Starting off in 1st gear

[litemup]

Originally Posted by DeadStar7

...there totally is. Don't ever do that.

<sigh> it's true.

[DeadStar7]

Originally Posted by chrisl

No, there isn't. Using the handbrake to prevent yourself from rolling back on a hill is perfectly fine, and it's way easier on your clutch than trying to slip it a bunch to not roll back. Sure, once you get good enough with a stick, you'll just about never want to use the handbrake for starts, but there's no reason to abuse the clutch while learning.

That's ridiculous. No one is big enough of a n00b to actually do this. Just find the friction point to avoid rolling back. Very easy. Not so good for your clutch, but better than looking like an idiot while you are still learning.

[aristo]

not sure if this guy is trolling or not LOL

[litemup]

Originally Posted by aristo

not sure if this guy is trolling or not LOL

yeah, but he's from the falls so it's cool.

[paulca]

Originally Posted by DeadStar7

That's ridiculous. No one is big enough of a n00b to actually do this. Just find the friction point to avoid rolling back. Very easy. Not so good for your clutch, but better than looking like an idiot while you are still learning.

I think you must be trolling. It's one of the things the hand brake is for and if you had learnt to drive "stick" properly with proper training, you'd have been taught to secure the car with the foot brake, apply the hand brake, then worry about getting the car settled on the clutch before dropping the hand brake to move off. It's just safe, let alone easy on you and easy on the clutch. We aren't trading "I'm cooler than you", we are trying to learn/teach how to drive properly. You find me a proper manual driving test that doesn't teach/assess this use of the hand brake.

Sure you can transfer from foot brake to clutch/throttle, but it's easy to mess up. It can be as simple as over-reving or stalling, but it can be as bad as lurching forward into the car in front or rolling back into the car behind.

Being honest, it depends on the hill for me. If it's a slight grade and I find myself on the foot brake alone, then I will probably bite the clutch to get the revs to just start to drop, then quickly transfer to a little accelerator and balance the clutch to catch the roll back, but you WILL roll back an inch or two. On a steep hill I won't even try I will start from the hand brake. I don't care if you think it's uncool, it's correct/safe driving.

To be honest, like most people here, unless I'm going to be stopped for a while, like the traffic lights have just gone red, I will get off the brake with enough momentum to roll to a halt and "catch" the car on the clutch as it stops and sit hill holding for a while. Depends on how long the wait. Sure it wears the clutch faster, but clutches aren't that expensive and will still last many many years.

In driving tests here they give you the "Gold watch test", they don't literally get out and put a gold watch under the back wheel, but you are to imagine they did.

When I come up behind someone at a stoppage on a hill and they have their brake lights on, I always stop a good distance back cause I know they will roll back and invariably they do, a good driver will only roll back an inch, but I have had cars roll back quite a bit and was glad of stopping with a good 6 foot gap!

There are several junctions on hills in my home town, some of them very steep, where pedestrians will cross between the cars. Having a young mother with a baby in buggy/pram crossing behind your car while you are trying to move off focuses your attention. Rolling back into a mother and child and crushing them between two cars is... unthinkable. I don't give a hoot if you think it's cool. Hill starts should be from clutch hold or handbrake.

[paulca]

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@54.65..._yEARPeaiA!2e0

This is probably the worst hill start I know all too well. That hill is a lot steeper than it looks. It's two lanes, one for right, one for straight on and left, onto a busy roundabout. Nobody ever lets you out and when cars do get out they get out in ones and twos, so sitting in the queue on the hill you are constantly stopping, then advancing 6 feet, stopping and repeating until it's your turn. It's also very slippy and easy to wheel spin, especially over the shiny iron access covers.

To make matters worse, to the right as you come up the hill is the main railway/bus station and to the left is the Main St. At busy times there is a constant flow of pedestrians, walking, running or pushing prams and buggies across where the dropped kerbs are or anywhere they please really. Definately a place to either hill hold from the start or use the handbrake.

[paulca]

OP: Don't take this patronizingly, I gather your are far more experienced than this girl, she hasn't driven anything before this video, but it's an interesting watch: [ame="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_tEmVy2pak"]Claire's 1st driving lesson - 1 Getting moving - YouTube[/ame] The "getting away" starts about 25:00

[Ubersuber]

Originally Posted by DeadStar7

...there totally is. Don't ever do that.

Assuming you are serious you are seriously mistaken.

Using the handbrake to hold the car while you engage first gear to get going up an incline is an important driving skill quite tricky to learn.

This is why Subaru fits "hill holder" to their manual clutches on their other models.

Just try to parallel park by reversing uphill into the space in say Vancouver or San Francisco. If you don't know how to do this important driving skill you cannot do this. On any hill steep enough to allow the car to roll backwards when transferring from foot brake to clutch it is essential you should know how to do this. Amazingly, you need not demonstrate this skill to get a drivers license in North America. In other countries you must know how to do this to be considered a competent driver.

As for the issue of slipping the clutch while starting off well that is the only reason the car has a friction type clutch. It is designed to slip only when starting off. When shifting while driving the clutch should be regarded as more of an on/off switch. Clutch wear is caused by heat which in turn is caused by the relative speed of the engine and the transmission and the time the clutch is slipping. Clutch linings are much like brake linings and designed to be heated up without much wear. Overheat them though and the linings glaze over and you have no clutch even though plenty of lining remains. Smell toast burning? STOP slipping the clutch immediately.

If you intend a quick getaway you need higher revs but you should engage the clutch as firmly as possible. If you break traction at the rear wheels you have engaged the clutch too quickly (unless you intended to spin the wheels of course but that is another technique). If you are not in a hurry then 2,000 rpm or so is plenty and engaging the clutch more slowly is the key to a smooth start.

Most automatics start off in second gear these days for economy reasons, you need to floor the gas pedal to get the transmission into first on take off. It is perfectly feasible and permissible to start a manual transmission car in second gear if you are reasonably skilled at doing so. The problems are excessive clutch wear if you use high rpm to compensate for lack of skill and the risk of bogging the engine down to rpm low enough to strain it. Generally speaking the engine won't take much load at less than around 1,500 rpm. Moving off from a stationary position takes a fair amount of torque. Small engines especially need rpm to start the car moving. Higher rpm doesn't work well if starting off in second gear so the usual technique is to slip the clutch for longer. Personally, I wouldn't do this routinely because there really is no reason to do so, but it can be done and is done frequently enough to be acceptable as an advanced driving technique. I occasionally resort to using 2 nd gear starts in very slippery conditions for example as it is much easier to control torque delivery by slipping the clutch than using the gas pedal. The trick to avoiding overheating the clutch is to use the lowest rpm the engine will tolerate and still pull. Obviously in slippery conditions the clutch can break the rear wheels loose even when slipping. Low rpm compensates for longer slip time.

This car has a tricky clutch (as does the Impreza this car is based on) because the pedal action is too soft and the clutch bite point too low relative to the top of the pedal travel. I highly recommend adjusting the pedal free play and clutch bite point so that the clutch engages when the pedal is a bit closer to the floor. About one half inch can be taken out of the total pedal travel without endangering the clutch.

The clutch pedal action is so bad that long time experienced manual transmission drivers routinely stall the engine when first driving this car. I have maybe 500,000 miles of driving manual transmission cars and still took about three weeks to get used to this clutch pedal action. Then I gave up and had the pedal adjusted and it is now much more normal and easier to operate.

[paulca]

I stalled mine the first time in the dealers forecourt. Asides the clutch being very low to the floor it has virtually no "idle pull".

[DarkSunrise]

If you want to start in 1st with minimal slip/RPMs:

- From a stop and with the transmission in 1st, practice quickly bringing the clutch out to just before engagement point. (Releasing the clutch even 0.5" more should make the RPMs drop immediately.) Do this repeatedly until you have this exact point down cold.

- The next time the light turns green on the street, you should quickly bring the clutch out to this point with your right foot still on the brake. Then simultaneously release the brakes, press the gas and release the clutch the last 0.5" to engagement point. If you do this right, the clutch should engage just as the tach hits 1000-1200 RPM. Slowly release the clutch from here and drive away.

- You can also use this for hill starts. The car should not roll backwards at all if your timing is correct.

[Jyn]

Originally Posted by DarkSunrise

- The next time the light turns green on the street, you should quickly bring the clutch out to this point with your right foot still on the brake. Then simultaneously release the brakes, press the gas and release the clutch the last 0.5" to engagement point. If you do this right, the clutch should engage just as the tach hits 1000-1200 RPM. Slowly release the clutch from here and drive away.

I started lol'ing at my desk because of the mental image of me trying this on the street. I'd lurch so hard into the intersection that I'd probably just do the awkward Napoleon Dynamite runaway

[DarkSunrise]

Originally Posted by Jyn

I started lol'ing at my desk because of the mental image of me trying this on the street. I'd lurch so hard into the intersection that I'd probably just do the awkward Napoleon Dynamite runaway

Haha it sounds much harder when I try to explain it in writing. But it's not too difficult in person. All I'm saying is bring the clutch out to 0.5" before the engagement point while your foot is still on the brake. Everything else is normal.

Leaving only 0.5" before the engagement point helps minimize the guesswork in finding it.

Try it in an empty parking lot a few times. Doesn't hurt right?

[Phantobe]

Originally Posted by DarkSunrise

If you want to start in 1st with minimal slip/RPMs:

- From a stop and with the transmission in 1st, practice quickly bringing the clutch out to just before engagement point. (Releasing the clutch even 0.5" more should make the RPMs drop immediately.) Do this repeatedly until you have this exact point down cold.

- The next time the light turns green on the street, you should quickly bring the clutch out to this point with your right foot still on the brake. Then simultaneously release the brakes, press the gas and release the clutch the last 0.5" to engagement point. If you do this right, the clutch should engage just as the tach hits 1000-1200 RPM. Slowly release the clutch from here and drive away.

- You can also use this for hill starts. The car should not roll backwards at all if your timing is correct.

I will literally practice this haha.

So the idea with Hills is to hit the friction point as soon as possible to prevent rollback, right? I've been getting better at Hills still just a bit of a nervous thing with the car behind me, trying to just forget about it.

[DarkSunrise]

Originally Posted by Phantobe

I will literally practice this haha.

So the idea with Hills is to hit the friction point as soon as possible to prevent rollback, right? I've been getting better at Hills still just a bit of a nervous thing with the car behind me, trying to just forget about it.

Exactly. And bringing the clutch out to 0.5" before engagement point while still on the brakes minimizes your roll-back (removes the guesswork in finding the engagement point and reduces the time needed to reach it).

It takes a little practice, but this works for me.