Stick or Automatic Transmission?

[Chip NoVaMac]

I know of at least one person here in CA who after receiving several moving violations (usually going upwards of 95-120 mph) had a government installed/mandated speed governor placed in his car; his modified BMW would then top out at a blistering 70 mph. Also, most cars do come stock w/ a form a speed governor-- they just aren't set 'low enough' I believe to be of great help.

Great to hear that. That and fines based on the income will go a long way to making our highways safer from those that only think of themselves.

This may be a solution to those that "hate" red-light and radar cameras. No longer do we penalize the owner of the car, but we penalize the car itself. Don't want to be penalized. then don't loan out your car.

 

[devilot]

Oh man that is pretty sweet, I had no idea they could do that, I'm kinda wishing my car had that. Just for the other uninformed I did a quick search when I had no idea what you were talking about exactly , this is from wikipedia...

Honda S2000s also have a big red START button, right? Or does it say, START ENGINE? Not sure... never looked in the interior of one or sat in one.

 

[Chip NoVaMac]

Oh man that is pretty sweet, I had no idea they could do that, I'm kinda wishing my car had that. Just for the other uninformed I did a quick search when I had no idea what you were talking about exactly , this is from wikipedia...

With CVT's you only need a (F)orward, (N)uertal, or (R)erverse....

 

[tag]

With CVT's you only need a (F)orward, (N)uertal, or (R)erverse....

Haha wow does that suck, it reminds me of those battery powered jeep/car things kids can drive around in the back yard.

Honda S2000s also have a big red START button, right? Or does it say, START ENGINE? Not sure... never looked in the interior of one or sat in one.

Ah yeah I should have remembered that, I learned to drive stick on my uncles S2000 for a quick while before I got my car to learn on, but you also had to put the key in the ignition before you could hit the button. So not quite as cool as the Prius in that respect.

 

[Kobushi]

Fair enough. The real point is that we have way too many over powered cars on the road, all due to the culture and promise that we have a free economy to decide what we should be able to but, in particular to cars.

I don't know about over powered cars, but definitely over powered drivers. I hate to see Hummers used as grocery getters simply because the owner is overcompensating for....whatever.

Keep in mind most state laws require you to anticipate that a slow poke may pull into your lane, and you should be ready to address that.

Hence, having a more responsive car. It wasn't the going slow that bothered me, it was the trying to run me off the road. State laws are of no help after I'm a grease spot.

Maybe any more than I would trust GWB on WMD in Iraq. Sorry but I could not resist after your condemnation of CR.

My bitterness toward CR isn't without merit. I worked for a paint company that we were proud to say was rated #1 by CR for many years. One year, they rated us next to last. The reason? The tested the wrong product for the wrong application. Had they used the appropriate product, we'd have come out near the top. After that, I took what CR said with a grain of salt and noticed that mine was not an isolated case. (can't argue with the WMD comment)

As to speed governors, there has to be something that we can do about about those (at least in the DC area) that do well over 15-20mph over the posted limit (the max in the area IIRC is like 65mph). These "speeders" are a safety concern. They are also a social concern, because increased speed is a drain on the limited fossil fuel resources we face as a world economy.

What we can do is enforce the laws we already have or make steeper penalties. I fear the day I need to take a loved one to the emergency room (from my rural location), and don't make it in time because my car would only go 70.

 

[TheMonarch]

I don't know about over powered cars, but definitely over powered drivers. I hate to see Hummers used as grocery getters simply because the owner is overcompensating for....whatever.

Kinda like those who buy a quad powermac with 16GB RAM to check email

 

[Chip NoVaMac]

What we can do is enforce the laws we already have or make steeper penalties. I fear the day I need to take a loved one to the emergency room (from my rural location), and don't make it in time because my car would only go 70.

My Mom died next to my Dad on the way to NIH. It would not have mattered how fast my Dad drove, she would have died. Even my doing 70mph getting to the hospital would not have changed the out come. I was "clocked" by a MD State Trooper on the way to the hospital. It was only at the gate to Andrews AFB that he became aware of my desires, and we were both waved on post. To the troopers credit, he remained till I was able to "talk" with him.

He was genuine concerned on my well being after finding out that my Mom had died. But he did try in in his way remind that that I put myself , him, and others, at risk for my own concern. that is a lesson that I have not forgotten.

YMMV living in a rural area. In a rural area it may be very hard to go over 70mph safely. And if you have the intestates/highways to do that, you my not be as rural as you might think. Keep in mind that even in our metro area, rescue services are rarely seen doing above 70mph in response to an emergency.

 

[radiantm3]

Automatics = for people who want to get from point A to point B as quickly and seamlessly as possible.

Manuals = for people who have a passion for driving and prefer to drive from point A to point D to point C to point B from time to time.

Manuals give driving a very engaging experience (especially in the right car). You feel like one with the car.

I live in the Los Angeles area and used to have to drive in 2 hour traffic everyday to work. I still prefer driving manual over automatic.

 

[garybUK]

Automatics arn't that big here, manuals's and semi-auto's (inc tiptronic) are in at the moment.

I've only ever driven manual's until I had a Mercedes E200 with Automatic transmission. It was very very nice on the motorway, automatic with cruise control ... and sometimes in the City but take it on rural roads doing national speed limit (65 mph) and i'd take a manual any day!!!

Auto's are just too slow at changing gear for sports cars... with the exception of Audi's DSG ... wow!!! nice clutch on that thing.

 

[Chacala_Nayarit]

Never drove a stick. Not because I never wanted to, but because I never had the oportunity to learn. Any company I worked for always had automatics. I learned on an automatic in Job Corp too. I feel kind of weird around car-nut Americans who want to bang their car like it's poon. Why put all that money into a vehicle? It's your culture, your life-blood, you can't get laid without it, and you are too lazy to ride a bike or walk.

I can understand a small car, or a work truck for making money, but city people in SUVs and jeeps, stupid.

 

[Chundles]

I prefer manual (I guess this is what you americans call "stick") but some of the newer tiptronic autos are pretty good. I'd love to try out some of the new Audi DSG and Mercedes 7speed boxes.

I don't have a car at the moment but my folks cars (when I'm at home to actually drive them - I don't need one where I live) are both tiptronic Peugeots and they are a great drive.

 

[thomasp]

Being English, where most of our cars are manual, I learnt and passed in a manual.

I've never driven an auto though, but have heard from a lot of people that it's not nice when you first do it

Manual cars are about £500 - £1500 cheaper over here (depending on the type of car), so I imagine I'll stick with manuals for a while longer (I've only been driving for 14 months). I also like the control that manuals give - if you're in a 30mph zone, and there's no other traffic around and the road's pretty flat and straight, depending on your engine size (I've only driven 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4L cars), you can just leave the car in 5th and it'll run quite happily with very little accelerator input, and it doesn't burn as much petrol as in 2nd or 3rd

 

[BakedBeans]

Being English, where most of our cars are manual, I learnt and passed in a manual.

I've never driven an auto though, but have heard from a lot of people that it's not nice when you first do it

Manual cars are about £500 - £1500 cheaper over here (depending on the type of car), so I imagine I'll stick with manuals for a while longer (I've only been driving for 14 months). I also like the control that manuals give - if you're in a 30mph zone, and there's no other traffic around and the road's pretty flat and straight, depending on your engine size (I've only driven 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4L cars), you can just leave the car in 5th and it'll run quite happily with very little accelerator input, and it doesn't burn as much petrol as in 2nd or 3rd

yeah thomas is right, we dont have loads of automaticas here. we can actually drive

most cars are manual, when you take lessons you would specifically have to ask for an automatic (and then when you pass you cant use a manual)

5/6 gears is the way forward

 

[GroundLoop]

You had to expect that most people in this thread would say "stick", because it is the cool thing to do. Honestly, I don't care, but if all options were available, I would go for an SMG.

Hickman

 

[GroundLoop]

I don't know about over powered cars, but definitely over powered drivers. I hate to see Hummers used as grocery getters simply because the owner is overcompensating for....whatever.

I am wondering why every makes this remark. If you look at the sales of Hummers, and SUVs in general (at least in America), women account for 55-60% of SUV purchases.

Hickman

 

[Lacero]

So true. Sticks are highly overrated. Stick shifting is sorta like smoking.

Like dating a girl and taking her in their car, the guys think it's cool to stick shift, otherwise they just sit there looking stupid, wondering what they should do with their hands. I hate it.

I prefer automatic because it's one thing less to think about while driving.

 

[mad jew]

I am wondering why every makes this remark. If you look at the sales of Hummers, and SUVs in general (at least in America), women account for 55-60% of SUV purchases.

Hickman

They may have an Elektra complex.

 

[juicedus]

I don't think its the "cool" thing to do. I think its people want control over the car. Especially on curvy hilly roads, its so much fun to downshift and upshift into and out of corners.

I do have to say driving a stick has at least saved my life once. I was driving home from school one winter to with my brother and g/f at the time. I could tell that the road was icy so I was driving cautiously. There was an SUV in front of us and the second he stepped on his brakes, i said uh oh to myself then he started swerving all over the place and doing 360's and then finally off the road into a really deep ditch. Thankfully since we were in a manual I was able to slow down soon enough and call the cops to show then where exactly they went off. Mind you when I got out of the car, I fell flat on my butt. The whole road was a sheet of ice, it wasn't that they had just hit a lone piece.

On another note, how many people actually keep the clutch pushed in when they are at a light, or just waiting while the engine is on. I've been taught that the only time to have the foot on the clutch is when you're actually shifting or else it causes excessive wear on the clutch. (this is coming from mechanics in the family).

It also annoys me when people think they can just jump gears cuz they think it will save them gas, i.e. start in 2nd and go to 4 then to 5 or some combination. I can understand those that are going into 5th when they are going slower but at least don't try to accelerate quickly. Its worse for an engine to pushed at the low end than the high end.

EDIT: The new lexus also comes with push button start. Some new BMW's too, as long as you have the special "key" with you.

 

[iGav]

Driving down slick roads, your breaks can lock up to where ABS is pretty much useless. If you downshift, you can use the compression of the engine to slow down.

You can do the same with any half decent automatic though, which usually have the option to overide and keep the car in either 1st, 2nd and 3rd.

And of course, there's going up hills where automatics always seem to shift at the wrong time.....

See above, same principle applies.

If I'm ever in a completely automatic car, with no manual functionality, then I'll usually use whatever gears the car has available for manual selection, it's handy when you're overtaking for example to select 3rd rather than rely on kickdown (which can be near lethal in a powerful car) then once you hit the redline just shift into Drive then the automatic gearbox takes back over and upshifts into 4th.


Anyway, back to the topic at hand, for me it depends on the situation, in London rush hour, an automatic is arguably better, faster and smoother, but on the open road a manual gearbox is infinitely more fun and challenging.

What makes me giggle is all this nonsense about not being able to be at one with your car with anything other than a manual gearbox, what crap... in which case it's like if you really want to be a 'purist'... you wouldn't have synchromesh at all.

I much prefer the possibilities that a DSG or SMG style electrohydraulic manual transmission offers up, over a conventional manual gearbox, even a very good one. I know of very few (normal) road cars that have ideally positioned pedals for heel-n-toeing for example, meaning that you're limited and compromised by what you can do on the entry-mid-exit of a corner, a DSG/SMG style gearbox allows you to focus on the positioning of your car, via steering, braking (I'm a left foot braker) and throttle inputs, I have much more fun concentrating on balancing a car on the brake and throttle mid corner than I would struggling with your average road car, which generally have a piss poor shift action and incorrectly aligned pedals.

I can kind of love and leave tiptronic style gearboxes, the good ones (Porsches Tiptronic and Mitsubishi's INVECS-III for example) are excellent compromises for those that spend a lot of their time in cities, and like to have manual control at weekends, but (the average/poor ones) are still hampered by having torque convertors which sap power and often provide sluggish shift speeds in comparison to electrohydraulic manual transmissions or even an average driver with a manual gearbox.

However conventional automatics, with no manual functionality though are a BIG no-no, best left for fat, lazy arses that don't give a toss about driving.

Anyway, a quick question for our stateside friends. In the U.S. is there a separate test for Automatics and Manuals? if you pass your test in an automatic, even though the driver may have no clue as to how to drive a manual gearbox can they legally drive one without having any lessons or evening passing a test in one?

 

[devilot]

Never drove a stick. Not because I never wanted to, but because I never had the oportunity to learn.

Same with me-- until I got with my boyfriend who drives a stick VW. Growing up as a little tomboy, I vowed to learn how to drive stick because few Asian American women can.

I feel kind of weird around car-nut Americans who want to bang their car like it's poon. Why put all that money into a vehicle? It's your culture, your life-blood, you can't get laid without it, and you are too lazy to ride a bike or walk.

I take offense at that. You could easily tweak what you just said to something along the lines of... "I feel kind of weird around Apple-nut Americans who want to sniff out rumors and upgrade their computers. Why put all that money into a computer? It's your culture, your life-blood..." As silly as that sounds that is how silly your car comment felt to me. A lot of car aficionados do not 'want to bang their car like it's poon.' They enjoy the ins and outs of the engine (much like many a MR member eagerly awaits Ars articles that show the insides of computers/iPods. Many car lovers enjoy the experience of using one machine over another (just like some MR members prefer using one computer or OS over another). And yes, being 'into cars' is a different culture, but then again, so is being interested in Apple rumors and at this point, Apple computers.

I agree w/ other posters, some cars are getting very impressive trannies... but really, they're more like true race transmissions-- double clutch, paddles, and whatnot. Pretty nifty but I don't know if I could handle driving in that manner; it sounds quite different than plain ol' automatic or plain ol' manual.

I prefer automatic because it's one thing less to think about while driving.

Eh, drive stick a little longer and supposedly it becomes second nature-- don't think I've clocked in enough hours or miles to be able to honestly claim that one yet.

I don't think its the "cool" thing to do. I think its people want control over the car.

Unfortunately, I only know a few people (here in CA's silicon valley) that have stick cars as daily drivers (or at all, really) and those are 1) car enthusiasts interested in the experience, the choice to execute power, the choice to stay in their car's powerband, 2) lame rice rockets/ street racers-- enough said, and 3) people being thrifty. So for the most part, I do believe people choose 'stick' at least here in CA as a marker of 'cool' (Hee. I fall into a different category-- the car I wanted at the time only came in a manual 6-speed transmission. ).

On another note, how many people actually keep the clutch pushed in when they are at a light, or just waiting while the engine is on. I've been taught that the only time to have the foot on the clutch is when you're actually shifting or else it causes excessive wear on the clutch. (this is coming from mechanics in the family).

I agree-- from the aforementioned people I know who are attempting to become master technicians (ie, the top rung in the field), they have told me the same. Not a problem for me though, never got in the habit of engaging the clutch until I needed to-- why 'work' more?

Anyway, a quick question for our stateside friends. In the U.S. is there a separate test for Automatics and Manuals?

NOPE.

if you pass your test in an automatic, even though the driver may have no clue as to how to drive a manual gearbox can they legally drive one without having any lessons or evening passing a test in one?

Yup. Terrifying, eh? I got my boyfriend to teach me stick in a big open parking lot that is almost always empty (except for on the Sabbath; it's the lot for a church and a Jewish temple). Others I know who have learned manual as an afterthought have just gone out there on the road.

 

[iGav]

On another note, how many people actually keep the clutch pushed in when they are at a light, or just waiting while the engine is on. I've been taught that the only time to have the foot on the clutch is when you're actually shifting or else it causes excessive wear on the clutch. (this is coming from mechanics in the family).

The clutch itself shouldn't wear if it's disengaged... so as long as it's fully disengaged when you're stopped (e.g. you ain't on the biting point) then the wear will be negligible e.g. not on the clutch plates themselves but other components, cable, springs etc.

The wear on a clutch mainly occurs when it's either engaging or disengaging (changing gear basically), if you're holding it on you biting point... for example a hill start or if you're slipping the clutch for any reason.

I've said this before on here, (and was ridiculed for it) but if driven properly, a clutch should essentially never wear out and last the usable lifetime of the car.

<edit> But I will just add, whenever you come to a stop for any prolonged period of time, you should be in neutral with the handbrake on.

Now here's a question... I wonder how many people, when faced with an emergency stop in a manual car, depress the clutch at the same time as the brake?

 

[iGav]

NOPE. Yup. Terrifying, eh?

Holy sh*t!!!! not just terrifying... seriously f**kin' dangerous!!!

 

[juicedus]

Now here's a question... I wonder how many people, when faced with an emergency stop in a manual car, depress the clutch at the same time as the brake?

I was taught that you don't touch the clutch cuz then engine helps slow the car. In reality what I do is always start downshifting. Its weird cuz even in an emergency I don't just slam on the brakes and hope not to hit anything. I start downshifting and look around to see what other cars are doing and look for an alternate path out. I think it goes back to being a pilot and being aware of your surroundings and think of what to do next.

 

[macartistkel]

..I went to slow down for a stop light and hit the brake looking for the clutch... Needless to say we left some rubber behind!

Yep I do the same thing!! I have a stick (and a really small car, Beetle). But when I had to drive my boyfriend around with his automatic I hit the brake really hard thinking it was a clutch all the time. Very tramuatizing for someone who hated to get on the road because he was sandwiched between 18-wheeler semi last year and suffered greatly.

Anyway, I prefer a stick and love small cars----I can zip through traffic faster!! I am looking at getting an even smaller vehicle like the MINI cooper now.

 

[devilot]

Anyway, I prefer a stick and love small cars----I can zip through traffic faster!! I am looking at getting an even smaller vehicle like the MINI cooper now.

*Waves hand frantically* Ooh Ooh!!! Me, me! I drive a 2004 dark silver MINI Cooper S.