driving a manual - what and what not to do

[muhhan]

May have been covered already but when approaching corners (I'm talking your regular suburban 90 degree corners where little kids or oldies could be crossing) slow down early and change down into second. You should try to be in gear as much as possible.

I'll tell you a story from my experience that made me realise the importance of this. Once I was approaching a corner that I needed to take. I was on the main road turning off so I put the brakes on, pushed the clutch pedal down and started to go around the corner, essentially in neutral as I had not down shifted and put the car into gear, as I was rolling around the corner a car from the small street I was turning into came out and as I was going a little fast without the car in gear I had no control of my car as I couldn't use the accelerator to pull the car around and it kind of wandered through the corner (major understeer). Luckily the other car saw me coming around the corner and slowed down to give me plenty of room to hall my hatchie around the corner, but it could have easily ended in a head-on collision. Had I been in gear I could have pulled my car around the corner much more effectively.

It's all well and good to be able to use advance driving techniques but best bet is to take it easy and try to prepare the car and your actions for the road ahead. When you think about it even the best racing drivers in their race spec vehicles have accidents so is it realistic to think that we, with all our driving experience, will be able to avoid an accident by using these race techniques on our crappy public roads with people around, in a car that isn't set up like these race spec machines? I'm not trying to dis anyone and my hat's off to any successful racing car drivers among us, but I'm a young driver who is well within the statistics for young male drivers and it is just too easy to have accidents.

[EK4R]

You double clutched correctly? Test by getting into 1st with the engine off. If it is still difficult, then check your linkages.

hmm i cant get into 1st no problems with the engine off, clutch in and in with 1st but while im moving i cant and im pretty sure i dbl clutch properly (2nd > clutch in > N > clutch out > clutch in > 1st?)

also explain could anyone explain my idle problem?? cant get into first when im at a full stop. i have to put it into some other gear first then into first. feels super gritty if i try to put into first gear first.

[TypeRice]

what is double clutch???

r u meant to double clutch when changing gears ? =O ???

[aaronng]

hmm i cant get into 1st no problems with the engine off, clutch in and in with 1st but while im moving i cant and im pretty sure i dbl clutch properly (2nd > clutch in > N > clutch out > clutch in > 1st?)

also explain could anyone explain my idle problem?? cant get into first when im at a full stop. i have to put it into some other gear first then into first. feels super gritty if i try to put into first gear first.

When at full stop, try pressing your clutch in, count to 3 and then put it into first.

As for your 2nd to 1st shift with double clutching, you need to revmatch once when the clutch is out in neutral before you clutch in and put it into 1st.

[EK4R]

cheers will try both.
mind explaining why the 3 seconds??

[aaronng]

cheers will try both.
mind explaining why the 3 seconds??

When in neutral and clutch out, the input shaft is connected to the engine and is spinning at your idle speed of 700-800rpm. If you clutch in and put it into 1st straight away, the synchros have to work to slow it from 700 rpm to 0rpm (the speed of the transmission).

Waiting 3 seconds with the clutch in allows the input shaft to slow down to almost 0rpm before shifting in.

[bungsai]

hmm i cant get into 1st no problems with the engine off, clutch in and in with 1st but while im moving i cant and im pretty sure i dbl clutch properly (2nd > clutch in > N > clutch out > clutch in > 1st?)

also explain could anyone explain my idle problem?? cant get into first when im at a full stop. i have to put it into some other gear first then into first. feels super gritty if i try to put into first gear first.

when i am driving stupid hard...and need to put it into first whilst moving/slowing down, say a u turn, this is what i do.

2nd
clutch in
heel toe (cos im on the brakes and dont want to stop braking)+ bump the accelerator, you have to bump it up quite high for first, not so much for the other gears.
shifter should slide quite easily into first if you have got the revs right
clutch out whilst revs still high
1st, then accelerate through...

and for the rest, what aaronng said, though 3 seconds might be a bit too long, it wont take long for the syncros to slow down so it doesnt grind...

[EK4R]

When at full stop, try pressing your clutch in, count to 3 and then put it into first.

As for your 2nd to 1st shift with double clutching, you need to revmatch once when the clutch is out in neutral before you clutch in and put it into 1st.

tried that and my idle problem is gone!!! have to hold it for 2 sec or so.
damn thx alot aarong, helped me out again!

[aaronng]

tried that and my idle problem is gone!!! have to hold it for 2 sec or so.
damn thx alot aarong, helped me out again!

Good stuff. Glad to be able to help

[theHKway]

When at full stop, try pressing your clutch in, count to 3 and then put it into first.

As for your 2nd to 1st shift with double clutching, you need to revmatch once when the clutch is out in neutral before you clutch in and put it into 1st.

i have the same problem with my dc2
1st gear is really hard to get into no matter the situation
i find when i'm at the lights
hold the clutch down for about 3secs because i can shift into 1st

so... i gotta shift to 1st because the green lights up otherwise i gotta wiggle it into 1st gently

[[XsCaPe]]

or you can go into second before shifting into first

[Muzz]

This is a great topic, i strongly recomend reading the highly acclaimed book "drive to win by carrol smith" it is a supurb read (cant stress enough) that anyone should read if you are into performance driving. Shifing is really covered in depth. its a great book, its made me realise that you never run out of things to work on your driving technique. Even the likes of schumarker (sp?) never stop trying to better their technique. Every time i get in my car i try and better my heel toeing, making my rev matching as accurate as i can, choosing the best lines, turn in points, shifting points, breaking points etc etc etc.......

I think most people learn how to drive decently, then just keep on doing it that same way, they dont put in an effort to improve their technique, when there is an unlimited amount of improving and refining that can be done.

Alot of my passengers comment on how smooth/seemless and flowing my driving is, which i take alot of pride in. I work on Smooth seemless braking and downshifting (the goal is to keep the deceleration as constant as possible through the hole range of deceleration), smooth cornering (its all about the smooth transition of lateral g forces), seemless upshifting (harder than seemless downshifting) etc. the list goes on.

I feel that this is an excelent way to improve your skills on the race track, as being as smooth and seemless as possible allows you to push closer to the limits of your tyres, without slightly stepping over the boundarys of grip. ie, you need less of a margin for the slight variations in lateral and lonitudinal g forces.

dont be confused that this requires to drive in a illegal manner, you can improve yourself completly obeying the speed limits.

My style of driving is very much like Dylanamus's

I don't like to waste time breaking, so I would approach the corner at the speed limit and double clutch down to second, (tapping the accelerator in neautral until the revs roughly match what they will be at when downshifting to second), and just power through. This is probably the best treatment for your clutch (and breaks ^^), it's also good practice for racing if you ever do any track work. Less slowing down time means less slow overall! From the way my car responds, I would say Hondas are made for gear breaking!

Also Hondas generally already have very close ratio gearing, so downshifting to first while on the move is mostly unnecessary, (unless you really want to loose traction). If, when in second, you slow down to the point where you feel you can't go again without the car jumping around like a madman, then (you're a grandma :P)

You obviously need to brake for corners where you need to slow down for a sharp turn etc, but alot of things, like coming up to a clear roundabout, requires using the brakes barly at all. Say you approach the roundabout at 70kph in 4th, take your foot off the accelerator, and blip the throttle and drop in down to 3rd about 50m or so away, just not having your foot on the accelerator is enough braking, by the time your at the round about youd be doing maby 50kph. If its a really tight roundabout, feather the brakes real slightly and drop it down to second. My brakes rarly get used when cruising around town, unless im required to slow below say 30kph.
The tradeoff is, i may not use the brakes very much at all, but i keep my revs relativly high in the rev range through downshifting (blips to 4500-5500 for shift), this is what provides the nesisary braking force. Too low revs (or to higher gears) wont provide enough decelereration. Honda engines are made to be rev happy little creatures, it dosnt really use any extra fuel when not accelerating.

I totaly agree with what dylanamus feels about minimising the amount of breaks you use, can help you for when you get out on the track.
It has been showen that amature racing drivers, over used the brakes much more than need be, compared to a professional drivers. They need more cooling capacity for the brakes than a professional does. they downshift to late (at lower rpms) which requires more work from the brakes for an equal rate of deceleration. If you wanna know more, READ THE BOOK

Cornflakes, if your engine is shuddering, your in the wrong gear for the speed your doing. youe engine is simply dropping out of the rev range that it should be working in.
If you need to slow to 10kph to take the corner, when the revs are getting low in second gear, drop down to 1st.

Droping down to first is more of an art than dropping down any other gear. It will take longer than any other shift aswell. its also harder to learn. There is absolutly no reason the gears should crunch, if they do your not doing the shift properly.
When your at the speed to downshift, clutch in, push the gear to neutral, blip the throttle to matching revs, at the same time having pressure on the gear leaver, it will fall into first itself from neutral, you dont push it as such into 1st like other gears, thats when you get crunches, you let it drop itself into first when the gears match speed from the sinchros.

The main thing when doing this though, is matching the revs as you release the clutch to keep the deceleration smooth, if you dont match revs, you will decelerate very quickly, and it will be extremly jerky! not nice.

It sound like alot of steps but its not, alot of practice makes it a quick smooth one step exercise. You learn how much is the perfect amount of pressure to apply to the leaver for it to drop quickly into 1st smoothly and without crunches.

good thing is, dropping down to 1st instead of clutching in 2nd, is youl have plenty of power for corner exit, which is good in an emergency where you need to get up to speed cus of an aproaching vechicle that you may have missed, or for sudden deceleration cus of unexpected pedestrians.

Riding the clutch, instead of dropping to first when it is necissary, would be worse on the clutch because as you engage it, you will need to accelerate slightly and slip the clutch till the car is traveling at a speed where you can completly let it go without the engine shuddering. And youve got very little power on tap to deal with emergency situations at such low rpms.
Using this method of staying in second and clutching to stop engine shudders, is for grannys and soccer mums IMO.

Coming up to a stop sign, i prefer to wait till the revs get low in 2nd, and just clutch it and break to a stop, put it in 1st, and take off.
Once again read that book, its great, its very technical. there are so many aspects to driving a car more efficiently and heathily in a racing situation that can also be applied to driving well on the street.