But the question remains – are there any diesel pickups available with a manual transmission? If you’re shopping for a new diesel pickup, unfortunately, the answer is no. In fact, most pickups these days are offered with an automatic transmission only.

Thus, 6.7L Cummins owners who opted for the manual transmission option surrendered a significant amount of engine performance….G56 Transmission Specs.

The single advantage to the NV5600 is the higher OD ratio than the G56 in the pre-emission years. Some say there isn’t enough main shaft supports and the aluminum case flexes too much on the G56 when used hard. The NV5600 is heavy and requires oil changes often, IMO at 20K miles, as it shears it’s oil down.

Cons include: Automatic cars are more expensive to buy, whether new or second-hand. As they’re more complex, repairs are more expensive if automatics go wrong. Some people find automatic cars less interesting or exciting to drive. Older automatics are less efficient than manuals as they have fewer gears and weigh more.

Without service and maintenance, some transmissions can fail in as little as 100,000 miles. If you drive around 10-15,000 miles a year, your transmission could be down for the count in seven years! With care and service, transmissions can last 300,000 miles or more.

With a manual transmission, when you want to accelerate, you choose to downshift if you feel it’s needed and there’s a direct correlation between engine rpm and tire speed. Shifting your own gears gives such a more powerful, visceral, personal connection to your vehicle compared to an automatic.

Manual cars also go faster than an automatic. New drivers don’t have to worry about such occurrences when driving an automatic. Another advantage of driving a manual vs automatic could be fuel economy. Manual cars, traditionally, get much better gas mileage than automatics.

If you do a lot city driving, an automatic may be easier to maneuver through stop and go traffic than a standard transmission. However, if performance and the driving experience matters to you, you might want to consider a manual. Another factor to keep in mind is if there’ll be other people driving the vehicle.

What gear for which speed

When you do bring the car to a stop, do not leave in the car in first gear with your clutch pedal pressed in. This, again, will wear out the clutch and transmission parts over time, so we suggest just leaving the car in neutral with your foot on the brake.

Rather than rowing through all five or six gears, drivers will skip from third to fifth, fourth to sixth and so on. But is this practice safe to do? Engineering Explained tackled the common practice in its latest episode and the short answer is yes, it’s perfectly OK to skip gears when upshifting or downshifting.

Too quickly and you’ll break the clutch then and there, too slowly and you might fry it. Best, though, for those of us who don’t have unlimited budgets, is to ease the car into first gear at much lower rpm and fully engage the clutch. After that, there’s no risk to the transmission at all.