Steering maintenance — Hawaii Permit Test
Steering maintenance on the Hawaii permit test — 2 rules, each with the reason behind it and a question on it while it is fresh.
The rules
With power steering, there should be no more than 2 inches of free play in the steering wheel, checked with the motor running.
Too much slack in the wheel means the car is slow to answer when you swerve around a hazard.
There should be no more than two inches of free play in the steering wheel, if you have power steering (check with the motor running); or 3 inches, if you do not have power steering.
Without power steering, there should be no more than 3 inches of free play in the steering wheel.
A wheel that turns a long way before the tires move makes the car wander in its lane.
There should be no more than two inches of free play in the steering wheel, if you have power steering (check with the motor running); or 3 inches, if you do not have power steering.
On the test
With power steering, what is the most free play the steering wheel should have?
2 inches. Too much slack in the wheel means the car is slow to answer when you swerve around a hazard. State of Hawaii Driver’s Manual, p.20: “There should be no more than two inches of free play in the steering wheel, if you have power steering (check with the motor running); or 3 inches, if you do not have power steering.”
How this works
Most practice tests hand you a bank of questions and leave the manual somewhere else. This one puts them together.
You read one law and the reason behind it, then answer a question on that law while it is still fresh. Get it right and you move on; get it wrong and you have found the gap while it is cheap to fix, not on the morning of the exam.
Learning one rule at a time, and proving it immediately, is what turns a manual you skimmed into something you actually know — and it makes studying feel like getting somewhere rather than like waiting to find out.
What it costs
- One payment, once — not a subscription. Nothing renews and there is nothing to cancel, for an exam you sit one time.
- Free to start: a 10-question test and the first section of cards. No sign-up and no account.
- Paying opens the rest of the cards, unlimited full-length practice tests, and retests built from exactly the questions you got wrong.
- Every level up to Prepared — 3 tests passed in a row.
- Do the work, fail the real exam, and we refund you.
Where these come from
Every rule here is checked against State of Hawaii Driver’s Manual, published by the Hawaii Department of Transportation, and against the state code itself. Last checked 2026-10-05.
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/HI.pdf (State of Hawaii Driver’s Manual, 2023, Hawaii Department of Transportation, retrieved 2026-09-14; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/HI.pages.txt (scripts/hi-text.py: PyMuPDF with the clip honored, sorted, hyphens rejoined; the fixture every citation here was cut from and verified against; sha256 pinned in SOURCES.json)
- src/assets/drivers-manuals/HI-exam.html (County of Maui, Division of Motor Vehicles & Licensing, Class 3 Instructional Permit, https://www.mauicounty.gov/1541/Class-3-Instructional-Permit, read 2026-10-05; states both exam figures; sha256 pinned under examSource)
- https://hidot.hawaii.gov/highways/library/motor-vehicle-safety-office/ (read 2026-10-05; links the manual)
- https://hidot.hawaii.gov/highways/files/2021/08/19-122-std-format.pdf (Hawaii Administrative Rules chapter 19-122, the DOT’s own copy, read 2026-10-05; §19-122-10(f)’s 80 percent agrees with the county’s figures)