My wife took out my front spoiler on my clk while parking. She's now just a passenger in the pcar.

 

Find another car to teach her in. I taught my son to drive a stick in my old 928, with a big V8, lots of torque. He did fine, only a couple of stalls. But he only drove it once or twice. Then when I got the 996 I let him try. After stalling it about 10 times he said Dad, I don't think I shlould keep trying. He whent and practiced on a friend Toyota, once he got experience he was fine int he 996. Remember that a clutch job is about $500 in parts and $800 in labor, if you dont need a flywheel. If the flywheel gets damaged add another $800. Renting a stick for a couple of days is a whole lot cheaper.

 

Do rental places even have manual cars any more?

 

Let's see? A chance to make your wife happy by teaching her to drive the Porsche or.....what? Seems to me if you married her she should be the priority without hesitation.

 

It's not just teaching the wife to drive, but it's also the little things: parking away from other cars, driving up/down a steep driveway to avoid bottoming out, not following a gravel truck on the fwy..

 

As you two are married, technically half the car is hers anyway. Teach her how to drive it. The old saying says "it's cheaper to keep her". Good luck with your adventure.

 

It's one of my "requirements" that a girlfriend must know how to drive a manual. The past two have both had to learn on my Turbo M3. Luckily they've both been pretty easy on the car.

 

If she rode a Ninja, she knows clutch engagement.

One exercise I did with my son that worked well was: in a level, open parking lot with engine at idle (keep right foot off the accelerator), have the new driver:

- close their eyes, then release the clutch ever so slowly until they feel the least sense of engagement. Press the pedal back in.

- Repeat several times until they can bring the pedal up a little faster, but still stop just at the point of engagement.

- Then do several times eyes open.

Now that they've gotten a sense of where the engagement point starts:

Again, with engine at idle:

- release clutch to engagement point, and then very slowly continue to full engagement -- no accelerator. Let the car roll forward a bit, then push in clutch and brake to a stop.

Repeat until it is an easy movement.

If you've taken your time, it's quite likely that the engine was never stalled. At slow rpm, no excessive wear on the clutch. The person now has a sense (muscle memory) of what the engagement feels like.

Now you can start introducing the accelerator while engaging. Drive around a little to help keep the engine cool, clutch in, then stop. Repeat.

By doing this at off hours in a large 'box store' parking lot, they can focus on the actions rather than traffic, on lookers, etc.

Once that's down, then start working on gear selection (for proper rev range/load/traffic) and double-clutching (which she couldn't do on her Ninja).

Good luck. The skill at using a clutch has Nothing to do with gender.

 

I had a 98 WS6 convertible with about 14k miles. The first time she got into it she asked if it had a flow master exhaust. I thought to myself, she's a keeper.

 

I am contemplating teaching my kids to drive the 996. Show me a place that rents a car with manual transmission.

 

I am all for having the wife drive the Porsche, mine drives ours all the time (or did until the intermix happened). I just suggest you teach her to drive a stick in another car, then give her her own set of keys to the Porsche!!!!

 

Sure wish that you had been my Dad!!

 

Me too, my dad had an 82 Dodge Omni

 

I am not suggesting that a Porsche was their first car. They just learned to drive a manual on them. I would never but a high end car for my kids. They need to earn that themselves. They ended up getting a Sentra 6 speed and Honda 5 speed. Kept their college pals from being able to borrow their cars for pizza runs, too.

 

I tought mine how to drive on an old VW then she got promoted to the 911...Greatest thing i did for the relationship...seeing that i spend more time working on the car...now she can enjoy it and does not mind when i drop new mods into it

Once you wife respects the car anf realizes that it is not a minivan...all is well in the house...My father once said a happy home is a happy wife....