[venukrithish]

Ok motorcycles, pretty much every time. But on cars, I'm not that good at it and still trying whenever I get an opportunity.

[buzzy_boy]

Blip down-shifting is a technique that's used, predominantly in Motorsports, in two situations:

1. To select a lower gear without having to slowdown
2. To select a lower gear while concurrent application of brakes

The technique has limited application in real-world driving due to two reasons:

1. It's much easier, smoother, and safer to first slowdown to an appropriate speed before selecting the lower gear.
2. Modern cars have widely overlapping in-gear power bands which makes it easier to select a lower gear without having to blip the throttle.

[puneetakhouri]

I rev-match and downshift on all vehicles that I drive or ride. Right from my brother's Bullet to our Baleno, Nexon or my current ride the Storme. Going downhill or coming to the signal I do downshift but since I do not know the heel and toe technique hence I cannot downshift while braking.
My style is somwhat like this.

• While going downhill from a flyover or a descent I would press the clutch.
• As I press the clutch, at the same time I downshift as well as pump the accelerator simultaneously. So 3 things going on together, pressing the clutch, blipping the accelerator and downshift the gear.
• Release the clutch as soon as the activity is done.

Usually this has made the experience very smooth and there is hardly any jerk in the vehicle except for the rise in engine note.
However, my observation on manual cars has been that I need to blip the accelerator a lot more when going from 3rd to 2nd than when going from 5th to 4th or 4th to 3rd. Now I haven't paid attention whether it is due to gear ratios or because I take a longer time shifting down from 3rd to 2nd than to any other gear.

[Geo_Ipe]

Motorcycle - Yes!
Gives you a much smoother shift, less of jerky downshifting.
The exhaust sounds terrific.
The perfect rev matched downshift still gives me a ear to ear smile like when I did if for the first time!

Car - No
The manual I drive is my 2005 Scorpio. The truck has enough grunt to be in 5th gear as low as 40-45 kmph. Downshifting below that speed is smooth enough and one having to do the heel-toe circus is quite cumbersome. So rev-matching is reserved for the motorcycle exclusively.

[Doonite]

This is pretty much a necessity of everybody who lives or has lived in hilly areas.

It's so much fun when you drop a gear just before the u-turn and rev match. I grew up driving across almost all of uttarakhand hills and this is something I picked up from my father even before I could drive.

On a different note, even with my limited experience of using public transport, I loved the old buses *vroom vroom* sound while changing gears. Everytime I had the opportunity, I always picked the sideways facing seat next to the driver. (Just got hit by a healthy dose of nostalgia while writing this)

* By u-turn, I mean those upward gradient / steep u-turns that you fill find in any hilly area.

[Kols]

Always do it during highway runs and driving downhill.

While its fun to see the car staying in the desired powerband all the time, I believe its mechanically beneficial for both man & the machine for following reasons:

• Matching revs of engine to the transmissions "expected" higher rpm in the lower gear result in a smoother shift and less load on transmission components
• Precise revv matching is a boon for passengers who aren't holding to the steering wheel (you can emulate an auto transmission while shifting gears manually)

[GrandTourer]

Originally Posted by McQueen

My questions to all of you:

1. How many of you use this technique while driving your car?
2. How many of you employ this technique while driving your bike?
3. Can we switch the order of blipping the throttle and downshifting in step 3? That is, blip the throttle first, then downshift. This oughtn't to be an issue as the engine revs up and brakes until the desired RPM is reached (which occurs rather quickly), with only the sequence of it being altered.

Although there's no real necessity of this anymore in any modern manual car/bike, I still typically do it on my Interceptor 650, which makes the shifts smoother, since the throttle is a bit choppy on the Int. Cherry on the top is the exhaust note!

No expert here, but for 3, I don't think it would be of much use if you rev before the clutch-in. The reason we used to rev-match in non-synchro gears, was that the lower gears would spin at a higher RPM than the higher gear. As a result, we would blip the throttle to match up to the higher RPM. If you rev before clutch-in, by the time you release the clutch & get back on the throttle, the revs would have gone down. So net result will be a normal gear change. This would not be true for cars with rev-hang. And honestly rev-hang is more annoying that useful.

Also, engine braking is much more effective in lower gears, so another reason it won't be useful to blip first.

[sudeepg]

Originally Posted by McQueen

I think blipping the throttle first and then downshifting accomplishes the same work, just in the opposite sequence.

For instance, if you're driving at 60 km/h with the engine at 4000 rpm, and the desired rpm after downshifting is 4750 rpm, a quick throttle blip raises the rpm to, let's say, 4800 rpm. As you downshift, engine braking brings the rpm down to the desired 4750 rpm without a jerk. That's how the blipping-before-downshift method works.

However, if you downshift before the blip, considering the same car/scenario as above, the downshift triggers engine braking. Subsequently, the blip raises the rpm to a level very close to (and above) 4750 rpm. Say, you reached 4800 rpm - then engine braking will pull it down to 4750 rpm without a jerk as you'd desire.

Either works I suppose. I find it better to blip the throttle about the time the downshift has happened. If I do it before, then the time gap allows revs to fall more. Blipping the throttle right about the time the downshift is completed gives me a better rev-match and within the desired rev ranges.

[anilp]

1. How many of you use this technique while driving your car? - Almost never, unless if I'm driving a turbo engine with narrow power bands. That's almost a rarity these days.
2. How many of you employ this technique while driving your bike? - All the time, especially in enclosed spaces

[UdayC]

I do this all the time in my Honda City 2014 diesel, both while driving sedately in the city and during spirited driving on highways. Once, my wife asked about the ‘vroom’ sound. I explained rev matching to her and felt as if I had invented E= mc².

[Jabberwocky]

Yes I also do this while driving. A couple of blips of the throttle, and a quick downshift to make sure there is no jerk. I started out because I found it cool to emulate race cars (in my head), continued doing it for the smooth shifts because it helped me mitigate my back and neck pain. Heel toe shifting is something I never managed to perfect mostly because of pain in my ankles. Never tried on a bike primarily because I am shamefully unable to ride a bike.

Rereading my post makes it look like I'm a Senior Citizen, but I'm actually 30. All these aches are because of bad posture or prior injuries.

[RaceCyborg]

Rev-match is one skill that I had a really hard time initially to get the hang of. It comes almost as second nature to me now. I do it all the time in my WagonR as well as the Altroz. It is pretty easy to do in the WagonR as the engine revs up quickly with the clutch depressed. Heel-toe is easy as well even with relatively light braking.

In the Altroz, I found it a lot harder to do it perfectly. The engine simply doesn't rev up as quick and the gearbox feel leaves a lot to be desired. But I eventually got used to it and can do smooth downshifts now. Heel-toe is very hard though especially with light braking as the throttle pedal is placed quite a bit below the brake pedal, making it a bit hard to reach with your foot pressing lightly on the brake pedal.

I think the main benefit of rev-matching is the damn smooth downshifts. You can do a quick overtake without causing any jerks and as a plus, passengers would be happy too (Not so much when you mash the throttle ). Oh, and heel-toe adds a layer of fun as well on your favorite ghat section. That feeling of perfectly nailing the downshift(s) and exiting out of a corner is something else.

[Aakarsh Gupta]

Always on my CB350 RS. The exhaust note on it is a delight and it becomes even more so when you rev match on it. I'm efficient with clutchless upshifts/downshifts so it makes it a bit easy on my left hand too.
On my Rapid, I tend to do a rev matched downshift only when I shift from 5th to 4th and 4th to 3rd. Somehow I just can't get it right from 3rd to 2nd, try as I might. The car just doesn't rev enough on that shift for some weird reason.

[shresan23]

Originally Posted by McQueen

Greetings T-BHP members! How many of you use vroom-vroom downshift to rev-match your car or your bike?

I am not an expert as i just started driving. Yes, i do it all the time in my car. It is fun. It makes me feel as if i am more in control of the vehicle than otherwise. That is, i know what the engine is doing, feeling, wanting etc. I know how to adjust accordingly. (i drive a 10 year old A-star. I dont know about the synchro-mesh in this one, but i do know that quick downshifting without some rev matching would jerk the car very hard.)

Why i mentioned the feeling is because, i have also driven a newer car extensively and every time i do something i have the feeling of detachment from the engine. For instance, i generally dont have to match revs as the jerk is barely noticeable unless the difference is great. No vroooom sound creeps into the cabin, makes me feel as if i am driving something that is not fully in my control.

As far as switching the order is concerned, i am not sure if that would work. If you are in a higher gear, accelerating before shifting would only push the rpm higher, which means downshifting would push it even higher, leading to a higher jerk. Of course, this can be negated if you know where exactly the band for the lower gear lies at that juncture or by being extremely quick. But my question is, why risk it? Doing it the first way would be easier and in fact safer.

Quick edit : I actually dont do blip blip. I usually just keep the A lightly pressed while slowly releasing the C. First it was super slow, but now since i've gotten a hang of it, its more of a flow and i barely realise i did that until after the fact.

[Redex]

True "rev matching" is changing gear, up or down, without using the clutch. Takes a lot of practice. Easiest to do if you keep the engine speed low.
Knock the gear stick into neutral, rev the engine to match expected speed for next gear, engage gear without using the clutch. Just keep a little bit of pressure on the gear stick and it will slip into gear as soon as the 2 dogs are synchronised.
The selected gear will engage, with a little help from the syncro, and can be completely jerk free.
Much easier to do changing up gear as you don't need to blip the throttle. Down changes take a bit more effort.
Find a quiet bit of road, keep the engine and road speed down until you get the feel for it.
Don't rush the change, you have to allow the gears to spin up to speed to avoid a crunch or jerk.
I practice this for a few gear changes everyday, so I don't forget how to do it !!!
After 50+ years of driving I have had to use this technique 4 times to "get home" after suffering clutch cable failure, clutch cable quadrant failure and 2 clutch arm/pivot failures.
I also had to knock the gears into neutral and coast to a stop at junctions, turn the engine off, then engage first and turn the ignition on, start and drive straight off.
Failed a few changes, had to coast to a stop and try again.
My longest trip like this was nearly 80kms in a 3.5 tonne Ford Transit diesel van.
I have also used this technique on my 2 wheelers after clutch cable failure. However I now keep a spare clutch cable "cable tied" to the original, so repair is easy at the roadside if needed.