No Standard Transmissions

[cowboydoc]

I agree there are certainly instances where an auto is better. I have a clutch fan, two coolers, and a tranny gauge. Fryed tranny after only 3500 miles of towing. /w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif. Never even got above 200 degrees and it's toast. Read ford-diesel.com and you'll see the auto's are pretty poor. Read the Dodge and Chevy pages and you'll see they don't like the autos much for towing either and alot of them are in the shop more than on the road. To say the least I'll be trading mine in when that new 6.0l comes out this fall and match it with the six speed.

 

[DK35vince]

patrickg,
I pull a 10,000 # trailer nearly every weekend,fully loaded standard transmission in my F-250 Ford.160,000 miles on the truck and have never smelled the clutch.

 

[patrickg]

wolbert, Why, that is just wonderful. I'm sure many drivers have done as well or better. I note you didn't say anything about backing up steep hills or winding steep hills from a dead stop on the hill or pulling a steep incline from a stop with poor traction. I have no difficulty admiting the superiority of the standard tranny in some applications but the converse is true as well. There are apps where auto is better, apps where either are fine, and apps where manual is better (assuming a driver not a truck herder).

Slightly related annecdote: When in Minot ND (USAF/SAC) every winter dependents of military (wives and older children) would be stranded in town, unable to return to Minot AFB 15 miles north of town due to their innability to drive out of town. The town is in a river valley and the US highway out of town goes up a fair incline which when icy was a problem for vehicle herders. They start up the hill, stop at a light, and when the light changes they press the accellerator and the car backs down the hill. Snow, ice, frost, whatever made it fun to watch. Car herders press on the gas to go, if the car doesn't go enough, they press harder. This was almost universally true, stick or auto. To unblock the road ahead I have had to drive as many as 3 women up the hill to clear a path for myself. Now for the punch line... I could usually (not always) show them how to do it if the car was an automatic but don't recall ever succeeding with manual. Again, a driver could do it, but car herders aren't drivers. This was pre-traction control, oops that is only available with automatic.

I am a lisc pilot. I like a little aerobatics now and then and enjoy messing around in the air but on a long cross country flight I dearly love autopilot. I really miss autopilot when driving on a long haul. Cruise control is great but not even a close second to autopilot (especially autopilot with nav interconnect and altitude hold). You are freed to do management duties rather than repetitively engage in motor skills coordination practice.

Yes, I do have a manual shift vehicle, a VW powered dune bugy. Strangely enough when my wife and I got married she didn't know how to drive an automatic and wasn't checked out with three on the tree, only four on the floor as her family had a Corvair, VW, and a karman Ghia and I was driving an MG-A and then a Sunbeam Tiger after we got hitched so after 3-4 years of marriage she had her first auto tranny experience (it caught on just fine with her).

Patrick

 

[Kodiak]

<font color=blue>"Real farmers wouldn't be caught dead plowing with a horse, they do it by hand with a bent stick if not their bare hands, none of that sharpened steel for them.</font color=blue>


Caveman think plowing for sissies. Real caveman wouldn't be caught dead plowing with a horse. They would just club it and eat it.

 

[patrickg]

Richard, Where was the the tranny temp gauge sensor installed? I saw one brand of kit with instructions on where to put the sensor and it was in the line coming out of the cooler in the radiator. I don't like that much as it tends to be strongly related to the radiator temp. You can fry the tranny but the scorched fluid coming out of the water bath heat exchanger in the radiator is a decent temp which inspires overconfidence. Put the sensor in the pan or in the line going to the radiator/cooler which ever comes first. Another point of contention is where to put the accessory cooler(s). I strongly recommend in the line on the way to the radiator. This will cool the most as the fluid will be the hotest prior to being in the water bath. It also reduces the heat load on the radiator which can be a benefit.

Patrick

 

[hosejockey2002]

If you are towing with a light duty manual transmission truck, starting on a hill with a load is murder. If it's a heavy duty pickup, especially the new 6 speed diesels, first gear is so low that if you have to slip the clutch on a hill you are doing something seriously wrong. Even when I had my older F250 with 460 gas and a five speed I never smoked the clutch, even when towing 7,000 pounds. It definitely takes a bit more skill than just putting it in drive and mashing the gas, but if properly geared and driven, I think manual transmissions are easier on the equipment. As far as backing up a steep hill goes, if you are smoking the clutch in a low geared heavy duty pickup, in the same situation with an auto you will be putting that tranny under a tremendous amount of heat stress. I don't have one yet, but I would definitely prefer a 6 speed 4wd diesel. If first gear or reverse is still too tall, there is always low range.

 

[RobS]

The Ford Super Duty locking hubs have an Auto and a Lock position. In Auto it will engage moving forward (must be a ratchet mechanism) then disengage when the T-case is shifted out or you go backwards. Our builder has this set up and she got her truck stuck first day on our site. Did fine moving forward but only had 2WD in reverse. Her husband came out to find she hadn't locked the hubs. Once he did that all was well and of course I've had to rib her about it ever since.

It just goes to show that even that word "auto" inspires a false sense of confidence /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[RobS]

I think I'm following you Patrick...

Let's explore another aspect of driving. I like to listen to the radio when I drive. I set the volume to a level I like but find it too low at speed or if I put down the windows (with one of those automatic window putter downer things I might add). I always thought an automatic volume control would be great and it is now available on some vehicles (and motorcycles). Still fits my model as I have manually set the volume delta above ambient that I want to maintain. Take it a step further and the vehicle could assess your driving style and select the music to suit. If you are moving along briskly with a lot of accel/decel it could pick Rock and Roll. Stop and go traffic might suggest Rap. Drive down a bumpy road and the suspension sensors tell the radio to jump to a country station. Steady driving at or below the speed limit would result in easy listening. This makes perfect sense and would eliminate some crucial decisions on the part of the driver allowing more focus on the actual driving.

To go a bit further, let's consider the musicians making all that music. The Rap artists are probably the most advanced of the lot already using a lot of automatic music generation technology. All the rest have some room to grow. Why have any "manual" instruments. Music is just a collection of sounds, tones and rhythms. All of this can easily be generated on a computer now-a-days. Think of the savings!

Same with artwork. Why bother painting a picture when a digital camera can do a much better rendition automatically.

OK, I'll take my tongue out of my cheek now. Hopefully, we've had some fun and can all agree that like tractor color, it all boils down to personal preferences. After all, that's what makes life interesting anyway /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[Egon]

Rob:

Can't hear my radio cause of engine noise so never use it.

Egon

 

[Wingnut]

same as cars .... I had to factory order my last Camry in order to get a stick ... and it was the last year that they made the Camry with a stick.

otoh ... MY tractor has a stick! Unlike all these wussies and their automatics! (just kidding, guys)