Driving - Manual Vs Automatic

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I've been driving manuals as my daily drivers for 10 years now, and I'm on my third manual car.

Like most Americans, I learned to drive in an automatic. I was 12, my uncle was 16, and he was drunk after we'd been hanging out with his friends. He told me I had to drive. My driving lesson was "See the stick on the right of the steering wheel? Pull it until it points to the D with the circle around it. The pedal on the right makes you go, the one on the left makes you stop." And thus, I learned to drive in a 1985 GMC Jimmy, and I didn't kill us or anyone else! (Once I figured out how much pressure the pedals needed it was easy.)

In 2005, the beat-to-hell Buick Rivieria I had bought off a friend for $400 finally gave up. I had little money, and I needed a car. A guy I climbed with had a 1998 Mercury Mystique (Ford Contour twin, same idea as the first Ford Mondeo in Europe) with a V6 and a five-speed. Trouble was, like every other Contour/Mystique ever made with a manual, it had a bad synchro on third gear. But, he was willing to sell it to me cheap, as in the next-best car I could find for the same money was a 1992 Chrysler with 255,000 miles on it cheap!

So, I went to look at the car. Aside from the third-gear synchro being trashed, it was a beautiful car-loaded with options, body only had a couple of minor dings and no rust, had 111,000 miles on it. He was a Ford engineer, so he explained how a manual works (as in what was actually happening when I pushed the clutch and changed gears and released the clutch), then we took a ride around his subdivision. After a couple goes at it, I got a bit of a feel for what I was meant to be doing, and I figured I could do it. I gave him money, drove the car away, had a scare when I couldn't figure out Reverse (that car had the Ford lockout where you have to do a modified golf-grip and pull up on the boot), and eventually made it home.

Within a week I'd fallen in love. By the time I traded it I'd gotten to the point I could shift that car without the clutch (and even use third gear!). I wound up getting a manual Honda Element, drove that for 144,000 miles, and now I'm driving a Ford Fiesta ST.
 
How do you float gears? I tried in my Jeep going up and I couldn't get it into gear and I'm too scared to try going down.
 
For my job tomorrow i'm driving a 26ton Mercedes rigid truck 8 speed split manual
 
I wish I could drive standard but most cars are automatic now so I doubt I'll ever learn
 
paddedrunner said:
I wish I could drive standard but most cars are automatic now so I doubt I'll ever learn
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Buy an old car or move to Europe
I've been driving since 1991 but the first Auto i drove was in 2001 and that was a 20ton Dust cart lorry
 
Experiment626 said:
How do you float gears? I tried in my Jeep going up and I couldn't get it into gear and I'm too scared to try going down.
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It takes the right combination of a easy clutch spring, getting the RPMs pretty much dead-on where they need to be, and a willingness to potentially hear the grunt of metal and metal. Getting out of gear without the clutch is easy. That just involves applying the amount of throttle that keeps the car going, but not gaining or losing speed. It might take slightly easing off when you go to do it, but a gentle but quick flick of the shifter will usually be enough to overcome the clutch spring and pop it out of gear.

Going into gear is a lot trickier. It involves knowing how many RPM the engine will run at in whichever gear you're about to choose at whatever speed you're traveling, getting the engine to that speed, then giving the shifter a quick shove. Get it right and it'll pop into gear. Get it wrong and you'll hear some nasty noises. Get it close and you'll get a grunt on the way into gear.

Also, some good advice I got when I was learning to drive manual was to treat the shifter like it is made of glass. This is good advice anyway, but when trying to do stuff like float in or out of gear without a clutch it's especially important. Mashing the thing around like a hamfisted idiot is just going to wear things out or break them.


And just for full disclosure, it's been awhile since I've done it. When I had the Mystique, the transmission already had issues, so it didn't bother me. Once I was making a car payment, I got a lot more conservative with how I treated the thing.
 
Marka said:
I first learned to do it on a 1930's farm tractor... no synchro's there... not to mention the throttle was a stiff lever about 2-O'clock off the steering column... going down hill, I would sometimes have to apply some brake, and increase the throttle... and as stated above... light guiding pressure with the shifter... not literally gear-jamming...

Even when you're using the clutch... don't force the shifter on difficult gears... depress and partially release the clutch-pedal while applying that light guiding pressure on the stick (double-clutching)...

Happy motoring!
-Marka

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To basically reiterate what GDA is saying... you don't want the engine pushing, or the transmission dragging behind... you're matching speeds of the two to disengage the gears, which you'll have to compensate for the next gear ratio that you're intending... and that means that you'll hold the speed from gear to neutral, point the shifter to your intended gear-change position, and either speed or slow the engine. Slow it to around 200 -500 RPM less to match the up-shift like from 4th to 5th... Speed the engine maybe around 200 -500 RPM more to down-shift like from 3rd to 2nd gear... going up or down slopes will change the rate at which the vehicle accelerates of slows as gravity will fight your inertia... subsequently having to fish a bit more with the accelerator (and/or slowing with your brakes) to find your speed-point for the gear you're attempting to engage...

Happy Motoring!
-Marka
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Wow both of you explain it way way better than you tube! Once I get my car back together I'm going to practice on doing it and hopefully learn to do it.also Marka I work with a non profit for agriculture history and they have many tractors with non synchros and despite them telling me to stop for all of the shifts I learned to double clutch on their Farmall B and it's fun!
 
Marka said:
Nice, Experiment626!

I ran the 30's John Deere A & B, and another model I don't recall specifically... tricycles, all but one that had the front-loader... I was plowing with one of those bad boys when I was around 13... ... oh, and a small JD dozer... they are fun... differential braking (with metal bands), was a must for turning sharp under load... like when skidding logs around upright trees... not a thing ergonomic about them though... I think that's where I first started screwing-up my back...seriously!

I don't recall 2x-clutching on the JD's (may have helped) but, I was good at speed matching and sweet-talking the gears... I'd get like a half-second clatter as the gears found their way...

p.s. I added to my previous post... vehicle speed.

-Marka
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Those tricycles both scare the **** out of me and yet they are fun to drive especially pivoting them around! I want to drive their dozers but they don't take them out since they don't have track pads. I hope to lean a lot from them and I think I'm the youngest in their non profit. Also thanks for the additional info!
 
I as an American learned to drive on an automatic, and only knew how to drive that way for a very long time. Manual transmissions are just hard to come by over here. However a little less than a year ago I stumbled across my current car which was a manual, but also too good of a deal to pass up. So I learned. After driving it for a while autos feel strange. Like I should be shifting I should be controlling the engine more it's almost unsettling.
 
I prefer an automatic personally. When I get into a car I just want to get where I am going. The drive is just in the way and shifting is just one more thing to pay attention to.

soupy said:
a little less than a year ago I stumbled across my current car which was a manual, but also too good of a deal to pass up. So I learned. After driving it for a while autos feel strange. Like I should be shifting I should be controlling the engine more it's almost unsettling.
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My dad drives semi trucks which are predominantly manual. A few years ago, he got placed into an automatic for a few days. It just about drove him crazy. Always found himself reaching for a shifter that wasn't there. He even joked about taking a toilet plunger and putting it between the seats to have something to grab onto.
 
Maxx said:
LOL!!!! No shit, Sherlock!!!! I want to punch people who talk about work being 'fulfilling'. They're either lying or have no imagination whatsoever.
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Quite the contrary Maxx, it is using your imagination and creativity which can make work fulfilling. I was a chemical engineer and I designed and supervised the installation of equipment, control systems and so forth for a relatively small company. Seeing something that you designed efficiently produce a product is quite satisfying. Yes, there were several PIA aspects to the job - tedious safety analyses, supervising childish operators, etc., but I am now retired nearly eight years and I miss the challenges. And yes, I do realize that most jobs are uncreative and boring.

I own 5- and 6-speed Porsches, and I shudder to think of shifting w/o the clutch and what it would do to the syncros. I double clutch when I get serious. My true challenge? The reverse on the 5-speed is far right and down - where 6th is on the 6-speed and yes, I do occasionally try to put the 5-speed into "6th".
 
The best manual challenge is driving a car with a dog leg 1st , like Merc's and reverse is where 1st is (rev bang !)
 
I've driven a Seagraves fire engine (well two different ones actually). Learned how to double clutch on that one. Was useful as a few years later a friend bought an old inter-city bus turned into a camper and I had to teach him how to downshift it.

Only other bizarre thing I've driven is a self propelled high reach lift. It's actually easier to move that thing around when you have the boom all the way up vertically, but it's kind of wierd looking down from that high up as you're driving.
 
Kenn said:
Quite the contrary Maxx, it is using your imagination and creativity which can make work fulfilling. I was a chemical engineer and I designed and supervised the installation of equipment, control systems and so forth for a relatively small company. Seeing something that you designed efficiently produce a product is quite satisfying. Yes, there were several PIA aspects to the job - tedious safety analyses, supervising childish operators, etc., but I am now retired nearly eight years and I miss the challenges. And yes, I do realize that most jobs are uncreative and boring.

I own 5- and 6-speed Porsches, and I shudder to think of shifting w/o the clutch and what it would do to the syncros. I double clutch when I get serious. My true challenge? The reverse on the 5-speed is far right and down - where 6th is on the 6-speed and yes, I do occasionally try to put the 5-speed into "6th".
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I'm sure it's not the greatest thing ever, although honestly it's probably not as hard on them as would be a two or three gear jump where a novice operator makes no effort to match revs and just jams the shifter like it's no big thing. I know Subaru transmissions hate that sort of thing, as any 5th to 3rd or 3rd to 5th usually make crunchy metal noises, at least from what I've seen. Like I said, I haven't done it in any of my cars since I've had ones with good transmissions and car payments attached. The Ford MTX-75 transmission was notorious for eating synchros on 3rd (and then usually 4th as the owners would jump 3rd and not bother to let the revs fall to match), and my Mystique had already lost its 3rd by the time I got it (part of why I got an otherwise fine car for the price I did), so I didn't feel too bad learning some tricks on it.
 
parcelboy2 said:
The best manual challenge is driving a car with a dog leg 1st , like Merc's and reverse is where 1st is (rev bang !)
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ahem: Merc Sprinter, failed clutch-release and a round of deliveries and collections in The Peninnes :cool:
 
GoldDragonAurkarm said:
I'm sure it's not the greatest thing ever, although honestly it's probably not as hard on them as would be a two or three gear jump where a novice operator makes no effort to match revs and just jams the shifter like it's no big thing. I know Subaru transmissions hate that sort of thing, as any 5th to 3rd or 3rd to 5th usually make crunchy metal noises, at least from what I've seen. Like I said, I haven't done it in any of my cars since I've had ones with good transmissions and car payments attached. The Ford MTX-75 transmission was notorious for eating synchros on 3rd (and then usually 4th as the owners would jump 3rd and not bother to let the revs fall to match), and my Mystique had already lost its 3rd by the time I got it (part of why I got an otherwise fine car for the price I did), so I didn't feel too bad learning some tricks on it.
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Haha my 2003 2.5 5-speed dual range Forester with 214,000km has the synchros going on 3rd/4th. I've tried clutchless shifting but Subie trannies are notchy at the best of times and 5-4 is about the only clutchless shift my box has left in it. Although sometimes it refuses to shift 5-4 with the clutch when it's cold? IDK, either way it's my first car, I paid cash and it sees its fair share of abuse, both on and off the road... It's pretty average how Subaru stopped fitting dual-range gearboxes to their US models after the 80s GL wagons. They fitted them up until 2013 in New Zealand, to the Forester.
 
KiwiBoi said:
Haha my 2003 2.5 5-speed dual range Forester with 214,000km has the synchros going on 3rd/4th. I've tried clutchless shifting but Subie trannies are notchy at the best of times and 5-4 is about the only clutchless shift my box has left in it. Although sometimes it refuses to shift 5-4 with the clutch when it's cold? IDK, either way it's my first car, I paid cash and it sees its fair share of abuse, both on and off the road... It's pretty average how Subaru stopped fitting dual-range gearboxes to their US models after the 80s GL wagons. They fitted them up until 2013 in New Zealand, to the Forester.
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I'm sure you have, but try double-clutching instead. Match the revs yourself, clutch, give it a go.

But yeah, 'dem Subaru transmissions! So notchy!
 
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