Struggling to drive a stick transmission. Help
 

I have driven auto for years and now ive done 4 hours of stick driving lessons with a instructor however i am still struggling with the uphill handbrake starts and starting from 1st. ps. (I dont have a manual car to practice on)

On the up side i am good at changing gears once i am moving

Before i purchase the manuel scion frs i would like to hear experiences on how many hours it took you to drive stick by yourself?
Does it become second nature to the point you dont even think about it like an auto?

There are about a million threads on this subject already!

This one is pretty good

http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=72561

Seat time will help the most. Take the advice in the linked thread and get out on the road!

What part of NY are you in?

Take SOME of the advice and be very wary of the rest!
Seat time, seat time and MORE seat time is really the only answer!

Ok ok ok, take MY advice in that thread.

Seriously though, use your own discretion and try not to stress out too much about it the process. The point is to enjoy yourself, after all.

Like what Tcoat said..

Anyway, up-hill start is the most challenging part of driving manual.

Here's how I do it:

1. Put in neutral
2. Step on brake with left foot and release E-brake
3. Rev or give it some gas while holding on brake and in neutral
4. QUICKLY clutch-in, engage 1st gear and gas-up before the car start rolling backward! The steeper the slope the faster you need to be. Only way to be better at it is lots of practice. Find an open parking lot with a ramp or slope and do it over and over..

The only thread you need.
http://www.ft86club.com/forums/showthread.php?t=56113

Like I said MILLIONS of threads! This is probably the best though!

It does come across that way! My apologies for the wording. Just linked that one because it was most recent not the best.

don't want to start a flame here but there is certainly something that is wrong with this technique... no offense

Search the damn forum

Exactly why I said be "wary" of what people here tell you to do! Some very good info, some very bad info and some that just is confusing reading and not actually doing! A simple miss phrase can be the difference between a new MT driver starting out nice and smooth or rocketing into the back of the guy in front of them (not that the Twins and the word "rocketing" are found together much)

I am not sure if this is supposed to be serious or what it is,
but this is wrong and stupid. Or funny. Can't decide really.

Just learn how to drive and don't make a fuzz about it, that's my advice.

Erm...There's absolutely no reason to use the brake pedal when you're doing a hill start using the e-brake. Clutch in, first gear/second gear (depending on conditions), rev up, release e-brake as you clutch out. Then, drive as normal. Done. :bonk:

Your way you have to pedal dance between brake and clutch...This way, you don't. Left hand on the wheel, right hand on the e-brake, left foot on the clutch, right foot on the accelerator. No quickly jumping between controls. (Obviously if you're in an RHD it'd be left hand e-brake, right hand steering wheel, but OP is in NY so...)

Learning to drive somewhere like NY must be difficult with the hills. Makes it 5x harder than learning somewhere flat like Kansas. That said, the only thing that can help you is practice. Find an empty car lot. Do stop and starts for 1 hr.

Meh, just balance it on the engagement point, ain't that hard.

4 hours? What did this "instructor" have you doing?

Not that after 4 hours you should be an expert, but you should be able to have the basics down.

Hills will take longer, however.

If you KNOW you want a manual car, just buy it. You'll figure it out with time and practice.

Precisely what I did. Drove around my neighborhood a few days while taking my motorcycle or girlfriend's car to work, and once I was comfortable it was out on the road for real.

I have never used the ebrake on a hill start.
Maybe if I drove a stick in SF (actually drove my supra in sf briefly)
And for street driving never use the left foot for anything except the clutch.

Uphill brake start is probably the hardest move so I wouldn't be too bummed.


Handbrake and relax. You ok. Now shift into firsts and hold clutch. Relax its cool... then put your right foot on the gas just a bit maybe 2 to 2.5 k rpms. But don't worry about being exact your just giving it the gas it needs to start ahead of time. now slowly let off the clutch and as you feel the engine catch you lower the Handbrake. these steps can overlap a little, but with practice you'll get so good its second nature.


I feel sorry for anyone learning stick in san Francisco

Handbrake. Auto's have e-brakes. The hand brake is a brake used by, well, your hand. This is for when you feet are busy.

A hill start requires brakes (to secure the car), clutch and throttle. You either have to have three feet, do some fancy heel toe or do the pedal dance which is easy to screw up and not very easy to learn when learning clutch control. Or... use the hand brake. It's what it's for.

Clutch wear asides, practice, practice, practice with the clutch bite. Slow maneuvering, hill starts etc. The driving along part is easy (er).

At 30k miles with my Scion and I'm only now at the point where I'd say I'm >95% confident with my MT abilities and even then I still make mistakes and I stalled about a week or two ago.

A couple hours to learn and a lifetime to master, seat time. Also handbrake hill starts should be all you need, still takes practice it isn't easy mode to be smooth and controlled but it helps and you can always yank the handle in a panic to stop the car.

By the way, I have sympathy here. The first few vehicles I owned were auto motorbikes. Driven on a learner plate. When it came time to do my test however there was no point doing an auto-only test and be limited to autos on my license. So I took manual bike lessons. Was horrible only getting an hour at cost with an instructor to get practice. Eventually I traded my own bike in for a manual and drove and drove and drove, then went back for lessons.

The OP might consider buying a second hand clapped out old beater manual for a few hundred dollars and thrash the clutch in it.

Sorry for tripple posting, but it is much easier to learn hill starts in a FWD car. When you get the clutch right on the bite the back of the car will sit down as the front tries to pull the car and the handbrake resists. In a RWD you don't get this feedback.

If you want to get technical....neither transmission has an e-brake. The true name is a parking brake.

OP, if your just learning. Get out in a big open parking lot. And just actuate the clutch over and over. Once you learn the point where the revs drop and car starts to move (engagement point). It will be easier. After that, find a long sloping hill, aka not a 90° hill, with no traffic on it. And practice until you can't anymore.

The biggest thing is once you get onto open roads, don't get nervous and don't freak out if you DO stall. Stay calm and remember what you learned. After awhile, you won't even realize that your doing it, it becomes second nature

This. Just do it. I put in in neutral on hills and hold the brake. If you know how to finesse everything, you can get 150,000 miles or more out of a clutch. If you get 60k out of one, you don't know what you're doing. And redlining gears does not wear a clutch. I got 200k out of a 5G Prelude clutch caning it all day every day.

Number of miles on a clutch is miss-leading. If you drive on the freeway from CA to NY and back constantly you could get a LOT of miles on a clutch. Spend your time driving around San Fran in rush hour everyday doing hill starts and 60K is probably good!

Recently heard an indirect quote that Subaru say 70K for an Impreza clutch is a normal life expectancy.

learn to get used to feeling where the clutch grabs... don't need handbrake...

Yeah, that's two of us that have said this now.
Funny thing is when these people go AT is dumb but they can't drive stick properly.

More like 4000 thousand that have said it over many MANY threads!
Let this one die already!

learn to drive the stick better.
then you wont struggle anymore.

That's the best advice I've heard so so far. /s

Please avoid the trap of using your e-brake for hill starts. Learn to drive your manual properly and you'll never roll back more than an inch or two even on the steepest of hill starts.

The amount of vehicles out there with poor e-brakes that won't hold on steep hills is incredible. Chances are you will be driving quite a few of these in your lifetime.

Sorry, but coming from a country that only drives manuals (except for about 1% autos), using the handbrake on a hill IS the RIGHT way. Has been for a very, very long time. Pedal dancing IS NOT the right way and will fail a learner test OR an advanced test.

Well, hello, Jon2 ...... and welcome to .... The Forum......http://www.runemasterstudios.com/gra...mages/wave.gif

Congratulations on your decision to purchase a FR-S!

Back in the day, it was "easier" to learn how to drive a "stick".

Why? Because there weren't many cars with auto transmissions prior to 1950. So, if you wanted to drive ..... you had to learn how to manage a standard transmission and clutch.

Also, the vehicles were geared lower and the flywheels were heavier (made it easier to start off).

Don't get discouraged ...... very few engines ever got killed by stalling them; very few drivers ever died because they stalled an engine.

Like said above ...... practice .. practice .. practice.

I have been driving clutched vehicles for over 65 years, and I still stall my FR-S from time to time ...... ;)


humfrz

Countries that require a manual transmission specific license instruct you to use the handbrake to do a hill start.

http://www.learners-guide.co.uk/less...-and-stopping/
http://www.firstcar.co.uk/learning/d...es-hill-start/


Sure you can certainly set off from a hill without a handbrake (no better test than SF hills :wub:) but using the handbrake is the 'proper' way to do it.

Not to mention that holding yourself stationary by slipping the clutch is generally considered terrible practice and is probably one of most abusive things you can do to your car.

Edit: If your handbrake cannot hold your car on a hill then it is not in good repair and is a danger on the road, plain and simple. Here's a handful of results from google:
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/i...4090515AAigkJG
http://www.ehow.com/facts_7457996_te...quirement.html
http://www.corvetteactioncenter.com/...nspection.html
http://massvehiclecheck.state.ma.us/...s/11SPRING.pdf
http://www.jeepsunlimited.com/forums...rake-what-now-!

Half the vehicles in the US only have a foot operated parking brake, which would make this task impossible. Not knowing how to start on a hill without a hand brake will leave anyone in the country in very bad place eventually. I'm unsure what your country's requirements are for having a handbrake but there are none that I'm aware of in the US. Out of the three manuals that I own, only one has a handbrake.

It's actually much easier to do once you get used to it.

@humfrz You're back!

What did you own? I'm curious since I know they're out there but all four manuals I've owned had a handbrake.

My 500 Abarth has hill-assist, so I was curious and turned it on. Stalled the goddamn car because I didn't expect it to hold as long as it did . :D Turned it right back off.