Driving a manual transmission car can be a thrilling and rewarding experience, but learning how to change gears smoothly takes practice and patience.
Whether you’re learning to drive stick or just want to brush up on your gear shifting skills, keep reading to pick up some helpful tips to help you master the manual transmission.
Getting Started
#1. Find the Right Teacher.
If you can, recruit a friend or family member to teach you who is a skilled manual driver and willing to be patient with you. Instruction from someone who has learned clutch control and why smooth shifting matters is worth its weight in gold.
Start with someone you trust who drives a manual transmission on a daily basis. If no one fits the bill, hire an instructor. You can even make a post on NextDoor or a local Facebook group for leads.
#2. Start in an Empty Parking Lot.
Before you head out on real roads, practice the basics (hey, automatic transmission folks, this applies to you, too!) in a wide-open parking lot.
This low-traffic expanse will give you practice in engaging the clutch, how the stick engages the gears, and the relationship between the gas and brake pedals, but without car-on-car horrendous accidents or terrible wrong-way-die-death derailleurs standing in the way. Practice starting and stopping, moving on to smooth clutch releases and planned gear changes.
After you’re competent at the footwork, go on to wide turns and circles. You have room to stall and mess up, so you won’t be under pressure developing your coordination. Use plenty of time in a vacant parking lot before you try the real thing.
#3. Learn What the Clutch Does.
The clutch, you might think of as a bridge between the engine and the transmission. Depress it, and the power of the engine is detached from the wheels. Let the clutch out gradually, and it goes to delivering power again, making the wheels turn.
Learning to slip the friction of the clutch in and out on the clutch pedal takes some finesse. Let it out too fast, and the engine achieves high revs before anything happens to the car, or you stall it.
Clutch down all the way when shifting gears and let it out gradually, getting the feel of when, precisely, the clutch hooks up.
#4. Find the Friction Zone on the Clutch.
Unless you give it some gas, you’ll feel your car want to creep forward as you hit this engagement point. Know the Clutch release where this occurs, and practice the art of smoothing out the engagement of the clutch here before you give gas while doing it.
Since you are leaping through the friction zone too early, it will stall, or if you leap into too early a friction zone, your starts will be jerky. Release the clutch completely again if you have to. No two cars remotely control the pressure of the clutch, the point at which it engages.
Good drivers who deliberately pound the pavement stick shift take a bit of time to get used to the clutch of such an automobile they have never handled before.
If you feel you’ve mastered the motor of one car, practiced on, and suddenly have some motor trouble with the handling of a different people carrier, you are not alone. Some practice and be on your way.
Basic Techniques
#5. Smooth Shifting.
If you start from a standstill, you have to accelerate the engine a little first so the gear changes won’t jerk but will be smooth. Note that you need to ease up on your gears and not rush it.
#6. When it’s right Shift.
Just flick an eye at your own RPM, and you’ll know when to shift. The recommended range is usually around 2000-3000 RPM.
You’ll be optimizing your fuel economy, and your gear changes will be much smoother for it.
#7. Can Hear You Shifting Gears.
You will know when it’s time to change gear just from listening to the noise your engine makes. A deeper sound means you’re in a low RPM range, and louder, higher-pitched sounds mean you’re at high RPM and it’s time to change to the next gear.
With experience, you will know when just by sound.
#8. Control the Clutch.
You will have to learn clutch control. Get your left foot pressing down and raising the clutch a few times until you know when the clutch is engaged or not. Getting the timing correct will help you with the next steps.
#9. Change Gears Fully Before Releasing the Clutch.
You have to be fully in gear before letting your clutch out. Make the mistake, I’m sure we have all made.
You don’t have to grind your gears too long before your transmission will break down, so just take your time and move your shifter in and out of gear so you feel it engage and feel the groove, and then slowly let out the clutch pedal, and you once again change gear. Try not to force them!!
Advanced Techniques
#10. Shifting Down.
Slowing down, stopping, it is necessary to downshift to suit your vehicle’s speed. Gently depress the brake while freeing off the accelerator and keeping the clutch down, downshifting, and then releasing that clutch slowly.
Learn to catch your downshifts and keep your vehicle in proper control while slowing down.
#11. Shifting Up.
Accelerating, watch your revs and when time to go up a gear, back off that gas, step on the clutch, and slide the gear-stick into the next gear position.
Smoothly off that clutch and begin using the accelerator. You will get to grips with it very soon.
#12. Block Changing.
Using the accelerator pedal and carefully applying the brake, sliding the gear recognizably by skipping several ‘gear-tooth’ positions is called ‘Block Changing’. Skipping several gears in sequence may be necessary at times, but the simpler ‘Block Change’ idea springs to mind more often when ‘downshifting’.
An average instance of a ‘Block Change’ would be travelling at about 35 MPH on a road in 4th and having to turn at the next side road. You might use your brake pedal to slow down a little and go straight into 2nd gear to negotiate the corner.
#13. Double Clutching.
Double the air in your gearstick! It is useful for changing gears on an “old banger,” presuming it does not have a nice synchromesh gearbox and double clutch to make it run smoothly, so is a throttle-blipping change itself.
You push in the clutch pedal, change into neutral, and then take your foot off that clutch again and promptly depress it once more to make the desired change in gear.
#14. Heel-Toe Shifting.
Designed as a dual-action of pressing the brake and accelerator at the same time as you shift, having your toe on the brake would require the heel of your foot to blip to maintain an increase in the engine’s ‘whirr’.
The foot is actually blipping its toes up for the lower gear to enable a nicely smooth downturned down track and perfectly flat down chipped, in coasting balance during the cornering bend.
Practice this type of shifting, which means driving training out and better controlling your car on bendy roads. You may never use it, but if you think you might go on a track day or even a trip to the Nurburgring, you will need to begin practicing now, phewie!
Specific Driving Scenarios
#15. The Way Down.
Instead of having to use your brakes almost all the way down a hill, downshift one or even two gears and let your transmission and engine do the downshifting. This will extend the life of your brakes and help prevent overheating and even brake fade.
#16. Practice the Hills.
If you are driving on an inclined street or hill, there will probably come a time when you will need to stop on it. You can’t place your foot on the brake like you can with an automatic car.
You must press down the clutch pedal with your foot, and also the brake pedal. You may find it better if you also put the gear in neutral. Some even recommend using the parking brake, depending upon the steepness of the hill.
Now, when you are ready to proceed moving forward over the hill, go back to first gear, gradually taking your left foot off the clutch.
You will want to transfer your right foot to the gas pedal. If it’s not down already, pull down the parking brake.
The probability is that the trickiest part for production learning to drive the stick shift is getting moving after being stopped on the slope of a hill. It takes plenty of practice to get moving in a car, without rolling backwards too far, or stalling the vehicle.
It is a good idea to practice with nobody but yourself if possible. If the engine stalls for you, don’t panic. Just hold the brake pedal and clutch pedal down and restart the car, and try again. Every manual transmission driver has failed in this, so don’t sweat it.
#17. Well Chosen Gear.
Virtually all manual vehicles have either 5 or 6 gears. Older cars may have gears of only 4,3 or even 2. For modern cars with 5 and 6 gears, the first 3 gears are used for city driving or driving on roads where there is a lot of stop-and-go traffic.
The 4 through and including the 6 are for faster roads, such as highways and state roads. Before you change from one gear to the next higher, be sure to depress the clutch pedal fully until it touches the floor. It will take a while for you to get used to this, but don’t worry; you soon will.
Safety and Best Practices
#18. Do Not Shift Into Reverse Unless Stopped.
You may feel tempted to shift your car into reverse in order to “stop” it, making a go of it while reversing.
If you do this while still rolling forward, you could end up damaging your transmission, and may even end up paying for expensive repairs.
#19. Do Not Half-Clutch.
When changing gears in a manual transmission, press the clutch pedal all the way to the floor. Do not leave it half-way or you could damage the transmission.
#20. Do Not Rest Your Left Hand on The Gear Stick.
Apart from the fact that you may scratch the good paint on your car with your engagement ring, doing this distracts you. Premature wearing may also occur on your transmission. The best position for this hand while driving is on the steering wheel.
#21. Always Wear Good Shoes.
If you have ever accidentally stepped on the hot concrete pavement on a hot afternoon, then you know what it’s like. When driving barefoot or with only socks, shoes, or flip flops, your feet easily slip off the pedals, and you have less control over acceleration, braking, or both.
While not illegal for the normal driver, it’s dangerous when learning to drive.
#22. Drive Defensively.
When you learn to drive a stick shift, be careful as to how defensive you are in your driving techniques. Since you will be distracted learning the clutch and shifter, you will need extra space between yourself and others on the road.
Scan more yards ahead on the road to figure out what sort of slowdowns or shifts are needed well in advance. Going slower through complex intersections can also help take a load off your mind.
Know that other motorists will be impatient due to your learning curve. The defensive habits will help to avoid accidents while you’re learning that third pedal.
#23. Do Not Use A Cell Phone.
Because it is so much easier to drive an automatic, the driver then has one hand available for using their cell phone (even though this is not recommended and often illegal in many areas).
This is not a luxury they would have in a manual vehicle, however, because one hand is always required to be on the steering wheel and the other hand must be changing gears. You won’t have a hand available for using your electronic mobile device.
And if you do try, this greatly increases your tendency to get into an accident. So don’t use a hands-free phone, or any other electronically mobile device. If you must, use a Bluetooth headset that is wirelessly connected to your phone.
Troubleshooting and Maintenance
#24. Recovery from a Stalled Engine.
Don’t worry if you stall your engine once in a while. Everyone who drives an axle reciprocator gets stalled at some point when they first learn to drive a car with a manual transmission.
Simply put the car in neutral again and restart it, remembering to step on the clutch as you shift into first; keep practicing, and you’ll soon become an expert at recovering from a stall.
#25. Hard Shifting of Gears.
If you find it hard to change gears, make sure your clutch is right back and that it is fully engaged before attempting to change from one gear to another.
Never jam your foot down on the gas pedal, as you will snap the transmission belt and wreck your car. Patience and smooth adjustments will result in solving and avoiding gear-shifting problems.
Finishing Up
#26. Shutting the Engine Off.
An automatic just needs to come to a stop, get the gear shifted to park, and turn the key to the off position. It’s a little trickier when it comes to shutting off the car with a manual transmission.
As you come to a stop, you’ll want to shift into neutral. Complete your stop and, with your foot still on the brake pedal, turn off the ignition.
Now, still pressing down the brake pedal, push in the clutch pedal and gear shift to first. Otherwise, the car may simply roll once you take your foot from the brake pedal. Now release both pedals.
It’s a good idea to set your parking brake, and you will always need to do this anytime you are parked on a slope.
#27. Be Patient!
It takes most people weeks, or even months, of regular practice and driving to learn to drive a manual transmission vehicle. The coordination between the hands and feet is awkward at first and requires concentration.
Realize it is going to take lots of practice and patience to learn to drive a stick. Don’t be discouraged if you stall the car or make jerky gear changes at first. It takes time for your brain and your muscles to “wire” themselves properly and get the hang of smooth shifting and clutch work.
Eventually, driving a stick will be second nature, and you won’t even be aware of doing it consciously any longer. Your brain will know what gear you should be in for what situation, and when to change gears (without checking the tachometer).