Is it bad to shift without the clutch sometimes?

If you hit the exact right RPMs you can just pull it in gear with out the clutch. Is this bad for anything? I only do it for like 3rd and 4rth gears.

 

Like a "perfect shift" type situation?

 

I do it all the time in my wife's Corolla. Also you rarely use the clutch to shift a truck, and when I say truck I mean semi or 10 wheeler (dump truck style).

 

exactly, but its a bit of a pull but nothing over forceful. About 30mph for 3rd and 40mph for 5th.

 

if your doing it right, I cant see it hurting anything. if you are putting pressure on it and waiting for it to "fall in" you are probly putting unnecessary wear on synchros.

I had it about mastered in my 92. haven't tried it much with the new truck though.

I have come to the conclusion that gas motors rev down too fast to make it easy to hit each gear correctly. and if you fuck up, and get it close enough to chatter, that's never good and was not accounted for in the trans design.

unless your good at it, leave it to the big-rigs.

 

I once heard this is like catching a baseball with your teeth. You can do it, but there's a very high likelihood that you'll do some pretty good damage over time.

 

As long as it doesn't grind it won't do any damage just make sure you match the revs properly.

 

If it's done perfectly it's actually better than clutching BUT it's nearly impossible to do perfectly. If there's a grind then that's obvious damage, but even a delay with pressure on the stick before it drops in is wearing on the synchros more than clutching would. If you're good enough at it that it just drops straight into gear every single time with no clunk or delay then go for it, if it's even a little off use the clutch.

Big rigs and some race trannys have no synchros and sometimes straight cut gears. These are totally different from what's in a normal vehicle and can't be compared as far as shifting technique.

For 99% of drivers I'd say use the clutch.

 

If you like your syncros yes.

 

Don't or you WILL be rebuilding the transmission. Use the clutch and don't skip gears, either.

 

Why is skipping gears bad for the tranny?

 

Apparently the synchros don't line up correctly if you skip gears.

 

When I had my FJ40 I could drive it without the clutch as long as it was moving without grinding any gears. Up or down. I loved that truck. I used to do it in my 89 when I was still driving it on the road. Now it rarely gets out of 1st on my property. As long as you aren't grinding gears or forcing the shifter to "pop" it into gear you aren't hurting anything. My current tacoma doesn't have a clutch pedal...

 

My question is why? I drove a manual for 7 years years and 3 different cars, and never did it occur to me that pushing the clutch pedal was just too much work

 

It's just more of a challenge without a clutch.

 

No you just have to double clutch it to prevent excess wear on the synchros. Another option is to wait for the input shaft to slow down enough to match the road speed preventing excess wear. Double clutching is just a faster way of doing that.

 

I used to do it all the time with this truck....

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I'm not sure I would try it on your Tacoma though. You either know what you're doing or you don't.

 

It takes a bit of pressure to push it in but it never grinds.

 

That's what she said.

 

Well if it's bad for it then when the tranny goes bad you can just replace it with an automatic, since pushing the clutch is too much work for you