StangChang

Hi
my parents are trying to teach me how to drive stick and i really want to learn how. But theres sort of a little problem. We dont have a manual car. i tried looking up cars at enterprise rent-a-car but they only rent automatics. does anyone know of a good place that would rent us a manual car?

unreal89

you dont have a buddy with a manual? or a cousin, uncle, etc. I dont think any company rents manual cars.

StangChang

i have a couple of friends that have manual cars but their all nice cars so i'd feel pret bad if i messed one up. and i have a cousin with a semi auto car if tha helps in anyway

CrazyRX88's

Try calling some of the local driving schools.

Although none of the schools around me actually taught in manual cars 1 school had an instructor that had his own manual car that was available for lessons.

I already knew the basics and just needed to make sure I was doing things right, it was like $40 an hour or so. I think after a few hours you'd have the basics down enough to where you could borrow your friends car for future practice and not mess anything up.

Good luck, stirring gears is a blast!

hyperlitenerd

buy an old civic for 1k, learn how to drive stick, donate to charity, tax write off for the parents!

tjbourgoyne

Rent a uhaul truck. Some of the older ones are stick.

Rhawb

Try asking a friend. Just go somewhere that you'd have a really hard time crashing into anything and just learn with the "no throttle" method. Simply take off the brakes, put it in first, and pop the clutch until it starts engaging (rpms drop, car shakes). If it feels like it's going to stall (car starts sputtering, rpms get very low or the car starts shaking heavily), push the clutch in and then engage it again - keep balancing between engaging and stalling until the car's moving on its own.

If you just do this for maybe 10 minutes with a friend's car, you'll probably have a pretty decent idea of what you're doing. Then find another friend and practice some more some other time. (or use the same friend if they're really nice) You'll learn stick in no time with that method.

StangChang

yea i dont think any schools around me teach stick either. well actually i'm pretty sure. just out of curiosity will learning in a semi automatic be any help?

Mazdaspeed RX8 ver2

i'll have to agree with this one, get one beat up old toyota or honda or ford or whatever thats stick, learn on that old beater car, it doesnt have to really look nice, just run alright. i bet you can find one well under 1k.

hyperlitenerd

semi-auto, is there a clutch pedal? there is your awnser. Really the rx8 is very easy to drive stick on. The clutch is almost as easy as my friend's civic. Which is idiot proof. But just ask your friends who has the easiest clutch to drive, have them take you to an empty parking lot, and practice going into first, that is all you need to practice. First the the hardest part, and once you figure out where the cluch "grabs" you'll be all set.

Huskyfan23

um, anyone else realize that he's obviously a kid without a real job? How is he gonna afford a $1000 beater to learn on? My first car when I was 16 was a 1987 Buick Century with 80,000 miles for $2000. His parents probably won't buy it for him for just that reason, either.

The reason why Enterprise (or any other car rental place) won't rent vehicles with manual transmissions is for the exact reason this thread was posted. Too many people that didn't know how to drive standard were wrecking too many expensive transmissions.

Really, if you don't know anyone who drives a manual or you cannot purchase a beater, you're not going to learn.

BTW, on this topic, I was thinking about starting my own rental car company that only had beaters with manual transmissions so people could learn. But I'm not great at fixing broken parts, so i don't see myself ever making a profit.

tiltmode43

iTrader: (15)

Agh, I too am a youngin' and when it came time to learn my dealer actually taught me - on my 8 :-/ I was extremely careful and got away with little-no extra wear from a first timer. Just be as careful and precise as possible and think about it from a mechanical point of view.

There was one place around here that rented standards but the insurance was ridiculous for a cheap toyota.

GotBass

Semi autos will not help at all. The first and most important thing about learning stick is getting the feeling of how to use the clutch and throttle.

oryas

I was in the same situation. After calling several driving schools I found a small school that still taught how to drive manual.

SoFL_RX8

Im sure you can find a Hyundai Accent or something of the like in stick for a few hundred dollars... doesnt matter if it will run very long, you should junk it (or trade it in LOL) before you get the 8 anyways.

As for learning on your friends 'Nice' car, sometimes nicers cars are easier to learn on because they have a more gental and forgiving clutch... thats not always true, but Ive found it to be in most cases. I originally learned stick on a 1987 Toyota MR2... let me tell you, that car was NOT easy to learn on. The clutch was very finniky, the gearbox felt like it had stones in it, and it was rack and pinion steering (no power steer). I practiced on that car for about 3 days, then I took a shot at my step-mothers Audi A4. After driving that tempermental POS, the Audi was a breeze, like driving an AT with something to keep your hands and feet buisy.
So my point is, it may be easier to learn on a nice car than a POS, so you might wanna give your friends car a shot.
GL, be safe, and happy motoring!

ZoomZoomH

iTrader: (1)

that's sad, driving schools no longer offering manual driving as an option.

bascho

Stupid question: Why are you trying to learn how to drive a stick if you don't have one? If in the future you want to buy a car with a manual transmission.....take the afternoon to learn it then. Really, it only takes an afternoon to be comfortable enough to drive in traffic.

Rhawb

Eh, I don't know about it only taking an afternoon, but it sure doesn't take a terribly long time. My roommate bought a new Mazda 6 5-speed and had never really driven stick before. He's now quite happy with his purchase. I'd say it took him a week to actually get comfortable, but he was capable of driving in traffic (and pissing lots of people off due to his struggle with first gear) after only a short time.

bascho

Well.....like anything else there is a learning curve. A big part of it is the teacher. Just remember to push the gas as you take your foot off the clutch and you won't jerk the car. The biggest thing to learning to drive stick is training your brain that more than one foot can move at the same time.

Rhawb

I've taught quite a few people and they all learn quite quickly, but I'm just saying I'd hesitate to call what they feel after one day "comfortable." I'd agree that they're almost always capable of driving in traffic after a short bit of instruction, but they're anything but comfortable. I've found that if anything out of the ordinary happens when they're first learning, they just shut down and kind of freak out. They just don't know how to handle everything yet. Sure, they could probably make their way across town, but it'll be very stressful until they've had some time for a few basics to become routine.

In short, I'm mostly just playing semantics, not saying you're wrong or anything.

lone_wolf025

I've gotten a very limited amount of time driving stick so I am confident enough that I can move a car across a large parking lot, but fine control, shifting, driving in traffic, and uphill or downhill engaging is still beyond my experience and skill. But I'm in the same boat at least until my dad brings his old - in need of restoration - '66 GTO out of storage. Now THAT would be a car to learn on. Learn it the hard way before going easy.

Phantom Menace

I don't think anyone rents MTs. Basically you have 3 options, if you don't know ANYBODY with an MT...

1) Go to a dealership and learn during a "test drive"
2) Steal an MT an joyride your little heart out
3) Buy an MT and learn QUICKLY for the sake of your clutch...

Rhawb

I've found that most people, even if they have NO idea what they're doing, won't do anything terrible to the car as they're learning. Even when they screw up, they learn super fast not to do that anymore, so they won't do it again. In fact, if people want to completely learn stick, I give them a lesson or two and just tell them to just go for it and buy one. All my friends who have listened (3 in the past 2 years) still have had no problems at all.

Phantom Menace

Yes. That's how I learned! My brother gave me his old car and said...here! So each time I'd jerk or stall, I made sure not to do it again because it was now MY car and not someone elses.

I highly discourage GTA and dealerships/salespersons aren't very patient when they learn that the "buyer" doesn't know how to drive stick.

If someone REALLY wants to learn, and I mean REALLY wants to learn (for me it was an obsession since I'm the youngest of all boys and my manhood would have been in question if I didn't pick it up--I was 13 y/o when I learned) they should buy one and have someone explain the mechanics behind the "pedal pushing" first so that the student knows EXACTLY what they are doing by pushing the pedals. That way, they have NO choice but to learn....

My two cents....

HAPPY THANKSGIVING.

RotaryN00b

lol... I wasn't allowed to get my license until I could competently operate a manual vehicle.