does parking on a steep driveway and putting my MINI on handbrake and on 1st gear can create any problem on my MINI?

just wondering...

thanks,
dominos

 

wouldnt think so, seems like it might stress the gear a little bit if all of the weight was resting on it but you would be fine with the handbrake too, putting it in 1st is just a second line of defense

 

I have read on other threads, that the handbrake alone sometimes does not hold on an incline. In that case, please do use the first gear. I wonder if chocking the wheel would be appropriate for longer periods of time, say over the weekend or on vacation. (I can't imagine being gone and not taking the MINI, but I hear it does happen on occasion!

 

In gear and the handbrake should be fine. I had a manual trans truck ('91 Isuzu Amigo 4x4) that the handbrake was difficult to use. I parked it on hills all the time in 1st gear, and it never moved. If there is a curb, you can also practice the "up and away" and "down and in" method of letting the front tire rest against the curb, as they taught us years ago in driver's ed.

 

On my 2004 MCS w/ 6spd, I have learned to never trust the parking brake alone, especially when the car is pointed up even the slightest incline. On several occasions I have found my car on the other side of the parking lot from where I left it.

 

I always park in first with the E brake set. On a steep incline I set the E brake first then put the car in first gear. That way the brake is holding the load & if it doesn't first gear will.

 

+1

Do they not teach that anymore?

 

+ 2

 

no kidding, whatever happened to Driver's Ed.?

 

They don't teach that anymore, and it seems like with "modern technology" nobody uses it. Oh well... poor ignorant people.

-Cody

 

Wild. I think it's still in the WI and IL drivers' handbooks, though.

Where I took my exam in IL, it was so flat there were no inclines/declines at all... the instructor just said, "If you were on a hill, which way would you turn the wheels?"

 

Considering the incredible forces that a transmission handles when powered by an engine, just sitting there on an incline is not going to harm a thing.

 

i learned the hill thing in drivers ed i just dont remember what it is. i had to do it in my drivers test too.

 

Having been a resident of San Francisco for 20 years and mastered the whole "parallel parking on the left side of a one-way street going downhill while driving a stick" thing, I can say for certainty that parking your car in gear with the handbrake engaged isn't going to hurt a thing. And BTW, you ALWAYS turn your wheels toward the curb on a hill just in case...

 

it turned into a bunch of bs lessons with people who cant speak enough straight english to explain to you what you're doing wrong,
and then the bare minimum became a bunch of dumb, made in the 80s, movies that are so corny they put everyone who watches them to sleep because they talk about common sense things like seatbelts I mean if you dont know that you should wear a seatbelt, or shouldnt drink and drive, you dont deserve a license

just my 2 cents
-Matt

 

Exactly. People have been doing this in every kind of car with a manual transmission for longer than any of us have been driving.