Very soon after starting to drive a stick, it becomes second nature, muscle memory, no real thinking needed. I am the car.
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Can you drive a stick shift car?
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Very soon after starting to drive a stick, it becomes second nature, muscle memory, no real thinking needed. I am the car.
Yep, love manuals.
Driven everything from my first car: Pontiac Sunfire 1980, to class 8 car hauler. Currently running a VW Passat Sport 5 speed. Next car will be Porsche Cayman ( hopefully ), manual, of course.
Define a "luxury" car. It's not hard to find a BMW with a stick, for example or even a Cadillac CTS-V. Perhaps those are far too pedestrian for someone of your means? I suppose if you're looking for a Rolls Royce with a stick, you're probably SOL. Most people that have those want a chauffeur with it and so couldn't care less what the hell kind of transmission it has, regardless. Ultra high-end sports cars used to sport sticks, but someone got the idea that "paddles" were "fun" when they're absolutely NOT. Yeah, anything with 600+ HP is going to be "fun" regardless, but paddles are the absolute worst idea ever, IMO. A digital H-pattern selector with clutchless shifting wouldn't be a bad idea to get the same effect without the horrible forced sequential shifting of paddles (personally it annoys the hell out of me compared to a H pattern), but it seems no car company on earth has ever thought of that idea for some unfathomable bizarre reason. What's "fastest" isn't always what's the most fun, regardless. For everyday driving, I simply want CONTROL and that means direct selection of the gear I want at any given moment, not trying to tap through to it while the car overrides my selection and automatically down-shifts even in "Manual" mode.
Technically, BMW manuals are available, but I do challenge you to find more than a couple on a typical BMW dealer's lot in the Northeast. And I don't think you can get an AWD BMW with a manual. Audi yes.
On very few models at that. More often than not, if you're wanting a manual on a model that offers it, you may have to special order one. I don't believe anything in the 5 and 7 series offer a manual in North America. IIRC Europe does, but only on diesel models? I can't comment on Cadillac. Never driven one, not my style. The digitized H pattern pedal-less gearbox was thought of before. It just turned out to be a very different animal later on.
I can't quite comment on what luxury is because everyone's tastes are different. I'm actually in the market for a new car, or rather an SUV. So far I haven't seen anything I've liked.
Oddly enough, in Europe, most of the BMWs sold - especially the 3 series and the 5 series - are manual shift. While automatics are available, manuals seem to outsell them by a considerable margin.
No. Manual models in the BMW 3 and 5 series are available in petrol as well as diesel in Europe.
First car was a 1938 Buick, stick shift of course. Didn't get my first automatic until 1985. Stick shift is much more fun to drive, but not for old people with knee problems.
I'm a little late to driving manual I am 19 years old and I just learned, bought a new 2015 Honda Civic Si. Came with a 6 speed manual transmission. Had shifting and starting in about 2 hours and by the end of the day could drive in normal traffic with it. Needless to say absolutely love driving manual, best decision ever to purchase a manual car and I don't think I could go back to boring automatic
It should be noted that most BMW 3 and 5 Series sold in Europe also have relatively weak engines by American standards. The US-market BMW 320i (180 bhp turbocharged petrol), 328d (181 bhp turbocharged diesel) and 328i (240 bhp turbocharged petrol) are actually considered higher-end models sold in Germany. I believe all three models are available in the USA with either six-speed manual or eight-speed automatic transmissions.
Yep, you are correct. I was just looking at BMW328i and it had 240hp, six-speed manual. I did not know that European models had different engines, interesting.
Hm. Interesting.
I hadn't really realised this, and nor had I given it much thought, but it is interesting that you both have drawn attention to the fact that Europe and the US offer BMW models with different sized engines in their respective markets.
I suspect that this may have something to do with how motorcars are taxed in Europe; for some governments, road tax, fuel tax, and motor car tax comprise a considerable percentage of a Government's discretionary tax take.
Several countries - and individual governments - choose to tax cars by engine size. Moreover, with the advent of 'green' awareness, and increasing EU interest in environmental policies, we can only expect increasing oversight and further directives which require compliance in these areas.
Just looked them up on BMW.de and there is a 320i with 135kw(184 "german" HP). There are no 328s listed but the 330i (252 HP) and 330d (190HP) come pretty close, so the engines are still the same I'd presume, just marketed under sligtly different label.
What is true is that BMW does sell "non luxury" versions of the 3series overhere starting with the 318i (136HP) and 316d(116HP) but I wouldn't really consider them "common" or even in the majority.
Smaller Diesel BMW are often driven as company cars by travelling salesmen, the type the would get some extremly boring Buick,Ford or whatsnot in the US.
Offcourse all 3series including the M3 offer manual.
By the way, BMW is one of the few companies (besides Honda, maybe Mazda and Porsche) where I would actually consider a manual, mostly because they bother to design a good shifting mechanism. Most manuals nowadays have shifters that sometimes have trouble finding the right gear.
I think this has always been the case. And today you have a better chance of finding a decent one because the cars with crappy ones just come in auto now. In my lifetime it was mostly the cable shifted front drivers that made me crazy. But even a V8 Mustang came with a shockingly bad shifter, fortunately easily replaced. I do agree your list includes some of the best.
VW also allways (well can't judge for the ancient rear-engine cars) had niece and easy manuals.
We had a rental Renault Captur for 17 days this summer. The shifter was like stirring a bowl of soup. You just aimed for a general area where the gear you want should be. For all that, it worked well enough most of the time. Very little effort involved for either the stick or clutch. Made my NSX feel like a truck once we got home.
I imagine that has more to do with supply and demand for a given market rather than any technical reason for unavailability. They are far more common in Europe. But the markets vary depending on who is buying cars in them. For example, demand for automatic Subaru WRX cars was so low in the U.S. that they stopped offering anything but a manual transmission in 2008 through 2014. Only with the introduction of a new sport-CVT with paddle shifters has a form of automatic WRX returned to the U.S. market with the 2015 model. I have yet to see anything but a 6-speed manual at my local dealer (for either the WRX or WRX STI), however and he goes through about 2-5 a week in the summer. There is simply little demand for an automatic so they don't stock them. OTOH, Subaru only offers their turbo Forester with that CVT-Automatic due to low demand at that price point (they do offer manuals for the lower-end non-turbo Forester models) and that's a shame as I did not want a non-turbo Forester and had to pick between a stick and the turbo (I went with the turbo). The CVT with manual paddle modes is OK, but it's kind of boring to me compared to a traditional manual (all 4 prior cars I've owned have were manuals including a 2004 and 2011 WRX).
One nice thing about a manual is that it's much harder to do things like hold a cell phone in one hand while driving (save the freeway). Less phones in hand equals safer roads. You can't just drive half asleep (well until you've mastered it anyway) and more attention equals safer drivers in the long run. Just don't hang too close to someone new to them. In the U.S. you're less likely to have your car stolen if it's a stick as well since many people here don't know how to drive them.
Shifters don't have trouble finding the right gear, drivers do.
I think you mean some stickshifts have sloppy feeling shifters (e.g. my 2011 WRX was like that at first, but a short-throw shifter + after-market bushings = one awesome improvement). Even so, proper shifting technique avoids the problem even with sloppy feeling shifters (i.e. don't ever JAM the shifter around through different legs of the H-pattern. Always let it guide itself into neutral momentarily first and then straight up/down or over. I find most people missing gears are trying to "push" from 2nd to 3rd in one motion and then end up in 5th instead sometimes. I know because I did this at first 23 years ago. I quickly discovered the solution, but gauging by some friends that STILL don't know how to (and in one case never even HEARD of) rev-match after 20 years, I don't doubt many never figure it out.
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I'm surprised synchronized first gear actually came along so late:
http://oldcaradvertising.com/Ford Motor Company Corporate Ads/1965/1965 FMC Ad-03.html
http://oldcaradvertising.com/Ford Motor Company Corporate Ads/1965/1965 FMC Ad-03.html
Never driven a 2011 WRX, but Subaru must've improved it because the stock shifter on my 2015 WRX is excellent. Pretty sure any screw ups I've had (and it's only been a couple) have been my fault.
And how the hell do you drive a manual without knowing how to rev match? You either have extremely jerky downshifts or have to slip the clutch way too much. Some techniques like heel-toe are advanced and not necessary for daily driving (I've never mastered it) but IMO, rev matching is as fundamental as learning to upshift or hill starts. Speaking of hill starts, I have a love-hate relationship with Subaru's hill hold system. It's great on steep hills, but I think every time I've stalled was when I was on a very slight incline and wasn't expecting hill hold to activate so I didn't let out the clutch slow enough or give it enough gas to give it a chance to release the brake.
There are a few isolated areas in New England (Vermont anyway) where apparently it was not uncommon up into the mid-20th century to find some possibly inadvertent inbreeding. Probably discovered via higher than expected rates of developmental delay or such, that first drew attention of educators or social caseworkers. But I had heard there were some instances of multiple stillbirths that indicated deadly recombination of recessive genes for fatal missteps in prenatal development. Whoever said ignorance is bliss was at least sometimes not correct... I'm trying to remember where I ran into that info, it may have been was while I was taking some courses at the New School in NYC.
On the car thing: I only drive a stick now and have only ever owned them. I always get a bit freaked out whenever I have to rent a car and it's an automatic; it takes me at least three or four stops (or hills, or approaches to curves) to quit looking for the clutch pedal.
Being able to shift down and keep moving around someone ahead of me who loses nerve and takes foot off gas approaching a snowy hillcrest has saved me more than once. I'd always stop at the village just past the downslope and tell the local deputy "There's guys in the ditch up top..." but I never dared to stop on the hill or I'd have been in the ditch along with them.
How I learned to drive a stick was on a hilly bunch of back roads with zero traffic except for a hay wagon once in awhile in summer. Best way! You have to be able to resume forward progress without stalling, skidding or sliding back and freaking out the guy behind you. This you do not want to learn while on, say, the ramp to the George Washington Bridge.
You can, but, as you said, they're rare. On the 3 series, BMW only offers AWD + manual on the 335i, not the 328i. For RWD models, all variants can be ordered with a stick (320/328/335). You can get a M235xi with a manual too.
Audi offers a manual across the entire A4 lineup.
These are German cars. In Germany (as in most of Europe) stick shift driving is the standard. Driving lessons are standard with a stick shift, while some driving schools offer special automatic drive lessons. All European car models (give or take an exception) are available with stick shift first and maybe also as an "automaat" (Dutch).
It is also how you should drive a car. Actively and in control.
First time I drove an automatic, my left foot was on the break >.<
I unlearned that really quickly
I unlearned that really quickly