2022 GR86 Premium MT & AT Comparo

[StE92ve]

[Sport-Tech]

^ I would take his comments about the feel of the old car being more enjoyable despite all the improvements he notes in the new gen with a big grain of salt. He owns a 1st gen BRZ so he's got skin in the game, he's comfortable with it. And it seems he's got UELs on it (judging from a video of him driving it) so no wonder it sounds better.

[Ernest72]

Originally Posted by Sport-Tech

^ I would take his comments about the feel of the old car being more enjoyable despite all the improvements he notes in the new gen with a big grain of salt. He owns a 1st gen BRZ so he's got skin in the game, he's comfortable with it. And it seems he's got UELs on it (judging from a video of him driving it) so no wonder it sounds better.

I have not driven one, but I don’t think having skin in the game matters. It’s not like he’s trying to sell his first Gen to you. Every review says it’s better including him. The only way it’s not better is when your current car is paid off and the new one will cost you a significant amount of money for basically a very similar experience. They all said the essence is the same.

My 16 is DD, AT and I have a long commute, so no upgrade for me. Not going to bother spending more to sit in 6th gear for an hour. Plus all the upgrades I have done and work, it’s just not worth it. But if I was in the market for a new one I would buy it for sure. With a 70% AT I figure some used ones will be available in a few years, maybe then when the math works better. But for me the difference is not enough for a daily. If it was a track toy, I would get the new one, hands down if I had the money. Although a used stage 2 Gen 1 at half the price might be a better choice as a toy.

Not really trying to convince anyone one way or the other. I hope many people buy the new ones.

[Sport-Tech]

No he's not trying to sell me his car but everyone has their prejudices based on their experiences and ownership is a well known unconscious bias generator.

One thing that video did make clear is how atrocious the AT tuning is. I checked closely and there were several occasions where despite hitting the downshift paddle well within a safe RPM range the transmission simply failed to oblige. For a sports car that is inexcusable.

[Ash_89]

I feel he may have sold his BRZ, also the linked channel appears to be someone stealing his content.

Edit: it was for sale not sure if it sold.

[Pete]

Originally Posted by Ash_89

I feel he may have sold his BRZ, also the linked channel appears to be someone stealing his content.

You are right on both counts. The Topher sold his BRZ a while ago, and this link is NOT his channel.

https://www.youtube.com/c/TheTopher

There is a link to the right channel.

and there is a link to him talking about selling his BRZ.

[Ernest72]

Not surprised he sold. You tubers need to make content and everyone likes new cars. You can only beat a horse for so long.

I think the AT is fine for DD or spirited runs, but for the track or racing you need a manual to have the control. Can’t rely on a computer. It’s no PDK.

With 70% AT that means many people just driving for fun, like me. I bought this car as a commuter because of 33mpg and it’s fun and cheap. I used the trunk twice in 5 years, back seat maybe 10 times with my kids. I do have other cars though.

[Yoshoobaroo]

Every time this statistic pops up I would like to point out that only the Toyota has an almost 70% automatic take rate. The BRZ has sold almost 80% manual cars across the 1st gen production run.

https://jalopnik.com/u-s-buyers-stil...-th-1834945061

So if you look at the entire production run of twins across both brands we are looking at a 45-55% distribution between automatics and manuals, with manuals actually having the advantage overall. These numbers are all for the US market.

[OwlDance]

I don't think calling the AT tuning atrocious is fair because they only have a single programming mode for it (sport mode aside from the regular D mode which is specifically designed for torque converter usage) which has to decide between daily driving and track driving according to inputs. In order for it to be consistent it takes a minute for it to decide "alright you're actually driving at the track let's keep RPMs higher."

Based on my experience with the first gen post refresh AT, sport mode isn't so much sport mode as much as it is torque converter lockup mode which will limit the fluid coupling usage as much as possible except in first gear, so it's basically locked up except during shifts. During that lockup there is no (for all intents and purposes) different transmission losses compared to an MT or other direct drivetrain car.

This video is extremely grainy even at full res but the one time I saw him trying to downshift and fail it appeared to be at the cusp of 5000 RPM in gear 3 --> gear 2. The AT gearing from gear 2 --> 3 is like 7400 to 5000 (Because the gearing is stupid, stupid tall) so it makes sense to me that it would decide to not. It's an unfortunate side effect of the gearing, NOT the response of the transmission. That being said I've downshifted to 7000RPM on accident by nudging the stick twice in rapid succession and scared the shit out of myself on the AT. I only saw once or twice where there may have been some flubbing from the AT but without actually being able to drive it, it's hard to say.

I will say the transmission isn't the smoothest in shifting, but here's a dirty little secret I've found out between the aisin 960e (Ft86 AT trans) and the famous zf8hp that's used in like every BMW and european luxury AT car - their transmission response times are actually nearly identical in my experience.

The only difference is that the ZF8HP hides it better by having smoother shifting when at cruising RPM and the digital screen makes it seem like the engine is shifting near instantaneously, but in reality it's as chunky and slow when you're actually giving it the beans. Flip the ZF8HP to manual mode and anything above 2.5K RPM feels as "slow" and jarring as the 960E. The difference is the 960E just has atrocious gearing spacing to begin with so there's large jumps in RPM that are quite jarring. The 86 doesn't hide the fact that it's slower to respond than a DCT unlike luxury brands. It's still damn fast at shifting however, just not some straight cut F1 trans.

Nevertheless I think it's perfectly acceptable transmission and is perfectly fine for performance work when done right and is more or less bulletproof for NA. Pretty sure there's someone on the forums who ran 5.29 FD gears with the stock tune and was the fastest on their track compared to tuned MT cars. I have no doubts that the new AT would be any worse - the only downside is that according to the BRZ spec sheet it has 3.9 FD instead of the 4.1 of the gen 1 cars which is mindboggling to me because the gearing is already stupid tall.

[Dzmitry]

Originally Posted by OwlDance

the only downside is that according to the BRZ spec sheet it has 3.9 FD instead of the 4.1 of the gen 1 cars which is mindboggling to me because the gearing is already stupid tall.

Emission and gas mileage reasons.

[Kona61]

Originally Posted by OwlDance

I don't think calling the AT tuning atrocious is fair because they only have a single programming mode for it (sport mode aside from the regular D mode which is specifically designed for torque converter usage) which has to decide between daily driving and track driving according to inputs. In order for it to be consistent it takes a minute for it to decide "alright you're actually driving at the track let's keep RPMs higher."

Based on my experience with the first gen post refresh AT, sport mode isn't so much sport mode as much as it is torque converter lockup mode which will limit the fluid coupling usage as much as possible except in first gear, so it's basically locked up except during shifts. During that lockup there is no (for all intents and purposes) different transmission losses compared to an MT or other direct drivetrain car.

This video is extremely grainy even at full res but the one time I saw him trying to downshift and fail it appeared to be at the cusp of 5000 RPM in gear 3 --> gear 2. The AT gearing from gear 2 --> 3 is like 7400 to 5000 (Because the gearing is stupid, stupid tall) so it makes sense to me that it would decide to not. It's an unfortunate side effect of the gearing, NOT the response of the transmission. That being said I've downshifted to 7000RPM on accident by nudging the stick twice in rapid succession and scared the shit out of myself on the AT. I only saw once or twice where there may have been some flubbing from the AT but without actually being able to drive it, it's hard to say.

I will say the transmission isn't the smoothest in shifting, but here's a dirty little secret I've found out between the aisin 960e (Ft86 AT trans) and the famous zf8hp that's used in like every BMW and european luxury AT car - their transmission response times are actually nearly identical in my experience.

The only difference is that the ZF8HP hides it better by having smoother shifting when at cruising RPM and the digital screen makes it seem like the engine is shifting near instantaneously, but in reality it's as chunky and slow when you're actually giving it the beans. Flip the ZF8HP to manual mode and anything above 2.5K RPM feels as "slow" and jarring as the 960E. The difference is the 960E just has atrocious gearing spacing to begin with so there's large jumps in RPM that are quite jarring. The 86 doesn't hide the fact that it's slower to respond than a DCT unlike luxury brands. It's still damn fast at shifting however, just not some straight cut F1 trans.

Nevertheless I think it's perfectly acceptable transmission and is perfectly fine for performance work when done right and is more or less bulletproof for NA. Pretty sure there's someone on the forums who ran 5.29 FD gears with the stock tune and was the fastest on their track compared to tuned MT cars. I have no doubts that the new AT would be any worse - the only downside is that according to the BRZ spec sheet it has 3.9 FD instead of the 4.1 of the gen 1 cars which is mindboggling to me because the gearing is already stupid tall.

That is highly false about the ZF. The performance tuned versions are magnitudes better than the Aisin. I’m not really how you came to the conclusion they are the same. Jarring? I think not. The only shift that gets odd is a low speed constant throttle 2 to 1 shift. That is the only slow shift and it still is not “jarring”.

Maybe you’re comparing it to a Dodge Ram or something…

[Yoshoobaroo]

Originally Posted by Kona61

That is highly false about the ZF. The performance tuned versions are magnitudes better than the Aisin. I’m not really how you came to the conclusion they are the same. Jarring? I think not. The only shift that gets odd is a low speed constant throttle 2 to 1 shift. That is the only slow shift and it still is not “jarring”.

Maybe you’re comparing it to a Dodge Ram or something…

Yea the ZF can shift in 200ms. That’s DCT territory, it’s insanely fast for a torque converter. The ZF 8HP is primarily why BMW gave up on DCTs, that’s how fast it is.

[Ernest72]

Originally Posted by Yoshoobaroo

Every time this statistic pops up I would like to point out that only the Toyota has an almost 70% automatic take rate. The BRZ has sold almost 80% manual cars across the 1st gen production run.

https://jalopnik.com/u-s-buyers-stil...-th-1834945061

So if you look at the entire production run of twins across both brands we are looking at a 45-55% distribution between automatics and manuals, with manuals actually having the advantage overall. These numbers are all for the US market.

The stats don’t really matter anyway. The way the car industry is going very few manual trannies will be left, especially with EVs. The endless debate of AT vs MT is waste. They both do certain things well and others things bad. What’s great is they offer both so get the one that you want. It’s that simple.

[Yoshoobaroo]

Originally Posted by Ernest72

The stats don’t really matter anyway. The way the car industry is going very few manual trannies will be left, especially with EVs. The endless debate of AT vs MT is waste. They both do certain things well and others things bad. What’s great is they offer both so get the one that you want. It’s that simple.

The stats absolutely do matter because they show that over half of people buying these sports cars want a manual transmission. This includes over 90% of them that will never even see an autocross let alone a track.

These people that claim you should only buy a manual for track time ignore the fact that over half of us actually prefer to drive the manual on the street, yes even in traffic. Cause it’s more fun to us. For me it’s not even close. I have NEVER driven an automatic car that didn’t disappoint compared to a manual.