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Most of us would never admit we’re poor drivers. Yet, given an honest appraisal, many of us would likely find that we have numerous poor driving habits. Over time, these habits cause gradual damage to our cars, making them expensive to repair and unsafe to drive.
Take the clutch. Essential to vehicles with a manual transmission, the clutch endures a lot from our poor habits. Let’s look at common driving habits and how they impact your clutch’s health.
Riding the clutch
When you ride the clutch, you never take your foot off it. At some stage, everyone who drives a manual vehicle has had this habit. It’s a driving habit born from nerves (a new driver getting familiar with the clutch) or laziness (a driver who crawls through traffic daily). Either way, it’s a habit you need to shake quickly.
Riding your clutch keeps it in limbo, neither engaged nor disengaged. The flywheel and the friction disk remain separated, which causes gradual wear on the friction disc, over time. A slipping clutch is the result, which eventually you’ll have to replace.
Using the clutch while in neutral
We call this coasting in clutch; a habit we once thought fuel efficient. When you drive (or, coast along) in neutral with the clutch depressed, you’re completely disengaged from the engine. Coming down a hill mightn’t affect your speed, as gravity and momentum will keep your vehicle moving. A completely disengaged engine means you can’t rely on engine braking to slow down. Habit or not, this isn’t safe driving.
For your clutch, constant depression stretches the clutch cable, resulting in an unresponsive clutch.
Not depressing the clutch all the way down
This habit divides opinion. One camp will say you only need to depress the clutch (push the clutch down with your foot) enough to disengage the transmission from the engine. The other camp will insist you must depress the clutch to the floor to properly disengage. Get familiar with your car and you’ll know which camp to side with.
The lesson here? Always make sure you’ve disengaged the system when you change gears. If you don’t, your gearbox will sound as though it’s filled with gravel. Eventually, all that grinding will wear a hole in your wallet.
Neglecting your handbrake during hill starts
Funny how we neglect proper technique over time. When we learned how to do a hill start, we were taught to use the handbrake to keep our vehicle from rolling down the hill. Over time, many of us replaced this technique with excessive engine revving and clutch riding.
Smell something burning? That’s your clutch. Hill start regularly without the handbrake and you’ll burn the clutch to the point where it no longer works.
Overloading your car
We’ve been carrying this habit for a long time. From the moment we built the first cart, we’ve been overloading our vehicles. It’s a habit that brings short-term gain and long-term pain.
We design vehicles to handle a certain weight. Learn what your vehicle can safely hold and stick to it. A family camping trip in the Blue Mountains isn’t an invitation to stuff your vehicle with things you might need. Learn to pack lightly for camping and you won’t put added strain on the clutch as you ascend and descend through the ranges.
Not getting your vehicle serviced regularly
Sometimes, it’s what you don’t do that does the most damage—like not servicing your vehicle regularly. You can be an angel to your vehicle every time you drive it and still, this habit will hurt it in the long run.
Regular servicing helps you keep on top of any clutch issues, like stiff pressure springs or a damaged pressure plate, that inevitably arise from wear and tear. A clutch that’s routinely cleaned and inspected by a clutch specialist translates to a vehicle that’s smoother and safer to drive.
Looking after your clutch is largely about breaking poor habits—often easier said than done. If you’ve been on the road for years, driving the same roads for as long, you’ve no doubt settled into a routine that barely warrants thinking about. It’s time to think about it. The more you consider how you handle your vehicle, the better placed you are to correct poor habits and extend your vehicle’s life. The benefits you’ll enjoy today and tomorrow are impossible to ignore.
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