Comment on Driving a manual: is it difficult?
CandleTiger@programming.dev 1 day ago
Learning to drive a stick is really easy if you have somebody to teach you well, but waaay too many people are like, “here, keep fucking up until the car doesn’t go anymore or you figure it out, whichever comes first”.
Hardest part is getting the car to start moving from stopped. Changing gears once moving, you can fuck it up a bunch and nothing much happens except funny engine noises and the owner starts making constipated-looking facial expressions. But if you fuck up starting from stopped, then you lurch around a bunch, stall the engine, and don’t go anywhere.
To get started from stopped, without horrible lurches or stalls, do like this FROM A FLAT PLACE – don’t try anything with hills until you can make the car go on the flat first:
IMPORTANT: adjust your seat so you can easily push the clutch (left pedal) in – all the way to the floor – without uncomfortable stretching
In your driveway when there’s nobody going to honk at you, start the car, put it in neutral, and practice pushing the gas pedal just enough to hold the engine at 3000 RPM or so. Not making crazy racing noises, just a nice steady “the engine is running normal-fast-ish” and hold it that way. Practice a couple times until your foot and your ear know what it feels like
Put it in gear without moving – gas off, clutch in and put the car in first gear.
Gas on, steady at 3000 RPM, slooooooowly let the clutch out until you can just barely feel the clutch is engaged. Engine revs down a little bit, car starts crawling forward. Practice that a couple times, just let the clutch out until it barely starts doing anything, then put it back in, until your foot knows what it feels like.
Now do it again, engine held at steady revs, clutch out until just barely engaged, then let the clutch out just a little bit more, so the car wants to crawl, and hold the clutch there. Car starts crawling. Keep the engine steady like you’ve been, let the car start crawling, don’t even change anything, just let the car crawl. It will slowly accelerate until you’re moving at some steady 1st-gear speed. Once it’s come up to (slow) speed you can let the clutch out the rest of the way.
Congratulations you moved a car
IMPORTANT: adjust your seat so you can easily push the clutch (left pedal) in – all the way to the floor – without uncomfortable stretching
The person of the driving school who thought me how to drive told me to push in the clutch completely, and put your seat in a way that you would have your knee bent just a tiny bit.
Successful_Try543@feddit.org 19 hours ago
Depending on the type of car, this might usually be somewhere between 1500 and 2000 RPM, 3000 RPM are more typical for a sports car.
lime@feddit.nu 18 hours ago
especially in a diesel…
gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works 16 hours ago
Overall (and this is from a lifelong manual driver), I go much more by feel than I do any particular number on the tach, under normal driving circumstances.
lime@feddit.nu 15 hours ago
i can imagine. i’ve mostly had automatics, but when i was looking for my first car one of the candidates was an old saab that only had little indicators on the speedometer for where to shift. in that situation i imagine muscle memory is created pretty quickly.
Successful_Try543@feddit.org 16 hours ago
Indeed.
sem@lemmy.blahaj.zone 18 hours ago
It’s also typical for a Honda fit