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Patrick Van Calck Posts: 297 Joined: 28th Jun 2007 Location: Belgium | quotePosted at 07:59 on 3rd March 2009 Hello As most of you know, I'm planning a trip to England's green country. We like to hire a car but have an important question (to us). We'll be landing at Bristol airport (with Ryanair) and wish to hire a car from Hertz. We know that many cars in Britain have their transmission on the steering wheel so we would like to know if we can hire a car where the transmission is between the front seats (like in the good ol' continent). I've called their helpdesk but got some brainless teenage child on the line so that was more a wast of time and money. To make things worse they don't seem to be interested in answering their e-mails. Can anybody find out if we can hire a car at Hertz Bristol with a transmission 'continental style' e.g. between the front seats and NOT at the steering wheel? A thousands thanks !!! Patrick |
Stephanie Jackson Posts: 3911 Joined: 13th Apr 2008 Location: UK | quotePosted at 12:31 on 3rd March 2009 Not sure what you mean Patrick - when we have hired cars on the continent they are the same as ours only left hand drive. Do you want automatic transmission? |
David Donnelly Posts: 61 Joined: 22nd Jan 2009 Location: UK | quotePosted at 13:29 on 3rd March 2009 I'm not sure what Patrick means either," We know that many cars in Britain have their transmission on the steering wheel". Do you mean a "tiptronic" type electronic gearbox where you have a paddle on the steering column ? I heard about them but never seen one, the usual type of transmission in England is "manual" (stick) or automatic, both controls would be between the driver's and front passenger's seat. Regards. |
| Patrick Van Calck Posts: 297 Joined: 28th Jun 2007 Location: Belgium | quotePosted at 13:48 on 3rd March 2009 We don't want the transmisson on the steering wheel. Here we have the transmission between the two front seats. So no automatic either |
| Stephanie Jackson Posts: 3911 Joined: 13th Apr 2008 Location: UK | quotePosted at 13:58 on 3rd March 2009 You should have no problem Patrick - probably 98% of the cars here have the gear lever between the two front seats as most of our cars come from Europe. You will be safe with most makes of car. As David said only the rare one has the paddle on the steering column & they are usually sports cars - they don't tend to hire them out except at very expensive rates! |
Paul Hilton  Posts: 2605 Joined: 21st Nov 2004 Location: UK | quotePosted at 14:05 on 3rd March 2009 I think David's assumption seems correct with variations of VW-Audi's Tiptronic/ DSG padel chages F1 style on steering wheels, but most of the cars I've seen have auto-transmission changes between the seats. I would have thought any car hirer would be able to answer such a question about their cars, but apparently not. |
| David Donnelly Posts: 61 Joined: 22nd Jan 2009 Location: UK | quotePosted at 15:41 on 3rd March 2009 Going on the principle of "a picture is worth a thousand words" : These are the common types of car transmissions in England/UK: http://harleydonski.googlepages.com/cartransmissions
Regards.
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lancashirelove Posts: 1986 Joined: 18th Feb 2009 Location: UK | quotePosted at 20:54 on 6th March 2009 hi Patrick, the last 'british' vehicle I can remember driving with the gear change on the steering column was a Bedford van back in the 60,s or a Standard Vangaurd car in the late 50's (my father drove) Renault (French) had some a few years ago with 'funny' column changes but almost all cars in britain have gear changes between the seats. The only other cars are what we call automatics where you dont use a manual gear selector but change gear automaticly as the revs and speed increase. some allow a 'manual overdrive' or gearchange by 'kicking' the accelerator (two peddles, Left footbrake, right accelerator). (Forget you have a left foot) Remember to drive on the left though and take care at mini-roundabouts . The simple rule is give way to traffic coming from the right at roundabouts and if at a mini roundabout a car is aproaching you with its right indicator flashing, he has the right of way, to cross your path. Dont worry, us Brits have the same problem when we drive abroad lol |
| Patrick Van Calck Posts: 297 Joined: 28th Jun 2007 Location: Belgium | quotePosted at 13:14 on 9th March 2009 On 3rd March 2009 15:41, David Donnelly wrote:
Well, that's what I meant. Thanks everybody |
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