Recently I have been trying to improve on my driving skills. I'm actually doing very well and driving has never been more exhilerating. But there's a concern that I've had for awhile.

When I'm rev-matching to downshift I tend to hold the clutch down while I blip the throttle. While this wouldn't be a concern of mine until I read on this forum that I'm skipping a step. The article claims that I should be in neutral and let the clutch out as I bliip the throttle. Then shift as usual. Am I causing any serious clutch wear or transmission problems due to skipping the neutral/blip step?


Cliffs: Will blipping the throttle while the car is in gear and the clutch is depressed cause abnormal clutch wear?

 

thats double clutching... you do not need to do that...

Say you are in 4th gear going 40MPH... you want to drop it into 2nd to climb to 60MPH really quick...

Press in the clutch... hit the throttle... Let the clutch out rite at 5000 RPM to cahtch 2nd gear in the rite palce and shift when you hit the next shift point...

 

Don't worry about wearing out your clutch if you have it pressed (depressed) in all the way.

About rev matching, the gears will seem closer together RPM-wise as you get into higher RPMs. So if you're going 60 and you're in 5th, you won't have to blip much (or rev up much) to match for a shift down to 4th gear.

Keep an eye on your tach and do this a lot. You get a feel for it, then you get satisfaction, it's like an art.

I've recently discovered the shift down to 4th while already going around 80, this is quite a rush.

Be careful

 

I usually put it in the gear Im downshifting to before I rev match. I duno if thats any different

 

you can also rev match 6th to 3rd doing about 65. thats a favorite of mine if you catch it right. BE CAREFULL NOT TO THROW IT IN 1st

 

yea be carefull with this , i downshifted one time Wont say the gears , but i put it to you like this, i did a 360....regained control and smelled clutch lol

 

Interesting comment... I've noticed this as well, although theoretically, higher rpms mean the distance between gears is further apart... not closer

anyone with insight into why real-life (in this case) does not concur with theory?

 

I thought the car has a first gear lockout meaning you cant drop it into first at 80 mph. Not that i would try. Newer car technology?? Not sure though. One thing I DO know is you CAN do it in an 85 toyota pickup, and it sucks....bad

 

i think it has a lockout also... i cant put it into 1st if im moving, even if its only at like 3mph....

 

ummmm....Gear ratios! The lower gears (1, 2) are geared mainly for acceleration, 5 and 6 are mainly for cruising depending on the speed. I do not know the exact ratio of each gear but as the gears go up, the ratio approaches 1.

 

it's not a lockout. you have to rev the motor and rev match to get into first. just in most cases, you're at a high enough speed to where dropping into first would overrev the motor... and the synchros arent able to efficiently match up the gears, thus giving you the feeling of "lockout".


go down a parking lot at 5-10mph in second, then depress the clutch, and rev the motor up by blipping the throttle... make sure the motor revs up over 4000rpm just so you can get a feel for it... then lightly push the lever towards first. it'll pop in. you can let off the clutch if you like, but you'll know what happens at that point.

 

True... but we're talking about the 'feeling' that two gears (1-2, 2-3, 3-4 for example) get closer together as you shift at higher rpms

 

I haven't tried this technic yet. I always double clutch.
So jason, you're saying that if you rev-match correctly, you DON'T need to depress your clutch to shift into gear??
I remember a while ago, a member who grew up with a tractor had said the same thing. But i am too much of a puss to try this out, afraid of grinding the gear.

 

i don't think that's what he's saying... he's just saying that you don't need to go into neutral before down-shifting... you can just push in the clutch, shift into the desired gear, and release the clutch in one step

afaik - you can upshift without the depressing the clutch, but not downshift (but that's just afaik)

 

no double clutch necessary with a synchro transmission.

press clutch, shift into desired lower gear AND blip the throttle at the same time. no NOT let off the clutch until ready to release into the lower gear.

double clutching was back when trannies were unsynchronized (mostly old race cars). you had to let off the clutch before blipping the throttle to spin up the layshaft and rev match the dog gears.

 

Now heel toe shifting is pretty tricky. I;ve been practicing on my daily driver POS 95 corolla, but only a couple of times with the z, but its really hard to go from one car to the other. Do you guys do heel toe shifting?, ie braking with your toe while simulatneously rev matching with the heel while down shifting around corners. From what I understand this will put you quickly through turns and alow you to power out of the turn better whille always having the car controlled in gear. It is pretty hard to get it right though and I worry about premature wear on my clucth because they aint cheap.

 

I try heel-toe shifting every once in a while when there is no traffic and it is dry. However, I don't do it all in 1 second like the pros do. It usually takes me 3 (haha).