…
The general consensus is that a head check should be no more than a glance => a fraction of a second.
That's less than "one Mississippi", so "one mi"
Your head check should take no longer than it takes you to check your mirrors. You're not sight seeing.
How long does it take you to check your mirrors? You're not looking at the road ahead then, so travelling just as blind when you do that.
This kind of makes your argument invalid, eh?
As dangerous as checking your phone
I don't think it's the "checking the phone" that is the problem, I think the problem is "for how long you are checking your phone and what else you're doing whilst checking the phone".
those who dont do head checks are the same type of people that dont signal when turning. scums of the earth
The 'head check' is verifying assumptions, ie. checking the part of your surroundings not in your peripheral vision.
The purpose of the head check, ie. taking your eyes off the road ahead momentarily,
is for the purpose of being safe to yourself and others, as you are still on the road.
Taking your eyes off the road, for the purpose of looking at your phone,
is in no way, checking assumptions of the your road surroundings,
nor is it about the safety of others, while you are commandeering a car.
There are blind spots in people's intelligence too, so that is why in academia, you are always told to check assumptions,
ie. 'blind spots' for what is not always obvious or in view, so to speak.
The purpose for that small bit of 'extra effort', is to check and verify assumptions.
This is a bait thread.
The 'head check' is verifying assumptions, ie. checking the part of your surroundings not in your peripheral vision.
It's been a while since I've done my defensive driving course, but I checked with a couple of the Muppet kinder who have done theirs quite recently and they've confirmed everything you said in your post ie: what they were taught at defensive driving course.
They expanded to remind me that defensive driving is about being able to respond to and anticipate how others are driving/using the road space.
Confirmed that the side mirrors are convex and however you position them, their very nature creates a blind spot because of the image distortion created by all convex mirrors.
Oh, and as you're travelling, you're blind spot is likely a moving target because there is no guarantee that other road users are maintaining a constant speed and trajectory.
General reminder is that both yours and the other vehicle are dangerous weapons possibly weighing a tonne or two.
Therefore, (according to them) it's best practise to utilise as many safety precautions as possible (so use mirrors and head check*) because whilst crashing your car is frustrating, inconvenient and often expensive, there is a good probability that you will also become injured and that often hurts quite a bit if you happen to survive, that is.
Taking your eyes off the road, for the purpose of looking at your phone,
is in no way, checking assumptions of the your road surroundings,
nor is it about the safety of others, while you are commandeering a car.
Just a quick comment about this bit though…
Glancing at a hands free mounted phone can be ok, as many people use gps apps via their phones still.
Note, phone (or any screen) not supposed to be in direct line of sight as in not mounted in front of windscreen.
The problem with phone usage arises when a person doesn't just "glance" for a second without touching screen, it's when they can't resist checking emails, texts etc and/or replying to them etc.
OP makes no sense. You're literally scanning the road that's what head tilt is. Looking forward, mirrors, head tilt to check blind spots are all literally looking at the road. It's definitely not the same as looking at the phone.
Looking behind you at the blind spot that could be seen on well adjusted mirrors is looking at the road ahead?
Looking behind you at the blind spot that could be seen on well adjusted mirrors is looking at the road ahead?
You do realise that you're not looking at the road ahead when you're checking your mirrors, don't you?
If I look at my mirrors I can still see a big portion of the road infront of me compared to rotating my neck to check through my back window
@Slowestdriver1: Now you're being disingenuous.
Nobody is talking about head checking their back window. (As opposed to using rear vision mirror).
The entire conversation and your responses until now has been about using side mirrors, adjusting them to address blind spots to the side and glancing to the side windows for a fraction of a second.
Some vehicles don't even have a back window.
By rear I meant backseat windows
No, you didn't.
You specifically mentioned being happy about not seeing your rear car doors because "they weren't going to fly off".
@Muppet Detector: Yeah I don’t position my mirrors to show the rear doors I position them to avoid blind spots
@Slowestdriver1: No you didn't, no one can do this.
If you're looking at your mirror, you literally have no vision of the road in-front of you. Your recollection of the road in-front of you is what you remember before you looked at the mirror.
You hurt your argument by adding the phone thing as being similar.
90% of people driving have their mirrors position incorrectly, I agree with you there.
Image link
I see almost everyone with their mirrors positioned so far inward that they can see the cars behind them in their side mirror. Which is the exact same thing they can see in their rear view mirror. So it's doubling up on the same view and cutting out a possible wider view.
While I agree a proper mirror position like the image shows will reduce and even remove the blind spot. Depending on the type of car, the position of your head at that time etc could mean something small like a bike could be hidden.
Modern cars also have curved mirrors showing a lot more than the old flat ones where head checks out the rear window was a necessity.
For me, with mirrors correctly positioned means a head check is a glance at the front passenger/drivers window. Not the windows behind as that's covered by the mirrors.
But getting people to change their mirror position, something they have gotten used to from the time they started driving, is almost impossible. People are creature of habits.
Agreed I’m mainly concerned about head checks where you’re looking at your back window, I find them dangerous especially if you’re going 100 km/hr you’re often going 50-100 metres completely blinded to what is in front of you, and I think that is as bad as looking at your phone.
Agreed I’m mainly concerned about head checks where you’re looking at your back window,
I'm calling shenanigans.
I'm calling shenanigans.
How is she? What did she tell you?
For me, with mirrors correctly positioned means a head check is a glance at the front passenger/drivers window. Not the windows behind as that's covered by the mirrors.
I think this is what most people in this thread are suggesting.
Modern cars also have curved mirrors showing a lot more than the old flat ones where head checks out the rear window was a necessity.
I'm thinking people are only looking out the back window (as opposed to using rear vision mirror), is when their stationary and/or reversing, not whilst travelling forward.
As for those curved mirrors, remember that they are convex mirrors and distort the image they're reflecting.
I am completely baffled that this is even a topic………
Too many people passionate about headchecks
I somewhat understand where the OP is coming from, but I have also had head checks (especially before I got a newer car with blind spot monitoring) save me from potential crashes many times. It's so easy for a car to sneak into blind spots it's insane.
The head-check turn, though, early days of driving I struggled with keeping the car straight/ensuring I'm also maintaining attention to what's in front - and there was definitely some brown pants moments when I had to break hard because I head-checked too long.
Now after driving for many years it's more natural/I don't have this issue anymore, but learning it early days without compromising your front driving safety + paying attention to everyone else left/right /behind you is definitely a lesson in awareness and motor control.
That said, OP's take is terrible that it's as bad as a mobile phone. It's absolutely not. And whilst I agree more and more cars having tonnes of crap in the info screen/some you cant even use AC with dials anymore, means laws should adjust/change for this (tbh, dials/knobs you can use without looking for things like AC/Volume, etc should be mandatory! I shouldn't need to look at any screen more than a fraction of a second to do any of this.. Touchscreens with buried controls are even worse.. Menu > Item > AC > change is a horrible way to use a car!).
My Civic Hybrid 2024 is pretty good at this as it's kept dials/knobs for most things like AC volume etc. I still would've preferred to have a gear level to move than the buttons… And even a year later I still mix up the buttons once in a while.. But it a better option than most touch screen/touch sensitive controls for everything else!
Makes you think about all the accidents due to head checks I assume bulk of them would be L and P platers
i had an incident with about 100h on my Ls - went to merge, blinker, mirror shows a gap between the 'last' car, started moving over…
do a head check, realise i am about to merge into a car directly parallel to me. oops!
takes 0 time especially at low speeds where cars spend more time next to you. if you don't ride someone's bumper it's plenty easy to give a quick glance across, just past the passenger mirror, to see if the place my car is going is empty
Yeah but you would’ve seen the other car if you adjust your mirrors properly as it removes the blind spots. It’s not my opinion it’s a fact.
Just calculate how many metres you cross during that glance, it’ll be more than the gap you’ve left
L plate next to username checks out
Thanks
Op, unless you're car is like Dumbo, with giant side mirrors, you're gonna have blind spots.
See this
https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Blind-spot-around-a-vehi…
If that's the case, OP probably drives a VW Beetle. Their trunk's at the front too.
Silly graph from fantasy land. If a car is next to me and my mirrors are set correct I can see the front of it through the side glass and the back of it in the mirror at the same time
Given you still don't know how a head check is done, you're the only silly one here my friend.
Apparently you're not thinking about the right things at the right time though.