What do the numbers mean on my automatic transmission car? And when should I use them?

1

These are the gears! L (low) is 1

Basically the car has 5 gears. When in Drive the car will automatically change between these gears (L or probably 2 to start from rest and then up to 5 when cruising on the motorway. When you slow down or go up a hill it will automatically change to a lower gear.

But it may be that your want a little more control over the car. Then you can move the lever to the other gears. Let's say you were going down a steep hill you might move it into 4 or 3 so that the engine will slow the car down. Or for more acceleration you could put it into 4. In the lower numbers the gears will still change down automatically but will not change above the manual gear you are in. For example with the lever on 4 the car will not change up to 5. You may need to keep an eye on the rev counter as you may be able to over rev the engine. Although they normally have rev-limiters incorporated. Put it this way, if you are doing 100mph and move the gear lever to 2/3 it probably won't change down as the revs would be too high (blow the engine up). In my car it just won't change down if going too fast. Hope that helps (although most people don't use the manual gears)

If you want to try it out safely do this. On a straight clear road cruise along at 60-70 mph. Keep your foot where it is on the accelerator and push the gearlever from D to 4. You won't notice much except the rev counter will go up and the engine will sound a little louder. You will be at the same speed but the engine is turning over faster. Push the lever back into D. Again the revs will go down and the engine wuill be quieter.

L stands for "Low" as in low gear. I don't know why they wouldn't just put 1 their, because its just first gear. When you move the stick to one of the numbers, it dosn't let the transmission go higher than that gear. This is helpfull if you are driving in a mountanouse region and don't want to wear out your breaks going down hills. Having the car in a lower gear will make it roll slower, without using your breaks. Also, if you are towing something, you may want to lock it out of the higher gears to stop the transmission from constantly shifting between gears, that is bad. For the most part though, you will not need to use these. I hope this information was helfull.

It'd help if you would list your car, then we could look up the transmission details for you.

I can infer, but it could be slightly to significantly off.

Usually the L gear is for towing or driving downhill, or driving in slippery conditions 2 is much the same, except lets you use the 2nd gear, while 3rd is for under speed driving. I would say 4 would be much the same.

But without a vehicle, I could be completely off, and I certainly can't give particulars.