Sometimes thieves get angry.
In 1985 a thug pulled a gun on my wife as she was loading groceries into the hatch of our new 5sp Trans Am and demanded the keys. The punk ass didn’t know how to start, much less how to drive a Manual transmission. He ran off within a few seconds.
All my personal cars have been manuals.
I’d be okay with a manual, but only if I can get “three on the tree”.
We raised our daighter right.
Once she learned to drive her mom’s Tauris, I taught her to drive my manual transmission Civic.
When it was “first car time” she opted for a manual transmission one. Her male high school friends (most of whom went onto engineering schools) looked upon her as some mecahnical genius!!
It seems no one knows how to drive a stick these days. I had the valet park my car. When I came back for it, he told me that the guy who drives the sticks had gone home and no one else knew how to do so but he could show me where it was. Luckily he did not expect a tip for that “service.” Or in any event he did not get one.
Had to be the best car thieves in the world.
Now, I could at one time manage to start and drive a manual-transmission in which the clutch engagement mechanism was broken.
Part of the linkage to the clutch had dropped off out on the road, and the pedal just went to the floor. I could stop the car by simply stepping on the brake until the motor conked out, then by shifting the transmission to low, start the car up using the starter, then by careful control of the throttle, shift the transmission into the next higher gear.
I crippled some fifty miles home using this procedure.
Today I would just call AAA. If I still had a manual transmission vehicle.
Florida Man strikes again! This time, thwarted by manual transmission. Shocking.
Imagine a millennial trying to figure out a manual trans with a hi/lo axle.
Realistically, most people can’t drive stick, or if they can aren’t especially good at it. In my experience just as many millennials as anyone else can drive stick — that is to say, a small number.
From the looks of him, it’s surprising he even knows what a car is.
When I was a state copper working in Cook County I was in Chicago in the Greektown restaurant area when my partner and I monitored a Chicago Police Dept flash message about a car jacking that had just occurred in the area within the last few minutes.
Just moments after we made note of it, we heard cars honking at a late model import that was moving slowly in the left lane, jerking and stopping as other cars swerved around it. Since it matched the description of the suspect vehicle, we made a felony stop, detained three suspects who had two pistols in the car, and notified CPD Tactical officers to meet us at the scene.
These suspects were subsequently identified as the offenders in the car jacking, and the reason for the erratic driving that had captured our attention was the fact that the ringleader driver couldn’t operate the 5 speed manual transmission in it very well. One of his accomplices was an 18 wheel truck driver who was entirely capable of driving it, but the boss said that he had always wanted to drive a stick shift and this would be his first chance, so he ordered his buddy to stand down and took the wheel himself.
As a result of this experience, my 2010 Hummer H3 has a 5 speed manual trans.
We wouldn’t catch so many of these clowns if so many weren’t so damn stupid.
Thieves should have no problem with the new C8 Corvette.
This exact situation is why I specifically bought my Challenger SRT with a manual.
Less than 5% of Millenials can drive one.
I do have to wonder about how many Millenials can stop a car after the power brakes fail - not the brakes, the power brakes (or after snapping a power steering belt), probably not very many!