e246

alright i was talkin about cars to friends at work today and they said you should be able to take off in a stick without revving it a little. they said its bad on the transmission and stuff. but what i do when just normal driving is let clutch half way then rev it to like 800-1000 rpm and slowly let the clutch go, is this wrong?

engifineer

If you take off without giving it throttle, it will stall the engine. You should give it a little gas, let out the clutch and increase throttle evenly as you let out, basically keeping the engine speed at the same point the whole time. And you want to learn to do it fairly quickly, but not so quick it is jerky, so you dont slip the clutch excessively.

nforce4

Yeah, you can start off without using any gas at all. It takes some time to master it, but once down it works fine, and also increases the life of the clutch. Giving a little gas is normal but does wear on the clutch, or what we call "Riding the clutch". I have owned 3 stick cars, and I never use the gas to roll out of first gear. Never had any powertrain issues either, but that may just be me.

engifineer

Giving it a slight bit of throttle makes for a better take off and does not hurt your clutch. That is how a manual is designed to be driven. Letting off more slowly on the clutch to take off with no gas just slips the clutch even more.

aen

and here i thought i've been driving stick wrong my whole life

i was taught to let go of clutch, hit gas.
i never drove like that, instead i gas a little. let go of clutch.


the things we are taught huh.

engifineer

It is all timing really. You dont need to have i revved before you start letting off... you do it as you let off in one smooth motion.

aen

^^ exactly, it took me a while to figure that out though.