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Old 02-18-2020, 07:40 PM
 
9,694 posts, read 7,341,791 times
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i been driving a stick since 1976, that all i ever had, got to where i dont even think about it, but a stick is two hand and two feet at all time. you get it one day


only tip, only use first gear for complete stops, use second to turn corners, drop it in second before going into turns
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Old 02-18-2020, 07:44 PM
 
1,065 posts, read 768,478 times
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Default A picture is worth a thousand words.

Quote:
Originally Posted by pouringsunshine View Post
Hello Everybody,
I’m sorry to bother everybody again. I’m learning how to drive a standard transmission car and am having trouble stopping it at intersections, and whenever I have to turn left or right I completely panic and stall it. I had posted something else on here a couple of weeks ago and was told that most Americans don’t know how to drive stick so I guess if you’re European or in the minority of Americans who know how maybe you could give me some advice? I get so scared whenever I have to stop at an intersection and when I have to turn right and left and I don’t know how to fix it. My instructor tells me I have to either slow the car down and change into a lower gear without stopping the car (?? He calls it a roll and gear change), take it in the gear that I’m in if there aren’t any cars coming, or completely stop and wait until the road is clear of cars to go. But I just don’t understand how to judge what I should do each time and I feel like there isn’t enough time to judge. and I tell my instructor that maybe I should just stop each time but he tells me no so I’m just a little stressed and in need of guidance. Thank you so much.
I did a simple youtube search requesting manual transmission instruction. Shifting examples are governed by a number of variables, Engine, gearing, traffic, terrain, weather, distractions, etc, etc. Everyone has their own technique on how they prepare for a test for example. So get into your test zone or learning frame of mind and pay attention (as if your life depends on you being a good driver) which includes shifting if you own a car with a manual transmission.

Now just find one or more of these tutorials which help you to fill in the gaps in your lack of understanding of shifting a manual transmission.

Put away the phone, turn off the radio, roll up the windows so you can get audio and visual ques from the tachometer and the engine sounds. Always give driving your complete attention. Here is the link.

https://www.youtube.com/results?sear...ic&sp=CAM%253D
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Old 02-18-2020, 08:10 PM
 
Location: Los Angeles
4,488 posts, read 3,896,130 times
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I'm not a huge fan of engine braking, brake pads are WAY cheaper to replace than engines. Downshifting when you're driving at speed is fine because you can "blip" the throttle to match the RPMs. Just use the brake. As you approach an intersection, just use the brake to slow down. When you get almost stopped, just push in the clutch and brake to a stop. If you are fully stopped, shift into 1st gear so you're ready to take off again. If you're just slowing, you might shift into 2nd so you're in the correct gear for the speed you are going. Think of the clutch like an On-Off pedal for the engine. With the clutch pushed in the engine won't do anything and the car won't stall. When you're ready to move, let the clutch out and you're going again. It's hard to explain, it would help if you could drive with someone and watch them. I think of it like playing X-Box. I can run, jump, shoot and throw a grenade simultaneously, but I could never tell you which buttons I'm pushing. It's become automatic and driving a stick will become automatic for you too. Practice.
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Old 02-18-2020, 08:57 PM
 
Location: Vallejo
21,678 posts, read 24,843,652 times
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Well, how I learned was in a big parking lot. High school on a weekend with no one around or an empty mall parking lot. Start off learning the friction zone on the clutch. Practice slipping the clutch without using the gas pedal at all. Once you can get the car rolling smoothly using just the clutch, then move on to clutch and gas. Once you can take off using the clutch and gas then practice stopping.

Take off in first, shift to second, leave the car in gear and gently brake. Once you begin to feel the engine lug, depress clutch, come to stop. Shift back into first and repeat. That quickly depress the clutch while also concentrating on braking. If you just go and stop both feet in a panic, you'll just kill the engine before you can disengage the clutch.

Once you're comfortable with that, then you're ready to leave the parking lot. Trying to figure out the basics of operating a clutch plus the basics of driving at the same time on roads with traffic is higher stress, so figure out the clutch stuff in an empty parking lot where you don't need to worry about other cars.
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Old 02-18-2020, 10:17 PM
 
5,989 posts, read 6,727,967 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by pouringsunshine View Post
Hello Everybody,
I’m sorry to bother everybody again. I’m learning how to drive a standard transmission car and am having trouble stopping it at intersections, and whenever I have to turn left or right I completely panic and stall it. I had posted something else on here a couple of weeks ago and was told that most Americans don’t know how to drive stick so I guess if you’re European or in the minority of Americans who know how maybe you could give me some advice? I get so scared whenever I have to stop at an intersection and when I have to turn right and left and I don’t know how to fix it. My instructor tells me I have to either slow the car down and change into a lower gear without stopping the car (?? He calls it a roll and gear change), take it in the gear that I’m in if there aren’t any cars coming, or completely stop and wait until the road is clear of cars to go. But I just don’t understand how to judge what I should do each time and I feel like there isn’t enough time to judge. and I tell my instructor that maybe I should just stop each time but he tells me no so I’m just a little stressed and in need of guidance. Thank you so much.
Calm down. It will get easier, I promise, and eventually it will be so second nature that you can drive stick, eat and drink, make phone calls, and swat the misbehaving kids in the back seat, all at the same time. In my father's generation, substitute lighting a cigarette for the phone calls. I'm assuming you already knew how to drive, and that now you're just learning stick. If you're learning to drive, and not learning on an automatic, if at all possible, first learn on an automatic, then learn stick.

When you are approaching an intersection where you will have to stop, take foot off gas, push down the clutch, move stick into neutral, coast and brake to stop. When you want to go, push down clutch, shift into first, and apply gas and release clutch, simultaneously. I'm sure you're already learning how to gradually give gas while you gradually release the clutch.

When you need to slow to take a turn, but don't expect to stop, take foot off gas, push in the clutch, and coast/brake through the turn. If you are now moving at a slower speed, and need to speed up, shift from the higher gear to the appropriate lower gear (say you were in 3rd when approaching the turn, coast through the turn with clutch pushed down, and now you're probably moving slower, shift stick into 2nd, start to apply gas and simultaneously gently release the clutch). As you speed up, shift into higher gear.

Sometimes, even though you have slowed a bit in the turn (and you had the clutch pushed down as you coasted through the turn), you don't need to down shift, because you're still moving at the right speed for the gear you were in when you approached the turn. So you don't downshift - you just leave it in that gear, and apply gas and release the clutch simultaneously.

The thing is, you can ALWAYS just take your foot off the gas and push down the clutch, and brake, if you need to, and then shift as necessary. You could be going 60 miles an hour in 5th gear, and need to stop, and just take foot off gas, push in clutch, and coast or brake right up to the light, and then shift it out of 5th and into 1st. It doesn't matter what gear the stick is in, if you've got the clutch pushed in. That clutch is your friend. When in doubt, foot off gas and hovering over brake, and push in the clutch.

Later on, you'll learn that there are times when you will downshift while slowing down, for certain reasons. For instance, I found that in snow, it was safer to slow the car by coasting and down shifting (as long as I didn't stress the engine) instead of braking, which might put me into a skid. But for now, just foot off gas, push in clutch, and coast and brake as needed to slow to the desired appropriate speed, and then shift into appropriate gear, give gas, and simultaneously release clutch.

And to any smart tuchis who wants to criticize this, know that I have NEVER, EVER needed to replace a clutch on my standards. I routinely drove over 100K on them, and sold them, having never needed to replace a clutch, or any part of the drive train. So there.
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Old 02-19-2020, 12:45 AM
 
Location: Canterbury, United Kingdom
121 posts, read 63,104 times
Reputation: 90
Quote:
Originally Posted by nicholas_n View Post
Nah, automatics suck. I wish we had as many manual cars as you do in Europe. Keep your head up and keep practicing. The more you drive, the more comfortable you'll get driving a stick.

So...stalling. If you're stalling when coming to a stop, you're staying in gear for too long. It's a little tough to explain through text, but imagine that you're just sitting in a parking spot with your car running; you won't be in gear, and your engine will be idling at roughly 800rpm. If you start driving, and let the rpm fall below 800 any time while driving, your car will start bucking, and if the engine speed drops too far below 800rpm, it will stall regardless of what gear you're in. It stalls because the speed of the engine is too low to overcome the rotational mass of the internals. I'm not sure if that makes any sense, but hopefully it gives you some understanding of how and why an engine stalls.

To keep from stalling when coming to a stop, push the clutch in before the engine speed falls below idle (which, again, is roughly 800rpm in most cars). Ideally you'd push the clutch in at about 1,000rpm, and once you've pushed the clutch in you can shift into neutral, and once you've shifted into neutral you can let the clutch back out without the possibility of stalling.
Hello, thank you so much for the advice. Your explanation made sense to me, you’re basically saying that the car will stall if I’m going too slow for the engine? Also, I keep wanting to put it into neutral at lights and stuff but then my instructor is like “no, not neutral you have to put it into first” but then pretty much everybody else I know was taught to shift to neutral so I’m not sure what to do. I have a driving lesson in about an hour so I guess we’ll say how that one goes. Last one was a disaster, it was my maneuver lesson and I had to reverse park and also do this other thing where you reverse around a curb and I also had to drive around.
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Old 02-19-2020, 12:56 AM
 
Location: Canterbury, United Kingdom
121 posts, read 63,104 times
Reputation: 90
Quote:
Originally Posted by Malloric View Post
Well, how I learned was in a big parking lot. High school on a weekend with no one around or an empty mall parking lot. Start off learning the friction zone on the clutch. Practice slipping the clutch without using the gas pedal at all. Once you can get the car rolling smoothly using just the clutch, then move on to clutch and gas. Once you can take off using the clutch and gas then practice stopping.

Take off in first, shift to second, leave the car in gear and gently brake. Once you begin to feel the engine lug, depress clutch, come to stop. Shift back into first and repeat. That quickly depress the clutch while also concentrating on braking. If you just go and stop both feet in a panic, you'll just kill the engine before you can disengage the clutch.

Once you're comfortable with that, then you're ready to leave the parking lot. Trying to figure out the basics of operating a clutch plus the basics of driving at the same time on roads with traffic is higher stress, so figure out the clutch stuff in an empty parking lot where you don't need to worry about other cars.
Thank you so much. This was really helpful! I should probably tell my instructor to practice in an empty parking lot I’m just scared to suggest things because I wouldn’t want to undermine him haha
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Old 02-19-2020, 06:03 AM
 
2,632 posts, read 2,653,088 times
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My first car was a standard and it took me a while to really get it down. The main issue I had was breaking and stalling the car because I tried to use the clutch too late. On taking off I would barely push down the accelerator and release the clutch too fast. I think I would instinctively back off the accelerator when I felt the clutch engage, which would cause it to stall.

I learned to push the clutch in while breaking and just move the gear to wherever I needed it when I would accelerate again. I also learned to give the accelerator steady, firm pressure and smoothly release the clutch, while keeping firm pressure on the accelerator when taking off. I went from stalling out to jerky starts, but eventually learned the correct amount of pressure to give the accelerator and how slowly to release the clutch in order to get a smooth start.

Maybe I was doing it wrong, but I never did all this downshifting business. Coming up to a stop I would push the clutch and the brake pedal down at the same time. I’d move it to first gear. Then give the accelerator firm pressure and smoothly release the clutch.
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Old 02-19-2020, 06:15 AM
 
Location: Metro Washington DC
15,397 posts, read 25,669,091 times
Reputation: 10404
Quote:
Originally Posted by pouringsunshine View Post
Hello, thank you so much for the advice. Your explanation made sense to me, you’re basically saying that the car will stall if I’m going too slow for the engine? Also, I keep wanting to put it into neutral at lights and stuff but then my instructor is like “no, not neutral you have to put it into first” but then pretty much everybody else I know was taught to shift to neutral so I’m not sure what to do. I have a driving lesson in about an hour so I guess we’ll say how that one goes. Last one was a disaster, it was my maneuver lesson and I had to reverse park and also do this other thing where you reverse around a curb and I also had to drive around.
When taking lessons do what the instructor says. You can do it differently later after you have experience.

I almost always downshifted to 2nd for rolling turns. 3rd only if going faster than normal, which was almost never.

Is your instructor telling you to stay on the clutch pedal the whole time you are waiting for the green light? I mean that if the light went red and you stopped, and if it's a looooong red, does he or she say to push the clutch the whole few minutes, or shift to neutral and shift to 1st just before the green?
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Old 02-19-2020, 06:47 AM
 
Location: Grosse Ile Michigan
30,703 posts, read 79,445,266 times
Reputation: 39436
I learned to drive manual when I was 20. I had driven a tactor beofre and an old 3 on the tree truck, but just around an orchard for hte most part. (I drove the truck to the cider mill twice, but I drove very slowly).

I bought a manual 1980 (+/-2) Honda CvCC and thought I would be able to drive it right away. I got it near my house and stalled it at a stop sign. I stalled it about fifteen more times before I got out an walked three or four miles home.

After a few hours of calming down, I walked back and managed to get it home where I declared I was getting rid of it the next day (which I could not afford to do). It sat for several days with me afraid to touch it. Then I finally drove it to the end of the driveway, turned around and drove back. The next day I managed to drive it four miles into town and back and only stalled it about 11 times. The next day I drove it to work (about 15 miles) and stalled it and ground gears maybe ten or twenty times. I thought I would never learn.

At the end of the month, I was driving it 55 miles a day round trip to Detroit. I was in a car pool and the only one in our group who knew how to drive manual was a young lady just out of high school. While the others laughed at me, she gave me quiet respectful pointers. By the end of the next month, I could drive it pretty smoothly. By the end of the year, it was second nature and I was getting very good. Within two years I could drive any manual instinctively and could shift automatically and faster than an automatic.

After that I eschewed automatic transmissions and have always hated them. Some of the newer Autos are better than what you can do manually, but I still hate them. The only reason I have any automatic transmission is because my wife cannot drive one well and because some vehicles (like a 6500 pound pick up, are still a PIA to drive with a manual. Still after almost 40 years of driving manual transmissions, I occasionally grind gears or even stall a car. Anyone who says they never ever do that is either lying to themselves or they just do not drive much. It happens. It is rare and if you have some experience, do not panic and just promptly re-start the car and get under way, people behind you do not even notice. What makes it tough is the panic, embarrassment and stress you allow yourself to fall into. Learn to accept you will mess up once in a while and just deal with it rather than worrying about it. It is a good life lesson.
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