Most vehicles today use an automatic transmission, and unless you’re teaching your teen to use a sport or muscle car, chances are your teen is learning to drive on an automatic transmission. It may just happen to be that the vehicle you have to teach your teen to drive with is a manual transmission vehicle, and so you me be wondering “How do I teach my teen to drive with a manual transmission?”
Last week, I explained how it’s better to teach the skills of driving first on an automatic transmission vehicle, so that your teen does not become overwhelmed. This week, I’ll tell you about where you start when you’re ready to actually put your teen in a manual transmission vehicle.
The very first thing your teen needs to practice when driving a manual transmission vehicle is how to find the friction point. As you may already know, that’s the point when the gears mesh and come together as you release the clutch pedal, and it’s important to find that spot, because that’s when you apply the gas.
All the other skills needed to drive a manual transmission are built on this one. Push too much on the gas pedal before you get to the friction point and when those gears finally come together, the car is going to rush forward. Not enough gas, and the car will sputter and shut off.
It takes some fine tuning, so to speak, to find that friction point. When your student is practicing finding that friction point, just have your student depress and release the clutch pedal a few times and get a feel for it. See if they can even feel the friction point without the gas. After some practice at that, have your student start adding a little gas as they release the clutch toward the friction point.
It’s a gradual process. They gradually release the clutch as they gradually press on the gas.
Watch this video to see Patrick Barrett, the Driver Education Guru, explain the friction point.