It's a bit of a long story, but I'm being given a car with a manual transmission...

this ended up helping a ton, but I'm still having troubles finding the bite point. after some googling I can kinda understand it? but I guess it's just something that will come to me as I start getting used to it.

I'm gonna try this later tonight. not too soon though. I don't know of any totally empty parking lots nearby, so my practice is limited to this road that's not quite a roundabout, but it comes around in a circle anyway.

18 actually even though I don't really have to prove anything to you. there are plenty of people older than me who have not one clue how to drive. let alone a stick

dont let people give you shit, you cant just google how to drive a manual car

IMO 99% of it is clutch feeling and balancing the clutch and accelerator, once you got that youre good (just practice)

I had a feeling a lot of it would just be "getting used to it". I could almost tell just getting onto the pedals. I just thought there was some trick to it as it's been taking me a while. oh well.

in that case. What are some general tips, and some "don't do that"s. Stuff that might ruin the car

When I was learning stick, I practiced in my driveway. I would just back up to the end, then pull forward, then back up, pull forward, etc. It helped me a ton on getting a feel for the bite point in my car, which took longer than I'd like to admit. I had no problems backing up, but I kept stalling over and over trying to learn to smoothly pull forward. It really is one of those things that just needs getting used to.

A little touch of gas FIRST before slowly lifting the clutch will prevent you from stalling. Trying to find the bite first before applying gas is going to make you stall out especially when in a hurry to get going at green lights.
It's especially necessary on lower displacement petrol engines.

Practice. Understand what's happening mechanically and practice.

As far as shit not to do, there are some habits that you want to avoid at all costs right now so they don't develop.

Once your moving, move your foot off the clutch completely. Don't hover near it, don't rest on it. Move your foot to the footrest to the left of the clutch.

Also don't rest your hand on the shift lever. Movements on that lever move shit in the transmission, even small jars/bumps in the road that translate through the knob when your hand is on it. Put it in gear, put hand back on steering wheel or arm rest or whatever.

Stuff might seem kinda dumb and pointless, but it's much better to get gud while not building these habits than to try to get rid of them later.

Also: Some cars shfit smoother if you're revving high but require on point timing at low revs so every other shift will have a little jerk to it. The additional momentum forces more clutch slip and less momentum allows it to bite suddenly. The sportier your clutch, the less noticeable this is and the clunkier shit shifting is regardless of how many schumacher sounds your engine is making.

t. torquelet

If you know anyone who can safely drive manual, have them take you to a school parking lot sometime after hours, preferably one with a hill or slight slope to it somewhere. Here you can practice letting the clutch out smoothly. Let me share some of the issues I faced while first learning:

>your first instinct when the car starts moving is to release the clutch fully and quickly i.e. "the car has reached the bite point and therefore it is now time to go" this is not necessarily true.

Do not be afraid to keep releasing the clutch slowly and gradually even when the car has already bitten. Releasing it too quickly will do one or both of 2 things: jerk the car awkwardly, or jerk the car awkwardly and then stall.

>going from "going" to "stopping" how do I transition down and when?

This is where judgment and the scenario comes in. If you're rolling up on a light and its going to be a solid red for a while, assuming you don't have some asshole stopping short in front of you or tailgating the fuck out of you, practice downshifting towards the light. Lets say you have a car where you shift up on the 10s for MPH (its never really like this but bear with me).

You're cruising in 4th at 40 MPH, light ahead. Let off the gas, you will slow, you reach say 34-35, push in the clutch, tap the gas slightly to rev match, shift to 3rd, let the clutch back out slowly. Car is now in 3rd, slowing more rapidly down to 25 MPH, do the same thing, shift down to 2nd, etc, etc. You can essentially bring your car to a stop via proper shifting instead of braking. I think a lot of new drivers (before they get downshifting down) like to take the car out of gear and just brake it to a stop slowly. This is acceptable but unnecessary.

Adding to it:

>bogging down the engine around a turn is an issue

Same scenario as above, only you're coming up at 40 MPH towards a green turn arrow. The turn is a bit tight and you can't take it going 40 safely, you need to slow a bit. If you leave it in 4th, on the other side of the turn after slowing down to maybe 25-30, you press the gas pedal and hear that low strange sound. That's your engine being bogged down. The analogy would be if you were on the gear on your bicycle where its hardest to pedal. If you're going really fast, it feels nice and easy to pedal because it's easier to preserve that speed when you're already in motion. If you slow down, don't shift to an easier gear, and try to pedal, you're going to be giving your muscles a work out. It's difficult to keep the pedals turning.

When you bog down your engine you're doing the same thing. Staying in 4th gear but driving at 25-30 MPH isn't a massive problem, and depending on some other factors for your engine you car will be able to handle being bogged down better or worse. It doesn't really matter though. Plan your moves ahead and execute them properly.

>coming up on a turn at 40 mph in 4th gear
>begin to slow to execute turn
>push in clutch and rev engine to match higher rev which will be necessary for downshifting to a lower gear
>shift to 3rd, let clutch out smoothly while also turning the corner

This is safer, as on the other side of the turn you will still have some power in your acceleration and will be able to react more astutely to new traffic situations.

If there is anything driving manual will give you an appreciation for, it's thinking clearly and logically about your moves while driving, and how your habits might affect yourself and others around you. I find I drive much safer as a manual driver than I did early on with automatics, because I'm more considerate about driving in general.

>I have no idea how to ride manual
> But a lot of the tutorials are either hard to understand, or plain wrong and bad for the car.

How do you know it's wrong or bad for the car if you don't even know that shit?

these are exactly the little tidbits I was looking for. the bit with the clutch and the hand on gearshift I didn't know was bad for the car, however I never do any of that as it's a habit carried over from automatics that I had.

kek, what's a torquelet? someone who drives loudly?

I gotta keep this type of shit in mind.

just obvious shit. I was watching a video that straight up told you to rev the car up to 3k RPM before releasing clutch. also lots of comments I've been reading.

I'd like to add.
>The higher the gear you are in the faster you can go let of the clutch without the car lunging forwards or backwards
Meaning that if you are going from first to second it's better to let off the clutch slower than when switching from 3rd to 4th.

And remember
>practice makes perfect

>torquelet
it's a derivative of the words
>torque
and types of words like
>manlet
meaning the car doesn't have enough torque to get moving without stepping on the gas first.

>The higher the gear you are in the faster you can go let of the clutch without the car lunging forwards or backwards

That's also interesting, and helpful advice. best not to ride on the clutch needlessly, eh?

Be sure you've masted hill starts before going out on the road.

It's not nearly as hard as you think. I bought a 5 speed Celica without even knowing how to drive it just because I wanted to learn to drive stick. Needless to say the shitbox Kia I was dailying before hand died and I had to learn how to drive stick in fucking heavy traffic. A year later and I don't even think about driving. In fact, going back to an automatic feels strange, almost alien. I subconsciously keep wanting to grab the shifter to change gears.

Literally just sit down and drive it, you might crunch a couple gears or stall while figuring out the clutch but you can literally figure it out in a single session of sitting down and just trying to drive, it will be second nature in a week or two.

Been driving for years and I usually never downshift to a stop unless I know its about to turn green. Is there any other reason to not just neutral-brake besides that?

*Presses on the footrest at every stoplight

>*can't even move his left foot because beetus got to it*

Nice lude.

try to get the car moving without touching the gas. this will teach you the bite point. from there learn how much gas you need to start.

do not coast in neutral, always engine brake. release gas when shifting gears and rev match when down shifting.

handbrake start for steep inclines.

that's about everything, really

One thing that really helped me at the start was to get into the habit of pressing down the clutch whenever there was a problem.

>handbrake start
>for inclines

holy shit would you plebs stop shilling that dumb shit

youtube.com/watch?v=waeOibnmuJk

What is wrong with doing that? Brake pads are easier to replace than a clutch

If the incline is steep enough it is necessary to use the handbrake.

Its really easy user. Sure everything said above is good advice, but if you really want the easiest technique, do the following:

Stand on the left and right pedals. Calmly place car into gear. When ready to set off, let go of the left pedal.

Now, this will work to get you moving, but youll reach a point where the engine makes a funny noise and the car wont go any faster. This is normal. Just let go of the pedal and firmly pull gearstick into the next available gear. Itll go in eventually.

If it all goes wrong, stand on the 2 leftmost pedals. Peasy mate.

Hijacking this thread in regards to quickly taking off while turning.

>At stop sign, clutch down in 1st ready to go, need to turn with the flow of traffic (e.g LHD turning right), but in a really sharp turn, like 110 degrees.
>1st has extremely short gearing, if you accelerate and stop accelerating suddenly it lurches like a motherfucker.
>Gap in traffic
>Gun it, shoulder check as I get into the lane, make sure some cunt isn't going to try close the gap
>The split second I shoulder check the car lurches, probably don't keep even acceleration even or something
>The lurch then causes my foot on the clutch to move as well, because the bite point is SUPER high up and I can't seem to rest my foot in the well while clutching, so it ends up free floating while cluching
>Sudden rapid engagement and release of the clutch drops the revs, lurches the car again
>I try to smoothly correct this by full clutching down, blipping revs to compensate for speed and releasing the clutch.
>Car kicks roughly anyway and I join traffic with wounded pride

I know I can just chuck it into 2nd once shit goes weird, but it always happens at a speed that's too slow for 2nd, I lug the engine slightly and I can't accelerate into the gap fast enough, but regardless of what I do to the throttle it doesn't smoothly rev match. I've tried giving it more revs and less revs to see if it lets me get back into 1st smoothly.

>too slow for 2nd
How little torque do you have?

I have enough, it just doesn't pull particularly well in 2nd at low speeds.

Lmao dude what car you got?

wrx sti

Not really, some will say it's better to shift than wear your brake pads unnecessarily, but I have no idea if there is any truth or practicality in that.

>tfw car has 59hp and I can take off on clutch alone, even on slight inclines

It's a petrol 3cyl.

youtube.com/channel/UC9vvzqgfupUvAT-_ATPtr4Q

>if you accelerate and stop accelerating suddenly it lurches like a motherfucker

Yep, you said it. If you need to back off suddenly in 1st gear, you're gonna lurch like a mofo unless you clutch in.

>The split second I shoulder check the car lurches, probably don't keep even acceleration even or something

Sounds like you shoulder-checked a little late. Once you've gunned the throttle to accelerate into the new lane, you've committed to that new lane, and nothing good is going to happen from second-guessing yourself. You'll probably come to rest between the 2 lanes and that is worse than committing to 1 lane or the other.

You too.

I live in an area with lots of old people, they do stupid things frequently.

The problem is as you've said that I'm not looking at where I'm going. It sounds stupid to go where you aren't spotting, I know.
I position my car first, so I know I'm not going to hit a curb, then wait for my opportunity. If I see a space, I have to keep watching it as I pull out, otherwise I might fuck up the timing, or some dumbfuck will speed up and close the close the gap as I pull out to ensure people don't 'cut in line'. I only watch until I've positioned myself far enough that I can look back at the road ahead, but during those split seconds I fuck up my clutch work

>300hp
Cmon dude just put it in second you aren't in a race no need for quick acceleration.