So 5 years ago when I bought my brand new Honda, my girlfriend made me promise to teach her how to drive stick shift. I basically lagged it all these years and mostly didn't want her to stall a brand new car.

Now that I totaled the Honda about a month ago, my girlfriend is holding me to my promise to teach her stick shift on my new-to-me 08 MCS. So last night we went to an empty parking lot where she stalled 5 times in a row before giving up. The stiffer clutch and accelerator(vs. the Honda) probably didn't help the learning experience either.

So how bad is it exactly for the car when you stall it? Especially since MINI's tend to be a little more temperamental than you average Honda. It hurt me every time the car shook violently, wanting to jump forward.

 

Stalling isn't going to hurt it. Slipping the clutch is. I'm sure with some patience on your part your girl can learn.

 

STALL isn't an issue IME .... up to a point I can't define ...

I taught 2 kids how to drive stick in MINIs ... there were certainly a few stalls along the way

both cars went on for many many miles after the kids had their lic ...one car has done another 75,000 miles on the clutch

SO . . . . . IMO . . . the real question is:

how good of a teacher are you?

A 'not a performance car' is MUCH easier to learn in. I learned in a 70's Datsun pick up!!! VERY forgiving.

But I taught son in a Miata & dau' in a 7'S and no problems - she drives a manual today in her first 'new car' .... her friends are in awe that she can drive a stick .. he just bought a Focus ST (only tranny avail is 6sp)

here's where my lesson begins:

do not touch the gas ... get the car moving by the clutch

repeat until the student can do this 5 times without stall ... (you should know what slipping the clutch is and can correct this behavior)

THEN move on to shifting

 

agree thats how i taught my wife. they gotta learn that engagment point...


be Paitent

 

Thanks for the tips everyone, I appreciate it!

 

stalling is not the worst thing in the world for a car....

i bought my car new without knowing how to drive a manual......i stalled my car at least 2x a day for a week until i fully got the hang of it......and honestly, i still stall it ~1 a month when im not paying attention.

ive got over 20K miles on it now, havent had an issue yet.

 

Wife stalled the new to us 05 MCS...then it would not start until I got in and pumped the gas

 

As others have said, stalling is not a big deal. Slipping the clutch excessively will cause some extra clutch wear, but that's par for the course with any new stick shift driver. Assuming it doesn't take a huge amount of time for the new driver to learn, the extra wear shouldn't be a huge deal - maybe it means the clutch wears out at 150K rather than 160K.

I've taught six or eight drivers a stick shift and hundreds of motorcycle riders (almost all bikes have a clutch). The key thing is to let the new driver get a feel for the engagement point without the pressure of actually getting the car underway. So to begin with, teach the driver to just release the clutch enough to cause the car to barely start to move and that's all. They can just leave the engine at idle. Have them do this over and over until they get a feel for this. Then have them move the car a foot, again not releasing the clutch completely and leaving the engine at idle. Then have them start adding a little gas and maybe going a few feet. When they've done all this, only then have them actually get the car underway.

This sounds like a lot of clutch slipping but the thing that really kills the clutch is the tendency of new drivers to rev the heck out of the engine and then too abruptly "drop" the clutch. If they keep the revs down, clutch wear is minimal and they'll quickly transition to being able to get the car away from a stop as they learn the friction zone of the clutch.

Usually all I do on the first lesson is have them learn to clutch away from a stop. When people learn a new skill "sleeping on it" is very valuable as it engrains the skill into long-term memory. The second lesson, we start shifting gears. Usually a couple lessons on shifting, and they're ready to tackle light traffic. In a week, they're driving like a stick shift is second nature.

- Mark

 

Stalling it can be fatal, depending on where you stall it. My father once stalled his Volkswagen in Ipswich, on the railroad crossing. No he was not in the car when the train arrived, or I would not be here.

When he taught me to drive on his Rover 2000 TC, I was bound and determined to do a hill start up in Nova Scotia, just beneath another level crossing and at rather a steep uphill angle. I was stubborn, and unskilled, and I bet I took 5,000 miles of wear off the clutch in about 5 minutes.

I taught my son to drive stick in my R53, in a parking lot, and initially challenged him to get it rolling without touching the gas. He did, and then he knew how the clutch worked, and then he could add in the gas pedal without putting a bunch of unneeded slip into the clutch.

It's kinda situational huh...

Cheers,

Charlie

 

Stalled it last Sat backing out of a tight space. Had the wheel cranked all the way over and had to get it rolling with such...stalled it 2 more times trying to get it rolling. Lucky MINI's don't have real personalities or my li'l guy would disown me after that. Hunted behind a friends dog once, he went on a hard point, we flushed the birds and neither of us ruffled a feather. The dog looked over his shoulder at us and returned to the truck. Both failures gave me the same feeling.

 

I think I know the look you mean.

Cheers,

Charlie

 

I would think that the BMS clutch stop would help a new manual driver find the engagement point and make the learning curve easier. Plus, it's only $10 and easy to install. Good luck!

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