Rev Match On or Off

[Cueyo]

If I’m in second and find myself lower than 1200rpm I slip it into first.

Yeah I think that's about the only time I've done it, but I've also never been downshifting into 1st other than to get moving again. I think I used it once or twice when I was learning stick, shifting into 1st to decelerate that is.

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[Deleted User 3888]

Yup, start around :30



Covering both pedals with one foot and a slight roll for blip.

Haven’t seen this in years!!!! The way dude steers with the throttle was magical.

 

[Deleted User 3888]

Yeah I think that's about the only time I've done it, but I've also never been downshifting into 1st other than to get moving again. I think I used it once or twice when I was learning stick, shifting into 1st to decelerate that is.

Yeah. Basically parking lot stuff

 

[jtlctr]

It looks like he was on his way to dinner with those shoes.

 

[Spart]

Isn't that bad practice to shift into first anyways? You should be able to slow down enough in 2nd+brake. Only time you'd need first is going from a crawl/stop to go (or on stop and go traffic).

Completely depends on the gearing of the car and the particular transmission.

Some transmissions will just hate being downshifted into first.

Some transmissions have very tall gears and first more or less fills the role of second gear in a lot of slow-speed situations because of it, where you'd be lugging the engine to use second. For example at OIR going into turn 18 (a tight hairpin) I would downshift my GT350 to first gear. First was good for 53mph in that car and the torque curve comes in above 4000RPM, so you really need to keep the revs up to do work on track. That car also didn't mind downshifting to first in the slightest.

Our cars are geared so that first redlines at 38mph (according to Google, I haven't found out honestly.) This is pretty common for a sports car to have tall gearing where first can get you to 40mph or more.

I probably wouldn't downshift this car to first going into turn 18 at OIR, I'd use second and lean on the low-end torque.

Buuuuuut.... I do downshift to first a lot around town in low speed situations where I'm doing ~15mph or less. Just gives you a lot more control to accelerate and decelerate with the throttle and the car doesn't mind it at all.

 

[Deleted User 3888]

Completely depends on the gearing of the car and the particular transmission.

Some transmissions will just hate being downshifted into first.

Some transmissions have very tall gears and first more or less fills the role of second gear in a lot of slow-speed situations because of it, where you'd be lugging the engine to use second. For example at OIR going into turn 18 (a tight hairpin) I would downshift my GT350 to first gear. First was good for 53mph in that car and the torque curve comes in above 4000RPM, so you really need to keep the revs up to do work on track. That car also didn't mind downshifting to first in the slightest.

Our cars are geared so that first redlines at 38mph (according to Google, I haven't found out honestly.) This is pretty common for a sports car to have tall gearing where first can get you to 40mph or more.

I probably wouldn't downshift this car to first going into turn 18 at OIR, I'd use second and lean on the low-end torque.

Buuuuuut.... I do downshift to first a lot around town in low speed situations where I'm doing ~15mph or less. Just gives you a lot more control to accelerate and decelerate with the throttle and the car doesn't mind it at all.

I’m sorry. Shelby Gt350 does 50+ in first gear?!?

Did not know that.

 

[Spart]

I’m sorry. Shelby Gt350 does 50+ in first gear?!?

Did not know that.

Yes, but gears 1-5 are closely spaced. It makes it ideal for track work, and really lousy for drag racing. People who drag race GT350's get what they get, though.

Gen 5 Viper and Hellcat 6MT do 60mph in first gear.

 

[Cueyo]

Completely depends on the gearing of the car and the particular transmission.

Some transmissions will just hate being downshifted into first.

Some transmissions have very tall gears and first more or less fills the role of second gear in a lot of slow-speed situations because of it, where you'd be lugging the engine to use second. For example at OIR going into turn 18 (a tight hairpin) I would downshift my GT350 to first gear. First was good for 53mph in that car and the torque curve comes in above 4000RPM, so you really need to keep the revs up to do work on track. That car also didn't mind downshifting to first in the slightest.

Our cars are geared so that first redlines at 38mph (according to Google, I haven't found out honestly.) This is pretty common for a sports car to have tall gearing where first can get you to 40mph or more.

I probably wouldn't downshift this car to first going into turn 18 at OIR, I'd use second and lean on the low-end torque.

Buuuuuut.... I do downshift to first a lot around town in low speed situations where I'm doing ~15mph or less. Just gives you a lot more control to accelerate and decelerate with the throttle and the car doesn't mind it at all.

I think the highest Ive seen shifting out of first and hitting redline is 34mph, but I also use the sound queues and not my eyes to shift.

I've never actually shifted the car into first slowing down since I turned off rev match, and I'd rather not test it either lol

 

[Spart]

I've never actually shifted the car into first slowing down since I turned off rev match, and I'd rather not test it either lol

Not a big deal, I do it every day.

 

[maranelloboy05]

I've tried for a decade across S2000s, Miatas, GTIs and now the FL5 and it just doesnt happen. HB

Isn't that bad practice to shift into first anyways? You should be able to slow down enough in 2nd+brake. Only time you'd need first is going from a crawl/stop to go (or on stop and go traffic).

I'm not going to claim this isn't bad, but I haven't killed a clutch in 15 years of manual driving so I doubt its that bad. When slowing to a stop sign I shift to first but keep the clutch pressed, so I dont actually shift to first. I just like having the gear selector in first for when I'm ready to start going, its just mentally easier for me to check cross traffic etc knowing the car is in first gear ready to go.

 

[PNEUMA]

It isn’t hard on the clutch, it is the first gear synchronizer that is taking the abuse.

 

[Spart]

It isn’t hard on the clutch, it is the first gear synchronizer that is taking the abuse.

...a synchronizer which is perfectly capable of spinning up the input shaft on a downshift.

It's a bit of internet lore that downshifting to first always equivocates to being hard on your synchronizer.

Talking specifically about the FL5/DE5, when you're sitting stopped in neutral with the clutch engaged and you need to press the clutch in and select first, the first gear synchronizer has to slow the input shaft down from ~800rpm to 0rpm.

When you're going 10mph in second gear and you want to downshift to first to avoid lugging the engine when you go under 10mph, the fist gear synchronizer has to speed the input shaft up from ~1100rpm to ~1900rpm.

Our cars can handle this just fine, they have a relatively tall first gear befitting a sports car. The difference in input shaft speed handled by the synchro is the same in both situations.

The kernel of truth in the lore is that there are transmissions where downshifting to first is a really bad idea for not just the synchronizer, but also the clutch.

Many of us are old enough to have driven trucks (meaning passenger trucks, not commercial ones) where first is often referred to as "granny low".

If you downshift to first in those vehicles at too great of a speed, not only will you give the synchronizer (if there is one) a very hefty load to handle, but you risk spinning your clutch disk faster than it's capable of being spun without coming apart. As in, the clutch disk will literally explode from the centrifugal force due to being over-spun without you ever needing to "complete" a money shift by letting the clutch pedal out. Merely selecting the too-low gear destroys the clutch disk.

This is easy to do on some of those vehicles, because 3mph could be "just right" to downshift into first and 6mph could be "too fast."

On many of these older vehicles, first gear was actually unsynchronized. So you would need to double-clutch to shift into first, and it would have been an extremely tricky gear to double-clutch downshift into, given how fast the RPM would change relative to road speed. In this scenario, it's good advice to never downshift to first gear while moving, because second gear would not lug the engine. On most of these vehicles, if you weren't hauling anything you might start in second gear anyway.

There's a whole spectrum of this, from granny low at one end to the transmission you see in a Hellcat that can do 0-60 in first gear. Our cars are over halfway to the Hellcat in this spectrum.

TL;DR: you can downshift to first. The car can handle it just fine.

 

[maranelloboy05]

I always heard it wasnt great for the throwout bearing but its how I'm comfortable so doubt I'll change my habits. FL5 is my first car with rev match and it blipping the throttle when I pre-emptively shift to first coming to a stop just got on my nerves.

I do wish the setting wasn't as buried. Would love to have "Off" as an option on the individual settings. Would allow me to simply drop into R+ mode when driving aggressively and go from no rev match in individual to rev match in R+.

 

[Spart]

I always heard it wasnt great for the throwout bearing

I have never heard that argument in my life, and it doesn't make sense anyway.

Holding the clutch pedal in is what causes wear on your throwout bearing.

Downshifting to first implies that you're still moving, and that you are releasing the clutch pedal. Same as any other downshift. The speed the throwout bearing moves at is locked to engine speed, not gear speed. So the throwout bearing doesn't know the difference between a 6th-5th downshift and a 2nd-1st downshift.

 

[ctechauto]

TLDR is the car will handle downshifting into 1st fine, it just doesnt 'feel' good. But you're actually not harming anything.

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