What Would Happen If You Put Your Car In Reverse While Driving???

Transmissions are not meant to engage reverse while traveling forward. As a way of protecting us from ourselves, automakers design a function called Reverse Inhibit into transmissions to prevent inadvertent selection of reverse. "Putting it into reverse when going forward has no action at all, the car just ignores the request until you get down to a proper speed," a Ford engineer explained, using Ford's six-speed automatics as an example; "It'll just say 'hey, I know you want reverse pal, but I'm just not going to give it to you until the appropriate time." Manual transmissions have physical locks in the shift mechanism to make selecting reverse an active exercise. Barring lockout rings or pushing down on the stick shift, deliberately trying to select reverse while driving forward at normal speeds is basically impossible with a manual. "The main problem you're going to be fighting is what you're trying to get the thing to do is something it really does not want to do," Renneker continued. The gearset would likely growl at you if you tried, and if the protest of the machinery doesn't instantly deter you, it could be injurious to your transmission. Ford's Trans guru elaborated that the synchronizer mechanism in manuals is only designed to change the speed of transmission internals enough for smooth engagement. Attempting reverse at road speed would force the synchros to try matching shaft speeds, building up lots of heat and potentially causing damage. "It won't be effective, it won't do anything for you, and secondly, you're going to be putting a lot of extra stress on that synchronizer" . In other words, it's best not to try it.

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