Is Technology Making Cars Worse?
 

Just watched this video:
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8h_IcLn4JSg&feature=g-all-u"]Is Technology Making Cars Worse? - ROAD TESTAMENT - YouTube[/ame]

Chris Harris is in it btw!

Anyway..
Is Technology Making Cars Worse?

I would agree to an extent, but here in the U.S., the driving test is a joke, and it's basically designed so anyone can pass it. So there are plenty of people out there without the slightest clue on how to merge, or signal a lane change, or just drive in between the damn lines. For that fact I am glad they have all this technology, so long as they allow me to turn it off:D

I have owned mainly early 90's Honda's for the reasons they talked about. The E90 M3, modified 4th gen civics, and 240 sx's that I have owned have all leaned towards driving passion rather than technology.

The BRZ is literally the first car that's been on the market in the last decade that really seems to embody what I loved about those cars.

:thumbsup:

I watched this as well today. I could write pages and pages on this topic, but to sum up i'd say-- for sports car fans, yes technology is beginning to get in the way and make things worse.

Classic example r35gtr

I agree!

I think average people will get much better cars due to technology.
The typical sports cars on the other hand seems to be more numb these days..
Powerwise, consumtion wise, safty wise etc.. they are better.
Driving feel and fun-factor seems to be lacking in several of the modern cars. I think that is the reason why the GT86 have gotten so much praise from automotive journalists. It is back to the basics, to the roots of performance cars. And that is a good thing!

There is no doubt technology makes performance cars faster tough..

I know I'll be splitting hairs here and I know what they're really talking about are electronic aides (more specifically transmissions) when they say technology, but the BRZ is as technically advanced from an engineering standpoint with DI, it's auto transmission, and as electronically aided with Electric Steering, ABS, VDC, TC and the like.

Not to mention the engineering that it took to get a car like the BRZ's CD so low. So I really don't get how the BRZ is any more raw than say my WRX, or a Mustang, because I don't think it is. It just has a better chassis.

Now compared to a GTR or even a Focus ST, that has torque control, and overboost, then maybe...

If we're just talking about manual transmissions vs auto, or different sport modes, like on the EVO or STI, then yeah, I'd always prefer a MT. But I really like technology and things like different modes. Granted "Auto Sport Mode" seems to work well in most cars, but I like the choice and messing with things like that.

Comparing a car like the GTR vs an M3. I'd most likely choose the M3 because all of the tech in the GTR makes the engagement a bit numb. Tech makes winning easier, but at the cost of "feel" and IMO enjoyment.

I think people want to be supermen behind the wheel and cars with a lot of tech make that happen. And although that's cool and especially it makes fast cars safer, I'm more at home with a machine I can control, rather that it controlling itself.

funny how they made no mention of government laws causing manufacturers to do what they do... electric steering is a DIRECT result of tightening fuel economy standards. the rise of the AT/DCT is also very much mpg related considering 7 speeds are normal, 8 speeds are becoming common, and we are on the verge of a ZF 9 speed AT (with a 10 speed in development). not to mention the proliferation of CVTs...

traction/stability control is for safety, and most sporty cars allow you to turn it completely off so there is NO argument against that. ABS is also something 99.9% of the population should want.

anyways, while i do agree with almost everything they say, it seems they completely overlook the external factors that affect manufacturers' decisions.... and chris harris is from the uk. over there they can legally drive ariel atoms, caterhams, radicals, etc. on the road. if we could do that in the US, i wouldnt care how detached road cars are, i'd get a weekend track toy that i can drive there with, and i'll get my fun that way...

Not really, there are easier ways to get fuel economy. Targeting parasitic load is nice because it increases max engine power available, but from a cost perspective perhaps adding an extra gear into the transmission is cheaper than swapping belt drive for electric motors everywhere.

Electric steering always gets attacked, but there are different electric steering systems and often times the electric steering is just a hydraulic system with electric steering pump.

Fuel economy standards aren't what's killing MT, imo, the demand is just dead. The way cars are tested for fuel economy is bad for MTs though, and necessitates crappy gearing (for fuel economy) (part of that is also market demand, sports car buyers like their short cruise gears for "good response"). Porsche is making their 7 speed manual, which is awesome. If Honda/Toyota weren't such cheapasses they wouldn't have only 5 speed transmissions available when Hyundai has 6 standard. More gears is a good thing, as long as they remember that there are people who want manual transmissions. Unfortunately, people who buy Porsches probably go for DCT since it's faster and all, so all we can hope is that there is enough demand to keep MT alive.

I agree with a lot of this.

Part of the reason demand is dead is because as much as we dread it, most buyers are not car enthusiasts in the least. Many people view all driving as a tedious chore. And so most people don't even want to bother learning manual out of pure laziness.

The enthusiast crowd is now more anti-manual, because automatic transmissions (and dual clutch trannies) have erased the speed advantage that manuals once had. So, if you're a speed freak, you'll probably opt for auto to get better track times.

Manuals are now for people who simply enjoy their cars more that way. People like me. And that number's growing smaller by the day. Ferrari and Lambo stopped selling manuals altogether due to customer demand.

Technology is great, as long as it doesn't get in the way. Unfortunately, this is more than just cars, it's everything. Remember calling companies and getting a person instead of an automated system? Then you have these new automated systems that try to do it via voice commands and often you end up getting frustrated and routed to the operator anyways. That's the kind of that gets in the way. On the other hand, you have on-line bill pay which is awesome, trust me trying to pay bills on the phone sucks (and feels insecure).

I would say that the economy mode of newer cars gets in the way and is almost intentionally difficult to disable to get proper emissions/fuel economy. While for some people, they like the new "green" indicators and ECON buttons (my dad loves that on his 2012 CR-V), it would annoy me.

Now stuff like electronic power-steering, traction control, and the pretty amazing automatic transmissions are pieces of technology that I think are great in modern cars like the FR-S. Unfortunately, there are bad examples of this same technology with cars that have terrible turn radius, almost worthless traction control, and garbage slush-boxes.

At the end of the day, it's how the technology is applied and does it work for you or against you. Some cases like traction control are based on the situation. If it's rainy or otherwise inclimate outside, or maybe I'm just doing something stupid that day, I don't mind the car keeping me in line. Now if I was at the track/AutoX and trying to test the limits, I wouldn't want them in the way. Options like that should always be able to be turned off, but the problem is some people don't understand that they should probably keep them on in most cases. ;)

I agree with most of what you said ^above^ except this portion I quoted here.

Perhaps you didn't mean it this way but...

"Back in the day" most non-enthusiasts learned to drive a manual out of necessity, not desire. For 99% of drivers, it was no different than learning to do math without a calculator or washing dishes without a dishwasher. It was part of the price of admission.

The bottom line is there is no real "reason" to learn to drive a manual any longer, at least in some areas of the world, any more than there is to know how to program a VCR, or how to saddle a horse. It is a "desire" to learn it, not a "reason", but it is certainly no longer a requirement to be able to drive.

I'm not saying the skills are equal, or even that folks shouldn't learn how, I'm just saying not having the desire to do it does not make you lazy.

When talking about technology it is the whole package. Not just electronic aids. In general the technology that is being questioned is stuff like:
-Electronic steering instead of hydraulic
-Automatic gearboxes
-Electronic steering aids that can not be turned properly off. (getting more and more common)
-ABS (yes, most appreciate it. I know I do. But would be nice with a button to turn it off for some track fun and braking when going sideways..
-Turbocharged engines with duller response and often less exiting noise.
-The lack of proper LSDs. Some cars now have an open "e-diff". Thereby excluding the need for optional LSD. Atleast for average joe. Not the enthusiast.
-WEIGHT! or maybe I should say safety? (yes, not directly technologys fault, but since we have gotten more and better technologically on safety equipment. All that stuff have become standard requirements. Thus making cars weigh more)
-Focus on consumption. (again, not directly technologys fault) In several countries Co2 and other parameters on the engine and car are triggering high taxes. Making small displacement turbo cars more attractive with their good performance and low co2 emissions. Thereby making the high reving NAs, and high displacement engines obsolete. .. Some call it evolution. I call it the result of stupid taxes)
-Electronic stuff making cars harder to work on for the average car enthusiast.

Probably more stuff that could be questioned.. like, the safe understeer in most cars.. etc etc..
Again. Im not saying technology is bad. I welcome it! I love it. (atleast some of it)
When looking at several sporty cars, or proper sports cars, the technology in many cases seem to make them more dull... less connected.. Less mechanical.. Less pure.
...atleast in my opinion..

but laziness can be involved, because it involves some effort.

often times? i disagree. i think that is the exception and not the rule. afaik both the jtekt and zf systems are not electrically driven hydraulic pumps...

fuel economy is killing off the MT. there is a physical limit to how many gears you can fit on a shift gate before it gets too complicated for the average motorist. porsche is already pushing it with the 7 speed, but it will never match the upcoming 9 & 10 speed ATs. and i'm talking globally, where MT is still the standard. as mpg standards rise, manufacturers will have to add more gears to keep low speed acceleration and keep high speed cruise rpms low.

I don't think technology is making cars worse. Stupid implementation of irrelevant technology is making cars worse from an enthusiasts perspective.

In the past 10 years, cars in general have become so reliable that actually getting stranded is essentially a non-issue. When JD Powers reports "Initial Quality", the scores end up being on minute ergonomic quips and infotainment bobbles, not actual transportation-based reliability.

New cars are also so safe to the point of absurdity and the basic lack of responsibility for your own behavior. You barely need any skill to pilot the car and have almost no risk of injury even in a massive crash. All of this is due to implementing new technology.

How has technology ruined the experience for enthusiasts? Unswitchable ESPs, lane-departure warnings, brake assists, distracting infotainment systems, general market bias towards an insulated and quiet experience, the seemingly unstoppable human urge to make things bigger and heavier for no reason, and our insatiable lust for irrational amounts of power all conspire to make cars even bigger and even heavier to handle all that power. It's a vicious circle of immaturity and disregard for personal responsibility that ends up removing the driver from the experience almost entirely.

And yet, it won't get better unless either the consumers demand it, or the marketers teach the consumers it's what they really need.

$0.02

QFT

on a global scale, the % of cars with AT/DCT/CVT/AMT is rising. only 3rd world countries mainly use MT because they are cheap.

I can see the problem here. Do you think a magnetic gearbox instead of conventional gears could help the MT stay alive? I would think you could almost do a variable gear ratio with magnetics that would allow electric current to give you greater control over the 'tallness' of gears. That would be neat! Econ would be one ratio, Sport another, and Track for another.

Kind of like how some manufacturers are using "smart fluids" that can stiffen based on electrical input in their suspensions.

The BRZ is electrohydraulic I believe, I looked up the MR-S steering yesterday and it appears to be electrohydraulic too. I am not sure but I think Porsche might be electrohydraulic, considering they have hydraulically actuated semi-active suspension.

And about the gear ratios, it depends on how close you insist the gears to be. If you're like Lamborghini, then 10 gears isn't enough because they insist on being around max power all the time. American manufacturers aren't so picky, they drop the revs down basically as low as they can go on V8s with just 6 speeds. Of course, there's an acceleration tradeoff made.

If you're talking bigger engines, 8 speeds is nice, but 7 works. Small engines can get away with 6, but 7 is better to have. For example the S2000 would be awesome if it had the 6 speeds it came with, plus a 7th gear at 0.6ish. Then it would be turning a little less revs than the BRZ/FRS on the highway.

If we look at Porsche, I think the 7 speed manual has the engine at 2000 at 70mph, which is not super for a 3.8L engine (Carrera S), but not too shabby either. If they spaced the first 6 out by a tiny tiny bit and then spaced 7th a tiny bit more, they could drop that to like 1600.

If you ask me, >4L engines are stupid, but that's just me.

Great post Ryephie.. I basically agree with everyhing. Except this..

Reason being. We consumers have no right to demand things become more enthusiast friendly. Yes, we can try. Yes it could make a difference, but most likely not.
We as consumers use our money as a vote. Every time we buy something new from a store we vote yes to what we buy and no to everything else.
Products with many votes live on, and may even get several competitors..

It is not the marketing peoples fault. They only do their job. Finding selling points and making people want their products.
In most cases. The products have features people want or desire, and that is what they are marketing.

If we love lightweight cars, RWD, NA, LSD, low center of gravity, driver focus...etc etc.. We have to vote for the features we like..
In other words, most of us should buy a brand new Toybaru if we can afford one! ;)

Electrically coupled drivetrain? That's a series hybrid. When you have that, you might as well run the engine at one speed and shut it off when you don't need it, all it takes is a battery pack. It costs a lot of money to have all those electronics, so you might as well have energy storage capacity too to get the full hybrid drivetrain benefit.

There's also Toyota HSD, which is a power split transmission. The engine kinda "spins against" an electric motor to determine the gear ratio, in simple terms. Extremely beautiful IMO, the discrete shift points they put in for "sportiness" on some Lexuses are completely retarded.

The problem with continuously variable as far as enthusiasts are concerned is there's no way to manually control it. Discrete gears are fine IMO, saves weight and lets you shift your own gears, as long as you have a good selection to choose from :)

Certainly, as with anything, but your statement made it sound like it was the overwhelming factor.

If I misinterpreted, my apologies. As I said, it may not have been what you intended.

:happy0180:

I may have overstated a bit, no worries.

:happy0180:

Well, I guess I was thinking you could use electro-magnetics to alter gear ratios but not necessarily in real-time continuously variable setup. It would be more of a tuning type of thing, where say in Econ mode your gears are taller. Sport mode would add a multiplier and track mode maybe calibrate it so the first two/three gears are shorter and the latter three are longer. The resistance could be changed using induction.

Basically, your gears could be given "float room" where it could grow/shrink by about 20-30% or so (just throwing numbers out there). It wouldn't be something that changed as you drive but something you can program in the ECU and/or toggle with a sports/econ button.

well the HSD system in the prius already uses that principle in their eCVT. can it be expanded for sporty car use? sure! perhaps the BMW alliance will help bring about such a transmission...

and for all you MT lovers out there who cant live without a 3rd pedal, maybe someone will come out with a 9 speed sequential manual? its still a compromise, but at least you get to keep that 3rd pedal...

nope. the BRZ/FRS uses a column mounted EPS unit. http://blogs.insideline.com/roadtest...478-123170.jpg

i think mazda uses an electric pump but they're the zoom zoom company so they're the exception.

we're all talking about sporty cars here, right? so of course i want as many gears as possible! with AT/DCTs they can give me just that. MT has a limit, and manufacturers have to balance everything around that. with ATs, they just have to figure out how to stuff more gears in there :bellyroll:

i think at that point, why even have stepped ratios? just go full retard with a cvt... :lol:

Ah, someone posted that the "steering pump is really small!" so I thought the BRZ has a steering pump. Okay there's also the Mclaren MP4-12C, but let's not go there :bellyroll:

Yes sporty cars. That's the sad thing, AT/DCT shifts faster than MT so for most people the only advantage MT has is the slightly lower price :(
Is it that hard to stuff that 7th gear in there though? I mean, it's a matter of stuffing another gear in right?

I guess the dilemma it comes down to is that what makes the car faster and "better" to most people isn't always desirable to enthusiasts.

i think it 100% has to do with the shift gate. BMW's recent patent filing for a 7 speed MT address just that. they use some sort of electromagnetic fluid and shifting module to lock out gears and prevent a misshift. on something already available, porsche electronically locks out 7th gear to prevent misshifts, but where will the madness end? you could add an 8th gear under the 7th on the porsche shift gate, and lock that out too, but where does the 9th gear go? and the 10th? etc...

like i said before, i wouldnt mind seeing a move to sequential manuals. you get to keep your 3rd pedal, and at the same time you can choose your own gear, as many as can fit, without any misshifts. and with electromechanical actuation, you can probably skip gears somehow if that's important to you. i honestly wouldnt be surprised if this was the future of the MT...

Well, how about the American big engine cars? Their 6th gears are just as long as the 7th on Porsches, comparatively, and they don't have lockouts to prevent misshifts. That's the whole point of a manual transmission, you row your gears, and if you fuck up it's your fault. Doesn't matter if it's 7 speeds or 4, you can still misshift, same story all around.

Okay I guess 7 speeds is a little confusing possibly, but you could do something like have 2 different springs so the driver feels extra resistance pushing right into 7, and knows where 5/6 are.

big engine cars are a dying breed.

its definitely confusing. not for the enthusiast, but for the common man. and if the 7 speed MT cant work for the common man, then it's basically dead.

Hmm, I'd like you to have a word with the folks from SRT, SVT/Shelby, Chevy, AMG, amongst others. They probably haven't heard this rumor.

You know for a fact that 7spd is confusing for the common man and can't work? How? You've used it? I'm sure when there was only 4spd trannies out there, they'd have scoffed at 6-speeds as well.

But the common man doesn't drive manual, and the common man who drives manual doesn't drive a car with a big engine ;)

6 speeds is good enough for 4 cylinder engines, it's the big engines that need to worry about fuel consumption.

LOL come back here in 5 years and lets see who has egg on their face...

can i prove it scientifically? no. is it common sense? yes. did porsche lock out the 7th gear because they knew people could misshift? YES!!! im sure people needed to get used to 5-6 speeds from 4, but there is a point of diminishing returns. even if you physically make the shift gate wider to accommodate more gears, there comes a point where the throws become too long, etc.

Oh, I didn't realize we were talking about 5 years from now. Thought we were talking about the present. Can I borrow your time machine, though? I'd like to go record sporting results.

in america... :thumbdown:

tell that to the dodge dart and its 9 speed AT that's around the corner

if they survive long enough to even have to worry...

are you actually saying there are more big engines now than in the past? AMG who are systematically replacing their 6.2L V8 with 5.5L V8 TT is one of your examples. maybe you do need a time machine... :bonk:

I didn't say there were more. You're saying they're dying. Yet I keep seeing higher hp output with around 15mpg coming out from major manufacturers. Are you saying there will be none of that in five years? I highly doubt it.

Sorry, I forgot how a 5.5L V8 isn't a "big engine". :suicide: