[ShadeTreeMech]

If you are slipping the clutch, you are turning energy from the engine into wasted heat. By shifting without the clutch, you're allowing the engine and transmission to synchonize without being forced to quickly change speeds.

The description given is slightly overly complicated. When changing without gears, it is easier to learn to upshift without gears first, before learning to downshift. On a motorcycle it is crazy easy, in a big rig it is standard practice, and in a car or small pickup it can be just as simple.

When upshifting, you would ease off the gas while pulling out of gear. In one movement, pull out of gear and try to put the stick in the desired next gear. The stick won't engage the gear until it is time. Wait for the engine to coast down, and when the revs match, with you putting gentle pressure on the stick in the direction of the desired gear, you'll feel it start to engage. Give it the push needed to fully engage, and there you go.

Downshifting is a bit trickier. It involves disengaging the current gear, revving the engine past where it needs to be for the next highest gear, then following the above mentioned step of allowing the engine to coast down to the correct rpms.

For those who fear damage to their transmission, it is possible, but you'll hear it grinding away. If you clutchless shift without any sound being made, no damage occured. You just used the design of the synchros to your advantage for the purpose for which they were intended. Even using the clutch, the input shaft is still spinning, and the synchros have to force the input shaft to rev match to engage the gears. An argument could be made that a person skilled at shifting without a clutch could put more miles on a transmission that one skilled at shifting with one.

Even if you don't use it daily, being able to clutchless shift can save you a tow bill. My clutch cable broke on a Chevy Spectrum I used to have. I had places to go, so I drove for about a tank of gas worth with no clutch. I would kill the engine and put the car in first at stops, then start the car in first to get going. This may sound a tall story, but I drove in downtown Colorado Springs during a heavy snowstorm without a clutch sucessfully, then drove from there to Aurora (about 90 miles on the interstate) to my uncle's house, where he repaired it for me. He told me my grandpa had to do the same thing with an old Dodge pickup pulling a 5th wheel through the middle of Denver once, and didn't have a problem. I asked him whether it hurts the transmission to shift without a clutch, and with him being a master mechanic, figured he would know. He thought a moment, then said as long as it doesn't make a sound when you shift, no. And if it does make a sound, as long as you don't try to force the synchros together for a long time, it won't hurt it.

I've driven every stick shift vehicle I've been in without the clutch, and except for a 67 Chevy C-10, none of them complained. It is easier to upshift when the revs are higher up to give yourself more time to complete the shift, but with practice you can "speed shift" without thinking about it. I actually found it easier to upshift without the clutch than with it, but I would use the clutch for downshifting since it was a bit less tricky.