A Simple Way to AdjustYour Car's Rearview Mirrors

Today, I received the following email
from a man who is teaching his daughters
how to adjust their rearview mirrors:

I found your site while searching for
instructions to demonstrate to my
daughters that their dad was not
speaking garbage about their failed
mirror adjustment technique.

I had been taught the trick by an
advanced driving instructor from the
John Bowe lessons (Australian V8 super
car racing legend) I received with the
purchase of my Ford GTP (an Australian
high performance tourer).

The instructions were basically the same
but a heap simpler. After adjusting your
centre mirror correctly, pick an object
in the distance at each edge of the
panorama view provided by the centre
mirror and then adjust the external
mirrors to just include the objects chosen.

This creates a full panorama with the combined
mirrors views. There will be no blind spots either
side this will extending right to point where
vehicles appear beside you in your own peripheral
vision.

As you recommended it is worth getting used to and
the only long term adjustment is in some rare
circumstances you may need to adjust the
mirrors for reversing despite my preference to
encourage drivers to look rear ward, there can be
some instances where the additional information
afforded by slightly adjusting the mirrors could
be of benefit.

I like these instructions. In some ways, they
are better than the instructions I have in my
article:


12 Steps to
Rid Yourself of the
Blindspot in Your Sideview Mirrors


I designed my instructions for a
short field of view, such as one
might find in one's own driveway
with neighbors across the street.

However, I find the above instructions
very clear in that they give you a
sense of why you are doing what you
are doing.

Ed Abbott