driving a stick....without a clutch

[Bernard]

The thread on driving a stick shift got me thinking of something that happened to me several years ago.

I was driving from Houston to Port Aransas on the day before Thankgiving. While waiting in line for the ferry, my clutch gave out. I was sitting there at a complete stop in a line of cars. I was in first gear with the clutch pedal down. All of a sudden, I heard a VERY loud bang and my car lurched forward violently. I thought I had been rear ended. The clutch was toast.

On the eve of a hoilday weekend, the prospect of getting a new clutch installed in a timely manner seemed bleak, not to mention the thought of taking my 190k mile Accord to a new mechanic didn't sit too well with me.

I called my long time mechanic in Houston. He gave me a 10 minute phone lesson on how to drive a 5-speed with no clutch. I drove all the way back to Houston on Sunday morning without the clutch. It was pretty cool.

Anyone else know how to do this in a jam? I didn't even know it was possible unitl I did it.

Bernard

 

[MrPhlegm]

YEP, the hardest part was starting the car while it was in gear.

My clutch cable broke on my 120000+ mile Isuzu I mark and I had to drive it home and after I looked at what was wrong, to the import auto parts place to get a new clutch cable. Replaced it in the auto parts parking lot and drove home.

How did your mechanic say to start the car?

 

[Rusk]

so what's the secret, how's it done?

 

[Bernard]

I had to start the car with the transmission in 1st gear. When I turned the key the car would lurch forward as the engine started turning over. At that point, I was basically driving the car with the battery. I gave it a little gas and after 2-3 seconds the engine fired up and I was driving in 1st gear.

With a little practice, the sifting was pretty easy. I accelerated through 1st gear, then started lifting my foot from the gas pedal. At the same time, I started putting pressure on the stick shift to move it from 1st gear to 2nd gear. At first, it wanted to stay stuck in 1st gear, but a some point as the engine RPM's start to drop below about 4,000, the stick would drop right into second gear. No grinding all if done right. Accelerate through 2nd gear and repeat the process all the way to 5th gear.

The trickiest part was trying to time the traffic lights in Rockport and stopping at a toll booth on Beltway 8. If you stop the car you have to shut the engine off and start over.

Bernard

 

[Ave. H Horn]

I didn't think this would work on newer vehicles because of the "engage clutch" to start cut out.
I had to this in high school in my v.w. bug.- what a reliable piece of crap that was!

 

[accuratehorn]

I've done it many times on older cars. Depressing the pedal would release the neutral safety switch, so you should be able to do the same thing if your cable were broken on a newer car, but the pedal just would not be working the clutch. You have to sit a stop light with the ignition off, then turn it on and crank the key with it in gear, the car crawls forward and hopefully starts, begins lurching along then you pick up speed, and try to smoothly shift without the clutch. VW Beetles were great cars for this technique. It was easy with them, and the cables broke all the time. The tube that held the cable inside the tunnel broke too. You had to cut a hole in the tunnel and weld the tube, or a new piece, back in place. Of course the gas line ran through the same tunnel, so a modicum of caution was necessary.

 

[Bernard]

The car in question was a 1989 Honda Accord. I still had to put the clutch pedal down to crank the motor.

Bernard

 

[MrPhlegm]

thank goodness for synchros.