How much damage do these beginner mistakes cause?

novasorc · Post by **novasorc** » Fri Oct 17, 2014 11:40 pm

I've never driven manual before and I've been making some mistakes that are surely causing wear on my car. I'd like to know how bad each one is and if I should really worry about it.

Today, I accidentally let go of my clutch when I downshifted from fifth gear to first gear while preparing for a stop light. I heard a noise similar to one using a sander on a floor. I'm guessing this is from the clutch not being able to grab on fast enough so it made that noise.

I've noticed that I haven't been fully removing my foot from the accelerator while shifting gears. I've had a minimal, but constant amount of acceleration of maybe 300-400 RPM during a portion of my gear shifts.

I shifted into second while going up a hill and my car reached a very low speed, so I stalled while trying to release the clutch.

Any knowledge/advice on how to improve would be great.

Thanks.

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 12:32 am

The short answer to your question is very little damage. Not even enough to be concerned about it....unless of course you are so bad that you're constantly burning the clutch every chance you get.

With time (and practice), you'll avoid doing any of the stuff that you mentioned in your post. In the meantime, try not to worry about it too much.

novasorc · Post by **novasorc** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 1:09 am

Shadow. Thanks for the help.

Can you explain what exactly was happening when I shifted from fifth to first and accidentally let go? I've downshifted before without rev matching before and it didn't result in this sanding sound. Why did it happen this time?

Post by **IMBoring25** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 1:16 am

There's actually only one of those that has the potential to do any significant amount of harm, and it's the first one. There are advanced techniques you can do, but for now try to keep the clutch pedal on the floor whenever the shifter is in motion.

I'm accustomed to a floor sander being a whirring noise. If that's all it was you were hearing a speed differential in the synchro and you just wore the synchro more than absolutely necessary. In that case, in addition to needing to hold the clutch pedal in, you may have been going too fast when you attempted the shift. Generally speaking, in most cars you should be down not much faster than walking speed and usually a little slower before you attempt to shift to first using the basic techniques.

If there was a more rhythmic staccato to the noise that would have been gear clash, and you pushed through the resistance of the synchro to get the dog teeth to start to try to engage when they couldn't. As another general rule, the shifter should not be forced. Gentle pressure into the gate should be sufficient. More than brief resistance usually means something is not right.

http://www.howstuffworks.com/transmission.htm has a good series of diagrams to explain the inner workings of a typical transmission. It would help with understanding the above.

The second does absolutely zero damage, and it sounds like you're really doing quite well at this stage. You're not necessarily supposed to completely release the accelerator. If you completely release the accelerator, the engine will be braking the car. Perfection is the point in the accelerator's travel where the engine is neither accelerating nor braking the car. At that point, when you disengage the clutch, there will be no change in the tachometer and no jerk. Other than the minor flare in the RPM you noticed, the only consequence of what you're doing now is a slight jerk as you put the clutch in that will exhibit itself as a forward head-bob.

Stalling the car also doesn't hurt much. If you had gotten the clutch out and the hill slowed you down some more so you wound up putting the engine under a lot of load at an RPM very near or below idle for an extended period of time, that can be somewhat harmful, more harmful to some vehicles than others. Some suggestions include:

Raise your shift points when going uphill. You'll have more speed to lose before the shift becomes problematic and the engine won't be working as hard.

If you're just a little too slow for the current gear, you can slip the clutch for a short while just as you would to launch to get enough speed to let the clutch out all the way. There's some clutch wear associated with this, but not a lot if you do it right.

If you're a lot too slow for the current gear, downshift. I especially recommend raising the shift point for an uphill 1-2 because a rolling 2-1 downshift is most likely to put you in one of the situations from your first question until you get salty enough to start trying double-clutching.

novasorc · Post by **novasorc** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 1:57 am

IMBoring25,

Thank you very much for taking the time to write such a detailed response. I feel more at ease about making mistakes now. This is my fourth day of driving manual so it is very encouraging to hear that I'm doing well. I'll definitely look at that link you sent so I have a better idea of how it all works.

Can you explain how the first thing I did has potential to significantly damage my car? What would I need to do/how should I avoid hurting my car in a similar manner.

Also, I've noticed that my car is harder to shift into all the gears than when I got it just a few days ago, even when completely parked with foot on clutch the entire time. It almost feels like something is slightly misaligned. Is there any common reason for this, or maybe just my imagination?

Thanks again for the help.

Rope-Pusher · Post by **Rope-Pusher** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 9:13 am

IMBoring25 wrote: until you get salty enough to start trying double-clutching.

I'd recommend a tour of a salt mine to get you going in that direction.

theholycow · Post by **theholycow** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 9:15 am

Hold up a second. This is important. How fast were you going when you accidentally let the clutch pedal come up in first gear?

Coming from fifth, we might generally assume you were going pretty fast. In order to get the shifter into the first position, you would have to press pretty hard and wait a long time. If the shifter resists moving into a gear too much, you probably shouldn't be shifting into that gear. Pay attention to that and don't fight it.

If you force it, you're abusing the stuff inside the transmission. Once isn't any big deal; it's designed to absorb the occasional mistake. However, you want to avoid forcing it when possible.

Additionally, if you get into a very low gear at a very high speed and let the clutch pedal come up, you could overrev the engine. If you have a tachometer you may notice a red-highlighted portion at the very top. The beginning of that portion is called "redline" and you should avoid it. The engine isn't designed to survive much beyond that. That's not to say that the moment you go 1RPM over it your engine explodes, but it's marked like that for a reason.

Also, I've noticed that my car is harder to shift into all the gears than when I got it just a few days ago, even when completely parked with foot on clutch the entire time. It almost feels like something is slightly misaligned.

Do you mean with the engine on or off? It's probably your imagination, but if not:

Engine on: Your clutch is not releasing fully. (Please note that "release" is what the clutch does when you push the pedal to the floor, even though that word is commonly used the opposite way when describing the clutch pedal rather than the actual clutch itself.) A clutch not fully releasing when the pedal is floored is a mechanical malfunction that cannot be caused by a newbie learning and abusing it; it's just a manufacturing/assembly mistake or materials failure.

Engine off: Shift linkage issue. Again, not learning/abuse-related, just a manufacturing/assembly mistake or materials failure. (It would actually feel this way with engine both off and on, come to think of it, but it wouldn't feel any better with the engine off.)

Rope-Pusher · Post by **Rope-Pusher** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 9:35 am

novasorc wrote: Also, I've noticed that my car is harder to shift into all the gears than when I got it just a few days ago, even when completely parked with foot on clutch the entire time. It almost feels like something is slightly misaligned. Is there any common reason for this, or maybe just my imagination?

Two things that affect shift force in the short term are trans fluid temperature and clutch release. As we move into winter here in the Northern Hemisphere, the first is a given. The second, assuming you are burying the clutch pedal before you start your shift, would be more of a concern.

If, while parked, with the engine OFF, moving the stick around from gear to gear with the clutch pedal fully depressed feels fine, but while parked with the engine on things aren't the same, I'd say your clutch is not fully releasing. That could be from something on the hydraulic release system side of things, or it could be from a partially blown clutch due to downshifting at too high of a speed. Your clutch disk probably has a safety factor of 50 % with respect to downshift rpm - it can spin quite a bit faster than engine redline before overspinning causes damage. Think of how fast you can run in each gear when the engine is at redline rpm and don't downshift into gears above their redline speeds. Fully-blown clutches turn to shards and dust, but partially-blown clutch disks can just break up enough to make them "thicker", so for the same amount of release bearing motion, there is no longer enough gap between the flywheel and the pressure plate for the clutch to spin freely. The answer to this is to replace the clutch disk. If/when a disk fully comes apart, it often damages the release bearing and the hydraulic slave cylinder.

Before you go driving off a cliff in despair or something, remember that shift force is inversely related to shift times - the faster you try to move the lever, the more force you must input.

As you are getting more comfortable with shifting,

you may be unconsciously speeding up your shift lever movements.

Shadow · Post by **Shadow** » Sat Oct 18, 2014 4:43 pm

theholycow wrote:Hold up a second. This is important. How fast were you going when you accidentally let the clutch pedal come up in first gear?

Coming from fifth, we might generally assume you were going pretty fast.

The way I interpreted it, he was downshifting from 5th down to 1st....not from 5th directly to 1st. That wouldn't make much sense for several reasons. First, both 1st and 5th are "up" shift gates. It would be almost impossible to accidentally move the shift level from 5th gear to 1st gear, even for a noob. Secondly, if he was in 5th gear at a typical road speed for 5th gear, it would be virtually impossible to get the car into 1st gear at that speed.

So what I think he was trying to say (or at least the way I understood it) was that he was downshifting from 5th through the gears consecutively and then botched it when he was going into 1st gear.

After reading his post again, I'm not sure what he meant. I guess he could have had the lever in 5th gear and while preparing to stop for the light, decided to go directly into 1st gear before he was completely stopped. I wouldn't call that a downshift, but I guess he could have meant that too.

Either way, very little damage could have occurred because there's no way to accidentally force the transmission into 1st gear at a high road speed.

novasorc · Post by **novasorc** » Sun Oct 19, 2014 2:31 am

Shadow, the last scenario was right. Basically, I was coming to a red light that had just turned green, so I was slowing down a lot, probably going to fully stop since other cars hadn't started moving yet. I shifted directly from fifth to first and meant to keep my foot on the clutch until I was ready to start moving again shortly. However, I thought I was in neutral and simply let go of the clutch. I absolutely did not force my gear into anything.

theholycow, not that fast, probably 30 MPH since I already started braking when I absentmindedly let go of the clutch. Could such a mistake cause damage if I was going at like 60 MPH, then?

Another question for you guys. I read that I could get a good start on my car by revving up the engine and dumping the clutch. I got my engine up to about 1.2k RPM and just dumped the clutch and it instantly stalled when going from stop to 1st gear. What am I doing wrong? I'm afraid to bring my RPMs higher and try this if I'm stalling pretty badly at 1.2k RPM. Thanks.

theholycow · Post by **theholycow** » Sun Oct 19, 2014 7:49 am

30 is very fast to be moving the shifter into 1st. This is partly because there is the risk that you lose your grip on the clutch pedal (or absent-mindedly forget you're not in neutral), but mostly because that's an awful lot of work for the 1st gear synchronizer to do. I don't normally advocate worrying about synchro wear, but 1st could be subject to premature wear if you habitually do that. If you were going even faster when you moved the shifter but got down to 30 when you let off the clutch pedal, that's even worse.

If you had let off the clutch pedal at 60 in 1st (how the heck could you even move the shifter into 1st at 60???!?!?!?! Should be crazy synchro resistance!) then you probably would have destroyed your engine. (Can't confirm without knowing gear ratios, final drive ratio, etc, and having a little trouble digging up specifications for a Mazda3 sGT.)

It is best to avoid moving the shifter into 1st unless you're at a stop or below ~3mph. It is also important to not downshift too early even if you plan to keep the clutch pedal floored. If you feel you must be in a different gear, shift to a more appropriate gear and then shift again later, otherwise until you're ready to grab another gear leave it in the higher gear or put it in neutral.

Another question for you guys. I read that I could get a good start on my car by revving up the engine and dumping the clutch. I got my engine up to about 1.2k RPM and just dumped the clutch and it instantly stalled when going from stop to 1st gear. What am I doing wrong? I'm afraid to bring my RPMs higher and try this if I'm stalling pretty badly at 1.2k RPM. Thanks.

The kind of hardcore racing launch you're talking about requires RPM a lot higher than that. In a V8 car with short ratios it might be possible to do at 2000RPM, in an old Honda it might require 5500RPM, and maybe your car might do it at 3000RPM. It is, by its nature, quite abusive to the car. Occasionally it's fine, but it's not a habit you'll want to practice daily.

At 1200RPM, with practice, you can get a mildly aggressive launch with faster clutchwork if you've got the torque for that, but dumping will stall just about anything.

You mentioned in another post that your car is an expensive car to learn on. With that being a concern, you really should tone it down a whole lot in general. It sounds like you're trying to learn with a high-energy, high-speed, rough, abusive style. If I'm wrong, ignore the rest of this paragraph. You don't need to back it off to bluehair level or even down to soccer mom level, but you definitely need to be far more gentle and slow than 17-year-old who just watched the entire Fast & Furious franchise for the first time level or even mid-life crisis guy who just bought his Camaro level. If you're at a 9, bring it down to a 5. Once you've got a decent amount of practice and everything is smooth you can amp it back up.

ClutchDisc · Post by **ClutchDisc** » Sun Oct 19, 2014 7:54 am

I wouldn't be trying to "dump the clutch" yet.... you are still learning. Also a huge tip for you: Don't look at the tach while you are learning, don't worry about getting exact rpms. This will become a big crutch for you to the point where you relying on the tach to be able to shift. I don't have a tach, so when I learned a few years ago, I learned just by feel and sound.

theholycow · Post by **theholycow** » Sun Oct 19, 2014 8:47 am

ClutchDisc wrote:Also a huge tip for you: Don't look at the tach while you are learning, don't worry about getting exact rpms. This will become a big crutch for you to the point where you relying on the tach to be able to shift.

This is much bandied about but I challenge it. I'm a data junkie and watch all my gauges like a hawk. If I have a tach I watch it (even with an automatic), and I sure did on the 2008 VW where I got the bulk of my early manual experience (though I had driven manuals as early as 11 years prior, I don't remember if any of them had tachs and I didn't get a huge amount of experience). I had no difficulty whatsoever when I started driving my tachless 1980 Buick; I was mildly annoyed at the lack of data but I wasn't stalling or botching shifts or anything like that. The tach doesn't magically make feel and sound disappear. You still associate them with shifting.

Rope-Pusher · Post by **Rope-Pusher** » Sun Oct 19, 2014 9:52 am

theholycow wrote: If you had let off the clutch pedal at 60 in 1st (how the heck could you even move the shifter into 1st at 60???!?!?!?! Should be crazy synchro resistance!) then you probably would have destroyed your engine.

If you had downshifted the transmission to 1st gear at 60 mph, for most vehicles this would mean that by the time you got the transmission into 1st the clutch was already blown apart by the rpms - there would essentially be no clutch to let out. At some speed between 60 and maybe 40 mph, you might only partially fail the clutch disk and letting up on the clutch pedal could have led to over-rev damage of the engine.

novasorc · Post by **novasorc** » Sun Oct 19, 2014 10:42 am

theholycow wrote:30 is very fast to be moving the shifter into 1st. This is partly because there is the risk that you lose your grip on the clutch pedal (or absent-mindedly forget you're not in neutral), but mostly because that's an awful lot of work for the 1st gear synchronizer to do. I don't normally advocate worrying about synchro wear, but 1st could be subject to premature wear if you habitually do that. If you were going even faster when you moved the shifter but got down to 30 when you let off the clutch pedal, that's even worse.

If you had let off the clutch pedal at 60 in 1st (how the heck could you even move the shifter into 1st at 60???!?!?!?! Should be crazy synchro resistance!) then you probably would have destroyed your engine. (Can't confirm without knowing gear ratios, final drive ratio, etc, and having a little trouble digging up specifications for a Mazda3 sGT.)

It is best to avoid moving the shifter into 1st unless you're at a stop or below ~3mph. It is also important to not downshift too early even if you plan to keep the clutch pedal floored. If you feel you must be in a different gear, shift to a more appropriate gear and then shift again later, otherwise until you're ready to grab another gear leave it in the higher gear or put it in neutral.
Another question for you guys. I read that I could get a good start on my car by revving up the engine and dumping the clutch. I got my engine up to about 1.2k RPM and just dumped the clutch and it instantly stalled when going from stop to 1st gear. What am I doing wrong? I'm afraid to bring my RPMs higher and try this if I'm stalling pretty badly at 1.2k RPM. Thanks.
The kind of hardcore racing launch you're talking about requires RPM a lot higher than that. In a V8 car with short ratios it might be possible to do at 2000RPM, in an old Honda it might require 5500RPM, and maybe your car might do it at 3000RPM. It is, by its nature, quite abusive to the car. Occasionally it's fine, but it's not a habit you'll want to practice daily.

At 1200RPM, with practice, you can get a mildly aggressive launch with faster clutchwork if you've got the torque for that, but dumping will stall just about anything.

You mentioned in another post that your car is an expensive car to learn on. With that being a concern, you really should tone it down a whole lot in general. It sounds like you're trying to learn with a high-energy, high-speed, rough, abusive style. If I'm wrong, ignore the rest of this paragraph. You don't need to back it off to bluehair level or even down to soccer mom level, but you definitely need to be far more gentle and slow than 17-year-old who just watched the entire Fast & Furious franchise for the first time level or even mid-life crisis guy who just bought his Camaro level. If you're at a 9, bring it down to a 5. Once you've got a decent amount of practice and everything is smooth you can amp it back up.

Thanks for the advice. I was completely unaware that even moving the shifter into first gear without letting go of the clutch could cause problems. So, I should never even move my knob into first gear unless I'm already going super slow, right? That is what you implied right? What would be the proper protocol from going from about 40 MPH to a red light then. Should I just put it into neutral and brake?

Also, were you saying I shouldn't have been able to move my knob into first gear even with the clutch depressed? I really did not move my knob very hard at all to get it into first gear. I guess I was probably going slower than 30 MPH. As you can see, I'm definitely concerned about possible damage on my expensive car, so I am not trying to drive like a hardcore driver. I was just reading on about how to get a faster start off a full stop since I feel like I am starting at a crawl right now and having trouble keeping up with traffic. I read somewhere that I could just rev the engine a bit and let go of the clutch. However, it seems that I am mistaken and this is not an advisable move. Is there any advice on how to get a faster start? I feel like I spend a while just getting it into first gear and then just shortly after I have to shift into second before I can even break 10 MPH.

Thank you for the help.

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How much damage do these beginner mistakes cause?

How much damage do these beginner mistakes cause?

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