How fast is Neutral?

There have been conflicting reports on how long it takes for neutral to take effect. This poll is asking for those who have shifted into neutral while rolling to share what they've observed. There is also a response for those who have never done this.

I can't believe it! I clicked the wrong answer for the 2010. My testing shows it to be 1 second. But don't worry. The goal of a poll is the cumulative answers and one screw-up does not invalidate the results.

Bob Wilson

What if I screw up too?

I'll actually count the time tomorrow, I have slipped into neutral many times but never took much notice of how long it takes. I'll try it at full throttle.

I encourage everyone to TEST this out before voting! My car is approximately a half second. You can count a second "one mississippi"

Only time I use neutral is at the car wash.

Shouldn't the 'time' be consistent within each Gen? Why would it be different for a V owner in AZ compared with a III owner in Canada vs a IV owner in Belgium? Isn't this computer-controlled? And if the environment (speed, temperature, grade, etc etc) impacts - it would be for the individual driver at times as well.

And this surely won't be a scientific poll. One one thousand... won't do - need to look at a watch - while driving - while shifting into neutral. Just don't have our folks send themselves a text message to document...

I just don't get it...the purpose... or do I need coffee?

I just did this the other day to demonstrate it to my dad. I think it takes a full second when you hold the shifter in position. I voted +1 because it may even be a tad longer.

You don't have to be going 65mph. You can perform this experiment at 1mph in an empty parking lot. The difference between "instant" and "1 second" can be determined intuitively. Either it's instant, or there's a slight delay. (If you decide to use the stopwatch , be sure to report your results to the hundredths of a second, and perform the test enough times for it to be statistically significant

it's different at low speed than at driving speed

get on the freeway and start booking at 85mph and hit neutral or stab park and time it :rockon:

Then we balance each other. My timing agrees with yours, but I voted ~1 because it is close to a second. I would guess 1.25-1.50 seconds.

Tom

I tried this test and my floor mats burst into flames and the car accelerated out of control. I saved myself and the car only by luckily running into the back of a mattress truck. Thank goodness for all of those soft mattresses.



I wanted to be the first to make a hysterical post on this thread.

Tom

Piece of cake:


Bob Wilson

I may be wrong, but I don't think you want to be in neutral above 45 MPH do you? Aren't you over speeding one of the MG's if you are?

On Edit, I'm not saying that in the event of an emergency don't select neutral, just maybe it may not be good for the car if there is no need.

I tried selecting neutral at full throttle, at about 55km/h. Took under a second, like one misiss...
Feels odd when it comes out of drive and the engine stops.

Haha, I get that it's not important to really figure out the exact time to the hundredths of a second. But many people have reported that they have to leave it in "N" for three seconds for it take. That's (IMHO) because they don't know the difference between 1 and 3 seconds.

If you shift to N at speed it is okay. The problem comes from shifting to N at low speed and then coasting to a high speed. In N, if the ICE is on it will stay on. If the ICE is off it will stay off. When you shift to N at low speed with the ICE off, MG1 is spinning to keep the ICE stationary. As speed increases, the speed of MG1 increases, until an over-speed can occur. Since the ICE can't start in N, there is no way for the system to avoid the over-speed.

Tom

Got it, that makes sense

Yes it is ~1 second, there have been several posts claiming 2 or even 3 seconds. After reading some of the incorrect posts I tried it about 10 times, car stopped, car going slow, highway speed no throttle, highway speed full throttle, etc. the time was always 1 second. Of course we still need to decide if those are metric seconds or SAE seconds.

Probably BPT seconds (British Pipe Thread).

Tom

What surprises me is 1/3d of the respondents had not tried it. Hopefully, they will notice that 2/3ds had and ... we're still alive.

"Bring out the dead." <BONG>
"Bring out the dead." <BONG>

"But I'm not dead."
"Yes you are."

"I'm feeling better."
"No you're not." <BONK> (Thanks to Monty Python)

Bob Wilson

Everything I know about human nature I've learned from Monty Python. Sigmund Freud was an amateur compared to Monty Python.

Keith :focus:

And not nearly as funny. Perhaps more twisted than Monty Python, but certainly not as funny.

Tom