Ever seen someone driving a manual transmission who probably shouldn't have?
- Thread starter y_p_w
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Yes I see it all the time. Let me count the ways. Stopped at a red light on an uphill incline and slipping the clutch to hold the vehicle. Slipping the clutch with every gear change. Hitting redline in every gear as part of "normal" driving. Pressing the clutch when at speed and approaching a stop, instead of letting the engine compression help slow the vehicle. Etc, etc.
12 years or so ago saw a young Asian girl trying to reverse from a parking stall outside a mall, there were clouds of smoke and burned clutch smell coming from her new Lambo...
When I lived in Tokyo I saw multiple exotics everyday. Most would navigate the extremely narrow/tricky streets in the things admirably, but once I witnessed an older gentleman in a beautiful white Testarossa lurch, skip, and clutch ride his way through a solid 200-300 meters of stoplights. I was smoking a cigarette with a coworker at the time and the cig was burnt nearly all the way down by the time he made it down the street.
You're right a manual isn't for everyone. When I let out the clutch, the revs are the bare'est tick above idle (most of the time, "Grandma" starts)... I swear the clutch is fully let out at a person's walking speed. And if I wear out a clutch before the throw-out bearing buys the biscuit or the main seal pollutes the clutch disk, well, then I'm being too hard on the clutch. I've actually never worn out a clutch (but of course this depends on miles driven and how aggressively [competition use?] the car is driven...). Shifting gears, that's a whole other subject... and just like you, Eco, I double de-clutch down most times (and sometimes up, too). If it doesn't shift like velvet, or if I encounter synchro double-bump (much) I'm doing something wrong.
I wish one of my two adult (35 y.o. +) daughters were interested... Oh well, it's a dying kind of thing. Manual transmissions, conceptually, are off-the-ark technology. Who ever thinks that interrupting the continuity and smoothness of the car's acceleration to shift gears is a reasonable and modern thing to do in a car...
Still it's enjoyable, and I think most of the time it makes me a less aggressive driver.
Are you joking? 75 percent of Europe's habitants are sitting in cars with manual transmissions
which they aren't able to operate.
Owning a manual doesn't mean you're a virtuoso. 
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Probably very true. 'Lotsa "mechanically unsympathetic" folks out there. The reason (and I know I'm 'way too picky) that I don't generally go out of my way to buy a used manual transmission car... I've seen videos made, say, in one case of an air-cooled P-car where the guy showed no sense that his shifts ought to at least recognize that there is a neutral position between gears. It was first gear then right away second gear... and the guy was NOT driving aggressively. If you don't caress that shift lever with no more than two fingers on a pull towards you or a palm away from you - at least in the case of most modern, light-duty gearboxes - you are doing it wrong (in my opinion). It has to want to execute the shift, not be forced to.Are you joking? 75 percent of Europe's habitants are sitting in cars with manual transmissions
which they aren't able to operate.
.
I let an Italian coworker drive my car (‘95 Integra GS-R) during lunch once. He was slamming the gears and using excessive gas between shifts.
My 2004 WRX is old school. But I’ve test driven a few newer manuals and there’s the gear indicator and some even have automatic rev matching.
Of course some think of a light clutch with synchronized gears as cheating.
What an idiot your co-worker is/was. What gives him/(her?) license to abuse your car- and your kindness in allowing them to drive. 'Boy I don't like that
.I also do 2 finger shifts. I describe it as wishing the lever into the next gear.
I know how to shift aggressively too. I just hardly ever do it.
In 50 odd years of driving I've only ever replaced one clutch. And that was when the linkage broke on my Volvo 740 Turbo 4MT+OD. The Volvo specialty shop said it didn't really have to be replaced but "while they were there anyway" they replaced the clutch disc (and maybe the pressure plate too - don't really remember).
I had a neighbor with a 911 that only shifted to a higher gear when he hit the redline on the tach. I asked about that and he smirked and said, “A 911 owner would know that’s the way to drive a performance car”.
My sister studied dance of all kinds growing up…she is the smoothest manual driver I have ever known. It is a dance of timing and rhythm and she does it SO well.
My sister studied dance of all kinds growing up…she is the smoothest manual driver I have ever known. It is a dance of timing and rhythm and she does it SO well.
And smooth can be very fast.
I've heard of Formula 1 drivers being as being smooth. For one thing their car is more likely to last the race with a smooth driver.
But to be able to be fast and not abusive, at least with the reconnection of the powertrain after the shift is made, the flywheel has to be ultralight and the revs as a result fall really fast. Also, those manually shifted 'boxes in competition cars tend to be "dog-boxes", i.e. non-synchronized dog-engagement teeth, motorcycle-like, boxes that go "clunk" when you shift, but are tough and durable... no fine synchro spline teeth.
Corvette and the F-Bodies (Camaro/Firebird) both had this starting with the LT1 engines, its called CAGS (Computer Assisted Gear Shift). Had it on my 94, it was one of the first things I disabled in the PCM when I started tuning. It was purely for fuel economy standards, it was almost useless in real operation. Most people disabled it with a hardware module or in the computer with via tuning, otherwise you would have to shift down into 4th, then go back to 2nd when driving normally. Or you could just drive with a heavy foot everywhere if you really wanted to.
As far as people who shouldn't drive manuals, tried to teach a friend years ago to drive a stick with my 94 Z28. By this point it was already a fairly heavily modded car with even more HP/TQ than the factory originally had. Got him started in a parking lot, explained how the clutch works and showed him the basics of starting and stopping before letting him take over. First thing he does is just let off the clutch and the car lurches forward, killing the engine. After about 4-5 more tries he finally manages to understand that that the clutch isn't a brake that you just step off of. He could somewhat get started but he was always pulling the clutch up too much and not letting it out slow enough. Mind you, this car would start off in 2nd gear with little issue if you just let the clutch up slowly so it could get started. It was mostly a waste of time as he could barely stop either, for some reason pushing down on the clutch while stopping wasn't something he understood either.
Fast forward a few months and he wants to replace his V6 Mustang with a V8 manual one. I told him he should really look at an auto but he wanted a stick for some reason. He couldn't afford it anyway but they let him take it home to try to rope him in. It was the day before my birthday and we all went out that night, I was so drunk by the end of the night I had to get a ride home. He offers me a ride and I get in, him trying to get this manual Mustang going with very little success. I told him even as drunk as I was I could drive the thing better than him. He finally managed to get me to my house before he drove off, stalling it the whole way up the road as he left. I felt bad for whoever bought that thing after he took it back to the dealer.
I’ve heard Lewis Hamilton saying that he wished that F1 would go back to a real manual transmission.
Hamilton longs for lighter cars, V12s and stick shifts
Lewis Hamilton is not convinced the regulations proposed for 2017 will solve what he sees as the main issue with current F1 cars: weight.
We just don't have anything like that over here in the States. We probably should but there are so few manuals anymore that is really doesn't matter much these days. Unless you are specifically looking for a manual transmission, you probably won't find one. I was looking around to possibly add a newer Camaro to my collection last year and I could only find 2 6 speed manuals in my area to look at. It is always funny when the dealer asks you if you can drive a stick. Each time I was driving my 94 Z28 with the manual when I went to look and just pointed to her and said "What do you think that is?" and laughed. But I'm sure they get plenty of idiots that have no idea how to drive one in there to look at them and can't get them out of the lot like my old friend did with that Mustang.
They don’t need to worry about that any more. Their clutches are pretty much electronically controlled, although with an override that’s not used at speed.
im just a teenager and haven't driven a manual much. its not hard. i still dump the clutch a little early sometimes (cars rolling so I don't slip the clutch enough to smoothly take off) once the cars rolling you just have to smoothly let off the clutch every shift and no problems. i don't know how to double clutch and haven't rev matched any dounshifts but I've only had an hour of experience in a manual car. motorcycles are easier to drive with the wet clutch (more forgiving and less grabby) and the quick rev changes and light vehicle. I've replaced a few clutches in other people's cars, one had a bad pilot bushings and the other one was getting a fresh engine so we did the clutch just because.
