Me. I'm not that into burning out my clutch for no reason thanks very much.
Automatic vs Manual
- Thread starter 2L84SLEEP
- Start date
Me. I'm not that into burning out my clutch for no reason thanks very much.
I have a 4.6IS V8 X5 and have to say its the first automatic (with tiptronic) that ive ever driven and actually enjoyed. There is so much torque and the actual change is pretty swift (not formula 1 speeds but pretty sharp), Ive found setting cruise control whenever on carriageways or motorways saves a little fuel as Im not always in a rush and on the pedal so it also stays in top gear.
Despite not having driven an Auto myself (and therefore invalidating anything I say 
) I've been driven in automatic cars and wouldn't buy one as a result. I prefer to be in control of what I'm doing. For example, coping with offroad mud when parking in a field or off-road at campus (where the mud is notoriously slippery), is from my experience far harder to negotiate in an auto. Another thing - you can't adjust your gear, and therefore your engine braking, for the conditions. So in icy weather, where you might want to avoid using the brake due to risk of skidding (admittedly less of an issue with ABS these days), you have much less flexibility in an auto.
And as for eco-driving, try doing that in an auto. One of the main things I've noticed driving on A-roads is that if you get stuck behind lorries/cars doing between 40-60 (almost invariably happens on the A53 between Shrewsbury and Newcastle), you can save an awful lot of petrol by coasting for 20-30s at a time, on the downhill slopes. You stay at the same speed as the car in front, give or take, but only using the 'idle' amount of petrol, and as far as I'm aware, you can't do that with an auto (seeing as it has no clutch, although possibly by using neutral? I imagine it would get upset though).
One final thing - most of the buses are automatics round the Keele area, and there's one particular hill where they start off at the bottom doing 45 or so, and gradually slow down to about 35 before the automatic lowers the gear sufficiently that they can actually maintain their speed/accelerate. The speed limit's 60. Under no circumstances would I want a vehicle that can't maintain a speed in the current gear, but has to slow down to a certain speed before the gear change mechanism, however it works, lowers the gear to one suitable for the gradient/how fast I want to accelerate.
Who said anything about burning your clutch out? If you're on a downhill slope/level, you can have your clutch down and your accelerator up while waiting for either the car in front to move or for a gap in the traffic. Since you can judge when both of those will happen (at least I hope you can
) you can bring the clutch to the biting point just when you need to, no burnout necessary.
And if an uphill, I don't know how the automatic handles it, but it can't be pretty..? Anyway, same thing applies, have it in gear, handbrake on, and there's plenty of time to remove the handbrake just before it's time to pull off.
) I've been driven in automatic cars and wouldn't buy one as a result. I prefer to be in control of what I'm doing. For example, coping with offroad mud when parking in a field or off-road at campus (where the mud is notoriously slippery), is from my experience far harder to negotiate in an auto. Another thing - you can't adjust your gear, and therefore your engine braking, for the conditions. So in icy weather, where you might want to avoid using the brake due to risk of skidding (admittedly less of an issue with ABS these days), you have much less flexibility in an auto.And as for eco-driving, try doing that in an auto. One of the main things I've noticed driving on A-roads is that if you get stuck behind lorries/cars doing between 40-60 (almost invariably happens on the A53 between Shrewsbury and Newcastle), you can save an awful lot of petrol by coasting for 20-30s at a time, on the downhill slopes. You stay at the same speed as the car in front, give or take, but only using the 'idle' amount of petrol, and as far as I'm aware, you can't do that with an auto (seeing as it has no clutch, although possibly by using neutral? I imagine it would get upset though).
One final thing - most of the buses are automatics round the Keele area, and there's one particular hill where they start off at the bottom doing 45 or so, and gradually slow down to about 35 before the automatic lowers the gear sufficiently that they can actually maintain their speed/accelerate. The speed limit's 60. Under no circumstances would I want a vehicle that can't maintain a speed in the current gear, but has to slow down to a certain speed before the gear change mechanism, however it works, lowers the gear to one suitable for the gradient/how fast I want to accelerate.
Who said anything about burning your clutch out? If you're on a downhill slope/level, you can have your clutch down and your accelerator up while waiting for either the car in front to move or for a gap in the traffic. Since you can judge when both of those will happen (at least I hope you can
) you can bring the clutch to the biting point just when you need to, no burnout necessary.And if an uphill, I don't know how the automatic handles it, but it can't be pretty..? Anyway, same thing applies, have it in gear, handbrake on, and there's plenty of time to remove the handbrake just before it's time to pull off.
Last edited:
Lol.
hmm? Is disconnecting the engine from the transmission, i.e. preventing engine braking, not a good technique for saving fuel? If not, please enlighten me.
Turning your car into one massive dead weight rolling down the hill is tremendously stupid and if your car maintains the same speed then somehow you own a car that defies physics as many many laws of physics dictate that big things on wheels go faster and faster when going downwards on a slope.
Not in most modern cars, it's also fairly dangerous and I wouldn't recommend it.
Air resistance stops it from accelerating; forgive me for being dumb but how is it so much more dangerous than rolling down a slope with the accelerator down? Surely if anything I'm better positioned for a quick stop, as I can easily re-engage the clutch and my right foot is already poised over the brake in case I need to stop.
I've an N-reg 106, does that count as modern? And, same question as above?
Hi there, my name is Bryan and I am this person you speak of. I can find the biting point in an instant thus placing me in the category of those you can drive a manual car with a clutch correctly. When I'm waiting at a junction I am in neutral or I have he clutch fully depressed if I'm not waiting for long. If you have to sit there with the clutch making your car stink then you may need to re-evaluate your driving style.
Get a clue miniyazz, air resistance will not slow the car down, unless you have a sail on the roof of your car. If i'm going down a hill the car is IN GEAR with my foot off the noisy pedal, that way I can either maintain the same speed or even slow down using gears and not burning petrol as I'm not opening the throttle. If you think I'm talking rubbish I'm more than happy to take you out and demonstrate.
Seriously do you lot know how to drive or what?
Last edited:
That car will cut off fuel completely when the throttle is untouched, if you let a car coast you are on the tickover and thus requiring fuel to keep the engine running. It is an extremely bad habit to get into you should instantly feel the difference in car rolling speed when out of gear and thus obviously making it harder to stop without the aid of engine braking.
What if you need to get out of the way of an emergency services vehicle which comes up so quick behind you you can't engage the clutch and gear fast enough to accelerate out of the way in time because you are coasting in the belief you are saving fuel?
Oh i'm also fairly sure it's illegal as well.
Last edited:
Soldato
- Joined
- 24 Jul 2006
- Posts
- 8,876
- Location
- Hoddesdon, London, UK
Despite not having driven an Auto myself (and therefore invalidating anything I say
And as for eco-driving, try doing that in an auto. One of the main things I've noticed driving on A-roads is that if you get stuck behind lorries/cars doing between 40-60 (almost invariably happens on the A53 between Shrewsbury and Newcastle), you can save an awful lot of petrol by coasting for 20-30s at a time, on the downhill slopes. You stay at the same speed as the car in front, give or take, but only using the 'idle' amount of petrol, and as far as I'm aware, you can't do that with an auto (seeing as it has no clutch, although possibly by using neutral? I imagine it would get upset though).
One final thing - most of the buses are automatics round the Keele area, and there's one particular hill where they start off at the bottom doing 45 or so, and gradually slow down to about 35 before the automatic lowers the gear sufficiently that they can actually maintain their speed/accelerate. The speed limit's 60. Under no circumstances would I want a vehicle that can't maintain a speed in the current gear, but has to slow down to a certain speed before the gear change mechanism, however it works, lowers the gear to one suitable for the gradient/how fast I want to accelerate.
Who said anything about burning your clutch out? If you're on a downhill slope/level, you can have your clutch down and your accelerator up while waiting for either the car in front to move or for a gap in the traffic. Since you can judge when both of those will happen (at least I hope you can
And if an uphill, I don't know how the automatic handles it, but it can't be pretty..? Anyway, same thing applies, have it in gear, handbrake on, and there's plenty of time to remove the handbrake just before it's time to pull off.
I know some autos i saw in Canada had winter mode to move off in higher gears (2nd?) in low traction areas.
I've done an emergency engine brake by kicking down to 2nd, not recommend as a daily thing though, i think most trannies have a failsafe to prevent overrevving too much when kicking down
You can slip an auto into neutral at speed, dunno why you'd do it though. You can also shift to 2nd gear to keep a car from overspeeding down a hill and shifting past 2nd, usually maintains 30ish mph.
As for uphill, hold either the foot brake, use park or use neutral with the handbrake, many auto transmission shifters allow a quick shift from N to D without depressing any buttons or holding the foot brake, so a shift to D then handbrake off would work.
As for maintaining speed, many autos have a throttle sensor to kickdown a cog when the pedal is pressed quickly, so if loosing speed on a hill you could press the gas and it'll kickdown for some boost if not, manually kicking down could work.
Last edited:
I'm sorry, but simple physics will tell you that if you have a car driving along at 50mph, and you take away all forward thrust, the car will slow down. And it's a significant slowdown as well, I have in fact used this technique myself, and am not in the habit of making up facts as I go along. And a shallow downhill slope while travelling at significant speed is not necessarily sufficient to make a car accelerate, and not in my particular case.
Agreed, the difference is obvious, and yes harder to stop without engine braking, I was just more of the opinion that I would be able to engage the clutch in fractions of a second should the need arise - after all, changing down from say 4th to 2nd when approaching a roundabout involves braking with the clutch down for a short while (although somewhat different, sure). And if I need to accelerate out the way of an emergency vehicle, I'll need to change down a couple of gears anyway - acceleration is not so nippy while doing 40mph in 5th!
Am I right in thinking you mean, when you say the car is using petrol to keep the engine ticking over, that it's actually using more petrol to tick over than it would be if I had the clutch engaged and the accelerator part way down? That just seemed illogical to me! However, I shall compare my efficiency currently with keeping it in gear, and see how it goes.
By the way, would the same apply to slipping the engine into neutral? (Asking hypothetically, yes of course that would be more dangerous than just lowering the clutch)
Air resistance ALWAYS acts to slow the car down. Surely if the hill isn't tremendously steep, the air resistance counters the extra speed you'd gain whilst coasting and thus you remain at the same speed. Depending on the car and other factors, you may even loose speed whilst travelling downhill in neutral.
Surely an emergency service vehicle won't come up and surprise you, if you have even a hint of spacial awareness?
Is it illegal?
I've popped all of my cars in neutral and coasted many times and never had a problem. As long as you don't do it when you're on a massively steep slope, or where it might adversely affect other drivers around you, what's the problem? Why do people on here think that the moment you pop a car in neutral, you're going to end up in a hedge and die?
I can assure you that in neutral, whilst coasting, the power steering works fine, the brakes work fine, the car grips the road more or less as it always does, you just loose engine braking.
Air resistance does not stop a car rolling down a hill. To test this park on top of a hill, get out of the car with the handbrake off the car and the car in neutral and see what happens. The drag at say 30mph isn't enough to slow you down. People who coast to save petrol are so so incredibly annoying, engine breaking is very very handy and I seems a small percentage of people actually undertands how it works...
Newton would be turning in his grave...
Newton would be turning in his grave...
Last edited:
As I mentioned, I wasn't travelling at 30. And I didn't say air resistance would stop me, either, I said it stopped me accelerating, which it does. And just so you can feel safe on the roads, I also have a speedometer, so if I ever happen to accelerate down a hill with the clutch down, I'll be sure to re-engage the clutch before I notice I'm travelling at a gazillion mph.
I can't afford a new car, I only bought this one a few months ago, and it cost me £550. Since unlike many students I'm paying for my accomodation, car, insurance and petrol out of my own money (with help of the standard loan), I'm stuck (and happy) with what I've got. Plus I've been getting 45-50 mpg from it, I think that's pretty decent 
Edit:
You put it much more eloquently than I; I can see the problem with the lack of engine braking but honestly can't see the problem when it is so quick to re-engage the clutch.
Last edited:
Not at 30mph, no. But as air resistance increases to the square of the velocity, the wind resistance at 60mph will be 4x that at 30mph, which may stop you accelerating down a hill, or, if you're at 60mph under power, may slow you down to your terminal velocity when you start to coast.
I agree, it's not really 'cricket' to play about when you're in heavy traffic, but if you're on an empty road, it's not at all dangerous.
If you're daft enough to coast a car often perhaps you're daft enough to not notice an emergency vehicle coming up rather fast behind you leaving you in an awful muddle trying to desperately manoeuvre out the way whilst getting into gear?
It's a completely pointless exercise still recruited by delusional fools who think they are saving a thimble of fuel so why on earth do it, you are losing control of part of the car.
Absolutely moronic thing to do when there is just no need at all. There are ZERO fuel savings.
I don't remember saying I was doing it to save fuel....
Why exactly is it dangerous to coast a car? Please explain. Excluding the instances of being in busy traffic, or doing it on a really steep gradient....
Well why do you need to wear out your clutch when you can just leave the car in gear and still not use any petrol? What happens if you are coasting and then you jam it in the wrong gear by accident and bang, some nice valves making little dents on the underside of your bonnet.
It makes no sense to coast, in the one or two times that I have done it I felt out of control of the car. Maybe it's my driving?
It makes no sense to coast, in the one or two times that I have done it I felt out of control of the car. Maybe it's my driving?