Clutch Foot Positioning for MT

[extrashaky]

Originally Posted by Sony

Left foot is used for CLUTCH only in manuals and in Automatic's it is used for nothing at all.

Unless you're old enough to have driven a car with one of these:

[paulca]

Originally Posted by extrashaky

I also really don't care whether you burn up your clutch after only 60K miles. However, there are a lot of newbies on this board who are reading what we write here to basically teach themselves how to drive. Knowing that, it is irresponsible to teach them bad habits that can wear out their cars faster. "But paulca said it was okay to ride the clutch" will not help when they have to replace a throwout bearing.

1. I didn't burn up a clutch release/throwout bearing. Never needed to repair one and don't know anyone who has. 60k miles on a set of clutch plates/pressure plate assembly yes, but the car was 10 years old. "Trips" in different parts of the world are different. Miles on cars are different. No mile is the same. Do 60K miles in a city centre, all short 2 mile hops, would be a 100 times more hard on a clutch (and car) than doing 60K "highway" miles 200 hundred at a pop. The UK is small, so the average is probably about 60% urban, 40% highway time, 10 mile average per journey (probably).

The UK is hilly, lots of junctions on hills. A lot of things people "learning manual" worry about is stuff we do every day. All parking here is parallel parking or reverse bay parking, usually on a hill, even some car parks are on a hill. Our cars are tiny compared to yours, but so are are parking spaces! Lots of slipping the clutch while slow maneuvering, lots of sitting on hills at junctions on the clutch. All of these things wears clutch friction plates faster and deadens the springs. Release bearings, not so much.

2. It's not what I say, it's what I have been told and never heard a problem with it until I read forums like this. The problem you describe, blowing a throw out bearing appears to be something that rarely happens. The same applies both ways I'm not going to believe you who says hovering on the clutch pedal causes release bearing failure and I should dance my feet around on the floor, pedal, on the floor, pedal, it's daft.

It's actually hard to find any video of anyone outside of the US doing the pedal dance, TBH.

Most people in the UK and I mean most people, not petrol heads, couldn't tell you a thing about what a clutch does or what they do with it, but they will scare you sometimes with the things they will do with the clutch in precision and finesse. Every 16 year old knows how to use a clutch. Even what would otherwise be blonde bimbos can be amazingly good with a clutch, but wouldn't have the faintest idea what a release bearing was and she would probably never need it replaced.

I'd estimate that 99% of us sit with our foot on the clutch 90% of the time. I don't see any massive rushes on clutch release bearings, nor head about them.

[paulca]

Then again... this happened a few blocks from where I work.

[ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tf4TIWECZ30"]World's Worst Attempt At Parallel Parking, Enjoy! - YouTube[/ame]

[ZionsWrath]

Originally Posted by paulca

Then again... this happened a few blocks from where I work.

lmao I watched 3 minutes and I had to stop

[paulca]

But it only gets better! Especially the roaring, standing ovation she gets at the end.

[paulca]

They sell T-Shirts here for it. Seriously. It's a local University teacher/lecturer.

[markw]

Originally Posted by paulca

This is bollox. I have driven this way for 7 years, through about 100,000 miles and 3 cars. I have only had to replace or repair a clutch once and that was 60,000 miles old and it was the plates were worn not the release bearing. I was really hard on that clutch too.

You will find very people few who started driving a manual who move their foot off the clutch.

The manufacturers put the dead pedal there for a reason. 60,000 miles is less than half life for a clutch. Generally a clutch is good for 150,000 miles or so. You've been driving a manual for 7 years, I've been driving manuals for 35+ years, and repairing them for just as long. Resting your foot on the clutch will prematurely wear it which explains the shortened life of your clutch. Also resting your hand on the gear shifter preloads the shift forks and causes premature wear on the forks and syncros. They gave you a dead pedal, get your money out of it by using it.

[paulca]

Very few cars make it to 150,000 miles here. Very very few. See my point about "no mile is the same as another".

It's not that we are hard on cars, it's just that journies are typically short, urban or inter-urban jonts. Compared to a lot of America our journeys and the time we spend on highways is quite short. The bit of the world I live in, shore to shore has about 100 miles of motorway.

[markw]

Originally Posted by paulca

Very few cars make it to 150,000 miles here. Very very few. See my point about "no mile is the same as another".

It's not that we are hard on cars, it's just that journies are typically short, urban or inter-urban jonts. Compared to a lot of America our journeys and the time we spend on highways is quite short. The bit of the world I live in, shore to shore has about 100 miles of motorway.

I'm in southern California, 2 times a day the roads are turned into parking lots, we redefine stop and go traffic. Like I said, they put a dead pedal there for a reason, and that is to keep people from resting their foot on the clutch. The engineers that design this stuff know a thing or two.

[markw]

Hi/low beam switch.

Originally Posted by extrashaky

Unless you're old enough to have driven a car with one of these:

[paulca]

Lets face it, America + Motorsport.... not even on the calendar. Indicar, Nascar, LMAO! Interesting attempt, very quaint. America plus driving, not really an internationally recognized thing. Try Italy or England or Austria, FINLAND are GODS. Internationally we see American roads as long, straight, boring highways coupled with cities laid out on a grid. <Shakes head> tame, boring. Europe a different story. Heritage, pedigree, the origin of almost all sports cars including a lot of American ones and most Japanese ones.

Internationally if you asked someone, who to ask for advice on driving, no-one would offer the USA. Guaranteed.

Of course as, to you, the world exists of, "The great USA and everyone else, mostly backward nations and people who don't respect the U S of A who we bomb until they submit" then of course the world revolves around US driving. Which from an international stand point is pretty "out of the league" poor, to be honest. You very seldom do well in any international motor racing. Most of your cars are soft armchair barges with V8s that produce less than most Japanese 4 pots and polute more than twice what the jap care does. The fact some of you can drive a manual is surprising. The chances of any of your doing it properly, leaves a lot of doubt.

[DeadStar7]

Originally Posted by paulca

Have you ever had formal training in driving a manual? I expect not.

*sigh* Not that I have to justify myself to you, but when I took driving school when I was 16, I drove a standard vehicle. I've never owned an automatic. Shortly after learning to drive standard, my parents sent me to a competition racing school, which began my 10-years as a Formula car driver. I am now on to a career as a transport truck driver. I'm very well trained.

If it is really taking you so long to get from the dead pedal to the clutch pedal that you have to rest your foot over top of it, perhaps you should consider the automatic FR-S. I hear it's nice. :P

[paulca]

So you still had no formal manual training. That's what you are saying. Not on road driving a manual. In the UK your driving test requires you show how to drive a manual car safety and efficiently.

Race driving is NOT the same as how your supposed to drive safely on the road.

Even if you did do proper manual training, hovering over the clutch does no harm or negligible harm.

You are all so hyper about manual, you see it as something special, that only "good drivers" do, only sporty drivers know how to, only a petrol head thing, but over here, everyone drives a manual, nobody drives an auto. We see auto drivers as a bit special.

[extrashaky]

Originally Posted by paulca

Very few cars make it to 150,000 miles here.

And it's no wonder, if you're representative of the norm.