How America lost its love for the stick shift • Hacker News Board

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#501

Post by sologoub » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:02 AM UTC

I have a feeling that driving a manual will eventually be akin to learning to ride a horse - people who love the sport will still do it and pay for it, but the general public will regard it as something far from their lives, whereas it once was a common skill.

Driving a manual, especially on a track teaches you a lot about the physics behind the machine you are operating. For example, few people consider how weight transfer when cornering can either help you or send you into a spin - electronics handle most of this for you and when decelerating, computers won’t let you shift.

I do have to wonder if texting and driving would be a lesser concern if both hands were occupied... Probably not, but one can dream!

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#502

Post by closeparen » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:03 AM UTC

mulmen wrote: post #368

zanny wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy to say from the position of thinking you can't lose your license or have the financial means to deal with such a loss. For a majority of those living in the US the places they live and work have been so fundamentally designed around cars that no alternative form of transit is usable. Busses might run once a day, no sidewalks, no bike lanes amidst 5 layer highways. Even getting out of ones housing development via…

80% of Americans live in cities. It’s entirely possible to reduce our reliance on individual car ownership.

Where “city” means “not rural.” The vast majority of those are in seas of sparsely packed single family homes separated from the nearest businesses by miles of busy roads, not walkable/urban/transit connected cores.

Consider the Bay Area, population 7 million, with closer to 1 million of those in SF and Oakland. Then consider that the Sunset and Richmond, also basically suburbs, make up a huge chunk of SF’s land.

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#503

Post by jedberg » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:05 AM UTC

Johnny555 wrote: post #341

jedberg wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found that having a stick in traffic was actually easier for me. I could keep it in one gear which meant not moving my foot from brake to gas (I could just use engine breaking and use just the gas).

Can't you do the same thing in an automatic? Put it in first gear?

Sure, but I was just saying that to me moderate traffic didn't bother me when I had a stick, as was OPs complaint.

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#504

Post by mmmBacon » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:10 AM UTC

I bought my first automatic in 2011. Prior to that I drove all manual transmission cars from before I was able to legally drive in 1986 until 2011. In 2011, my truck configuration was only offered with automatic transmission. I really hate how automatic transmissions shift, usually not where I want them to and sometimes inexplicably (possibly for emissions reasons) when you are not in the power. While 6 speed automatics are better I still find the gear spacings and shift points to be really irritating (even on luxury cars).

Also, I vastly prefer the control a manual gives you in low traction situations over automatic transmissions with electronic traction control.

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#505

Post by hellogoodbyeeee » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:13 AM UTC

jimmaswell wrote: post #394

apple4ever wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Its absolutely more fun, and that's a pretty compelling argument. And another one is I tell the car what I want to do. Sure it can try to figure it out, but it will never know exactly what I want to do. I can do something quicker than an automatic will know. For example, I'll know I need to be in a lower gear because I'm about to floor it. An automatic can't know that.

Maybe I'll try it in real life someday, but I've tried manual in some sim games (Richard Burns Rally and Assetto Corsa, racing wheel/pedals + oculus setup) and it wasn't more fun, it was just a distracting chore. And that's not even having to use a clutch pedal, which would make it even worse.

I enjoy driving a manual because of how it feels to change gears. I don't think a racing Sim will ever be able to capture that feeling because you are only moving a joystick, not forcing a complex machine to change gears.

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#506

Post by jackvalentine » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:14 AM UTC

buckminster wrote: post #281

catdog wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany one reason might be that basically everyone learns to drive with the stick so it's the normal. To get a drivers license it's mandatory to go to a driving school and drive quite a lot of hours under supervision of an instructor usually using a car belonging to the school. While it's theoretically possible to use an automatic car nobody does that because you then are not allowed to drive a manual one afterwa…

> While it's theoretically possible to use an automatic car nobody does that because you then are not allowed to drive a manual one afterwards. Same in the UK.

Same in Aus, but it doesn't stop the majority of new licence holders taking their test in an automatic. What's the difference between us?

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#507

Post by brisance » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:14 AM UTC

tlrobinson wrote: post #485

int_handler wrote: post #313

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Driving a manual car isn't about efficiency. It is about driver engagement. Yes, you can row your own gears with paddle shifters, but no automatic will ever give you the same kind of engagement or connectedness with the car as a manual with three pedals will. But yes, if there is a smoking gun for the death of the manual in America, it would be our crumbling, congested roads and absurdly long daily commutes.

Why is a stick and three pedals the optimal number of controls for “driver engagement”?

You can get into a slide easily by disengaging the clutch temporarily. Few dual clutch cars can do this e.g. Porsche GT3. You also can do heel-toe downshift without unbalancing the car's weight distribution, if you do it right. Newer cars blip the throttle for you so you don't miss it, but that's kind of missing the point.

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#508

Post by brisance » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:17 AM UTC

goatslacker wrote: post #304

t0mbstone wrote: post #163

Speaking as someone who has owned a number of sports cars with manual transmissions, I can tell you why I finally made the switch to automatic: Adaptive cruise control in stop and go traffic. I used to have to deal with a six-speed manual transmission in stop and go traffic for an hour every day, and it was pure torture. I mean, sure, it was fun for a weekend drive in the mountains, but it sucked the rest of the time…

Never found paddle shifters to be in the same league as a manual transmission even in modern high performance cars. There's always that bit of lag and delay with automatic that there isn't on a manual.

Drive a Porsche newer than 2012, like a 981 or 991.1 or newer. The PDK transmission is very good, almost telepathic. Slight push on the throttle and it downshifts into the meat of the torque band. I currently drive an E92 M3 DCT which suffers from the "lag", which is why I'm on manual mode most of the time.

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#509

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:17 AM UTC

RaceWon wrote: post #409

I raced cars with non-synchronized transmissions for some years, which means you have to heel and toe (and blip the throttle) to engage a lower gear, and I always drove my MT street cars the same way. About 8 years ago though I switched to automatic with a VW GTI. There truly is no comparison, dual clutches and in sport mode the car executes a throttle blip on down shifts so I can left foot brake all the time and alw…

[deleted]

Re: How America lost its love for the stick shift

#510

Post by another-cuppa » Wed, Sep 12, 2018, 5:22 AM UTC

chrisdhoover wrote: post #345

t0mbstone wrote: post #163

Speaking as someone who has owned a number of sports cars with manual transmissions, I can tell you why I finally made the switch to automatic: Adaptive cruise control in stop and go traffic. I used to have to deal with a six-speed manual transmission in stop and go traffic for an hour every day, and it was pure torture. I mean, sure, it was fun for a weekend drive in the mountains, but it sucked the rest of the time…

I just do like the truckers do, leave it in second and crawl. It helps to not be concerned with maintaining a 6 inch gap with the car ahead. I truly believe that stop and go is caused by automatics. All of the brake tapping tends to bunch people up at the end of long lines forcing them to a complete stop. In a manual just let off on the gas a little and the engine brakes a little, no brake lights to create cascading…

Second in a car is optimistic. I often have to put it in first and just let the engine tick over. Some people don't think their car can do this. I'm not sure if that's true or if they are just bad drivers, though. My car will happily roll in third if it's flat.

I find I'm usually able to keep rolling in gear, which doesn't use any more fuel than just idling, and not apply the brakes in most "stop and go" traffic.