Can you shift without a clutch?

[Subaman]

Some weird things I have heard:

If your synchros are in good shape, you can gently nudge the shifter into first at idle, with no clutch. Is this true?

If you match revs while shifting, you can shift with no clutch, with no damage. I interpret this to mean you can do normal upshifts (1-2, 2-3) without clutch, since the revs drop and they match automatically anyway. However you're not supposed to do this, right? So who is correct?

If while downshifting you blip the throttle with the clutch up, can you engage without clutch?

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[Eric SS]

you can shift but I wouldn't practice it.

Just release the gas and it unloads the engine. You can pull it out of gear and when the rpm's match the next gear, it will go right in.

It's easier to do upshifting than downshifting.

Eric

[T-WRX]

Can you shift without a clutch?

Sure you can!

You can also run across the freeway without getting hurt.
or jump from a balcony without twisting your ankle.
or drink a bottle of jaegermeister and still like the taste the next day.
or play with an alligator without becoming lunch.
or record a MLB broadcast without the express written consent from the commissioner.

It's just not recommended.

[Bunuel]

There is actually a section on this in a book my friend has about racing Porsches. And when he went to drive his Boxster at Summit Point, the instructor was telling him how to do it. But I wouldn't recommend it cause if you don't do it right you could cause some problems.

[Subaman]

haha, I like the jagermeister one...

seriously though, I know what the shifter feels like when it is "properly actuated". If I shifted with the same amount of force and waited for the shift to go in, it would either go in right or not at all, no?

[cvalle-sd]

it's called rev-matching, and if done properly (it's not neurosurgery) you basically save your clutch and gearbox, while lookng ilke Ari Vatanen. You need to get a feel for what car speed corresponds to which rev count in each particular gear. For instance if you want to blip-throttle downshift from 5th to 4th at 60mph, you'll have to pop it to 4000rpm and ease it into gear - it's more or less one fluid motion (Well, it had better be). But it's different for every cog an dat any given speed. It's best to master double-clutching and heel-toe first. Oh, and you pretty much have to get an underdrive pulley to do this "easily". You can learn w/ the stock setup, but the engine revs so much more freely w/ the UR, that it seems like too much work without it. I rev-match, occasionally - i finds that double clutching saves the gearbox enough to allows the occasional quick run up though the gears that really goo acceleration requires, but I will often blip-throttle down shift. I match more as the revs fall, as there's a lot less shock if it doesn't go into gear - you get a little grind, and yu can back off. I f you shift as the revs are coming up, the engine side basically slams into the slower-moving tranny side - not good.

-have I confused it enough?

[Ghostrider]

That just scares me i wouldnt try that on my subie

[KC]

It's much easier on the Subie than it is on many other cars.

I do it quite a few times a week. Pop..out...pop...in.

It takes practice.

[iceman]

for some strange reason it is really easy to do it on a Kia. dont ask me why.
ice

[Hashiriya]

A while back my dad broke his clutch on his jeep but managed to get home by shifting w/o the clutch. It just takes experience with the specific car.

[Rubasu]

Never tried on my Scooby but do it everytime i drive my fathers Honda. Better his tranny then mine

[andyC]

Dude, it is all about clutch-less shifting in classic volkswagens My parents Chevy Tracker seems to do it fairly easy too!

[bigbird]

God did not provide the car with the clutch for no specific reason.

LOL @ bigbird!!

J. Kent