A Week of A/T Manual Shifting Mode

[bdbx18]

My daily commute is half bumper-to-bumper freeway and half canyon carving. For the twisting canyons, the paddle shifters are the only way to go because I need both hands on the steering. Otherwise, it's the floor shifter.

And yeah, push UP to UPSHIFT, pull DOWN to DOWNSHIFT.

[Asphalt~86]

Originally Posted by bdbx18

My daily commute is half bumper-to-bumper freeway and half canyon carving. For the twisting canyons, the paddle shifters are the only way to go because I need both hands on the steering. Otherwise, it's the floor shifter.

And yeah, push UP to UPSHIFT, pull DOWN to DOWNSHIFT.

There's a DYI Fix for this somewhere

[Demandred7]

Originally Posted by bdbx18

My daily commute is half bumper-to-bumper freeway and half canyon carving. For the twisting canyons, the paddle shifters are the only way to go because I need both hands on the steering. Otherwise, it's the floor shifter.

And yeah, push UP to UPSHIFT, pull DOWN to DOWNSHIFT.

I totally agree, to my brain BMW and Mazda have it backwards (pull down to upshift). Maybe they are trying to emulate grabbing for second gear.

[dsgerbc]

I play a lot of driving games, and my wheel has paddles that I use when the car I'm "driving" has them in real life (MY BRZ is M/T though). When I tried and A/T FRS few months back is felt very natural and seamless, and I must say I quite enjoyed it. So it's all in getting more practice.

[Demandred7]

Originally Posted by Asphalt~86

There's a DYI Fix for this somewhere

No need to fix what already makes sense.

[Atticus808]

Originally Posted by zohare

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 thought the car holds the rpms, and won't upshift or downshift unless you press the paddles?

also, this problem would be solved if they didnt attach the paddles to the steering wheel

[Ocala FR-S]

Originally Posted by zohare

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

Oh wow. Another good reason to focus on the paddles. I didn't even think about the obvious lack of ability to use the floor shifter for override while in auto mode. I could see myself doing that upshift to neutral thing. That would be an eye opener.

[Ocala FR-S]

Originally Posted by SkitterSkotter

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.

My last car was a 335i Sport Coupe M/T. I found some turns on an unused shortcut in town that always had dry sand washed up on the road. I always took off traction control there to practice slides.

[mechaghost]

Originally Posted by Atticus808

i thought the car holds the rpms, and won't upshift or downshift unless you press the paddles?

also, this problem would be solved if they didnt attach the paddles to the steering wheel

It only holds it in Manual mode...

[Ocala FR-S]

Originally Posted by Atticus808

i thought the car holds the rpms, and won't upshift or downshift unless you press the paddles?

also, this problem would be solved if they didnt attach the paddles to the steering wheel

In full manual mode it pretty much does. It will downshift itself when RPMs are ridiculously low and won't allow downshifts if vehicle speed would result in exceeding redline. It also won't allow upshifts if the resulting RPM would be ridiculously low. However, I understand it will not upshift by itself and you just bounce off the upper rev limiter. I'll just have to wait to do that by mistake to find out for myself.

What the poster is referring to is the ability to use paddles to upshift or downshift even while staying in auto shift mode. It temporarily overrides and will hold the selected gear for a short time before lapsing back to auto shift mode. Great for downshifts in anticipation of passing or when hard braking before a turn. Those things an automatic transmission doesn't know you are about to do and where the shift just can't wait.

[zohare]

Originally Posted by Atticus808

i thought the car holds the rpms, and won't upshift or downshift unless you press the paddles?

also, this problem would be solved if they didnt attach the paddles to the steering wheel

As answered- Only hold in manual mode, or for a limited time if you hit a paddle in either sport or drive mode. Sport has much more aggressive shift points that seem to adapt to exactly how aggressively one is driving. I'm curious if it tracks all the inputs etc to determine how long it holds gears, but when driving hard, I often find it just as efficient as me running the gears. I had also considered this when I was getting annoyed with the rotating paddles but I just don't see it as a fix all solution. IMO the rotating paddles have a higher + to - ratio than some that would be fixed if you know what I mean there. For the same reason that steering wheel controls aren't at your fingertips, but ON the wheel. (Except in the S2K :P Whose layout I love tremendously) I don't know though, perhaps either would be equal given adjustment period. Also to anyone who hasn't driven an auto... DO EEEET

[zoomzoomers]

I too tend to go to the floor shifter in manual mode. It just feels more right to me. Go figure, it was that way with my previous E46 M3 with SMG. I just hate how they dumb'd down the shif pattern by making you push forward for upshift and back for downshift. The proper way is push forward for downshift and back for upshift.

On a side note, does anyone know whether there's a difference between "sport" on and manual and "sport" off? Does going to manual automatically put you into sport mode? Always wondered.

[mechaghost]

Originally Posted by zoomzoomers

I too tend to go to the floor shifter in manual mode. It just feels more right to me. Go figure, it was that way with my previous E46 M3 with SMG. I just hate how they dumb'd down the shif pattern by making you push forward for upshift and back for downshift. The proper way is push forward for downshift and back for upshift.

On a side note, does anyone know whether there's a difference between "sport" on and manual and "sport" off? Does going to manual automatically put you into sport mode? Always wondered.

sport mode has no effect in manual mode, sport mode pretty much makes it hold gears longer and shift a little harsher

[SUB-FT86]

I like that the paddles is connected to the wheel. I would never need to upshift in a turn anyway.