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The Elio Standard Transmission

Lil4X

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I guess I'm showing my age. It's amazing to me how many people these days can't drive a stickshift. I grew up with them and since the 70's I've had three - my Opel, a company Pinto wagon :eek: (briefly), and a Civic. I had instances in all three where kids on the service drive at my mechanic's, car wash, or gas pump, had to come find me to move the car after trying to grind my gears to a fine powder. "It's that pedal on the LEFT, kid!"

Although she can drive stick, my spoiled wife wants an AMT, but I'm not willing to accept an early-production model - especially at a premium price - for technology that hasn't always been successful. Sure, an automatic would be more convenient than rowing my own gearbox in commuter traffic, but it's just not as much fun. I wonder if EM might offer a sequential gearbox, a la motorcycle in the future? I'll have mine with turbo please!
 

JEBar

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many years ago I drove a couple of Macks that required double clutching in the lower range .... I was much younger then and really didn't think much about it .... double clutching was just part of moving down the road .... more power to those who want a straight drive in their Elio, I hope they enjoy using it .... as for ours, been there, done that, no desire to do so again ..:)
 

pistonboy

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I guess I'm showing my age. It's amazing to me how many people these days can't drive a stickshift. I grew up with them and since the 70's I've had three - my Opel, a company Pinto wagon :eek: (briefly), and a Civic. I had instances in all three where kids on the service drive at my mechanic's, car wash, or gas pump, had to come find me to move the car after trying to grind my gears to a fine powder. "It's that pedal on the LEFT, kid!"

Although she can drive stick, my spoiled wife wants an AMT, but I'm not willing to accept an early-production model - especially at a premium price - for technology that hasn't always been successful. Sure, an automatic would be more convenient than rowing my own gearbox in commuter traffic, but it's just not as much fun. I wonder if EM might offer a sequential gearbox, a la motorcycle in the future? I'll have mine with turbo please!
I currently have a 1970 Opel GT.

What was your Opel?
 

ScarecrowRepair

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I feel your pain. One of my jobs as fire chief in a small (one truck) rural fire department is to check out new members on our truck.
A surplus Air Force M35A2 (duce and a half). Even people who can drive stick have problems with it. Double clutching is becoming a lost art.

I learned to drive in 2nd grade on an old Case farm tractor, probably a 1940s model. I've always guessed it must have had to double clutch, but I don't remember. Did have split brakes, and those were great fun to a 2nd grader..... once I got the hang of them!
 

Bert

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Hmm. The best way to describe double clutching..
Well, you usually only have to do it with transmissions that have no synchronizers for the various gears. (Synchronizers allow the different gears, spinning at different rates, to "mesh" together and not grind the gear you're trying to get into).
Simple as I can put it, you push in the clutch pedal to take the transmission from a gear into neutral, then let up the pedal and push it again to get into the next gear you've chosen.
For those of us who grew up with it, it is as natural as selecting your gear on an automatic. You don't lose speed or time. IMO
 

Jeff Miller

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Hmm. The best way to describe double clutching..
Well, you usually only have to do it with transmissions that have no synchronizers for the various gears. (Synchronizers allow the different gears, spinning at different rates, to "mesh" together and not grind the gear you're trying to get into).
Simple as I can put it, you push in the clutch pedal to take the transmission from a gear into neutral, then let up the pedal and push it again to get into the next gear you've chosen.
For those of us who grew up with it, it is as natural as selecting your gear on an automatic. You don't lose speed or time. IMO

In my 1936 buick with no synchronizers I find it pretty easy to match speeds when going up through the gears. Shifting down is a whole other experience. You need to go to neutral then bump the throttle to get the speed of the motor up to where it might better match the lower gear. I am getting pretty good going from 3rd to 2nd but I have to come to a near complete stop to get her back into 1st.
 

Bert

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Yes Jeff. You use engine RPM to synch with the transmission, and you probably don't even think about it while doing so! My Dad drove an old Mack for a lot of years. It had three shift levers. While getting up to speed he had one arm looped through the steering wheel and used both hands to shift, all while never touching the clutch pedal! I did a simular system while returning from a trip once. Throw out bearing froze up, so I started in gear and used RPM to synch my shifting. Proud and scared at the same time when I had to slow for padunk towns with a single stop light in the middle of no where. LOL
 
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