Very true. Being able to shift 2-1 while on the move is completely awesome, and well worth the effort of learning the two techniques.

You don’t need to brake hard to do it. In fact, doing it while driving gently is much harder, and very good practice for when you want to drive hard.

You just need to practice harder then! Seriously though, if you can do it badly, then you aren’t very far away from doing it well. The bit that was tricky to get right in my head was that it was the position of the foot on the pedals that was important, not the force.

You can do it on pretty much anything with the correct pedal arrangement. You can definitely do it in a transit van, for example.

On the contrary, it is fantastic for driving gently - get it right and you can eliminate drivetrain shunt, which makes for an exceptionally smooth ride.

It is definitely easier when breaking hard - there’s a lot more resistance on the brake pedal at that point and the brake braking force is stronger in comparison to the engine braking force.

Wrong. Matching the speed of the engine, transmission and wheels makes for a much smoother ride regardless of whether your car has synchromesh or not.

Depends on how they’re done. If they use new textures then no; if they use the pre-bomb Sanctuary textures then yes.

Ah, but it has one critical advantage - zero lag. Most of the issues we’ve had going to Mars are things that could have been fairly easily sorted if there had been a person driving because there would have been a chance to correct before it was a critical failure (Metric/Imperial error with the Mars Climate Orbiter,…

Telemetry? I can remember landing on the Mun without landing legs!

Where did you ever get the idea that it’s an economic organization? What trade body has a parliament and three presidents? It’s been terrible as an economic experience, just ask anyone in Greece.

I wouldn’t bet on it. Have you seen what just happened in Hungary? The government there are pushing Brussels, and pushing them hard. What sanction will be offered? Probably the same one that was given when Hungary started requiring import registration for EU roadfreight in flagrant violation of the common market -…

The UK is a substantial net contributor (i.e. pays in a lot more than it gets out), but that’s not even the main reason. Consider a stool with three legs - stable enough. One is France, one Germany, one the UK. With the UK gone it’s in danger of toppling one way or another, and neither direction is especially clever.

No, that’s not what I meant. The EU were, and still are, complacent. They have not and I believe cannot recognise that the “project” is in serious trouble and needs fundamental reform if it’s going to hold together.

What’s not to like? your tone.

On the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, it won’t affect sovereign immunity one jot. The US government has used the same straw man to oppose the International Criminal Court, amongst such democratic beacons as Yemen, China and Iraq. Perhaps if you all had joined the ICC then you wouldn’t need to have this…

Even that is a positive for the economy. Ask any economist what they think about inflation and they’ll say “Too much is bad, too little is bad too”. The consensus is that somewhere around 2% inflation per year is about right - anything less than that and you’ll have pockets of the economy where things are reducing in…

A very good question, since design and development isn’t covered by tariffs. There’s something else in play there. Perhaps it’s to do with the autonomous driving system that will debut outside of Japan in the Qashqai? Maybe it’s because sales are really ramping up in China and they want R&D to be close to what will…

The drop in the value of Sterling means that Nissan are making extra profit on every car they manufacture in the UK compared to before the referendum. As I’ve mentioned on another thread they would be about square based on the current exchange rate even if there was a 10% tariff on imports.

They’re a business, and it would be remiss of them to do anything else.