What is a handbrake turn?

What’s a handbrake turn?

A handbrake, or to give it the official name in the UK, parking brake, is the thing in the middle of your car*, that is not the gearstick or where you put your drinks so that you can knock them over later on.

The renaming to ‘parking brake’ is to differentiate it from the footbrake. The footbrake works on all four wheels, although it mostly works on the front as that is how physics does things. As you brake the weight of the car and everything in it shifts forward meaning that the front wheels have to do more of the slowing work. That is why some cars have much better brakes on the front than the back. You are learning some science, right here!

We will look at brake types another time. I know that’s some excitement to look forward to, isn’t it? Got to tease the good stuff to keep bringing you back.

The footbrake is there to slow and stop the car. The handbrake is there to secure the car when it **has stopped**. It almost always works only on the back wheels so straight away you can see that if most of the inertia of the moving vehicle goes forward it would be of little use to stop the vehicle.

I get it Trev, it works on the back wheels. Why are you telling me this? I can hear you mumble loudly to yourself as your mind wanders to when you can justifiably go and get yourself another biscuit. Well, let me explain.

Not the biscuit bit, the handbrake bit.

Remember the previous post on oversteer?

If you want the car to oversteer deliberately, presumably because you have a rich relative who is massive in the tyre industry or some such, you can engage the handbrake.

When a brake is applied and the grip of the tyre fails you get skidding. Basically, the wheels lock up and stay still while the car is still moving. This means that the rubber surface of the tyre is scraping along the road. Normally a bad thing, but if you are steering and engage the handbrake you will almost certainly lock up the back wheels and they will break traction and slide round. This will mean that you will suddenly find yourself looking out of the side window, not the front one.

If you want to try this make sure that you do it in a safe area, preferably with no one else about. Maybe with an accident response team on standby too. I would strongly suggest that you look out a professional to help you if you decide you want to try this. If you do feel you want to give it a go it might be worth waiting for a wet day.

**WHY? I WANT TO TRY HURTLING SIDEWAYS TO MY POSSIBLE DEATH IN NICE WEATHER THANKS TREV!**

If you try this in the wet then the road will be slippier it is therefore much easier to break the adhesion between the tyre and the road. You don’t see bone dry skid pans, do you? A soggy road ironically makes it more safe to try a handbrake turn. You can be going slower when you try it, so there is less chance of a massive cock up and you ending up on the local news.

To try it simply start to steer left or right, depending on your surroundings, and then gently start to pull the handbrake up with the button on it depressed. You will start to feel the back wheels scrabble for traction and then slide around. Do not just apply loads of handbrake as you will lose control, also make sure that you depress the handbrake button. If you don’t the handbrake will lock on and if you want to control the slide (and you do) you do not want that. That’s like trying to walk and then someone suddenly and unexpectedly ties your legs together. It will end badly.

If your car has an electronic style handbrake do not try this at all. Electronic handbrakes are on or off, there is no graduation in how they are applied. If you do that with an electric handbrake you will be facing the way you came very quickly. If you are lucky.

N.B. Electric handbrakes are a work of evil. I will take no discussion on this matter. I have a long list of modern car “improvements” that really are not. Feel free to ask me about these if you are having trouble sleeping.

While I have you here let’s talk about using the handbrake for what it is actually for. When you are stationary at a junction pop your handbrake on. It will help with you moving off if it is on an incline. You cannot roll back towards the startled driver behind you if you have the car secured. Another great thing about it is this: Imagine if you will, that you are stationary at a junction again. You can use the last time you thought about that if it helps.

You are minding your own business and a car hits you from behind. Now I am not saying that having your handbrake on will immediately make things better. What it does mean though is you are much less likely to roll forwards into traffic that is potentially coming at speed. If you are sat there on the clutch you will be shot forwards like a cork out of a surprised cat’s bum.

This means a potentially bigger accident (The holding on the clutch, not the cat’s bum. Please try and focus.) Anyway holding the car on the clutch is bad for the clutch too. So unless you are only going to be there very briefly do not do it. Put your parking brake on and feel a smug warmth that only emanates from being safe and correct. Not a warmth from a burnt out clutch. Terrible smell, it’s like someone decided to boil a pan of cauliflower dry.

It’s a lovely view from here, all of the way up on the moral high ground. Please feel free to join me as we judge other drivers who roll angrily backwards and forwards like baboons with an itchy backside. This episode is very heavy on the butt allusions, do you remember I said that the handbrake works on the REAR wheels? It’s almost like I planned it.

I didn’t, but it is almost like it.

When you are putting the handbrake on, press the button and then let go when you have it at the height that you want. Again it is better for the car that way.

Hope this explains handbrakes and their use in turning to you. If you have any questions about driving, pop them into the comments or email me and I may write a piece explaining it. Or I might just wave and say hello.

* Unless you are a Mercedes driver, in which case you will find it under your foot. Oddly