I bought my car brand new and so far I love it... except my parking garage at my company is freakin so steep. It's like 60-70 degrees incline. I'm fine on normal hills like lets say 45 degree inclines. I'm only at 940 miles and my service guy at Infiniti said not to pass 3000 rpm until about 1000 miles. The car rolled back a lot today and almost hit the car behind me. I try to go up and catch the point where the car will start going with the clutch and accel, but I was revving about 4000 and the car wasn't going up.

I know that part of this has to do with my stick skills, but I'm thinking that this is BAD for the car. There was a funny smell from the car afterwards. Do any of you have this problem with going up REAL steep hills? It's making me worried. I'm going to practice somewhere with real steep hills this weekend to get better.

 

Practice is all you need. The smell you smelled was probably burning clutch. It reeks of the horrible stench of failure. It's not great for the friction surface of the clutch to burn it , but it's not necessarily going to ruin your car if it's only occasional - everybody burns it a time or 2 no matter how expert most of us claim to be. Also practice using the hand brake technique on steep inclines. When you have to stop and don't want to roll backward, press the button on the end of the hand brake and fully pull it up to stop from rolling back on the incline. Keep the button pressed in with your thumb as you hold it. When you need to go forward again, release the clutch until first gear begins to engage (you should feel it) and then release the hand brake. You should go forward as you release the brake with no roll back at all. Practice this for a few days and you will be fine.

 

BB pretty much covered what I wanted to say, I just wanted to add it's ok if you break the 3k rpm mark, it's not like you're racing up there and your car is all warmed up.

Suck you won't be able to drop anytime soon though (Find another job? lol)

 

+1 big time for using the handbrake. I did that when I was first learning to drive a M/T, and it really helps you to learn the car w/o burning up the clutch

 

Just make sure you disengage the hand brake as soon as the clutch starts engaging.. Otherwise you can kiss that good bye lol

 

practice practice practice
thats all u need, once u master it ur good!

 

Well now that you had your *** handed to you through sarcastic comments about your inability to drive, welcome to the most friendly forum going! LOL! We actually are a great group of people who know tons of ish and don't hold back. The others do have a point though, once you learn how to drive your car it'll be much easier to get in and out of your parking conplex. Once again welcome to the forum!!

 

thanks everyone. i practiced a little bit on a hill with the hand brake. i was wondering if this technique is used by everyone for real steep hills?

 

The hand brake technique is used when you're still getting used to the car, especially that you're not very used to the engagement point. With time, you'll just lift of the clutch and blip the the throttle just enough not to stall or burn out (or both together lol)

It's just a matter of getting used to it.

When I was first learning how to drive an MT, I took that Clio to an incline (empty road). I would accelerate from a light pole and then stop at the next without using the brakes. I would then pause at the next light pole for like 20 seconds just by balancing clutch pedal & throttle (still no brakes) then accelerate again and so on till the end of the road. A few hours later I was rallying up haha

 

i always use the handbrake method, as im too paranoid to hit the car behind me

 

Once you are good at clutch/accelerator modulation for hills you will be more confident and better at it. However, for steep hills (not many around here) where there's a light or stop sign, you better believe I still use the hand brake technique. It's inevitable that it will be a busy intersection or a long light and your leg may get tired of holding the clutch at the engagement point because it's so damn high in this car. And inevitably some moron will pull up 6 inches behind you so that there's no margin for error at all to roll backward when starting off.

 

Doesn't that burn up the clutch? By "balancing" it implies that you are neither fully engaged nor fully disengaged... and are using a combination of rpms and clutch modulation to hold the car in place on a hill. I've always been under the impression that was riding the clutch and should be avoided.

 

No, this doesn't burn your clutch. The clutch is engaged and the throttle is only very slight (sometimes not needed at all). The car doesn't roll backward because of it's slight forward momentum, it doesn't roll backward because of the slight forward thrust. This is not burning your clutch.

I've burned a number of clutches in my day including the one on my G37 at the track once. This isn't how it's done.

Try putting your car into 1st gear and starting from a standstill by feather out on the clutch gradually without giving it any gas. Same basic principle.

 

Please explain how the engine can remain running and the wheels not turning with the clutch still fully engaged.

My understanding is that the clutch must inherently be only partially engaged in order for the wheels to remain still... otherwise the engine would stall or the wheels would move.

Partially engaging the clutch means it is slipping, which releases energy as heat, hence burning up your clutch/wearing down the clutch surface.


Feel free to point out what I'm missing.

 

The steep hill part.

The powertrain will need to overcome the inertial resistance of the car's considerable weight trying to roll backward down the hill before it can go forward, correct? On a flat surface or a downgrade as soon as you fully engage the clutch the car's powertrain will transfer enough power to the wheels to cause it to roll forward. On a steep rear grade, the car's weight is pulling it backward if it's in a neutral state. A certain amount of force is required to overcome this. Engaging the clutch and modulating the throttle so as to make your car's powertrain's forward thrust force equal to the effect of gravity on rearward motion is what's needed. The clutch is engaged and not slipping. The throttle input is what you modulate to keep it still. It takes practice and a very good amount of effort in modulating the throttle just perfectly to keep it still without rolling back or moving forward.

You are much better off just using the handbrake method though; its much easier than finding the perfect amount of throttle and holding it through an entire traffic light, especially a long one.