How one’s driving behaviour affects the state of their car

One day as he was driving to Ntinda for a meeting, Ronald Eyit recalls losing his front light. He was driving his Mercedes Benz C240 close to a commuter taxi that was ahead of him.

Driving too close
“I was merely dodging a pothole and the taxi driver had even stopped to let me drive by. Because I was very close, I ended up breaking my front light after rubbing it against the taxi bull guard. I realised later that if I had kept a reasonable distance from the taxi, maybe my light would not have broken,” Eyit recalls.
Admitting that it was his fault, something that some drivers never do, that same week, Eyit recalls parting with about Shs100,000 to have his light replaced. Not even the defensive driving skills he acquired could save his light that day.
Eyit’s experience is one of the so many bad driving habits that have left some drivers regretting. While he was lucky to spend only Shs100,000 for a new light, there are some habits that could cost you a lot more money and in some cases life.

Hitting potholes and humps
Unlike Eyit, about a month ago, Daniel Muhangi replaced the front shock absorbers of his Toyota Premio. He replaced them on recommendation of his mechanic yet they had not lasted a year on the car. He is quick to believe that because he does apply brakes when he’s driving through not-so-deep potholes, explains why his shock absorbers were replaced in a short period of time.

“I am a fast driver and sometimes I don’t care whether there’re humps on the road. One time as I was driving, I noticed that my shock absorbers were making noise whenever I hit humps. When I asked my mechanic, he advised me to change my shock absorbers before they could cause more problems,” Muhangi recalls, adding that he also at times struggled to negotiate corners before replacing the front shocks at about Shs500,000.

Driving on an almost empty tank
Edwin Kateregga, a mechanic at Kats Auto Garage at Rubaga says the commonest bad habit that affects the state of your car is driving when your fuel gauge is in the red line, which means that you are very low on fuel. While this might not be deliberate due to the need to save money, in the long run, it costs you so much than you can imagine if you drive with at least half tank.
“Every time you drive on budgeted fuel by allowing your car drive on an almost empty tank, you are subjecting your fuel pump to gradual wear and tear. When this habit is overdone, it will lead to fuel pump failure because fuel in the tank serves as the fuel pump lubricant to keep it functioning well,” Kateregga explains.

However, experts say using Shell FuelSave diesel and Shell FuelSave unleaded can help you save if you’re on a daily or weekly budgeted fuel.
Their argument is that FuelSave diesel and Shell FuelSave Unleaded are enriched with Shell active efficiency ingredients, designed to improve fuel economy from the very first fill.

Not using the handbrake
A characteristic that is shared by most, if not all vehicles is that they are manufactured with handbrakes. However, with automatic transmission cars that come labelled with “P,” which stands for parking, Kateregga says at times some drivers ignore the handbrake believing that the car can be parked firmly when the gear lever is shifted to the parking mode. This, he explains exerts excessive pressure on the brake system, which makes it weak overtime.
“Assuming your car starts moving on its own and it crushes into a ditch or a house, whom do you blame? Learn not to trust your car’s automatic brake and use the handbrake because it is stronger than the automatic brake,” Kateregga advises.

Instant braking and accelerating
Edgar Kaweesa, a mechanic at CKK Garage at Wandegeya notes that on the road, especially when you are a fast driver like Muhangi, you may get scared with an object or ditch or even a fellow motorist or cyclist and end up braking instantly. This makes you gain total control over your car but that in the long run, when done repeatedly, it wears out your brakes faster than they would have lasted. To have your brakes last a long time, Kaweesa advises driving cautiously and attentively to avoid sudden braking especially when it is raining or when you are driving on an unfamiliar road.

“The risk of you causing damage to your brake disc with instant braking becomes high if your brake pads are old. They (old brake pads) tend to create deep cracks on the brake disc which may is costly to have it resurfaced,” Kaweesa explains.

With instant accelerating, he advises stepping on the accelerator slowly until the car gains a steady or desirable speed. The demerit with instantly accelerating, Kaweesa observes is that the engine consumes a lot more fuel, thus pushing the engine to perform faster, unlike when you accelerate steadily, which creates a need to refuel shortly.

Kaweesa says other driving behaviour that affects the state of your car include taking long to have your car serviced as per your service manual, not paying attention to your dashboard lights when they appear, resting your foot on the clutch pedal which causes the clutch plate to overheat and eventually wear out and revving your car before the engine warms up, which causes undesirable changes in temperature of the engine, among others.

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