Is it worth it to drive a stick? (Where can you rent a car to learn how?)

[LumbermanSVO]

I always wonder how often a trucker has to use one of those. I never seen one after it has been used most of the time they seem pretty over grown.

There is a saying in the industry, "You can go down a hill as many times as you want too slow, you can only go down once too fast." a drive should go their whole career without ever using one. they get used by the driver who either have a mechanical failure, don't know how to properly down down a steep grade and smoke their service(normal/air) brakes or simply are too stupid to believe they need to slow down. You can bet that if you use one your career will be over.

It was more common to have to use them before jake brakes came into common use. Back then you would have to just use your service brakes to go down steep grades. You use to have to adjust the brakes properly before going down the grade. Trucks use drum brakes and when overheated the drums expand and you can't apply enough pressure to slow the vehicle anymore, they will usually start smoking before this happens, smells like burt clutch. To keep them from overheating you use to have to go down a 6% grade at around 10-15mph when fully loaded. In my current truck I can go down a 6% grade at 45mph when fully loaded.

 

[yg17]

Yeah, I do this (or rather, used to do this) in rev match shifting when I did some rally. It's still not how I drive when I do drive a manual. Or maybe I'm just getting old.

Incidentally, I've never been a big LHD vs RHD superiority kind of guy but this is the one case for me where LHD is clearly superior to RHD. It's much easier to bang those gears into slot if you're pushing away than pulling in for some reason. I don't think its a matter of what I'm used to, either b/c I'm usually driving manuals in RHD and usually autos in LHD.

I think LHD is easier, because for the 1-2 shift for example, it's easier to pull the shifter towards you and pull it down into 2nd than it is to push it out away from you for 5-6, at least in my opinion. I've never driven a RHD car before so I don't have any experience to base that on, but for me, 1-2 seems to be a bit easier and quicker than 5-6.

 

[Signal-11]

I think LHD is easier, because for the 1-2 shift for example, it's easier to pull the shifter towards you and pull it down into 2nd than it is to push it out away from you for 5-6, at least in my opinion. I've never driven a RHD car before so I don't have any experience to base that on, but for me, 1-2 seems to be a bit easier and quicker than 5-6.

Yeah, I don't notice any difference in everyday driving, other than I don't like it when the turn indicator stalk is on the wrong side.

It's just for fast, timed shifts when it seems to matter. I used to think this was b/c I was just right handed but almost everyone I meet who has done a lot of performance driving in both RHD and LHD seem to prefer LHD, even the left handed guys.

That's just from personal experience. I don't know how the real expert drivers at near WRC level feel. I've watched videos of the pedal pumping these guys do and I have no idea what's going on.

 

[YS2003]

WHAT?? The best reason in the world for getting a stick is living in a hilly area! Saves your brakes big time, saves on gas... essential for getting up and down slippery hills in winter.

Many of the modern automatic transmissions downshift to 4th or 3rd depending on the grade or hold the gear if you don't press the gas in the downhill. So, they are as good as the manual transmissions in terms of engine braking.

I myself is also thinking about getting a sports car with a manual transmission. I will be in Tokyo by then; so, I need to be brave to have a manual transmission in the heavy traffic (years ago, I used to have a manual car in the New York City area and my left foot got sour through the daily torture of massive traffic jams). As long as I am riding a car with a manual for commuting or pleasure, I don't mind. But, if I need to drive it for work, I don't hesitate to pick the automatic car, hands down. There are so many things I need to deal with at work and the last thing I need to do is shift gears for the car I am driving.

 

[northy124]

Is it worth it to drive a stick?

Yes, if you can't drive manual you can't drive in my book.

 

[NoSmokingBandit]

Im rather impartial to manual/auto transmissions. Manual is fun for driving faster and more efficiently, but often i want to jump in my automatic and just relax and not think about shifting.
Its essential to know how to drive one, imo, though it seems that less and less consumer cars are made with a manual option.

 

[kellen]

Even if your car isn't a stick, learn how. It will help you in the future. I have way too many friends who don't know how to drive a stick and its infuriating.

It won't take that long to learn and is rather fun. If you end up getting a car with a stick vs. auto isn't a big deal, just knowing how is a good thing.

Also it's like riding a bike. You will always know how. Although most clutches are different on when they let out, you will have no problems adapting after a shift or two.

Learn how!

 

[LizKat]

Many of the modern automatic transmissions downshift to 4th or 3rd depending on the grade or hold the gear if you don't press the gas in the downhill. So, they are as good as the manual transmissions in terms of engine braking ~snip~.

But they don't have eyeballs or whatever they need for the slightly downgraded curve for which you just drop it one gear instead of braking a little before the curve. When I rented a Corolla two years ago and drove it for a month, putting about 2k miles on it, I really did go nuts listening to that thing hunting for gears or else impatiently braking when it would, of course, NOT brake before a curve I knew I should not be taking at 55 or 45 or whatever.

Now it's true that that was only the case for while I was getting out of my own home turf. Once I got a couple counties away, the terrain flattens some and I didn't mind the automatic. And, as many here have said, automatics are great if you drive in city traffic. I did appreciate that while I had the Corolla, as part of my use of it involved running around Ithaca in rush hours. Crawl hours.

I am not fond of hitting every light in Ithaca proper as I pass through it in my stick on the way to visit relatives outside of town, I freely admit that. The rented Corolla was a pleasure to drive in town when I had to be there for that month. Even though Ithaca is hilly, its grades seemed to make sense to the automatic, for the most part.

But back home in these hills, I prefer my manual shifter. I live in the part of the Catskills that has three watersheds, the headwaters of the Susquehanna, East and West branches of the Delaware.

There's routinely a thousand-foot difference between one town and the next but it will be like 1/4 up and 3/4 down, with the down part being 1/4 up and 3/4 down too... plus you can be driving north, east, south, west over hill and dale and around 90º corners to get to what some local describes as "just take this road straight down aways into town."

The automatics just go nuts in this terrain, and the driver will go nuts too unless maybe he plays the music on a 7. Me I like to listen to the engine so the iPod plays second fiddle. If and when I get too old to live in the sticks and still feel capable of driving a vehicle, I'll probably spring for an automatic. Or to be green then skip car, get bus pass!

 

[Signal-11]

Yes, if you can't drive manual you can't drive in my book.

How remarkably narrow minded.

 

[northy124]

How remarkably narrow minded.

Yhup, just how I like it

 

[Signal-11]

But they don't have eyeballs or whatever they need for the slightly downgraded curve for which you just drop it one gear instead of braking a little before the curve. When I rented a Corolla two years ago and drove it for a month, putting about 2k miles on it, I really did go nuts listening to that thing hunting for gears or else impatiently braking when it would, of course, NOT brake before a curve I knew I should not be taking at 55 or 45 or whatever.

Gasoline 4 cylinder, 4 speed automatic = fail any way you look at it.

An automatic tranny mated to a big honking engine with lots of torque and a wide powerband is like driving a manual diesel V8 - easy.

And besides, Ithaca's not a real city. Ithaca's more like what happens when all the hippies didn't want to go home after they finish college.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

Okay, so all of the guides on how to shift in manuals say, when downshifting go one gear at a time. What happens if you go from 5-3 or 5-2 or something?

You learn with time where the shift points are. The manual in the car provides fairly good ones to follow.

For me I shift points are
1-2nd 15 mph
3rd 30
4th 40
5th 50ish
6th cruising speed (60-70ish)

Those numbers are for when I am accelerating and it is very flexible on where the shift points are. It all with experience and mostly by feel. Hell I do not even look at Speedo or RPMs any more when I am picking up speed I just listen to the engine and know when to shift. Only time I really look at RPMs is when I know flooring the car for maximum pick up and going to shift near the red line and when I am near the speed limit. I read the RPMs to make sure I am in the right gear.

Down shifts is when I need the power but like others have said it is experience

Manual is certainly something to learn because you never know when you are going to need it. But getting a manual where I live is suicide because the traffic is so bad any time of the day. Having to constantly shift in and out over and over in stop and go sucks really badly.

A good alternative is to get a newer car that either has a manualmatic or a manual sport shift mode. The car I'm looking at now is an XG350L with a manual shift mode. After you put the car in drive, you push the stick over to the right and can manually shift the car to override the automatic's fuzzy logic. This is great for those hilly areas or when you are making quick turns, and for the bad weather - that is what traction control is for though...

As seen in the image above.

Those are wanna be manuals at best. The car auto will not give you a full override. It will not let you down shift to low and it will force a shift for you some points. There are times when it very nice in a manual that those autos will not let you do.

For example on slippery roads a manual is and always will be king. Those wanna be manuals do not let you over ride the cars computer and start in 2nd or 3rd gear because of how slick the road is.
Plus with out the clutch you can not control how much power is getting on the ground. More than once I have had to drive my car on icy roads having to start from a dead stop. 1st and 2nd gear were completely worthless because all the car would do is spin. I was having to nurse the car in 3rd and 4th gear to keep from breaking free and just spinning my wheels. The high gears let me put a lot less power on the ground. I also was doing a lot of clutch slipping to limit that power. Let me tell you it is a little unnerving when the one is able to spin there wheels from a dead stop in 4th gear.

 

[yg17]

Okay, so all of the guides on how to shift in manuals say, when downshifting go one gear at a time. What happens if you go from 5-3 or 5-2 or something?

Gotta be careful with those, depending on what speed you're going in 5th, downshifting into 2nd (or maybe 3rd even) will put you past redline. When I'm on the highway in 6th gear and traffic is up ahead, I will leave it in gear and begin to slow down, if I'm down to about 20 or 25 mph and traffic picks up again, I can safely go to 3rd (and second too but there's really no need). But if I'm going 70 in 6th and try to go into 3rd I will most likely redline and it could cause damage to the car, even if you only do it once or twice. You just have to get to know your car and if you're ever unsure, downshift to a higher gear. If it's still not a low enough gear to get moving, you can safely downshift to the next, eventually you'll just get to know what speed requires what gear and can shift directly to what you need.

FWIW, you don't need to downshift through each gear when coming to a stop. Like if you're in 5th and need to stop, you don't need to go down through each gear. Just leave it in 5th while braking, and once you get to about 1,000 RPMs or so (a bit before it would stall) clutch in and go to neutral. Also, if you are downshifting one gear, sometimes you can get away without doing it depending on speed, but if you're skipping a gear while downshifting, make sure you rev match otherwise you'll burn up your clutch and the car will jerk like hell.

 

[LizKat]

And besides, Ithaca's not a real city. Ithaca's more like what happens when all the hippies didn't want to go home after they finish college.

They got real cars, though, and real traffic snarls, even after they got done building a zillion one-way bridges down there in the bottom. I'd be driving an automatic there if I lived there, for sure. And paying on a big mortgage - where those hippies get that dough?! Lot of Volvos and Prius and so forth, besides the hefty house price tags.

 

[0098386]

I don't get how folk say that manual cars are rubbish for inner city and traffic driving, yet people do that all the time here and don't have a problem with it.

Is it worth it? Yes. Before I could drive a manual I could drive an automatic, just felt like an overpriced toy .

 

[remmy]

How come the Auto is so popular in the US or compared not as popular in the UK or Europe? (I don't quite know the rest of Europe but where I have been its seems that a manual is most popular)

 

[SactoGuy18]

How come the Auto is so popular in the US or compared not as popular in the UK or Europe? (I don't quite know the rest of Europe but where I have been its seems that a manual is most popular)

Because the torque-converter type automatics work well with the larger displacement, relatively low-revving engines that American car manufacturers used for many, many years.

Today, with the emphasis on smaller engines for fuel economy reasons, automatics had to evolve to take better advantage of the engine torque peaks of smaller engines. That's why we're automatics with five to as many as eight forward gears and the increasing use of dual-clutch transmissions (DCTs).

A DCT is definitely well-suited for a high-revving engine such as the Honda K20Z3 used on the current Civic Si coupe/sedan (a very similar engine is used on the European-market Civic Type-R hatchback). Unlike regular automatics, when you use a DCT in manual-shifting mode you can easily keep the engine revs up and shift gears up and down far faster than a conventional manual.

 

[shaunymac]

How come the Auto is so popular in the US or compared not as popular in the UK or Europe? (I don't quite know the rest of Europe but where I have been its seems that a manual is most popular)

Have you seen most americans while driving, esp. those that drive autos? They are overweight, they are texting without watchinging the road, drinking supersized cokes with their big macs, ....

Next time you are out driving, seriously take a look around. It is a little frightening. I saw a woman here in Cinicinnati yesterday doing 60-65 texting on the interstate and not even looking at the road. What's crazier, she had both hands going. She wouldn't look up for 4-5 secs. Nuts

Most americans want everything done automatically, hince the poplularity of the auto. The others who like to drive manuals are probably more active and do things for themselves. Someone needs to do a study on this. I did read an interesting article in my "Roundel" mag a while back about the decline of manuals in the us.

Anyways, something to think about. That is my view.

EXTREME multitaskers drive autos. Heck, I don't even have cupholders in my car!

 

[Rodimus Prime]

How come the Auto is so popular in the US or compared not as popular in the UK or Europe? (I don't quite know the rest of Europe but where I have been its seems that a manual is most popular)

My guess is when Auto came out the US was using bigger engines that made up for the power that the Automatic stole of the engine to run it.

People got used to it. Right now Automatic transmission get equal to better gas mileage than there manual counter parts most of the time. The reason for this is because the Automatic uses less engine power run and now we are to the point that the cars computer handles the shifting so advantages a manual has is shot since next to no power rob.

The computer beats a human most of the time because it will shift based on best gas mileage for power being ask. The car shifts faster. Hell off the line in 0-60 times autos are getting close to betting the human counter part because yet again computer perfect shifting and faster than human shift times.

I see it taking over in Europe years too switch over to those advatages computer to the US already taking advantage of them.

 

[garybUK]

My guess is when Auto came out the US was using bigger engines that made up for the power that the Automatic stole of the engine to run it.

People got used to it. Right now Automatic transmission get equal to better gas mileage than there manual counter parts most of the time. The reason for this is because the Automatic uses less engine power run and now we are to the point that the cars computer handles the shifting so advantages a manual has is shot since next to no power rob.

The computer beats a human most of the time because it will shift based on best gas mileage for power being ask. The car shifts faster. Hell off the line in 0-60 times autos are getting close to betting the human counter part because yet again computer perfect shifting and faster than human shift times.

I see it taking over in Europe years too switch over to those advatages computer to the US already taking advantage of them.

That's all assuming the human changing the gear is doing it wrong, i'm sorry but no automatic can beat a manual driven PROPERLY to milage rates, anyhow have you seen the Millage rates that American cars get? Seen the ones you can get here? 60mpg+ those are ALL manual's.

Auto's will never take over Europe... at all..... simple reason: Auto's are still excluded mainly to the large 'bank manager' cars, BMW 5 series, Jaguar's etc. Even those that do have it, they are mainly Semi-Auto's like the VW/Audi DSG's etc.

If you take a test here on Automatic you are NOT allowed to drive a manual until you re-take your test, but a manual license can drive any.

I think it's a good idea to learn to drive in a Manual then you can take your pick whichever suits you and your environment. Personally i'm a Manual because that's what all the cars/people drive here.

 

[yg17]

Next time you are out driving, seriously take a look around. It is a little frightening. I saw a woman here in Cinicinnati yesterday doing 60-65 texting on the interstate and not even looking at the road. What's crazier, she had both hands going. She wouldn't look up for 4-5 secs. Nuts

Right...I saw some jerk the other day driving who had his cell phone in one hand and the other hand was putting something into his GPS. If we can't expect our drivers to have a free hand to steer, we certainly can't expect them to have a free hand to shift.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

That's all assuming the human changing the gear is doing it wrong, i'm sorry but no automatic can beat a manual driven PROPERLY to milage rates, anyhow have you seen the Millage rates that American cars get? Seen the ones you can get here? 60mpg+ those are ALL manual's.
.

Properly driven manual still only have a human control value on it. Means it can not shift perfectly or fast enough.

You are taking the 60+ mpg cars which have very small engines and quite frankly are very small.

Up the engine size a little and the advantages shifts back. I do not count the special case cars but the average car like the Honda Accord and Altima.

The EPA mpg I have seen between the manual and auto ON the same car is dropping to advantage shifting over to the Auto. Hell on some cars the city mileage is BETTER but that is because of the computer control.

It is only a matter of time before the Auto will be manuals. Humans have limitations.

Now my car is a manual and I prefer driving a manual but I do not do it for gas mileage reasons. The mpg argument I think is becoming more worthless every year

 

[Signal-11]

They got real cars, though, and real traffic snarls, even after they got done building a zillion one-way bridges down there in the bottom. I'd be driving an automatic there if I lived there, for sure. And paying on a big mortgage - where those hippies get that dough?! Lot of Volvos and Prius and so forth, besides the hefty house price tags.

Yeah, those one lane bridges are definitely weird. After a while, it's like, WTF is going on here? If they were wooden, covered and in Madison County I'd understand.

 

[benflick]

I just turned 16, and I'm getting my license in a few weeks. I learned to drive with a stick. My Mom's car (Ford Focus) is a 5 speed and so is my car (Saturn SL2).
Learning how is fairly easy, and, depending on the car, shouldn't take long. The only problem I have is starting out on a hill (Lots of hills in Cincinnati).

 

[richkent72]

Properly driven manual still only have a human control value on it. Means it can not shift perfectly or fast enough.

A fast shift is not necessarily a better shift. I use double de-clutching regularly when changing down. It's slower but far smoother, gentler on the transmission and (best of all) puts a big smile on your face when done right.

On the question of changing up/down more than one gear at a time, you can now fail a UK driving test if you don't do this when appropriate, e.g. rapid acceleration or braking.

Dipping the clutch while slowing (which several posters have recommended) is also a test fail. The only time you depress the clutch is to change gear or when almost stationery. Using the clutch when slowing means you've got no engine braking.