From Ls to Ps - A detailed guide from my experience with the driving test

Getting the Ls

Multiple choice questions on road safety and rules, 32 questions and you only need a 78% to pass (25 questions). All I did was go through the practice questions, the actual test was almost the exact same questions. After a couple of practice sets you can pretty much memorise the answers to the questions.

Tips:

- Just practice common sense

- Do the practice question sets a couple of times on vicroads website

Test day procedure

- Sign in, wait, go into a computer room, phones off

- Multiple choice questions on the computer

- They give you results, take your picture and signature etc. for the learner’s permit

Hazards Perception Test - HPT

You watch realistic clips of simulated driving and click the mouse to perform one action per clip to either slow down, make a turn, overtake etc. It consists of 28 clips with a passing grade of 54% (15/28) according to drivingtestvic.com. Vicroads did not tell me how I went exactly, just whether or not I passed and areas of improvement.

Resources

- Practice questions on the vicroads website here

- More free practice questions 

Tips

- Sometimes you don’t have to do anything

- Be very conservative when waiting for traffic to turn, the gap to turn will be obvious

- Watch for pedestrians coming out of between parked cars

- Pretty much never overtake bikers

- Go into each section with a “something is bound to go wrong” mindset and stay alert for all sections

- Don’t just look right in front of the car, see what is in the distance too

Test day procedure

- Sign in, wait. They call you into a computer room to a specific computer, phones off, headphones on.

- Instructions and a few practice questions

- Test duration about 40 minutes but you can finish in half the time easily

- When finished just walk out and they give you results at the desk

Feedback I received:

- Maintain a safe following distance behind other vehicles

- Choosing safe gaps in the traffic when turning or crossing a stream of traffic

- Improving awareness of the potential risks of unseen road users

The Drive test for Ps

Where you go for an actual drive in the car with an assessor from vicroads, they get you to do various tasks and navigate around some routes around the test centre. You need to have 120 hours of total driving and 20 hours of night driving recorded in your logbook or phone app. You also need to have passed the HPT. 

- Get the paper learner log book after your Ls test, it is much more… *ahem*… within your control compared to the app if you’re looking to get the hours and drive early.

Test day procedure:

Pre-test and paperwork

- Park your car in the learner’s section car park, reverse into it so you don’t have to reverse out when being tested

- Go and sign in, wait, they will take your log book, car registration, whether you are testing alone or with an instructor (I went alone) and then take your learner’s permit, you wait at the tables reserved for those taking the drive test

- The assessor comes out in a hi-vis vest, sits down with you and give you some information about the test, get your signature and ask you this:

o Can you do a 3-point turn or reverse parallel park? – Just say yes

Car controls

- After they talk to you, you walk them to your car. Unlock your car, sit down and turn the power on but not the engine. They will ask you to operate the following in your car:

o Left/right indicator

o Brake lights – just step on the brake

o Low beam, high beam – will be asked to keep low beam on for testing

o Hazard lights – the red triangle button

o Window wipers + squirt water

o Honk your horn

- They will ask for the following too and you just need to point at it: 

o De-mister front and back

o Hand brake* – just point, don’t actually put it down

*make sure the car you are testing with has an actual stick for the handbrake not just an electric button

- Now they will get in the car, put a little mirror on their side of the windscreen, a GPS speedometer gadget if they can’t see your speedometer from the passenger side. Seatbelts on and you’re ready to roll.

Phase 1

Now you pull out of the test centre, drive on a main road (60km/h – 70km/h) for a bit and go into a quieter street to perform either a three-point turn or a reverse parallel park (not both) behind a car (but never in-between 2 cars)

- Start your car, drop the handbrake and they ask you to pull out of the test centre, just be careful of the 10km/h speed limit, don’t accelerate just let your car slowly drift along until you are out. 

- They will say things like “turn right from the left turning lane and finish into the middle lane” which means chuck a right from the left turning lane (assuming there are 2 lanes to turn from) and then go into the middle lane of the road you just turned into.

- They will ask you to do some turns both left and right off of the main road into smaller streets, signal, check rear mirror, slow down, wait to turn.

- Once you navigate some small streets, they will ask you to do either 3-point turn after passing a specific car or reverse parallel parking behind a certain car.

- At the end of the first phase they will ask you to pull over and “make the car safe” which means shift to parking gear, handbrakes up. Make sure to check where you’re parking, don’t park in front of a fire hydrant, don’t park right in front of an intersection etc. If there is no sign to say you cannot park there, then usually you can.

- Just chill out while they grade you, if everything goes just according to keikaku then you should pass and will move off the curb to begin phase 2!

Reverse parallel park tips

- I find it helpful to adjust the side mirrors down so you can see how close your wheels are to the curb

- Remember to indicate left 

- You have a 6 – 7 meter leeway behind the parked car apparently so just take your time reversing and turning don’t need to cut it tight as if you’re parking between two cars

- 30 cm from the curb is a pass 

- Don’t forget to fix your side mirrors before pulling out again

3-point turn tips

- Indicate left when going to the left first then indicate right when you are making the first turn. Just don’t forget to indicate appropriately at each step

- Don’t be rushed by cars waiting for you, extra few seconds of patience won’t kill them, just keep executing calmly

- Don’t forget to shift your gears back to driving after reversing so you don’t jerk backward and like an idiot when trying to go forward again (I totally didn’t do this during my test, I don’t know what you’re talking about ¬_¬ )

- You usually have more space than you think, don’t risk hitting the curb

Phase 2

You go onto a highway and a bunch of lane changes before heading back to the test centre to discover your fate.

- Careful when pulling off of the curb, rear-view, side mirror + head check (honestly, I do random head checks and rear-view mirror checks all the time just to be safe)

- When driving on a highway, be careful not to speed but also not to be too slow as to obstruct traffic, I drove about 5 km/h below speed limit

- You will be asked to change lanes 2 – 3 times while on the highway, remember to do an obvious head-check and maintain your speed while changing lanes

- You drive back to the test centre but don’t relax yet! drive to the limit and still check all the mirrors when turning

- They ask you to just park anywhere in the learners’ section, diving in head-first is fine, they don’t seem to care as long as you get into the lines, backing out to adjust is fine.

- Pull the brakes, parking gear, turn off the engine and lock your car. Follow them back into the test centre.

- Give your parent/instructor a smile or cringe on the way in (depending on how you think you went) and just wait for the assessor to call you up to the window for the results.

- Celebrate or cry accordingly : p 

 

Tips

- Rules of thumb for judging speed limits

o Quiet streets and courts = 30 – 40 km/h

o Single lane = 50 km/h – sometimes 40 in a school zone

o Double lanes = 60 km/h

o Triple lanes = 70 km/h 

- Whenever the assessor tells you to make a turn, indicate and check the rear-view mirror – they will be looking at your face to see if you do – then slow down and turn

- When asked to change lanes: indicate, check the rear-view mirror, side mirror and do a head check before moving across.

- Always keep speed 3 – 5 km/h below the speed limit to prevent speeding accidentally, brake a little after a downward slope if needed.

- Check the rear-view mirror whenever you: slow down to make any turn, changing lanes, when just driving straight for a while every 20 seconds or so.

- Do not rush a turn, you are graded based on being safe not being fast. Wait patiently for traffic and only turn when there is a sizable gap. 

- Keep a safe distance from the car ahead of you, 2- 3 second gap between you and front car when driving and I stop just before their wheel disappears in my view at traffic lights.

- At stop signs: stop completely and count to yourself 3 seconds when there is a stop sign regardless of whether the road is clear.

- Be obvious when you are about to stop, slow down gradually when going into slip lane and don’t scare the assessor by stopping just before (I made my assessor yell “STOP!!”lol, but he didn’t hold it against me).

Mindset

- Don’t rush, you paid for their time, wait longer if need be at turns and always play it safe.

- Don’t let other cars influence your pace when doing a 3-point turn or parking, they will wait for you. Just execute with patience and precision.

- Remember, this is a test of whether you can drive safely, don’t stress too much even if you miss a turn, turn into the wrong lane of out three, or run into an expected situation. It’s not about following their instruction to the very T, just make sure you are prioritising safety.

- Therefore, I wouldn’t stress about trivial details that comes down to personal preference like how fast should I accelerate? How tight should I cut a turn? What exact speed should I go over a speed bump? Etc.

- Poised, cautious and in-control, that is the mindset I’d strive to maintain throughout the test.

- After getting your Ps, it is easy to become complacent and get a dangerous dose of overconfidence, I know I certainly felt it. So, it is important to remind yourself to always treat driving with a healthy level of fear and understand that you are not magically more competent than you were a few days ago just because you passed a driving test. Keep a beginner’s mindset, stay safe and enjoy.