Well, the time has come and I am now teaching my daughter to drive my Miata. She quickly picked up the whole concept of a manual transmission and was out on the open roads after a short practice session in a parking lot. As with all new drivers to a manual transmission, the most challenging thing for her is the balance between accelerator and clutch when taking off from a stop (e.g., somewhere between stalling the engine and spinning the rear tires). Any advice to help her get the feel of the clutch and engine?
practice makes perfect (along with constant instructional input ;-) but after awhile, I found with ea of my 3 kids, frustration sets in and I believe learning, for all intents and purposes ends. I recommend several relatively short sessions rather than a couple long / grueling / frustrating sessions. When you feel frustration coming on, find something good and leave on a high note. Each of my kids at some point decided I'd made a big mistake but got over / through it and now they each prefer to drive standard and enjoy it. I'd just add that your frustration level can be the limiting factor of the session too!
Excellent advice. If you get unnerved by the car bucking and stalling, it will be very difficult to endure. You have to accept this as part of the learning experience. I also used a vacant parking lot for two of my three daughters. They are plentiful here in Silicon Valley :-)
Ken and Chris, Thanks for the advice. I couldn't agree with you more. I survived teaching my wife to drive a 3 speed 68 Montigo back in college after her father gave up. The best part was the big hill on the way into campus with the stop light at the top. She almost needed both feet to push in the clutch. 25 years later we are still married and while she prefers an automatic, she drives a stick just fine. My older daughter lives out east now, takes the subway and train most places she needs to go and so doesn't drive very much. Anyway, she never really had an interest in learning to drive a stick and so I never taught her. My younger daughter however lit up when I suggested she learn since I am now traveling quite a bit, which leaves the Miata at home alone. Surprisingly, I am doing OK so far with the lurching and screeching. She actually does quite well most of the time. I'm more concerned about her getting frustrated and so am looking for hints to help her get the feel of clutch. I've been holding the sessions down to
30 minutes and we have not had any boughts of frustration by either of us. We'll keep pluggin away and I am confident she will figure it all out. Thank again,
I still remember being 17 years old and buying my '78 280Z. My Ford Econoline was being bought at the same time, giving me the money for the Datsun purchase. I suddenly realized that I now owned a 5-speed without having ever driven a manual.
I stalled it a few times, burned out a few times, , (ok, more than a few), and stopping on hills scared the hell out of me at first, but it didn't take too long to get it down. I had studied the concept at least, but there was never an instructor.
The way Chris suggests is better, I think, than the sink or swim approach. One other thing is that I found it helpful to know what was going on with the transmission. You don't have to show her how to rebuild a manual transmission, but if she has a general idea of what the flywheel and clutch are doing, it can possibly help.
Take her to an empty parking lot with a moderate slope. Her mission is to hold the car on the slope by slipping the clutch, eventually making it creep forward and back a couple of feet at a time, without using the brakes, under complete control...while staying under 1500 rpm. Don't worry about the clutch--you can tell her to take a break if it starts smelling funny. You might let her know that most drivers NEVER learn how to do this, even though it's not particularly difficult. It just takes a little practice.
Explain the goal, then get out of the car and leave her alone until she's ready to quit. Just go away, don't even hang around to watch. If she doesn't master it the first outing, don't tell her what she was doing wrong--she knows, and just needs more practice. Motivation is usually a larger issue than instruction; kids are just as smart as adults, and perfectly capable of teaching themselves such simple tasks as driving a manual transmission. Avoid criticism and embarrassment, and she'll do the rest on her own. Probably in under five minutes.
Intersting, I learned on a 73 240Z. It was my dad's car which I started backing in and out of the garage so I could get the mower out when I was about 13. By the time I first drove it on the street, the first day I had my license, I had a good handle on starting and stopping, but had never had it out of first or reverse.
One of the scariest experiences I have had was in that car. The throttle stuck full open when I was accelerating in first gear. Thanksfully, my dad had tought me well and I knew just to put my foot on the brake until I got the trottle loose. The only thing I could figure out was that the linkage had jammed where it went through the firewall. Once I got is loose, it never stuck again.
Good suggestion. I've been going slow and keeping it simple with my daughter. She's fairly mechanical (she helped me change the fuel filter when she was 10) and is grasping the ideas fairly quickly. She understood right away when I explained what the burning smell was after she had practiced a few starts on a hill.
I was going to suggest the same thing, and I still would with someone teaching their spouse, but this is his daughter.
She is going to be able to drive a manual, something that not many kids could do at my high school. When someone asks her where she learned how, she will say, "My dad taught me", instead of, "My dad dropped me off and let me figure it out after explaining what I was supposed to do".
Unless he is truly intimidating her by being present, this is an experience that goes beyond technicalities, and it will happen only once.
Are you sure that is a good car to learn to drive in? Being one of the best handing & easiest to drive cars ever made, once you daughter is used to it, she will come to grief driving almost anything else! It's also smaller & has better visibility than almsot anything esle. I recently taugth my son to drive, we started out in an 89 Hyundai Excel.
This will work, but I have done it a little differently with a wife and two sons.
I always start them out in a flat place. Put car in neutral, emergency brake on. Explain the clutch and gears, then with the emergency brake still on, put it in gear and with no gas release the clutch slowly until the engine starts to stall. This helps them find the point where the clutch starts to engage. Repeat a few times without gas till they can make the engine lug and then depress the clutch again smoothly.
Then they are ready to try it with the gas, and the emergency off. Usually they can get it then with very little trouble. I keep them on the flat and have them practice starting slowly, quickly, and fast till they are pretty smooth. Hills come when they are comfortable with starting at any pace requested on the flat. Then they are ready to master finding that clutch engage point quickly and transferring from brake to gas to start up a hill.
I agree with no criticism and embarrassment, but encouragement and hints can help them learn faster. Do not raise your voice, do not get excited or complain about damage. Just question them about what they think happened and what they think went wrong. Guide them, do not push them.
I do not believe in slipping the clutch if at all possible. The goal is clutch depressed, or engaged only. The time spent in between should be as quick and smooth as possible. Slipping the clutch is only an effective technique in very few situations to moderate torque to the wheels - usually only when stuck in snow or sand. Learning the sound of the engine in relation to load and speed will get you to master the clutch gas equation, and then teach you how to maintain a consistent speed without cruise control.
My daughter already knows how to drive and understands the difference between a real car like the Miata and everything else that is just transportation. She hasn't had the chance to learn to drive a manual since until recently I've been driving it to work every day. Actually, if she learns the joy of driving a Miata, is there anything more important that I can pass on to the next generation? My dad taught me the joy of a good sports car so why shouldn't I do the same with my daughter?
Great advice. We started on a flat parking lot, moved up to relatively flat streets and then moved to a street with a hill where I taught her how to use the parking brake to keep from rolling backwards. Next time out, I'll give a go at having her try to hold the car on the hill without using the brake.
We've already been there and done that (she got a good smell of burnt clutch while practicing on a hill). I also did a good job of not wincing and being supportive since I figure I've got a good 70k miles on the clutch and so if I have to replace it a little sooner, no big deal. Actually, you should have heard me congratulate her on her first burnout taking off from a stop sign on the first day.
Anyway, thanks to all for the supportive and positive advice. I think we are only one session away from me letting her head off on her own, at least for the drive to school and back.
Gus (91 BRG)
"Raising another Miata lover the only way I know how, by letting her experience the pleasure first hand"
I heard something on Car Talk that worked very well for both my kids. On a level surface, have her start using only the clutch, no gas at all beyond idle. A few (well maybe more than a few) runs through that drill and she knows what to do the gas.
When Dad taught me to drive those (too) many moons ago, it was in a '76 Honda Civic on a driveway with about a 10-15 degree slope. We spent about half an hour doing nothing more than, "edge it forward, let it back" using only clutch and accelerator.
After the half hour he asked, "have you adjusted your mirrors?" When I responded to the affirmative, he said, "Let's go shopping, you're driving." And off we went to buy a Holley 750 for the truck...
In the decades since, I think I've only stalled on a hill twice.
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