Newbie Jitters

[Jackrabbit379]

yeah but your an icon! when i float i will look at the tack but mostly just wait a sec and ease it and it goes. I still double clutch just about all of the time

I wasn't being arrogant, or anything. I'm sorry if it sounded that way. I know exactly how new drivers feel. I was there myself.
When I first started driving diesel trucks, I kept trying to go by the tachometer. I just couldn't do it. I was either too early or too late. I'd get frustrated, and I would try to cram it in gear, and I even had to stop, and start over. After a while, I decided that I would just drive the truck like a "4-speed" pickup, and that kinda helped.

[Scooby_1970]

Thanks everybody for the Great pointers!! I just can't to get behind the wheel now! I was worried about having to watch the tach, every engine I have ever driven has told me by the sound when to shift

[millersod215]

Hey Roadhog, computer's been sick for a few days I had to put her down and upgrade to a new Toshiba with a 16' screen, anyhow I guess the point I was trying to make is that I feel sometimes the clutch can give a new driver a false sense of confidence, like they look at it and say "well in my car I just push this in and the car goes in to gear, must be the same here". I can see where you and others are coming from, I did have to learn and test using the method of double clutching, but soon found out once on my own the method of floating gears was much easier for me to pick up on. So I'll just say this is the best method I know of........

[RootHB]

I learned how to double clutch at driving school. During training with the company I'm still with, I learned how to float successfully and continue to do so.
But every time I've ever been in a jam, instinctively going to the double clutch has gotten me out o that jam without dogging teeth..
Learn that double clutch first and well.
In the classroom, I didn't get it. Watching someone do it - it was terribly easy.. You'll do fine.

[jonp]

I wasn't being arrogant, or anything. I'm sorry if it sounded that way. I know exactly how new drivers feel. I was there myself.
When I first started driving diesel trucks, I kept trying to go by the tachometer. I just couldn't do it. I was either too early or too late. I'd get frustrated, and I would try to cram it in gear, and I even had to stop, and start over. After a while, I decided that I would just drive the truck like a "4-speed" pickup, and that kinda helped.

I was kidding. No worries, Jackrabbit.

[dle]

Did we actually answer the original poster's question or did we get sidetracked?

To answer your question, it doesn't really matter whether you know how to drive standard in a car or not. I do agree that knowing how to drive standard before learning double clutching can actually create problems.

Here in Texas, imagine it's the same elsewhere, when you take your driving test you must double clutch. If you don't you fail. Don't worry about the argument of the merits of double clutching versus floating until after you get your CDL and are in training.

[Roadhog]

I must be on dle's block list.

[EvenJoe]

I'm a newbie with 4 years on the road and about 600,000 miles behind me.

I can shift a truck just fine. I can even down shift without the clutch when I want to.

But ya know what? My sister bought her a new stick shift Scion and I couldn't shift it! I couldn't make my foot quit double clutching and shifting at low RPM. When I came to a corner I just totally screwed it up. Sis was Aghast. "I thought you could drive", she says.......
Yeah, me too.

You'll learn.

[Kevin0915]

Do not take double clutching as the golden rule of driving, I've driven for seven years and have never double clutched a truck other than when testing for specific companies. In my opinion double clutching will only make you lose your train of thought that much more, a truck driven correctly will float through the gears as easy, if not easier then a correctly driven doulbe clutched truck. If you were to double clutch all 10, 13, 18 etc. going up through your pattern, then back down you would be all but beat by the end of the day, and left with one hell of a cramp in your left leg. As for your initial question, do not take anything from a manual transmission vehicle as a confidence builder in driving a truck, you can up or down shift a car whenever and wherever you want, a truck works on RPMS, and you can't just push the clutch in and put it in gear, hence the waste of time learning to doulbe clutch, A TRUCK CLUTCH IS NOT AN AUTOMOBILE CLUTCH, remember that and you should be on your way to perfecting the art of shifting. And please don't adopt the mentality of "if you can't find em' grind em'" theres already enough of those wanna be's running the roads today, we don't need another one.

Never is a pretty big word. And can actually be used properly in a sentence. I can say i've never taken flight in a hot air balloon, but cant say 'i've never used a pencil with a little troll on the end of the eraser with the wild hair', just cause it wouldnt look "cool".

I highly doubt any driver has NEVER double clutched a truck before. I've been floating for the past few months, but there are also situations where double clutching is just faster (probably because i haven't got the nack for it down). But please, dont say "i've never double clutched" just to look cool, cause it really dont matter new newbies.

[millersod215]

There's no point of trying to look cool, I can honestly say that other than the time while testing in school I have never double clutched, I do not see the ease in it, it does not help me out in tight situations, and in my opinion at any point where I or someone else might miss a gear, upshift or down, a simple stab at the throttle and the correct RPM will solve the problem. So in now way, shape or form do I think I'm cool, or do I try to come off as some kind of supertrucker because of the fact that I don't, and haven't double clutched a truck in over 7 years, I'm just giving some insight, but I forgot so many times on this site that "opinions" by some aren't aloud, I'll take your word for it Kevin and quit trying to be "cool"............

[Roadhog]

I don't think the float shifter opinions on this thread had anything to do with acting macho.
I know the difference, because I've read plenty of O/O threads.