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A Week of A/T Manual Shifting Mode

Woke up and decided to drive my FR-S A/T using only manual shifting mode for one week. No Regular A/T mode, no Sport A/T mode and no radio so I can hear the revs. With 36 years of “spirited” driving in a mix of A/T and M/T cars, front engine and mid-engine, mostly RWD, I can be considered a skilled driver. Other than 1,400 FR-S miles mostly in regular A/T mode, I have no previous experience with paddle shifters and electronic shift control. I hope that this exercise will develop my driving skills and allow me to explore the potential of the FR-S A/T. I’ll post my experiences, observations and progress here for anyone who cares. Please share comments, suggestions and your experiences in manual mode. Thanks.

Day 1

Driving to work, I was apprehensive about jumping into traffic. It reminds me of being an everyday M/T driver who is trying out someone else’s unfamiliar M/T car. Mostly I was fine with shift points, but in a few miles I made about every minor error that could be made. I shifted early and late. I cruised in too high or too low a gear. I didn’t downshift enough when slowing to then be able to accelerate appropriately. I even shifted to 3rd when I wanted 5th (must remember... left downshift, right upshift). I know all of this can’t be harder than an M/T, can it?

The car did everything as expected. Clearly, at the outset, this is mainly about my learning curve. The first real challenge was trying to reach the +paddle for 2nd when making a turn after a stop. In normal traffic, it’s time for second gear halfway through the turn. The +paddle is somewhere my right hand isn’t as I can’t bend my arms into a pretzel. The +paddle was near my left hand and I tried using that. I’m not sure that will help in training my reflexes Winding out first gear under light acceleration through the whole turn just isn’t right. I’ll try using the floor shifter for low speed turning maneuvers and see what that’s like. What do you do?

For times when I have to do hard cornering I use the shifter to up or downshift 'till I get out of the curve. Hope it helps!

yeah I never use my paddles hard to turn with them..always use the floor shifter.

Hah I went through something similar when first commuting with my dual-clutch GTI. Lifelong manual driver trying to get used to shift paddles (damn new-fangled technology).

The good news is once you get used to shifting with the paddles, the rest should be cake. It should be almost the same as how you'd drive a manual.

If you can lay your hands on a driving video game with a steering wheel controller it could be a nice safe way to get used to which paddle is upshift and which is downshift.

I too use a combination of the paddles and shifter. I got used to it rather quickly.
The learning curve for me was deciding which to use and when. After a few weeks of really only a few days a week of driving for me, I had it down.
When driving aggro style, it's a little more challenging to get the coordination down pat.
I often leave it in sport mode as I'll toggle between manual and AT

Like you posted. There's nothing wrong with winding out first gear :)

I use a combo of both took a bit to get used to the paddles but youll figure out when to and when not to use them. I normally use the floor shifter.

floor shifter is much easier, esp in the corners

I find myself using the console shifter during most times... just out of being used to a manual and my hand rests there. Unless I'm doing higher speed stuff or like canyons I tend to use the console shifter. My brain just reverts to "move down to change!) However when I have forced myself to use the paddles almost exclusively and only use the console when necessary- it turns out to be rather fun and really nice to keep two hands on. But.. its sucks because where as the paddles can take over In drive, the shifter (obviously) can't. So there are a few times if thrown the car in neutral trying to up shift hahaha. Once used to it I think I use a combo. God I want to drive this trans w a turbo! Drove an is350 (beast in a silk coat) w this trans almost and it was sick

I drive manual so every day out of the week I look for lots of gravel on the road to prefect my driving skills as the back end comes out at low speeds. We must both practice.

I tend to use the paddles only in the straight aways or mild turns, but, tend to use the floor shifter otherwise.

For most spirited driving I also put it in sport mode as well as VSC Sport mode.

I even tried putting it in full auto, but, still having it in sport mode and VSC Sport mode and that was a very different experience. It got most things right and although it didn't fully anticipate what I wanted to do, it worked pretty good other than shifting up a little early out of first gear (but yet it will redline every other gear (maybe it is maximizing performance, but, I also prefer the sound of the engine at full wail)).

It was still a little uncomfortable leaving the control in its electronic hands and I think I still prefer doing it myself and mostly gravitate to the floor shifter.

So, I got the AT because I can't drive MT (and didn't want to learn *Wearing flame suit) and I caught some crap for it from my brother and some friends, but whatever.

I've driven it in M mode a couple of times now because I'm at least curious. I've learned from reading here, and watching how the car shifts itself how shift intervals work, so I kind of understood when to shift up, not so much on the down (kept shifting too early, got a little jerky) but it's good that it down shifts for you if you mess up. It does make me nervous because I'm always afraid I'll forget I'm in M mode and mess something up. And I also haven't figured out quite how to hit the paddles on the turns. I tried using the opposite hand, thinking I had turned far enough to reverse them but I guess I kept hitting the - paddle because it wasn't shifting up. It certainly takes getting used to doing it.

I use the Manual mode for autocross and the high performance schools. I'm too lazy to use manual mode in normal traffic, but for when I want to loosen out the back I switch it to manual mode once in a while and turn on sport vsc