Which cars perform better; manual or automatic?

In My Humble Opinion
61

All the time. We used to pull the Tranny back in ‘D’ in the Saturn to help it climb hills, and still do so on long descents in the corvettes and the Avalanche when towing.

But obviously I’m not an average user.

To answer this whole downhill engine braking situation though. The brakes on your car are typically able to restraing three to four time the amount of power you motor puts out. Those brake pads are a rather inexpansive part. Are YOU prepared to put your expensive driveline in harms way to save $100 on brake pads?

(I am, it’s a rhetorical question, but only show there’s been a LOT of discussion on this topic in the past. The reality is: there IS no right question as it’s NOT that big a deal in the grand scheme of things.)

As sports car owners age (and I’m talking in broad brushstrokes here), You’ll find they can afford more expensive vehicles. The number of second Corvettes purchased as automatics is staggering.

This just doesn’t hold true for young’uns in Hondas, Mitsu’s, Camaros, etc with young knees.

62

From my car manual (Nissan Primera):

Reduced braking performance is never a good thing. I’ve never seen a car manual which doesn’t include this warning. Yes, on a shallow slope it doesn’t really matter, on a steep slope it’s a big deal. Overheating the brakes can also warp the discs, permanently damaging them.

Engine braking in any other driving situation is completely optional. Like you say, the choice is between wearing your brake pads or transmission.

63

i don’t street race, that’s inherently dangerous and for for losers with “something to prove”

the same can be said for any economy car, even your beloved (guessing here) Honda Civic;)

the numbers i’m quoting are from a website devoted to fans of the Neon

as i stated before, the Neon is an economy car, nothing more, a really fun to drive econobox that handles quite well, but it’s not a tire-melting beast like the Viper (well, aside from the SRT-4 that is…

64

It’s more fun to drive a slow car fast than a fast car slow.

/me wonders what makes a car ‘real’ or not. Is a Trabant a real car? How 'bout a Maybach?

A neon can be fun or an A to B’er…depends on your motivation.

65

In slippery conditions, there’s no better way to get down a hill than engine breaking. Operating a manual, I do this without even thinking, and, having done my share of driving in the hills of Maine in winter, that response time has saved my bacon on more than one occasion. There have been instances where rapid downshifting was the only sane approach to getting down a steep grade with oncoming traffic (and empty space on the other side), and I don’t see how I could manage it with an automatic. It’s likely I’d probably just grab the lever and start wrenching it in a vain attempt to get from third to second, and wind up over the guardrails. But even with proficiency driving an auto, I have a tough time imagining I could get the level of control I’d need to feel safe.

I suppose one could argue if the roads are that bad I shouldn’t be driving at all, but the quality of the skiing is often inversely proportional to the road conditions in those parts.

66

Is anybody here aware that modern automatics, if placed in 2nd gear, will STAY (and start) in 2nd gear? That makes winter weather much easier to get around in.

As stated earlier in this thread, the folks with a stickshift bias are basing their opinions on GREATLY out of date information.

67

I do understand that. I don’t think the level of control is fine enough. You can start slipping with no brakes at all if the wheels aren’t spinning quickly enough; and if you’re going too fast, you’ve got no time to react. If there’s nobody coming up the hill opposite me, I’ll fishtail down just for fun, but if there is, especially at night, I really want to feel the road, be able to adjust what I’m doing according to the actions of the other guy as quickly as I can think about it, and use my brakes as little as is absolutely possible, because even with the best ABS, you’re gonna lock and slide if there’s no traction. I’m even creeped out by ABS, because with my car I know exactly when the wheels are going to lock, and can even maneuver using that if I have to. Trying to manage all that on an auto sounds like a nightmare, even in low drive. I’d guess I’d opt to just stay off the road (which would be the sane thing to do in any event, probably).

68

And (I’m going to repeat this until it sinks in) with my Dodge in cruise control if I set it to 35 mph it will not exceed 40 mph on any but the steepest hills. And LOW in the automatic gives just as much braking as a manual in low gear. It that’s not enough then brakes are needed in either case. I don’t ride the brakes on long down grades. I use them intermittantly so there will be time to cool off. I’m not sure this is of any use since the amount of energy that has to be dissipated by the brakes is determined by the hill and not how the brakes are used, but that’s how I do it.

I’ve never been in Cornwall but I suspect the Sierra Nevada roads in places are at least their equal for grades, curves and hair-raising narrowness with an 800 ft. dropoff and no guard rails.

I really can’t see the relative ruggedness bit. Both transmissions are a set of gears and can be made as sturdy as desired. In the case of the manual the countershaft is always turning and so all its gears are always meshed with a counterpart gear on the propellor shaft and so undergoing a little wear. The shift forks are always riding in the channel on the shift collars and undergoing wear. With the automatic the gear assembly spends most of the time in high gear, happily spinning around as a unit with no internal gear motion at all. The bands are only used during shifting and don’t even need adjusting any more as used to be the case. As someone said, it you change the fluid regularly, what’s the problem?

69

Downshifting with an automatic: sure, you can do it, but like featherlou said, the fact that one normally doesn’t do anything driving-related with that hand means that most drivers aren’t even going to think about it. Just the way that, while all cars have an emergency brake, the fact that most of us use it only to park with, means most of us will be slow to use it for stopping in an actual emergency.

I agree with that. And downshifting in certain situations is part of how I do so, while still going fairly close to the maximum speed that suits the driving conditions.

Sometimes when you’re driving in the mountains, the road straighens out a bit between curves. Sometimes when I’m driving on Maryland’s Route 4 in rush hour traffic, traffic speeds up in between slowing down. Downshifting to the appropriate gear for the ongoing traffic situation provides a restraint so that the natural driving reflexes don’t cause one to speed up too much during those brief straightaways or speedups, so one doesn’t suddenly find oneself going too fast when the curves or brake lights approach. Shifting down to fourth means I won’t be going 65 when I should be going 55, simply because the pace of traffic sped up to 65 for a moment.

But with an automatic, fourth isn’t even an option. Cars with a five-speed manual have four speeds in the automatic. (Damned if I know why.) And in a lot of situations where I downshift to fourth, third would be too damned low.

Amen to that. (And reliability is also big, for me.) But I must admit, if the car helps make the ride from A to B more enjoyable, that’s a Good Thing.

As stated earlier in this thread, this stickshift proponent is basing his opinions about automatics on recent rental cars with <10K miles on the odometer.

70

Like I said in post #59, I know that autos can use engine braking, and that this isn’t a reason to consider either transmission superior.

From memory, I think I’ve driven down some long 17% gradients. The terrain certainly isn’t as rugged, but the steepness of the roads is determined by the route the Engineers have taken. They can zig-zag down a hill to make it less steep, or just build straight down it. In Cornwall, there are plenty of roads where they’ve taken the latter approach.

Either should last the lifetime of the car, unless they are a poor design or improperly maintained. Autos are more complex, so can cost more to repair if they do go wrong, but manuals don’t protect against owner abuse (over-revving and grinding of gears), which can be an issue when buying second hand.

To me, it’s nonsense to suggest that one transmission type is better than the other. Some auto drivers seem to have trouble accepting the easily proven fact that autos are less efficient, and some manual drivers exaggerate their advantages. Your choice should reflect your driving style.

If I could afford a car with a big engine, I’d probably want an auto. In my current car (2.0 litre) I’m much better off with a manual.

71

Well not all modern cars, some don’t even have a 2 at all (I have seen P,R,N,O,D,L, where L is some combination of 1 and 2). But I was going to point out that many do have this ability to lock into 2nd gear.

72

I don’t think my cruise control works at the low speeds I need when I’m driving on slick conditions - after a fresh snowfall (especially when we start getting layers of snow and ice), I don’t think I make it all the way up to 35 mph. We’re not talking about downshifting just for hills here - I use it in slick conditions all the time, on flat and hilly conditions. And I don’t think the vast majority of automatic tranny drivers are using the engine to coast around like I do in my standard, judging from all the brake lights I see at stoplights. They can, but that doesn’t mean they do.

73

Which is precisely the problem. Did you LEARN how that car performed over an extended period of time, or just the weekend?

There’s an aspect I’ve not yet brought to the table. My wife has a disability in one foot the prevents her from driving a clutch. In our case, I’m MUCH happier driving around in two automatic Corvettes that my wife can drive than in NO Corvettes because I couldn’t get funding approval.

Forced to make ‘lemonade’ out of the situation, I’ve found that the differences in transmission choce aren’t that different for 99.999% of the time. That last 0.001% is divvied up equally between both transmissions.

On a track, you’d think the stickshift and it’s improved gearing would be better. What I’ve found however is this: Since I’m not Michael Schumacher, I can spend more time worrying about the course, smoothly loading the suspension, using the full potential of the tires with the automatic. In fact, I found that the transmission generated too much heat if I spent time shifting from first to second to third, than if I just left it in second. When doing so my times improved, my tranny temps dropped, and I became a better driver.

With the older vette, I had the opportunity to see if I couldn’t make a conventional slushbox perform as well as a stickshift. It picks the gear you want - immediately, it has the benefit of a race converter (there’s as much tech in picking the TC as there is in picking a standard transmission, I’ll detail if you care to listen), and it is a smooth, quiet, well behaved transmission for the 99% of the time you’d want it to be. This transmission’s lateral throwout is measured at 2 thousandths of an inch. The spec is 25-40 thousandths. All plastic spacers have been replaced with roller bushings. It’s losses approach that of a standard because I took the time to reduce the opportunities for mechanical loss. AFA losses from the TC are concerned, there are none when it’s locked up, which it does above 25 mph or 20% throttle.

I’ve GOT a standard in the Cruiser, it makes that a more FUN car. But every car isn’t about FUN. You can count the number of SUV’s with available stickshifts on four fingers on one hand. IIRC, the Viper engined dodge pickup has a stickshift, I don’t think any other end-user-purchaseable trucks do.

My point is this: Transmission choice doesn’t have to be the deciding facter in a vehicle. Would I want a slushbox in a miata? Not on your life, and not with the power levels available to the car stock. Would I want a slushbox on an RX-8? I’ve heard the paddle shifters are an absolute hoot. All things being equal, a better driver could make up for the loss in power between the ‘big motored’ RX-8 with a stick and the ‘small motored’ RX-8 with the slushbox.

I suppose this’ll turn out like arguements over marque or brand of oil. Nothing I can say will convince you if you’re not willing to be convinced.

74

I am intetresed in the CV transmissions, which are now available on HONDAS, FORDS. and SATURN models. These are essentially belt-dive transmissions, and work by changing the diameters of wheels in the transmission.
Are they reliable? And, do they get better gas mileage that a conventional AT?

75

I agree that the other drivers aren’t driving around in low or intermediate. I was raised in northwest Iowa and drove in snow and ice when all transmissions were manual. I discovered that about 90% of drivers, and at times that included me, often mishandled their cars in such driving conditions. I don’t quite understand blaming the type of transmission for the failures of drivers.

I don’t drive much in snow and ice any more ( :smiley: ) but at low speeds (under the 35 mph cruise control cutoff) I can easily shift from drive to low to 2nd, etc; in fact easier than with a manual.

76

You can really start it in second? How about first? I downshift during bad weather (the road mine is off of is very steep, as is our 1/8 mile long driveway), so I know they can stay in first or second, but it never occured to me that you could start them in any gear but drive.

77

Out 96 Saturn (now departed), 98 corvette and 2003 Avalanche all have a ‘slick weather mode’…when the transmission is placed in second, the tranny will STAY there, helping to reduce the applied torque and assist in starting out in poor weather.

It’s not common knowledge, but GM requested a Mud and Snow runflat be designed for the 1997 Corvette - it was intended to allow someone to drive the car year around in really crappy weather. IIRC, cold weather testing was conducted in blizzard conditions in like, Utah or some similar place.

The transmissions in the Av and Saturn are not particularly rare, and the transmission in the Vette is pretty much a 4l60e in a special case, so I’d imagine the feature is available all across GM’s productline.

Fo those of you who look down and see Park, Netral, OD, D and L…‘L’ corresponds to 2nd gear.

78

I think it’s good to learn how to drive a standard. I’m a photographer who learned on a clunky old film camera without automatic anything. And I feel I’m a better photographer for it because it forced me to learn about how film interacts with light to make photographers. I think there is something similar in learning how to drive a car with a standard transmission.
Just a thought.

79

Agreed, i tried to get one of my best freinds to learn using the “safety” argument…

“but Danielle, what if you and i are off skiing, we drove to the slopes in my car (a manual) and i break my leg, how are we gojng to get back if you can’t drive my car?”

“we’ll take my car”

“but i hate your car, it’s a scudmatic”

“but at least we can both drive it”

“my car’s more fun anyway”…

no reasoning with her, sadly…

80

WHen i heard that for the first time i was anxious to try it with my '93 Grand Prix, but i don’t think it was true for that car. I was still able to feel it shift around 15 mph as usual from 1st to 2nd. It wouldn’t, however, go to third no matter how fast i would move.

I just tried the same thing in my '04 Titan and i get the same result as the Grand Prix. What am i doing wrong?