I tought myself on my 96A4. Now i got my 99.5....... keep in mind I burned my clutch out on my 96. I was taking it to street races (lol) and racing crap outta it.

 

Becomes second nature after a while and once you have mastered a manual tranny, you will never look back as its you and the car and much more hands on and fun.

 

Jesus, 2 stalls and the god damn tranny started making noise? **** that, time to save up $300 for a ******* lol.

 

Haha noooo! The release bearing was making noise before I even let her behind the wheel. I am going to need a new clutch sometime within the next year or so regardless, because of that release bearing... so I figured I might as well let her give the car a whirl before then. She didn't hurt the car at all, and the stalls were very ... gentle. Haha She's hot, what are you gonna do eh?

 

I am just wondering if you mean drive stick or race stick?

I mean crap you can learn to drive stick on any car with out damaging it... learn from someone who knows a thing or two and if you listen you can learn how to avoid roll back and when to back shift. Really if you are going to get a beater, get something that is hearty and not going to stall at everything. I drove stick my first time just fine with out any stalls just because I knew the concept from watchig my parents drive it.

I still have problems on crappy cars though, like my sister's 70 horsepower pick up truck, yeah you have to stomp on the gas while letting out the clutch or it is gonna stall. On the flipside, at work I had a V8 F250 on a 5 speed... most people said don't even bother using first gear... they were right, the gear lasted 1/2 a second and smoked the tires like crazy.

You know where my friend learned is at work... get a job with a company car on a manual transmission.

Back shifting is the tricky part... all those people who are crawling up hills and destroying their catalytic converter with the gas petal smashed into the floor board need to learn that at 30 mph you could go to 3rd or 2nd and do just fine. My trick for backshifting is to remember where the shift points were on the way up the gears. Usually crap cars are every 15 mph and with Audi's it is about every 30-35. So if you are in 5th doing 45 and you want some power, with a crap car go back to third or fourth and with a nice car go to 2-3. The technique is a feel thing. And you can double clutch it for an even smoother ride but I usually don't.

 

Take a pocket full of quarters to the arcade. I learned to drive a stick on a arcade game, I think it was called Race Driving or somthing. Big yellow game you sit in, with clutch and shifter, key, it had it all. It was more like a simulator, not a game. Very realistic in the way you had to work the pedals. There was no real objective to it, just drive. When I was about 12 I spent hours in it and when my dad let me drive his car with a manual, I took right off and only stalled it after 30 minutes or so when I got cocky and thought I was a pro.

 

i learned a while back on my old saab (before it died for good), and now that i'm in the market for a 99.5 1.TQM... i'm beginning to brush up on my skills with a '74 f-250 at work. and when i say brushing up, i mean stalling every once in a while

best bet, buy or find a beater

 

It is highly recommended to buy it, people don't take well to you just "finding" their car, no matter how beater it is.