It used to be an accepted technique even in manual cars when the pedals were simply connected mechanically to the components they operated.
Blip the accelerator to match the revs with the right foot while braking with the left foot and downshift without using the clutch. This method when perfected, achieved super fast and smooth gearchanges.
Much more difficult to do on modern cars and sort of pointless anyway. As has been previously mentioned the electronics override the throttle blips when braking.
Having said that I do left foot brake in autos due to indolence more than anything.
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I have read and understood HJ's views on this subject. My input is that if I am in a manual car I accel and brake with my right foot and use my left for the clutch. In an auto, where there is no clutch, I don't use my left foot. It seems logical to me and keeps things consistent and simple.
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I'm the opposite.
I almost always left foot brake in an automatic, and frequently drive a manual car as well. It's what you get used to.
Its very handy when moving the car in tight spots, especially in car park or on a slope, and can be useful when pressing on, on a twisty road, when you want to slow down, but keep the wheels powered to maintain a line.
If you want to try - go to a large car park late in the evening and practice. Don't practice on the road; the accident will be your fault!
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I'm with Armitage, it seems natural to not use the left foot in an auto.
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Any diesel cuts the fuel on the over-run,let alone brake.
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Yesterday's letter from a reader who suffered from someone else's inability to left foot brake and therefore retain control over their automatic while manoeuvring at relatively low speed:-
"I recently suffered a total loss to my Mazda 6. Briefly it became "sandwiched" between the 3rd party [old lady in her 80's driving an automatic and selecting the throttle pedal instead of the brake] and my house. Over £3000 of damages have been done to my house...."
I get e-mails like this every couple of days.
HJ
(Today's lesson in English Grammar: Do not use an apostrophe before the 's' when signifying a plural. Autos is the plural of auto, not auto's. Use an apostrophe to signify possession, eg Fred's, else's. But it's signifies it is, not it possessing something.)
Edited by Honestjohn on 19/03/2009 at 09:14
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I always drove autos with one foot until I test drove an X-Type Jag.
There's an incline when reversing into my backyard and there is no way the Jag would go in smoothly using one foot.
I was forced to maintain a little throttle with the right and release the brake gently with my left to make the car creep up the incline.
Still can't see the point of using two feet on the open road.
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...Today's lesson in English Grammar...
Today's second lesson in English grammar.
Only proper nouns - names - and trade names need capitals: Ford as in car, but ford as in water on the road, Texaco, English, Honestjohn, etc.
Ordinary nouns and names do not have a capital: cat, dog, grammar, car, gate, oh, and did I say grammar?
It's a minefield, English grammar.
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LFB is absolutely essential for manoeuvering. In a manual, you can take the power off by dropping the clutch pedal; in an auto the only way to stop is to use the brake. You NEED to have your left foot ready for that, else you will run the risk of hitting the car in front.
I am told more modern autos than I have ever driven can be kinder.
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LFB is absolutely essential for manoeuvering.
How is it essential? It's not a skill I've learnt and I haven't encountered the day I need it yet.
In a manual you can take the power off by dropping the clutch pedal; in an auto the only way to stop is to use the brake. You NEED to have your left foot ready for that else you will run the risk of hitting the car in front.
Can you describe a situation where that risk arises and without LFB I am a danger to others? I'm intrigued.
I am told more modern autos than I have ever driven can be kinder.
How old is your automatic? The oldest I have driven regularly without understanding LFB braking to be essential was from 1991.
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It was a 1992 Audi.
>>> use the brake. You NEED to have your left foot ready for that else you
>>> will run the risk of hitting the car in front.
>>Can you describe a situation where that risk arises and without LFB I am a danger to
>>others? I'm intrigued.
I did - any circumstances when there is a car in front of you.
There is no way that you have the control with an auto that you have with a manual when trying to squeeze up that last inch to the car parked in front of you. In a manual, you can do it entirely using the clutch, with the right foot over the brake pedal, so you can stop instantly. If you RFB in an auto, the car does not move until you press the throttle pedal, and you lose the time of moving the foot across in order to stop instantly. If you LFT you have that same instantaneous control you have with a manual. Doddle.
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>>Can you describe a situation where that risk arises and without LFB I am a danger to >>others? I'm intrigued. I did - any circumstances when there is a car in front of you. There is no way that you have the control with an auto that you have with a manual when trying to squeeze up that last inch to the car parked in front of you.
I don't get it. Every auto I've driven creeps forward when in gear without me needing to use the accelerator. So when I'm parking or manoeuvring next to obstacles like other parked cars (or walls, or anything else) I can let that creep effect move the car - it's quite fast enough for me for tight manoeuvring - and moderate the speed with the brake pedal. If I needed to, I could stop as quickly as I can in a manual because my foot is already on the brake.
If you've trained yourself to, you certainly could use your left foot for that, but since your right foot isn't doing anything else then LFB surely isn't essential.
If you RFB in an auto the car does not move until you press the throttle pedal
All the ones I've driven start to move as soon as you release, or even partially release, the pressure on the brake pedal. Is yours different?
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All the ones I've driven start to move as soon as you release, or even partially release, the pressure on the brake pedal. Is yours different?
The difficulty might come on a steep slope where the normal 'creep' is insufficient to move the car forward at idling speed. Then a little bit of toe may be needed. It is all right for people like GJD and me who are in more or less full control of our motor muscles, but you only have to look around you on the road to see that a lot of people aren't. To some people all the pedals are just on/off switches to be stamped on or suddenly released. It doesn't help to be slow-thinking and it doesn't help not to understand how your car works. Nor does it help if the car is in anything but perfect adjustment (carburetted automatic cars, especially small-engined ones, could be pigs to maintain).
Given, then, that lots of drivers of large automatics are frail, ignorant and given to jerky involuntary muscle movements (drive through St. John's Wood if you don't believe me), and that these misfortunes may fall on any of us at any time, it may be a good idea to acquire the lfb habit for use in tight manoeuvring.
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The difficulty might come on a steep slope where the normal 'creep' is insufficient to move the car forward at idling speed. Then a little bit of toe may be needed.
Hill starts you mean? Handbrake?
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Hill starts you mean? Handbrake?
Just remind me not to buy a car that you've owned previously where the handbrake has been used to stop a car.
Mechanical sympathy...
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>> Hill starts you mean? Handbrake? Just remind me not to buy a car that you've owned previously where the handbrake has been used to stop a car.
What part of a hill START involves stopping the car? You go from not moving to moving, and in the process, amongst other things you take the handbrake from on to off.
Of course, at some point you may need to stop on such a slope. I don't suggest using the handbrake to do that. Are you saying that, even though the slope is steep enough that the creep at idle can't move the car and so lifting off the gas will stop the car, it won't stop it quick enough, and even the time it takes to move your right foot from gas to brake is too long so the only option is LFB?
I must admit that I live in a fairly flat part of the country, but it has not always been so, and I do drive and park in other places. I think perhaps I just don't have the need to park as close to obstacles as you. I hope I never do. With margins for error so tiny then unless I could achieve absolute perfection of timing and control every single time I would forsee the odd bumper scrape and cracked number plate becoming something I have to live with, and I think that would annoy me.
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Of course, at some point you may need to stop on such a slope
But the point wasn't just about starting off on a slope, GJD, but tight manoevring on a steep slope or having like BBD to drive over a step of some sort and then stop immediately. That is done most easily by using the (to me) wrong foot on the brake pedal.
I can't remember if I did that when driving my pushbutton slushpump Plymouth in the US, even parking in San Francisco. I do remember though that it was illegal not to leave your car with the front wheels turned to run into the kerb if the handbrake (and usually, solid mechnical transmission lock in Park) somehow failed.
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But the point wasn't just about starting off on a slope GJD but tight manoevring on a steep slope or having like BBD to drive over a step of some sort and then stop immediately. That is done most easily by using the (to me) wrong foot on the brake pedal.
Yeah I got BBD's point about a step or some such, where you need lots of revs to get up the step, but the instant you do get up you're back on the flat and lots of revs is exactly what you don't want. It's the sudden change that matters. On a slope - starting, stopping or manoeuvring - that sudden change doesn't exist.
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"Can you describe a situation where that risk arises and without LFB I am a danger to others?"
Parallel parking in a tight space that involves reversing over a high kerb.
Parallel parking in a tight space that involves reversing over a monster speed hump.
Reversing into my garage which has a steep slope leading to it and a two inch lip at the bottom of the door - requires huge gas followed by instant braking.
Aggressive tailgating.
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"Can you describe a situation where that risk arises and without LFB I am a danger to others?" Aggressive tailgating.
Hmmm. I'm not sure learning left foot braking is the right way to fix that one :-). I can see where you're coming from with your other examples though. I'll think about it next time I find myself needing to do that sort of thing.
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...aggresive tailgating...
Left foot braking in this instance enables the brake lights to be illuminated without reducing speed.
The idea is to warn the following driver, but not to increase the risk of a rear end shunt.
I've done it, very ocassionally, in a manual.
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...aggresive tailgating... Left foot braking in this instance enables the brake lights to be illuminated without reducing speed.
Ah - you mean when you are the victim of aggressive tailgating. I thought the suggestion was that LFB might help you perpetrate aggressive tailgating :)
I have done that occasionally too but to be honest I've given up bothering. All it does is let the tailgater know that you're uncomfortable, but if they cared about your feelings they presumably wouldn't be trying to barge you out of the way in the first place. Also, I think I've had more people respond by closing the gap even more than by backing off at all.
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.. It's a minefield, English grammar. >>
By your rules of grammar, is the use of a capital G wrong in the following?
"Welcome to Grammar Challenge, the programme where we help language learners use tricky grammatical structures.
www.bbc.co.uk/worldservice/learningenglish/grammar.../
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..."Welcome to Grammar Challenge the programme where we help language learners use tricky grammatical structures....
jbif,
The words Grammar Challenge in this context refer to the name of a programme, so would normally be capped up.
Doctor Who, Top of the Pops, Tomorrow's World, etc.
At the end of your quoted sentence the words 'grammatical structures' are quite properly not capped because they refer to grammatical structures in general.
Unless, of course, I devise a new panel game and call it...Grammatical Structures.
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ifithelps:
I have no problem writing any of the following:
Today's lesson in English Language
Today's lesson in English Literature
Today's lesson in English Pronunciation
Today's lesson in English Vocabulary
Today's lesson in English Grammar
grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/forms/grammar_requ...m
Anyway, back to Motoring, as the Mods often say.
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I love grammar because I can do it, and quite a few can't, or can't be bothered, or realise they are only composing ephemeral Emails. I usually stop myself commenting for fear of offending. But the obligatory motoring connection is wearing thin ..
Perhaps we need a new Grammar thread?
Edited by Andrew-T on 19/03/2009 at 11:26
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Only proper nouns - names - and trade names need capitals: Ford as in car but ford as in water on the road Texaco English Honestjohn etc. >>
Notice no capital letter in "ifithelps" , because that is not his proper name.
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...Notice no capital letter in "ifithelps" , because that is not his proper name...
CP,
True, but there's another reason.
Signing up to this site was one of my first efforts at user names, passwords and the internet, so I didn't really know how it would turn out.
I was just pleased to get started at the time.
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Is auto a word?
If not, could auto's be regarded as a correct abbreviation of automatics?
;>)
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