WHAT EACH PEDAL DOES

The right hand pedal is the accelerator (gas pedal). When you press it down the car goes faster (acceleration) and likewise when you come off it the car slows down again (deceleration). It only slows down gradually, something like when you ride a bike and stop pedalling whereas it keeps going, but it’s slowing down at the same time. You work the gas with your right foot.

The middle pedal is the footbrake or brake. When you press this it operates the brakes which work on all 4 wheels. The more force or pressure you put on it the faster it stops. The footbrake doesn’t operate until you have pushed it down to a point where you can feel resistance under your foot usually about 3-4 centimetres. The brake is also operated with your right foot. Your right foot is your speed foot alternating when need be between the brake and the gas pedal. You are either going or stopping!

The left-hand pedal is the clutch, its job is to separate the engine from the wheels. The way a car propels itself along the road is when you press the gas down the engine spins faster. Connected to the back of the engine is a long shaft which goes all the way underneath the car and is connected to the wheels on the back. When you push the gas down the engine turns faster, this turns the shaft faster and so turns the wheels faster. When you come to stop, if you took your foot off the gas and stopped the wheels with your footbrake, you would also stop the shaft because it’s connected to the wheels. If the shaft stopped the engine would have to stop as well because the shaft remember is connected to the back of the engine. In other words it would lock up (stall). The clutch eliminates this problem by separating the engine from the wheels. The way it works is as follows. The shaft that goes from front to back is cut in half, now you have 2 halves of shaft. One half is connected to the engine and the other half is connected to the wheels. A clutch consists of 2 discs about 20cms diameter. One is made of steel and the other is made of a gripping compound, lets say cork or fibre. What they do is slide these 2 discs in between where they have cut the shaft and they weld 1 disc to the engine shaft and the other to the wheels shaft. These plates are pressed against each other by really strong spring when the clutch is up (not touching it). When you come to stop what you do is press the brake pedal as before but when your speed comes down to around jogging speed you press the clutch down firmly, when you do this it pushes the 2 discs apart from each other disconnecting the engine from the wheels. The wheels can stop with the brakes and the engine keeps running.

To get the car moving again after you have stopped it you have to let your clutch up very slowly. Eventually the 2 discs will come into contact with each other (biting point) when you can feel this, which you will notice by the engine changing note practice holding the clutch very still whilst putting the gas down very slightly (1cm). What you do now is release the handbrake (Which works on the back wheels) and the car moves away again. If you let the clutch up too fast from biting point, it will stall the engine. The clutch isn’t your friend when you first start driving!! But it gets to like you eventually.