What car did you take your Driver's Test in?

[Ralph Greene]

53 Chryler Windsor in 1956. Had one of those transmissions where you took off in first gear and then let up on accelerator and it would click/clunk into the top gear. Fluidmatic I believe it was called. Had a hi and Low range. It was a tank.

[Hellcat_F6F]

'78 Buick Lesabre Custom 2 door, w/ the fearsome 301, in 1990.

[Ford Jellymoulds]

Vauxhall Viva HA not sure what year the car was.

[jpd80]

1969 Corty - Diamond white and 4 on the column.

[Roadrunner]

1987 Buick LeSabre, after training on a Aries K car....what a difference....lol

 

For better or worse?

 

What a nice big car those H-Bodies were.

[Mark8LSC CE0464]

1984 Ford Bronco II......

[Furious1Auto]

A friend of mine is teaching his daughter to drive and it got me thinking back to my driver's ed days. I took my test in my mom's '71 Vega Wagon.

 

The choice was between the Vega and my dad's '74 Chevy Laguna S-3. I figured that I would get sympathy points with the Vega. It was only 5 years old but the front fenders were mostly Bondo and most of the panels had been sprayed with touch up paint. Pennsylvania had State Troopers administer the test. The guy who got me was about 6'5" and the front passenger seat in the Vega didn't adjust. The poor guy had his knees under his chin.

 

I took the test less than a week after my 16th birthday. It all went well, I didn't run any stop signs on the closed course and completed the 3 point turn without hitting anything. As we were approaching the parallel parking stall, the right rear tire started going flat. The Trooper told me that he would pass me if I could change the tire correctly. Thankfully the spare was up and I passed.

 

One kid from my school took his test in the '76 Trans Am his parents bought him for his 16th birthday. He failed twice in the TA and finally passed in an old Cutlass.

I tested in a 1989 Ford Tempo, and did not grow up in a Ford family. In fact non of my relatives worked at Ford!

Edited December 5, 2007 by Furious1Auto

[StevenCaylor]

I remember I turned 16 on a Sunday. On Monday, I took my dad's 65 Mustang for my test. Passed with flying colors.

[pffan1990]

First of all, my local Ford dealership (Stuart Powell Ford-Mazda in Danville, Kentucky) would donate a car to my high school for driver's ed every year. At the end of that year, the car would go back to the dealership and be sold as used. Then the next year, the dealership would 'donate' another car for that year. It is a good thing because it doesn't cost the school anything at all and the dealership gets good advertisement going on and in the end, get to sell it used! Sort of a win-win-win as the students get to have a good brand-new car to learn how to drive!

 

Anyway, in driver's ed at my high school during 1995, we had a brand-new silver '95 Ford Aspire 5-door with automatic and power steering. I was a young student in that class as I was only 15 years old and the state law said I must be 16 to take a test. Well, I took my time in trying out for the test and didn't take the first test until 1998 at age 18... in another Aspire! By then, my sister bought a used red '96 Ford Aspire 3-door with automatic and sans power steering! Can you imagine trying to parallel park without power steering during the test? Anyway, I passed on the first try.

 

My case is purely coincidental! You know why? My first car I bought in 1999 at age 19 would be... a Ford Aspire! lol It was a brand-new bright red '97 Aspire 3-door with a manual! It was titled 'brand-new' since it had never been sold and had only around 50 miles on it, although it was two years old! It had 7-year/100,000-mile warranty, the tax, license, fees were included with the price and the price itself had been dropped as they were desperate to sell it! It was a good car but long story short: my vision got worse within a few years afterwards and immediately sold it right after paying it off. And the funny thing is: I still see it around town! An older guy in his 50s drive it and I can tell he really uses to work as he is always carrying boxes of things for some reason. So I'm glad that my first car is now being put to good use now. LOL!

[RaZor]

Sorry to hear about your vision situation pffan. Truly hope that some day, something can be done about it. Your post did awaken an old memory in me and that was the part about power steering. My '57 Chebby didn't have it either, as many cars of that era did not. It was not all that important to me at the time (even though the car was actually pretty heavy).

 

The key was to having the wheels moving when you started turning the steering wheel. Fortunately, they came with rather large diameter steering wheels back then which helped in the leverage department.

 

Here's one 'flash from the past' that those of the era might remember. A Fox Craft floor shifter kit. The Chebby had a 283 cid V8 and had a 3-on-the-tree shifter. However, shortly after I purchased it, I installed a Fox Crafter floor conversion kit eliminating the on-the-tree shifter. There was a trick that many guys (including me) did with the kit, which was to invert the linkage. What that did was invert the shifting pattern:

 

 

That did two things. First, it made shifting from 1st to second faster (pulling instead of pushing) with less miss-shifts (you had to be careful to get it all the way into 2nd when power shifting) and second, it put the gear shifter "out-of-the-way" whilst just cruising, which meant that one's girl friend could snuggle up even closer.

[2005Explorer]

My sisters 1986 Ford Escort EXP

[Muskrat]

1961 F-100 292 V-8, 3 on the tree. Awesome!

[Ford Jellymoulds]

[6t5frlane]

1968 Chysler Newport. A F'n land yacht !!!

[156n3rd]

1965 Plymouth Belvedere II, 4-dr. sedan, medium metallic brown, 225 Slant Six auto.

[richardmayo]

My Mom's '84 maroon Ford Thunderbird

 

[markfnc]

I learned to drive in a 1975 Buick Estate Wagon. Try and parallel park that! Actually took the test in drivers ed edition 1980 Chevy Malibu Classic.

[8A4RE]

I learned how to drive in a 1978 Chevy Corvette Silver Anniversary Edition, and took my test in an 1981 Mercedes Benz 380 SL convertible, my old man had some cool cars.

[Mark B. Morrow]

I learned how to drive in a 1978 Chevy Corvette Silver Anniversary Edition, and took my test in an 1981 Mercedes Benz 380 SL convertible, my old man had some cool cars.

 

 

I remember the first Vette I drove, a '68 427 convertible. I couldn't tell where the front ended on it and I was terrified to try and park it.

[Traveler]

I got my learner's permit when I was about 15.5 years old. I learned to drive in the Driver's Ed Chevy Citation. My folks had a Ranchero, LTD and a Chevy Celebrity. When I went to get my license at 16, I drove the Celebrity. This was in '87.