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Yes. This is why i never bought a C6 with the MN6. The new C8 Vette will have a Auto trans only. The A8 in the C7 Vettes had so much trouble that i skipped buying a C7 vette due to the AFM that caused T/C problems.
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.
IMO 14 hours is not nearly enough to get it. Practice practice practice. You can do it! Don’t give up! We let both of our kids off the hook and I regret it. The promise of a gift of my Mustang GT convertible was not enough to convince them to keep trying.
Re:rolling shift. My advice is to find an empty parking lot on a steep hill and just play with engaging the clutch-inch up their hill bit by bit. Let yourself slip down the hill in a controlled manner. Practice staying stationary on the hill without using the break. Once you can do this, rolling turns on a roundabout or just a left or right turn will be easy.
You have to listen to the engine and when it sounds unhappy, you need to put in the clutch. Either downshift, or keep the clutch pushed in, depending upon the situation.
Train your ear to the sounds of the engine, you will need to shift by ear if you are ever going to drive a stick.
You will sit at a stop light with the clutch pushed in.
I'm deaf. Can't shift by ear. I can feel it though. However, if I could feel it, it was too late to hit the clutch. I learned to step on the clutch just before the engine was going to react. The RPM guage (Tach.) was helpful, but not necessary once I figured it out.
You will sit at a stop light with the clutch pushed in.
I usually don't. I slip the car into neutral at a light. I do not want to have to hold the clutch down and risk my foot slipping, put more wear on the clutch system, etc. Often if I need a break to hold the car in place I put the parking brake on a bit instead. give my feet a rest to time to do a little foot dance if I like the music.
Incidentally for OP, it is way easier to use the emergency break for a hill start than the foot pedal brake.
Don’t give up! We let both of our kids off the hook and I regret it. The promise of a gift of my Mustang GT convertible was not enough to convince them to keep trying.
Shoot, that's how I motivated myself to learn to drive stick. I graduated college with a good job lined up, so I marched down to Ford and bought myself a brand new Mustang GT with a manual trans. I didn't test drive it. Salesman handed me the keys and I said "Nice, my first time driving stick!". His eyes went wide.
I knew the concept from riding motorcycles. I did ok. Didn't stall much but I did get nervious when i came to a hill and someone would pull up to my bumper and leave me no space to roll back. Within 3 days I was a pro. A month later I was drag racing it at the local drag strip perfecting my 3500RPM clutch dump launches and power-shifts.
That was 20 years ago. Since then I've done a lot of drag racing and autoX/road course racing with a stick-shift. My kids are 6 and 7 years old and I've already begun teaching them the art of driving a stick. Too bad they may not be able to buy a new car with a manual trans by the time they get older. It truly is a dying art.
ANd while i'm here, that's one of my biggest peeves when driving a stick. Stop on a hill, and someone behind me will stop 6" off my rear bumper.
I guess it depends on the scenario. if I pull into an intersection and I am waiting with a green light and traffic to pass before proceeding with my left turn. I come to a stop using the clutch and the brake. Once at a complete stop, I'll shift to first and wait with the clutch right at the sweet spot, but not quite moving forward. As soon as I know I have my window to turn left, I keep the clutch where it is and start feeding gas, and then come off the clutch like usual. But the trick for me is to be at the ready to turn. So I make sure I'm in the gear I want to be in but I've just disengaged the transmission by using the clutch.
If I am stopped at a light, i usually just sit in neutral with my foot on the brake until it's about time to go. Once I sense the light is about to change, I'll depress the clutch and go into first and get ready to take off. If I'm turning right (not stopping), I usually brake into the turn, depress the clutch and downshift as I come out of it to gain power.
but the thing is, i’ve been practicing for 14 hours total and i still haven’t got the hang of it. maybe i’m just an idiot because other people grasp it so much faster and I feel like I really suck. I’m never going to pass this test lol
Everyone is not capable of driving a car. Maybe you are one of them..
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.
Driving tests/instructors sometimes have stupid rules like that. In North Carolina, which is where I live, I believe that the official state driver's handbook says that you have to downshift through each gear (shift from 6th to 5th, then 5th to 4th, then 4th to 3rd, etc) when coming to a stop, which needless to say is complete bull****. Just do whatever is required to pass the course. Once you have your license and don't have an instructor in the car telling you what to do, you can go back to shifting into neutral at a stop and whatever else helps make it easier for you to drive.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LKJ1988
My tuned A6 auto in my modded 2013 C6 Vette can shift faster than anyone with a stick nick.
To be completely honest with you, I don't really care. If numbers on paper meant anything, I would have won my fantasy football league last year because I had the highest rated draft lol. I have a GTI with a six speed manual, and I can't shift as quickly as the optional DSG automatic can. But driving is boring as hell to me if the only thing I have to do is slap it into D and keep from crashing into something, and when I was carshopping a year ago, anything with an automatic was automatically removed from my list.
Last edited by nicholas_n; 02-20-2020 at 11:32 AM..
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