Originally Posted by III Corps

In the airplanes I flew (KC-135, 727, 737, 757, 767, MD-80, Airbus among them) NONE recommended that you use the tiller for control on the runway. Authority on the rudder pedals was 8deg either side (for some reason I remembered it as 12deg) and with the tiller it was 78deg. You can scrub a set of tires very quickly using the tiller and it MAY not be very effective in controlling the direction of the aircraft as proved by the 737 crash at LGA back in the 90s. As for the yoke, it is recommended that you keep slight forward pressure on it to ensure good nosewheel contact as speed increases on takeoff.

The 80kt call is many things... as noted, an airspeed check, the point at which one changes from low speed abort criteria (just about anything including caution lights) to high speed abort (fire, eng failure, perception the airplane will not fly) and this will include verification that the engines are fine, autothrottles/autothrust (if available) is operating correctly. Busy time...

It may vary with aircraft but I have never been in a community or on an airplane where the tiller was used as anything other than for taxiing where small radius turns were required.