OK here's an oddball one - sifting gears, how many variations have you tried?

[oldGSfan]

Here's my list:

• Granny taught me to shift in a 40's Farmall tractor, It was an H pattern, 4 speed, can't remember where reverse was.
• Lots of other standard 4 speeds, some with reverse up and to the left, down to the right. Fiat 124 had weird lift-up to get int R, far right and down on the 5 speed. Changed later for push down.
• 3 on the tree - old Fords and Chryslers. Sort of liked that action, felt like I was giving it the business, you know, the old up-yours haha.
• Honda 70/90/110 where you just poke the shifter down for more gears, up to top for neutral. Dual range a bonus.
• VW clutchless manual (auto stidk_, slam it into the next gear with a graunchy gear crunching sound, ugh. Probably because the ones I drove were clapped.
• Motorcycles with 1 down, 4 or 5 up. Too many to remember. That and the H pattern 4 is the most common other than column or floor mounted automatics.
• Mini bikes with 'torque converters'. Twist and go till the uncovered centrifugal clutch catches your pant leg and grinds your shin down to a pulp (ask me how I know)
• Right-side shift British bikes and the occasional Harley with right-side shift. Norton is one up, 3 down 'GP' shifting. Others (BSA, Triumph) were down for first, up for higher gears, just on the right side.
• Jeeps with 4 sticks. Like the Zeppelin song but not really. Some sticks used for pumps, wood splitters, saws.
• CVT leave them in gear and go to sleep
• Paddle shift 7 speed Nissan G37, or 8 speed ZF. Umm, leave them in gear and go to sleep.

Never tried-ums - those old bikes with the gear shift on the left side of the tank and the foot clutch. Yikes!

[zuluwiz]

My first bike was an old Kawa, Neutral on the bottom, up for first, up for second
, etc.

[Baatfam]

I've got one very few people have tried, Tom.
Austin Healey 100-4 BN1 (first gen) used a 4 speed from right hand drive Austin sedan.
But since first gear was so low, they blocked it off, so the car only used 2nd, 3rd, and 4rth, with an electric overdrive.
And since it was a right hand drive trans, in a left hand drive car, the pattern was reversed.
So if you followed all that, the pattern was right/down for first, up/left for second, and down left for third. Hit the switch on the dash for overdrive.
Don't remember where reverse was.

The car:

[Redman]

65 Mustang (stright 6 cylinder) I had 1971-72-73 was typical 3 speed on the floor. (Spring loaded to the left and forward for Reverse, is my faint recollection.)

Wifes 1975 Datsun B-210 was four on the floor, and reverse was spring loaded one way AND had to push down into the floor or something like that.

But then later, 1979, about no expereince with any motorcycle, getting my first bike (KZ400), I recall looking at the legend on side of engine/transmission

5-
4-
3-
2-
N-
1-

ANd trying to figure out what that ment. I thought it meant the lever had 6 positions. Salesman said "one down and 4 up". I dont recall how I figured it out - but thats another story.

[marvinsc]

My most unusual was a SAAB that came into my Vocational Auto Mechanics class. 5 on the column. We played with it so much that the hydraulic clutch gave up. One of many that drove in that got pushed back out........LOL

[Rob S.]

Always sift your gears before riding to get the lumps out.

[Brendan W]

The Renault 4 had an inline four motor with FWD so the gearbox lived out in front of the motor.
The gear shift was at the top of the dash and went forward over the motor and down to the box.
Reverse was top left, first bottom left, second top middle and so on.
Another feature was that the timing chain was hard against the firewall so the motor and box had to come out to change unless ..... you had a tin snips