Auto Driving, a few tips?

[Sone]

Got my first auto and was wondering about a few things.

1. On steep hills where the car is stationary should i still hold it on the brake?

2. Is it okay to use hand brake when stuck in traffic?

3. When driving i make it change into the desired gear by moving the accelerator to keep the revs to a minimum. Is this just plain stupid?

 

[Lashout_UK]

Got my first auto and was wondering about a few things.

1. On steep hills where the car is stationary should i still hold it on the brake?

2. Is it okay to use hand brake when stuck in traffic?

3. When driving i make it change into the desired gear by moving the accelerator to keep the revs to a minimum. Is this just plain stupid?

1) Yes (unless you put it into park, with the handbrake on)

2) You can but only in combination with putting the box into park. If it's a flat surface, just nudge the box into neutral. This does depend how long you're going to be there though - I only ever took the box out of drive if I looked like I was going to be stationary for more than a few minutes.

3) Not really. Depends what you're doing with it.

Drive it whichever way you feel comfortable.

 

[Confused]

1/2. When I drove an auto, I used the foot-brake if it was <30 seconds. If I knew I'd be stationary for a reasonable amount of time, I'd put on the handbrake and switch to N.

3. Just squeeze-and-go, really. I didn't pay much attention to the revs, auto boxes are reasonably good at knowing what gear they want to be in.

 

[Crowze]

Pretty much what they said. For 3, don't think of it being geared at all and instead use the accelerator to tell the box your desired acceleration, it'll sort out the rest.