Comment by hinkley
1 day ago
The problem with bench seating is not side impact but accidental steering wheel input during hard cornering. In the typical 10 and 2 hand position having your butt move makes your shoulders move, the shoulders make the hands move, and now you’re understeering. Understeering on a mountain road likely means death, and on other roads a ditch or hitting a phone pole.
Steering position has been taught as 9 and 3 for a long time now… but still fair point. You can add a bit of alcantara to the seat to help you stay in place though. My RDX has it for the sporty-ish trim and it helps.
It’s never 9 and 3 in a turn though is it. It’s more like 8 and 1. Or just 1.
It's actually more like 8 and 4 or even 7 and 5 to keep your hands and arms out of the way of the airbag
And then your problem is oversteering which puts you into oncoming traffic.
Skill issue. 100k miles on bench seats in full size sedans to full size pickups, including mountain roads, and nary a problem.
Literally survivor bias.