Concept
A gear stick (rarely spelled gearstick), gear lever (both UK English), gearshift or shifter (both U.S. English), more formally known as a transmission lever, is a metal lever attached to the transmission of an automobile. The term gear stick mostly refers to the shift lever of a manual transmission, while in an automatic transmission, a similar lever is known as a gear selector. A gear stick will normally be used to change gear whilst depressing the clutch pedal with the left foot to disengage the engine from the drivetrain and wheels. Automatic transmission vehicles, including hydraulic (torque converter) automatic transmissions, automated manual and older semi-automatic transmissions (specifically clutchless manuals), like VW Autostick, and those with continuously variable transmissions, do not require a physical clutch pedal. Gear sticks are most commonly found between the front seats of the vehicle, either on the center console (sometimes even quite far up on the dashboard), the transmission tunnel (erroneously called a console shifter when the floor shifter mechanism is bolted to the transmission tunnel with the center console to cover up the shifter assembly when used with a rear or front-wheel drive vehicle), or directly on the floor. Some vehicles have a column shift where the lever is mounted on the steering column - in vehicles with a manual four-speed gearbox such as 1950s Mercedes-Benz cars and all two-stroke Trabants, this is actually a manual gear lever connected to the gearbox with a linkage. In automatic transmission cars, the lever functions more like a gear selector, and, in modern cars, does not necessarily need to have a shifting linkage due to its shift-by-wire principle. It has the added benefit of allowing for a full width bench-type front seat (though some models with bucket seating as an option include it). It has since fallen out of favor, although it can still be found widely on North American-market pick-up trucks, vans, emergency vehicles (both law enforcement and EMS - the column shifter is retained where a floor shifter is unfeasible due to mounting the mobile data terminal and 2-way radio), and "full-size" US sedans such as the Ford Crown Victoria.
