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    What are the advantages of sticking to your car's manufacturer's recommended servicing schedule?

    DVSA-style practice question · Safety and your Vehicle

    The answer options

    • It will reduce your road tax bill
    • Insurance will be cheaper
    • Your vehicle will be more reliableCorrect
    • You will get to your destination quicker

    Why the other options are wrong

    • “It will reduce your road tax bill” is a distractor. It does not meet the standard the question is testing, which your vehicle will be more reliable does. Picking it in the real test costs a mark you cannot get back, and with a pass mark of 43 out of 50 you only have seven to spare.
    • “Insurance will be cheaper” is a distractor. It does not meet the standard the question is testing, which your vehicle will be more reliable does. Picking it in the real test costs a mark you cannot get back, and with a pass mark of 43 out of 50 you only have seven to spare.
    • “You will get to your destination quicker” is a distractor. It does not meet the standard the question is testing, which your vehicle will be more reliable does. Picking it in the real test costs a mark you cannot get back, and with a pass mark of 43 out of 50 you only have seven to spare.

    Why that is the answer

    Regularly servicing your vehicle according to the manufacturer’s guidelines ensures key components are checked, maintained, and replaced before they fail. This keeps the engine working efficiently and makes the vehicle much more reliable, reducing the risk of unexpected breakdowns. Servicing will not lower your road tax, which is based on factors like engine size or emissions, nor will it make your journeys quicker. Good maintenance is essential for safety and vehicle longevity.

    What safety and your vehicle covers

    • · Legal minimum tread depth of 1.6mm across the central three-quarters
    • · Dashboard warning lamp colours and which mean stop immediately
    • · Braking, steering and suspension faults and how they feel
    • · Fuel economy, emissions and eco-safe driving technique

    Mistakes learners repeat on this topic

    • · Quoting 1.6mm as an all-weather safe depth rather than the legal minimum
    • · Checking tyre pressures when the tyres are hot instead of cold
    • · Treating an amber warning lamp as something to ignore
    • · Forgetting that an over-inflated tyre wears in the centre, not the edges

    Instructor tip: Learn the warning lamp colours as a traffic-light system: red stop, amber investigate, green or blue informational.

    How this comes up in the real test

    Questions from safety and your vehicle appear throughout the 50-question multiple-choice section, and the wording changes between versions. Learn the rule rather than the sentence: the DVSA can ask the same point from the opposite direction, and a memorised answer falls over the moment the phrasing moves.

    The pass mark is 43 out of 50, so seven wrong answers is your entire margin. If a whole category is shaky, run the topic practice below until you are getting every question right for the right reason, then go back to full mocks under the clock.

    Practise Safety and your VehicleSit a full mock test

    More safety and your vehicle questions

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