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When and why are manual transmissions used?
Home » Automobiles » Stick Shift Manual Transmission » When and why are manual transmissions used?Just about every vehicle on the market is available with a manual transmission. You'll most often find them in small economy cars and in large trucks. The reason you'll find them in smaller cars, such as Hondas, is because manual transmissions are usually cheaper and they also allow the driver to control the fuel economy. They are found in large trucks because a manual transmission is better for towing and also help the truck handle carrying large loads - especially in starting and stopping.
Manual transmissions are usually used by people who live in more rural areas with long stretches of highways and back roads. Driving with a manual transmission in the city can be tedious and frustrating with a lot of stop-and-go traffic.
Manual transmissions are no longer popular in many classes of cars sold in North America, however they remain dominant in Europe. Most luxury cars are only available with an automatic transmission. In situations where automatics and manual transmissions are sold side-by-side, the manual transmission is the base equipment, and the automatic is optional--although the automatic is sometimes available at no extra cost.
Some cars, such as rental cars and taxis, are nearly universally equipped with automatic transmissions in countries such as the US, but the opposite is true in Europe.
In some countries, such as the United Kingdom and Japan, when a driver takes the licensing road test using an automatic transmission, the resulting license is restricted to the use automatic transmissions. Consequently, people who wish to obtain an unrestricted license take extra lessons to learn manual. This formal treatment of the manual transmission skill seems to maintain the widespread use of the manual transmission, rather than to diminish it.
In some countries, such as Germany, Hong Kong and the UK, traffic lights have an extra transition from 'red' to 'yellow plus red' just before green, to allow manual transmission drivers time to shift from neutral to first and begin clutch engagement.
Source
http://www.whtc.com/Shared/Auto/tutorials/learnstick.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stick_shift
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