My first shot at using an automatic…

[Anonymous]

I thought I’d share this story because it’s a bit funny. Maybe.

In the UK, there are two types of driving licence. I have a Full UK/European licence, meaning that I can drive any car whether it is manual or automatic. However, if I learned and passed my test in an automatic, I would have a licence allowing me to drive cars with an automatic gearbox only. If I wanted to drive a manual, I would have to re-take a full driving test in a manual and pass.

This is all well and good. I learned in a manual (a Toyota Avensis 1. and drove that for the first year after passing. It had to go in for a big service, so we got a Vauxhall Omega 2.2 for a few days. This was an automatic. Well, I was pretty excited – I had always wanted to try driving an auto. Our drive was on a bit of an incline, and in order to get out I usually left the car in neutral, rolled back a bit then pulled out to the right (I parked across the drive because of the way it was, and there was a bush in front of me).

Anyway, I started the car. Fine – it’s an auto, easy. I was wrenching on the gearstick and trying every damn button I could find to make it move, but it wouldn’t come out of park! Could I get it to change? Yeah, right. Although I was supposed to be able to drive an auto, I didn’t have a clue. Eventually, I was told that you have to put your foot on the brake in order to release the gearstick. Fine – into “drive”. I let go of the brake while I steered the car out, but didn’t realise that it was moving ahead slowly. I crushed the unfortunate bush that got in the way…

After a bit of messing about, I had it sussed and got out of the tight driveway (this is a big car). I drove to my mate’s house to pick him up, then drove down to another friend’s house. A mile at 40mph… With the HANDBRAKE ON! Little did I know, you can’t stall an auto and they don’t care what holds them back, they’ll just go forward like they’re told.

I got out the car and was greeted by the smell of burning rubber and that funny “hot metal” smell. The rear discs were glowing a dull red and it was so hot you couldn’t get too close. Oops! From then on, I was forever checking the handbrake to make sure it was off… Glad it was just a rental/company car!

I didn’t have too much trouble after that. Just a bit funny that I was supposedly qualified to drive an auto, but in actual fact I didn’t have a clue. Probably didn’t help that I was relatively inexperienced at the time, too. Maybe the DVLA should give out a leaflet to all manual passers telling them how an automatic works!

Hope I didn’t bore everyone with that…

Cobra

PS – I went more than 200 miles that night with my mates. Big spacious car, good stereo, full tank of petrol… No worries!

Topic

[Anonymous]

Wow didn’t know you had to be certified to drive a manual in europe. Here we have different licenses for commercial driving and “chauffer” licenses as such. But when you get your general license your good to go even if you’ve never set foot in a manual (which I’ve never learned to drive).

[Anonymous]

We need it, otherwise you’ll have people who haven’t ever driven a manual really struggling to change gear and take off from junctions, coordinating throttle and clutch, brake-clutch movement, gear selection problems… It’d cause an awful lot of accidents! Remember that manuals are most common here, and automatics are few and far between.

[Garibaldi]

Quote:

We need it, otherwise you’ll have people who haven’t ever driven a manual really struggling to change gear and take off from junctions, coordinating throttle and clutch, brake-clutch movement, gear selection problems… It’d cause an awful lot of accidents! Remember that manuals are most common here, and automatics are few and far between.

Oh right, so its a really different situation there. Like Yoda said we have a license for class C vehicles (I believe) that are any type of car, truck, van, or SUV manual or automatic. I can understand the reason for a difference where you live though

[Author]

Replies