Road&Track
A gunfight erupted between carjackers and a car owner in San Antonio Thursday morning leaving one of the alleged thieves wounded in the head, police say. The suspects were apparently unable to steal the car they targeted due to struggles with its manual transmission. More
Sames thieves who can’t read or write, stupid is gonna hurt.
Too bad he was just grazed. Now some moral person will have to waste their time on a jury.
A 3 in a tree column gear shift mechanism would totally befuddle these idiots. And none of them would know or how to start the car by popping the clutch to get the car going.
Pathetic. I took my drivers test in a car with a manual transmission.
Until around 30 plus years old, virtually all my cars were manuals, going from 3 on the tree, 4 speed, and 5 speed.
Now, we have automatic with paddle shifter overrides.
I refuse to go to the CVT sloppy bands/pulley crap transmissions.
Get a manual transmission and give them written instructions they can’t read.
I have a Tacoma with a 5 speed manual I say it is anti theft device. I took my road test in my Dad’s 72 Mercury Capri 4 speed. He sold it to me at about half the blue book value in 1975 for my high school graduation present. 900$. Drove to California and Rosarito Baja California and back to NE Ohio that summer. Good times.
Now, if only they made cell phones with a rotary dial…
@Anonymous: you can get a manual transmission and write the instructions in cursive.
I would have emptied the magazine on them…but that’s just me, I’ve always been know to over do it!
A rotary dial on a cell phone would be about as useless as a screen door on a submarine. Only old farts over 45 or 50 at the youngest still know how to use a rotary phone.
Lol.
In 1984 someone stole our 1980 Plymouth Horizon. They only got about 5 blocks away because they couldn’t drive standard shift.
Oh you youngsters! Don’t get me started on shiftin a transmission without synchros and havin to double clutch!
Or old vehicles with manual steering which we called armstrong steering. My 56 Ford F 100 P/U with a 4 on the floor had armstrong steering and a hard as hell bench seat which would beat you to death and cause a sore back if you drove it on long trips. I drove it to San Diego from Spokane (it was a 3-4-day trip) when my month-long leave was done in Sept. 1974 so I could have a vehicle to drive when we weren’t out at sea. My brother drove it home later the next Spring.
MCQUEEN DID A LOT OF DOUBLE CLUTCHING OF THE MUSTANG GT390 IN BULLITT CHASE SCENE
THE SOUNDS OF THAT CHASE WERE THE BEST PART
I’m laughing at a mental image of a wannabe car thief trying to take an old VW beetle parked where he has to get it in reverse.
(If you don’t already know how, you’re NEVER gonna back up!)
(Of course, four or five beefy guys could just pick it up and walk away.)
@¡BENITO — That’s my favorite movie car chase! McQueen did about 10% of the stunt driving (Loren James did the 90%). But it was Bill Hickman himself behind the wheel of the Dodge. Did you know that the biker who dumped his ride was just some guy who accidentally got into the thick of things by accident?
Close second: French Connection. The chase in that movie was also Bill Hickman’s wizard work.
I was going to write, Uncle Al, that the mechanic who does my inspections can’t get my 73 Beetle into reverse. And I took out the stock shifter and put in the EMPI with the reverse lockout that you pull up. The EMPI is easier than the stock shift, and it always goes in the first time and never grinds.
UNCLE AL, LOTS OF GOOD STUFF
THE DODGE CHARGER WAS THE FASTER CAR
DODGE DRIVER WAS THE BEST, THINK HE MAY HAVE ALSO BEEN ON SCENE @ JAMES DEAN WRECK, NOT SURE HOW BUT PRETTY POSITIVE ABOUT IT
THOUGHT THE MOTORCYCLE DUDE WAS SAME AS THE STUNT GUY FOR GREAT ESCAPE???
STILL LOVE THE CHASE….FUNNY THAT THEY USED THE SAME BACKGROUND CARS THROUGHOUT IE THE WHITE FIREBIRD ETC..LOLOL
THX
Agreed with putting the VW in reverse.
I rented a car in Belgium years back and I had a hell of a time figuring out how to back up.
From what I remember I had to push down then finagle the shifter back and to the left.
Very unnatural…
The stunt guy for The Great Escape was Bud Ekins.
The thing about getting a beetle in reverse is that it is just about impossible to do it slowly and gradually. You have to slap it straight down for an inch or so and then jink your hand left and back. Gotta be all one motion, no stopping or even hesitating. It all happens in maybe a quarter of a second. It isn’t at all hard with just a small amount of practice, but if you’re new to that shift you’re screwed.
I learned to drive in a ’59 (I think) VW. That was in 1965.
The show “The Amazing Race” always had multiple couples that couldn’t drive a stick while in Europe.
Just like idiots on Survivor that couldn’t make fire.
SMDH