02Impressor

.. I plan on learning to drive stick. When my lease expires for the c230, I hope to buy a car with manual drive. I figure the best way to learn, is to teach myself, and what better way to start then with Tiptronic (+/-) on the c230. I know it's two very different things but the concept is the same. Shift up when it reaches X rpm and shift down when it falls to X rpm. Is there anything significant I should know when learning to drive with the shifter? I am doing this on a wide field so I will have plenty of room to speed up.
So far driving on the street , I have problems shifting down. I usually shift down to early and it makes it very akward.

Clownburner

Good luck, but the most important thing to learn when driving a manual is the clutch-shift-throttle timing, and that just comes from practice (or practice + a good race driving course).

All the fancy tricks with a manual, like power shifting and double-clutch downshifting, are just gravy when you're first learning. It takes a while to get the feel of a clutch so you don't just stall it at stoplights.

But it's a blast. Enjoy!

MacPhisto

Nothing you can do with your automatic can help you to prepare to drive a stick.

You need to just get a hold of a manual transmission car and practice.

Matt230K

Driving your touchshift automatic C230 is nothing like driving a manual. The only thing that is the same is that you are choosing which gear to put it in. But even then, you have less control over it than the computers do. It's hard to mess up with the touchshift. But it's easy to mess up with a manual if you don't know what you are doing. And if you are having trouble with the touchshift, you should stay far away from a manual.

But you can use your car to practice the touchshift. If you downshift too soon, it's going to feel awkward. The car will lunge forward until the revs catch up to where they need to be for that lower gear. With a manual, you can hit the throttle to lift the revs while the clutch is in. But with automatic, you can't do this, so you just have to get used to it how it is. Or just don't downshift at high revs if you don't feel comfortable.

AndrewK

I agree, IMO shifting with an automatic will not help much. Once you learn the clutch/gas balance and such shift points come naturally. Shift timing is probably the easiest part of learning a stick. I would say after driving a stick for two or three days you should have at least a general idea of rev-matching.

MacPhisto

BTW, you'll love the stick shift. It offers far more potential for abuse because you can do things like 5000 rpm clutch drops, speed shifts, etc.

You won't have to do bush-league automatic neutral drops anymore!!

AndrewK

Since when was speed shifting abusive?

Matt230K

I don't know about that. It depends on who is teaching you. I drove another car that was a stick a couple years ago, and I never matched revs when downshifting. It just wasn't something that I was taught. I think most people don't know about it, and even more don't practice it. It is definitely something you SHOULD be able to get a general idea about in several days, but I think most people have no clue.

AndrewK

I guess I just paid close attention to the revs as I went though the gears and was able to match a few gear-speed-rpm sets in memory and started from there. For example if you are at about 25 mph you need to rev to around 2400 for a reasonably clean pick-up.

MacPhisto

By speed shifting, I mean flooring the car and shifting without lifting off the gas.

That is abusive to the car. If your synchros, clutch and other drivetrain components could talk, they'd tell you that themselves.

Matt230K

Is that for a 3 to 2 downshift? I always hate that one. The shifter is so much harder to get into 2nd or 1st than any other gear. I still do that downshift, but it's usually not as smooth as others. Everyone on here seems to have different feeling transmissions though, so it's probably different for everyone.

AndrewK

Oh yeah, thats plain stupid. I thought you meant that just making a quick shift motion was by "speed shifting".

AndrewK

No I mean for downshifting into third. Maybe its closer to 2300. For going into second at 25 I'd rev to maybe 3100(???)

MacPhisto

Yeah, my bad. People also call it "powershifting" and some other things that I can't repeat here.

Matt230K

Do you really put that much thought into it? I have just learned to do it by habit. I downshift too quickly to think about revving it to the exact point for perfectly smooth engagement. Sometimes I rev a little too much, but about 95% of the time I am pretty smooth by just blipping the throttle by habit.

AndrewK

That seems like it would destroy a tranny. Just grinding a little sounds horrible, I cant imagine ramming it in and out of gear with no clutch (at least on a precise device like a modern car tranny, my cousin used to do it on his 89 Jeep Wrangler with little effect)

AndrewK

When I was learning I did, but by now its just automatic and I dont think about.

Matt230K

I think I always just did it by feel. I was usually worse if I thought about it too much. I was bad at first doing it by feel too. It's just something you have to get used to.

JustinTRW

....or get a rental car with a manual tranny. Abuse away, it won't matter. Driving touchshift around won't teach you much more than gear selection.

oggle

It's absolutely fun to switch gears without using the clutch pedals also.

ElDiabloJoe

a lot of expense and heartache?

Spare your $30,000+ car and its transmissions.

Instead, do one of these two things:

1. Buy a cheap, older VW bug, manual, to learn in.

2. Rent a manual for a couple of weeks, but rent it at least a coupla days before you *have* to be anywhere so you can actually get where you're going when you need to, lol.

Oh, and...

3. Once you can do it so-so well on flat roads, go to one with a small, lightly traveled incline. Preferably with a stop sign half way up. Practice starting/stopping from First gear on an incline. Work your way up to steeper grades.

In no time at all you'll be rolling your car back and forth at a stop sign on a steep hill by just using the clutch

HTH,

EDJ

MacPhisto

Those seem like some extreme measures to learn a relatively simple task. Go through the hassle of BUYING a cheap car just to learn to drive a stick?!?

I would just find someone with a stick shift car and ask them to teach you. I've shown lots of people how, I don't have a problem with a novice learning in my car if I am there.

Or, just buy the new car and have someone teach you. Be careful and practice for the first week or so.

If you have someone there to teach you, you won't hurt the car. People learn every day, and do it without damaging the car at all.

Matt230K

That's a good way to wear out your clutch though, so I wouldn't recommend doing it just for the hell of it, except on the rental car.

dakarMcoupe

buy a miata for $1500.

learn how to drive stick then sell the miata for $1500.

problem solved.

MacPhisto

You guys make driving a stick shift sound like its more difficult than piloting the Space Shuttle.

Just buy the C230 stick and learn to drive it.

Problem solved. Don't make it a bigger issue than it is.