Learning manual

Almost all newbies exaggerate the difficutly learning to shift. You, having no car shifting experience, are in the best possible position to learn. Car experience will slow your learning the truck because they are so very different.

Explaining how to shift the truck will increase your anxiety. You need to see it and do it. EVERYBODY learns to shift. BTW, you will have more difficulty learning to downshift, slowing down, than upshift, speeding up. That's as normal as a sunrise.

One tip, never ever push the clutch pedal to the floor except when stopped. Truck clutch pedals are made to only be pressed about 1/3 to 1/2 of their full travel (touching the floor). When moving you only press the clutch pedal just enough to slide into or out of gear. EVERY NEWBIE TRIES TO PRESS CLUTCH TO THE FLOOR ON GEAR CHANGES. DON"T Pressing the clutch too deep will make it more difficult or impossible to get into the next gear.

If you tried to shift gears in a car like you are required in a truck, your car would need a new clutch in a week.

Repeat after me "I will NOT press the clutch pedal too far down."

 

At my CDL school, they put a student behind the wheel, told the student to put the truck into 1st gear, and SLOWLLLLY let up on the clutch until truck began to roll. No gas, or don't press on the accelerator at all.

You are building this molehill into Mt Everest. You will stall the truck. You will miss a gear. Nobody will die, someone somewhere might wish you were going faster. That's the worst-case scenario.

 

Stop right here. Deep breath. People way stupider than you or I have mastered this.

Take your hands and press them together. Try to move them in opposite directions while maintaining that pressure. Reduce that pressure and see what happens. That is what happens when you push the clutch down.

When you let the clutch up you are bringing two things together which are turning at different speeds. One thing is going to start turning the other as the pressure increases. Understanding that, you can "get" what you are doing.

Each successive gear is nothing more than building on the momentum you have already gained. When you downshift it is nothing more than dragging down the momentum and matching a lower gear to the momentum you have remaining.

It is way easier to do than it is to explain. What you need to do is actually do it and get a feel for it. If you are doing a road test for a job all you can do right now is explain that you need training and experience but you are very motivated to do this. And hope that they are willing to do the training to hire you.

If that doesn't work, see if you can find a school that will give you an eight or ten hour course in manual. Seriously, that is all it takes if you understand what the clutch is actually doing. It will take miles to get you good at it, but only hours to be able to do it without breaking anything.

Or you could rent a large straight truck with a manual and spend a day figuring it out. You know how to drive. This is only a variation on the theme.

 

Op cleared up question