Steve McQueen does some awesome double clutching in the chase scene from the movie "Bullit" (I think)... if that's not double clutching then somebody please tell me what he IS doing there because it's so consistent.

 

YES.... the scenes where we're behind his Mustang through the mountain roads... That was SWEET. Yes that's double-clutching... and IIRC he did all of his own driving too

 

Although I have never drag raced before, it would seem to me that it's all about UPshifting and there is no need to double-clutch on an upshift.

 

How long did it take you guys to get double clutching right? I want to start doing it and want to know what to expect.

 

Double clutching is USELESS in drag racing. Think about it. If your taking a .25 of a second longer to shift, your going to be a full second slower if you finish the 1/4 in 4th gear. Too much F&F BS going around.

 

it takes a bit of practice. make sure you are learning at low speeds and with plenty of error room. it will take a bit as to do it right you have to do it very fast. practice, practice, practice. and you will know when you get it right because its smooth, like a good heel-toe.

 

when you have 4 bottles of naws and twenty decals, whats a sec?

 

The real trick is to combine heal-toe with double clutching. With a bit of practice it can be done very fast.

 

What is heel-toe? Please explain.

I've heard that back in the day, you had to double clutch on an upshift due to weak hydraulic clutch systems... is that bs?

 

Nothing to do with the clutch. Read all the goodies above (especially the link I provided). Double-clutching is necessary on cars without syncromesh.

Heel-toe, essentially, is braking and blipping the throttle at the same time, whether it's for a single-clutch or double-clutch downshift.

 

When heel toe brakeing what goes where? Is your heel on the brake or gas?

 

It's more like the ball of your foot is on the brake pedal, and you push on the gas pedal with the side of your foot by rolling your ankle or something similar.

It's called heel and toe because cars used to have the pedals arranged so you actually used the heel and toe. IIRC Ferrari experimented with arranging the pedals clutch - throttle - brake instead of clutch - brake - throttle.

 

thanks

 

Do you GOTTA put it in N?

Couldn't you just hold down the clutch, shift and blip the throttle at the same time, and then let off the clutch?

 

You can do that if you have a synchromesh tranny and the syncros aren't stuffed.

If you don't have synchros (either by design or by wear) then you have to blip the throttle with the clutch out and trans in Neutral. (AKA double clutching)

 

Yeah but... Holding the clutch in disconnects the engine from the wheels pretty much, right? So wouldn't it essentially be the same thing?

I'm not understanding what putting it in Nuetral achieves.

Whenever I downshift, I just hold the clutch in, take the turn, and then let off it and hit the gas. Usually from 3rd to 2nd, and if I'm going too fast in third and I put it in second I hear this whirring high-pitched kinda noise until I slow down enough, is that my synchros?

 

No, you have to put it in neutral... that's why it's called double-clutching.

The concept behind double-clutching is to get the engine and trans input-shaft spinning at the same speed. That's why you have to put it in neutral, let the clutch out and blip the throttle. You do this to enable down-shifts on tranny's with worn synchros or simply to reduce wear on your existing gear-box.

What you described is simply heal-toe braking which is done so as not to unsettle a car's balance and prevent compression lock-up when down-shifting and braking hard for a corner.

Heal-toe braking and double-clutching can also be combined.

 

Sorry, double post. Damn forums ******* up on me.

 

 

we heard ya.