can you drive stick shift?

Automatic only. And I use cruise control at every opportunity. I like to adjust the cruise speed while pretending I'm in space, engaging forward or reverse thrusters.

re mileage - i understand that manual transmissions have historically been better on fuel economy, but i'm not sure that's still the case in many makes/ models. the difference is certainly not as substantial as it once was.

i drove a manual trans '02 Jetta from 2008 until last month and was definitely not impressed with the mpgs (though tbf i'm not sure that era Jetta was renowned for its economy). my current '05 auto Altima does considerably better. and quite a bit larger.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

i can think of three ilx0rs who don't/cannot drive; who are the other four

waaaayy the fuck easier to drive stick in the snow than automatic.

― Montgomery Burns' Jazz (Tarfumes The Escape Goat), Wednesday, October 8, 2014 11:34 AM (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

missed this before, so otm

don't drive in snow. don't do that.

You sure? It's fun!

i really only drive from el paso airport to the observatory at top of a mountain.

the first 3 hours are city and freeway so automatic works.

the last 30 mins is like 25% grade and the automatic is awful.

on balance, i would have to say: don't go to grad school.

It snows in El Paso?

Driving automatic still feels like operating a dodgem car to me.

Although two US ILX0rs offered to let me use their cars last year and I demurred out of wrong-side-of-the-road concerns, and it's only just occurred to me how easy it would be bcz automatic

I don't know how you UK/AUS drivers do it left-handed.

Used to borrow a friend's left hand drive car at uni, then drive my parents' right hand drive when I went back home. Whenever I switched I would fumble around a few times for the gear lever with the wrong hand by the door, but settled back in to the right mindset pretty quickly.

On a trip to Boston once the rental place was like "we have a manual, if you can drive that?" I was all smug-Britishes and like "Yeah, I think I can handle a manual, buddy". Got in and had the immediate panic of realising the gear stick was on the 'wrong' side of me, and curse my smugness, etc.

I like automatics, but I don't miss the unexpected downshift of an overzealous auto transmission while going round a corner. I had some dicey moments in my last (automatic) car where the back end kicked out a little because I went just too hard on the accelerator coming out of a bend. It was a ~1994 car, though, and I'm sure auto boxes have come a long way in 20 years.