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I'll tell you what's worse than reaching for an imaginary stick shift, and that's ramming your left foot down on the brake pedal, thinking it's a clutch!
Or when I moved back to the UK and drove my wife's stick shift and forgot and just lifted my foot straight off the clutch with the car in gear at the roadside.
I think every car I've had since turning 16, except maybe one, was a manual transmission - or stick shift I'm a 'mature' female - and most of my female friends 'cannot' drive a manual transmission
All but my first car have been manual transmissions as well -- and none of my friends can drive a stick, either! Although that usually meant we didn't take my car on long road trips.
The spouse is terrible at driving a standard transmission. He doesn't have the attention span for it. We take his car on long road trips, too.
I used to drive a 85 Mustang with a 5 speed transmission, and when i became a truck driver, the first rule was to forget everything you know about stick ****. My truck had 13 gears and I had to double clutch on each one
I used to drive a 85 Mustang with a 5 speed transmission, and when i became a truck driver, the first rule was to forget everything you know about stick ****. My truck had 13 gears and I had to double clutch on each one
That was the same advice I got at the CDL school where I got my 'A' license. I had driven stick cars on and off for 30 years. They told me the same thing.
I learned to drive a truck with a 9- speed then upgraded to the Super 10. I got pretty good at "floating" the gears (shifting without the clutch) then I went to an automatic big truck. I briefly considered a job hauling industrial gases and the carrier I applied to still has Super 10's. I took a 2-day refresher to reacquaint myself with the Super 10 and to "unlearn" double-clutching, since many hazmat haulers will not let you "float" the gears. ("Must be in control of the transmision at all times" is the reason) I ultimately decided not to take the job but I enjoyed shifting again!
Last edited by Crew Chief; 03-13-2009 at 08:40 PM..
A good friends daughter got married, and they were going to leave the church in a borrowed convertible sports car, with a 5 speed.
She grew up with tractors and trucks her daddy has, his exposure to this type of thing was zero. So she had to drive away from the church, as he couldn't drive it, and even with a couple of days to learn was unable to get the knack of using a clutch. So he very sheepishly open the drivers door for her, then walked around in got in on the passenger side
Here's an anecdote to ponder: About three weeks ago my wife took her driver's test. The guy who tested her said she was only the second female in his 5 years of working there who took the test with a manual.
Being able to make the car "go" and "driving it" properly are two entirely different topics.
I saw a lot of BMW's with clutches blown out within 35,000 miles because the drivers could not use low RPM to get off the line in first gear and would slip the heck out of the clutch. Then, when they were downshifting, they didn't match the gears so the clutch got slipped a lot to make a "smooth" shift. These were the clients that I advised to forget driving a manual trans and buy an automatic trans car.
I had a fair number of clients who could drive a manual trans BMW or MB for hundreds of thousands of miles and not need a clutch. I put over 400,000 miles on a 1971 MB 220D, and it still had the original clutch ... along with a 1970 280SL with over 200,000 miles. I wish my '82 MB 300Dturbo had a manual instead of the less than durable auto trans that 'benz used for the USA market.
I recently read that almost 80% of the cars sold in America are automatic while in Europe its closer to half and half. Like most oldsters I learned to drive on stick and prefer it but it does get to be a hassle when you have a traffic light every hundred yards. Queen Elizabeth drives a stick shift Land Rover
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I'm a 'mature' 
female - and most of my female friends 'cannot' drive a manual transmission 
We take his car on long road trips, too.
