Learn how to do a hill start in a manual car - watch the video.
How To Do Hill Starts in a Manual Car Correctly
Overview
METHOD #1 :: Footbrake
• Hold the brake pedal with right foot.
• Bring clutch to friction point and hold.
• Move right foot to accelerator.
• Throttle up the engine to approximately 1,200rpm in petrol engine; 900 rpm in diesel engine.
• Control clutch as you release it moving the vehicle forward and adding more throttle.
By holding the foot brake and bringing the clutch out to the friction point, you are transfering the braking force of the vehicle from the brake to the clutch.
When the manual car is held in place by the clutch, you can add throttle, release the clutch and move the vehicle forward on a hill without rolling backward or stalling the engine.
METHOD #2 :: Handbrake
• Apply the parking brake firmly to prevent the vehicle from rolling.
• Throttle up the engine to approximately 1,200rpm in petrol engine; 900 rpm in diesel engine.
• Release the clutch to the friction point and control.
• As you release the clutch and the vehicle begins to move forward, release the parking brake slowly.
• As you release the cltuch, add more throttle and get your foot off the clutch smoothly and quickly.
For both methods on a steep hill, get your foot off the clutch quickly, add lots of throttle and don't worry too much if you spinn the tires. Better to spin the tires than spin the clutch and cause premature wear.
Closed Caption
Introduction
Hi there Smart Drivers.
Rick, with Smart Drive Test, talking to you today about: Hill starts, with a manual transmission vehicle.
Now, just before we get started here.
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Hill starts, in a manual transmission vehicle: Probably the toughest thing to master.
Using the Foot Brake to do a Hill Start in a Manual Car
Now, if you've been following the lessons thus far, #1 through #4, here on the channel, hill starts are going to be really easy, because I already taught you how to do it, believe it or not.
If you do it correctly, if you do it every time, where you bring the clutch out to the friction point, and are holding the brake.
When you take your foot off the brake, and you hold the clutch at the friction point, you're now holding the vehicle with the clutch.
And then, you simply move your foot to the throttle, give it a bit of throttle, and then gently bring the clutch out the rest of the way.
Now, on a hill start, you're going to have to get a little bit more throttle, to get it going.
And, what you want to do is, the key is, to try and bring the clutch out, as quickly as possible.
Because, instead of spinning the clutch, you want to spin the tires on the vehicle.
It's much easier to spin the tires on the vehicle, than it is on the clutch, because you'll prematurely wear the clutch out, if you've got a lot of hill starts, as we do here, in Vernon BC.
So, today, we're going to do some hill starts.
We're going to show you how to do that.
If you haven't mastered clutch control, and isolated the clutch: Go back to lesson one.
Look at that, and figure out how to do clutch control, because that will make this lesson a lot easier.
So stick around, we'll be right back with that information.
Hi there Smart Drivers, welcome back.
Rick, with Smart Drive Test, talking to you today about: Hill starts, in a manual transmission.
Probably the most dreaded thing for new drivers to learn how to do, because they're afraid of rolling backwards.
So, we've got a vehicle here, and we are on a hill.
Just going around a corner here.
I already showed you how to do this.
Because, if you learned how to do this correctly, from the beginning, where you bring the clutch out to the friction point.
Hold the vehicle with the clutch, at the friction point.
And then, release the brake, and move your foot to the throttle.
If you've been doing that, then you've already learned how to do hill starts.
Because, I already taught you how to do it.
So, what we're going to do, is we're going to go up the hill here, to a very steep hill.
Which is called "East Hill," in Vernon, oddly enough.
It's on the east side of town.
Out to the friction point, right there.
Give it lots of throttle, and control the clutch.
And, I'll show you how to do that.
The other thing I'm going to do, is I'm going to give it a go, to put the handbrake on, and start with the handbrake.
Because, for those of you in Europe, that is how driving instructors are going to teach you, to do hill starts, there.
They and show you how to put the parking brake on, and do your hill start.
Which is going to be a little bit strange for me, because I have never done it that way.
So, it would be a learning phase for me.
Okay, here's a nice steep hill.
We'll pull over right here.
And stop here.
Get the brake on enough, so it doesn't roll backwards.
Out to the friction point, right there.
And, you want to spin the tires.
So, you want to let the clutch out fairly quickly, so you're spinning the tires, and not the two clutch plates inside the clutch.
So, give it lots of throttle, and bring that clutch out.
And, try and get your foot off the clutch, as quickly as possible.
If the tires spin a little bit, that's much more preferable, than spinning the two clutch plates against each other.
Because, you're not going to do this very often, obviously.
Okay.
We're going to go on this one hill, here.
You can see this is an incredibly steep hill, here.
This is pretty tough.
Okay.
Because, it's even tough to just get the vehicle to stop, with the brake on.
So.
Right there is the friction point, you can see the needle, the tachometer has sat down.
We take our foot off the brake.
Lots of throttle.
And, just try and get that clutch out, as quickly as possible.
Okay.
So, we'll go down to the bottom of the other hill, and we'll start one more time.
You can see how quickly this vehicle just rolls down the hill, here.
Now, when you're going downhill like this, you just want to not shift out of gear.
Try and control the brake, use the drive train a little bit.
We make sure that there aren't any vehicles coming.
Go down to the bottom of this hill.
And, we'll do it again.
And again, it's the same technique, that I've been teaching you in lessons one, two, three and four.
Bring the clutch out to the friction point.
Hold the friction point.
Quickly to the throttle, give it lots of throttle.
And then, expediently bring your foot off the clutch, as quickly as possible.
And, as I said, it's much more preferable to spin the tires, than it is to spin the clutch, okay?
So, out to the friction point, right there.
And quickly, lots of throttle.
And, you can hear, you heard that little squawk.
I spun the tires.
And, that's what you want.
You want to spin the tires.
You don't want to spin the clutch.
So, out to the friction point, right there.
Off the brake.
Onto the throttle, lots of throttle.
And, you heard that little *chirp*.
I spun the tires, instead of spinning the clutch.
And, I've got my foot right off the clutch, and that's what you want to do.
Now, right here at the top, I'm just working the throttle, and I'm just going slow and checking, so I don't have to stop again.
So, that's how you do hill starts.
It's the same thing as everything I've taught you, except it's a little more quickly.
Now, the other thing I'm going to do, is I'm going to go up here, on the Hill, again.
And, for those of you in Europe, you can all have a good laugh at this, about me trying to use the parking brake, here.
Because, I just don't use the parking brake.
I've never learned how to do it.
And, that is a lot more difficult in a petrol engine.
Especially a small petrol engine, like this vehicle here, where it's just a two liter petrol engine.
If you're in a diesel engine, you're going to find that you've got way more torque.
And, it's a lot easier to get started with a petrol engine.
So, I'm going to pull over here, on the side of the road.
And, we're all going to have a laugh at me, trying to use the parking brake, to do a hill start, here.
So, we're on a hill.
Clutch in.
Into first gear.
I'm off.
Out to the friction point.
There we go.
Little more throttle than we needed, probably.
But, it all worked out.
So, we'll do one more, for you, here.
Alright, so here we go.
One more for you.
Using the Handbrake to do a Hill Start in a Manual Car
So, stop.
Foot pedal on.
Into first gear.
Hand brake on.
Out to the friction point.
We release the friction point.
Now, we should be able take your foot off the brake, and the vehicle shouldn't roll.
Give it a bit of throttle.
When you feel it start to set down.
And, there you go.
And, that's the way you do it, with the handbrake.
For those of you in Europe, and other places that use the handbrake for hill starts, that's what you can do.
Because, that way, that'll let you get your foot on the throttle, and give it throttle, and then you can release the handbrake, and take off.
If you are on a really steep hill, that will work nicely for you.
So, we just put the handbrake on.
Out to the friction point.
A little bit of throttle.
Release, and then go.
And, as I said, It's important, when you're doing hill starts, to get your foot off the throttle, as quickly as possible.
Get your foot off..
Or, not off the throttle, sorry.
Off the clutch, as quickly as possible.
Because, you want to get those two clutch plates in contact, as quickly as possible.
And, when you get those two clutch plates in, then give the tires a little go.
Spin the tires, and get 'er going.
Because, it is incredibly hard on your clutch.
And, obviously, you're not going to be doing them, like I'm doing here, for a training session.
You're just going to be doing them, every now and again.
So, there's two options.
One way, is just to quickly get your foot to the throttle.
The other option, is to just put the handbrake on.
And then, just give it some throttle.
And, when you feel it start to move forward, then just release the parking brake.
And, for those of you in racing, we call that a "brake stand." Where you lock up the brakes, and then just start spinning the tires.
And, it'll just like take off.
It's called a "Brake stand," or "Rocket start." So, one more time.
Here we go.
Into first gear.
Parking brake on.
Out to the friction point, right there.
Give it throttle.
And, we go.
And, that's two options for doing hill starts.
And, as I said, if you've done them the way that I've taught you, from the beginning, by bringing the clutch out to the friction point, holding the brake, and then going to the throttle, holding the vehicle with the clutch: You've already learned how to do hill starts.
And, it's going to be fairly easy, to do hill starts.
Now, in another video, I'm going to show you how to recover, if you do, in fact, stall the vehicle.
But, that's how you do hill starts.
Quick review of: Hill starts, in a manual transmission.
If you haven't looked at lesson one already, and isolated the clutch, and learned clutch control, and have good clutch control, and learn where the friction point is on your vehicle: Go back to lesson one.
And, revisit that, and do that again.
Because, to do hill starts successfully, without using the handbrake.
And, I know for those you Europe, you use the handbrake.
That's part of their driving culture.
Which, for those of us in North America, who drive manual transmissions? It's a little strange.
And, If you want to know how to use the handbrake, you probably need to go to a driving instructor in Europe.
Because, I can do it.
But, it's awkward for me.
I do not look fluid, when I'm doing it.
So.
How you do it? Clutch out to the friction point.
Hold the brake.
Make sure you hold the brake hard, so the vehicle doesn't roll back.
Because, often, if you're on a steep hill, you're going to have to hold the brake hard, so it doesn't roll backwards.
Friction point.
Expediently off the throttle, give it lots of throttle.
Especially the steeper the hill, the more throttle you're going to have.
And, as you're going down on the throttle, you bring the clutch out, expediently.
Because, you don't want to spin the two plates in the clutch together.
You want to bring those two plates into contact, as quickly as possible.
And, into full contact, so you spin the tires.
It's easier on the tires, than it is on your clutch.
Because, tires are less expensive, than a clutch is going to be.
So, spin the tires, get the vehicle going.
And, if you're on a hill, and you got traffic behind you, just give it a little bit more throttle.
That way, you're not going to stall.
And as well, be sure you put it in first gear.
Because, it's pretty tough to get it going on a hill, if it's in second, or a higher gear.
And, you're most likely going to stall it.
And then, you need to look at the video on stalling, and how to get the vehicle going, if, in fact, you do that.
So, question for my Smart Drivers: Do you use the handbrake, when you do Hill starts? Or, are you going to use the method that I showed you, with bringing a clutch out to the friction point, and then giving it some throttle, and taking off? Leave a comment, down in the comment section there.
All of that helps out the new drivers, learning how to drive a manual transmission.
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Lots of great information here.
And, head over to our website.
Awesome information over there, and tremendous online courses that you can purchase.
Later this month, we're bringing out "Air Brakes.
Explained Simply." It updates the 40 year old air brake manuals, that are currently in circulation in North America.
As well, it gives you step-by-step instructions to pass both your theory, and your practical air brake component, if you're working towards getting a license to drive a bus, a truck, or an RV unit.
So, look for that.
As well, there's 100 multiple-choice questions, that you will be asked on a CDL air brake exam.
I'm Rick, with Smart Drive Test.
Thanks very much for watching.
Good luck on your road test.
And, remember: Pick the best answer, not necessarily the right answer.
Have a great day.
Bye now.
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