Best way to stop?

[vonhosen]

For what purpose are you takig each gear down through the box on the way to stopping ?

[gridgway]

my understanding of coming to a stop...use the brakes and de-clutch at an appropriate point to avoid labouring the engine before coming to a stop. The brake pedal pressure should be "rolled" on and off with max pressure in the middle of braking coming to zero pressure as you stop. In some cases is may be appropriate to select an intermediate gear during the process if you have tall gearing, are in a high gear and are decelerating to a stop from a high speed. This is not normally necessary. You come to a stop in the gear you were in when you started braking.

Graham

[vonhosen]

Stokey_Scouser said:

vonhosen said:

For what purpose are you takig each gear down through the box on the way to stopping ?

Engine braking and to be in the correct gear if I'm required to accelerate.

If you are looking & planning you shouldn't be surprised by a sudden need to accelerate.
Going through the gears you'll be slower to the hazard & not as smooth in losing your speed. Best to do as already suggested, lose speed initially with acceleration sense, then three stage braking. When you know you can go, then get a responsive gear for the speed you are the traveling at. If you can't go, come to a halt, dipping the clutch prior to the engine labouring & get first gear ready to go, or if no immeadiate likelyhood of that, handbrake on & neutral.

Brakes are for slowing, gears are for going.

Edited by vonhosen on Thursday 5th October 22:08

[MartinMGBGTSV8]

I don't double de-clutch (why do that when you have a modern gear box, theres no point! we aren't driving Austin 7s) But I do heel and toe. (accelerator and brake). The reason for doing so when you're B road bashing is indeed to be in the right gear for the right revs at all times so there is no delay should you want to accelerate for whatever reason. The added benefit of changing down through the gears as you decelerate is that you can use engine braking to contribute to overall braking. This will delay the onset of brake fade from overheated brakes, and makes a difference on a hard thrash of over 3 miles of B roads at maximum attack. For those of you that haven't experienced extreme brake fade, its something worth trying to avoid.

[zed sump]

if ur having to accelerate because you've braked too much coming upto the roundabout/ stop-point/ junction etc, are you trying to keep to close to the vehicle infront? when i see a long queue infront say leading upto a roundabout, i try to smooth the stop-start motion that often occurs by not being right up infront's arse and gauging the change in speed of the vehicle's 3-10+ cars infront. smooth braking and light throttle.
on t' other hand, if i'm not queueing and changing speed dramatically i.e. trying to get somewhere quickly, then it's plenty of gear braking in addition to varying amounts of foot brake. in my ford gear braking gives a much smoother, seemingly more 'balanced' deceleration.
in the tiger, gear braking is essential - the car's notorious for brakes that don't match the performance of it's V8, even with modern (similar) replacements.