Are the pedals on real cars always throttle, brakes, and clutch from right to left? I thought that on cars with right hand drive, the throttle and clutch pedals are switched.

yep same. Starting on the left, clutch, brake central, and accelerator on the right. Shift Lever is on the other side tho

And what about shift lever?
on right hand drive do you have gears mirrored or normal?

I mean, the first gear is on the top left corner like on let hand or is on right top corner?

Yeah the gear positions are the same.

Haha, imagine if they mirrored the pedals and gear positions, it'd be hilarious renting a car in Europe.

i always figured that the gears would be mirrored.
so in US, first is upper left, in europe, with shifter on left, first should be upper right, but i guess they dont use different "euro spec" transmisssions with reversed gears, so yeah.

i guess the only "special" transmission quirks to watch out for in europe would be the dogleg shifter, where 1 is 2, 2 is 3 and 3 is straight below 2

Some cars do have the pedals in the 'wrong' positions, for example the Maserati 250F:

Quote :

The pedals were arrayed in what was then known as the Continental fashion with the accelerator in the center with the brake to the right and the clutch on the left.

Quote from Zebediah_S2 :

i guess the only "special" transmission quirks to watch out for in europe would be the dogleg shifter

And you're more likely to **** the pope than come across one of those.

Quote from Zebediah_S2 :

1 is 2, 2 is 3 and 3 is straight below 2

:faint:

Quote from Zebediah_S2 :

I guess the only "special" transmission quirks to watch out for in europe would be the dogleg shifter, where 1 is 2, 2 is 3 and 3 is straight below 2

I've never heard of this one, but I always wondered how does the transmission lever behind the steering wheel work? Is it a manual or automatic? How are the gears (or modes) positioned?

Quote from thisnameistaken :

And you're more likely to **** the pope than come across one of those.

i know 2 people who either have owned (and want to buy again) or currently do own a car with a dogleg layout (and thats without counting all his 190e forum freinds some of which i met) and have driven one of their cars

so wheres that pope? i want my 15 seconds

Chances are I'll drive a car with a dogleg first later today...

And we have a Packard 8 that visits us from time to time which has the accelerator in the middle - but I haven't plucked up the courage to try it on the road yet. It's a big big, and a bit expensive, and a panic brake could result in an increase of speed. Gulp!

Quote from Zebediah_S2 :

so in US, first is upper left, in europe, with shifter on left, first should be upper right (...)

You mean "in the UK", as Europe uses lefthand drive

I've always wondered about the transmission as well, now I finally know

Quote from breadfan :

I've never heard of this one, but I always wondered how does the transmission lever behind the steering wheel work? Is it a manual or automatic? How are the gears (or modes) positioned?

It's for automatic.

As far as I remembers, it's similar as to 'regular' automatic -> PRND32 (or something inline of that).

Many years ago as a technician I had a car (I think it was a Ford Sierra) to work on that was an auto but had the throttle and brake pedals swapped over (owner had some sort of disability).
Was too scared to road test the thing in case as Tristan mentioned with the Packard I instinctively went for the brakes and got the wrong result!

A lot of old American cars had a manual shifter mounted on the steering column. A common expression to describe this was "three-on-the-tree." The typical alternative was "four-on-the-floor."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M ... on#Column-mounted_shifter

A lot of European cars had, up until the early 60s (with probably some later exceptions) had column shifts as well. I've yet to come across one with more than 4 gears, plus reverse, but maybe 5-speeds existed too.

Quote from breadfan :

I've never heard of this one, but I always wondered how does the transmission lever behind the steering wheel work? Is it a manual or automatic? How are the gears (or modes) positioned?

Trabant 601 or whatever, check that

Quote from Shotglass :

i know 2 people who either have owned (and want to buy again) or currently do own a car with a dogleg layout

I know three people who've ****ed the pope. I am still right.

Some cars had auto column shift, some manual. I've driven an '85 Toyota hiace van that had a 5 speed manual column shift. It's only advantage i could see was i could reach the lever with 3 people in the front seats, with a floor shift, you'd be out of room.

Quote from thisnameistaken :

I know three people who've ****ed the pope. I am still right.

sounds like an interesting story
please elaborate

oh and youre not

A mate of mine had a merc cosworth 190e and it had that weird dogleg box in it, the amount of times he would forget when he first got it and be beaten off the lights by something crappy because he had tried to pull away in 2nd gear

In case anyone doesn't know what people mean when they say 'dogleg' gearbox, i have added a picture, but i cant remember where reverse was so i left that out.

Quote from danthebangerboy :

In case anyone doesn't know what people mean when they say 'dogleg' gearbox, i have added a picture, but i cant remember where reverse was so i left that out.

Ah, thanks, I had no idea what you were on about Didn't Ferrari use to have those kind of gearboxes as well? I seem to recall the Testarossa has such a gearbox, but I may be mistaken.

And I think reverse was all the way top left, but further left than 1st gear.

EDIT:

EDIT2, from Wikipedia:

Quote :

Dog leg layout gearboxes are usually found on performance automobiles because in road racing it is rare to shift into first gear other than for the initial start or exiting a pit lane.

Don't the NASCARs use this gearbox, too? I think so

Edit: sorry, they have 1st as normal 3rd, I've kind of mixed it up :P

Yeah, when I was stationed (and racing) in Japan, it was the exact same. The only difference was that I had to shift toward me, instead of away from me. I actually liked it better that way. Oh, and about that shifter, my BMW here, first is still all the way left and up, but if you pull it hard to the left, and push it up, it will pop into reverse (don't know if I explained that well enough). Not all cars are that way though, and I haven't driven any japanese cars that way either.

I always assumed that Doglegs were only used on sports cars / road going versions of race cars (190e Cosworth, E30 M3) as when driving 'spiritedly' (on road or track) you're likely to need to change between 2nd and 3rd more often than 3rd and 4th, and this will be easier as 2nd and 3rd are directly above and below each other...

...if you get me.