Hacker News Reader

Comment by joeblau | Hacker News Reader

My brother has an R8, Viper, and Vantage (All Manual) and I would rather drive a Tesla over all 3 of them. Manual is fun and you get the feeling of control and I love driving them, but in reality, there is a reason they are on their way out. The main problem is that the replacement, automatic, make driving feel worse. The computers that manage automatic transmissions are so bad that they make automatics feel terrible to drive. EV's have their own problems, but changing gears is not one of them. Right now, my preference is:

  EV > Manual > Automatic

View on HN

Definitely this. I used to think I preferred manuals for the sense of control. When I got a Tesla, I realized what I was really looking for was responsiveness.

I also have an Audi TTS which is automatic but has a "manual" mode. Apparently it can shift faster than a human being, which makes it much quicker to leave it on auto if you're going for a fast 0-60 time. Just stomp on the gas and it'll shift at the optimum moment. But since that's rarely what I actually want to do, I find the auto-shifter too conservative for my taste most of the time and drive it in (no clutch) "manual." But the Tesla is just better: faster off the line, perfectly responsive, never in the wrong gear. I don't miss manual at all when I drive my Model S.

> When I got a Tesla, I realized what I was really looking for was responsiveness.

Yup.

The responsiveness of an EV makes even a Nissan Leaf feel surprisingly zippy.

When I drive my wife's CRV (which has a CVT), it feels bad when I floor it to pass someone and I have to wait for the RPMs to increase before it actually really begins to move. Even in my manual BRZ, it takes me a second to clutch in, give it gas to rev match while moving the shifter, and release the clutch. And I've had times dropping to second where I rev-matched poorly while releasing the clutch too fast, causing a bit of wheel spin, which made the traction control hit the brakes a bit.

Feels bad, man.

Looking forward to getting an EV in about 5 years. Planning on getting a Tesla Roadster if I can afford it. The wife would rather see me settle for a Model S P100D though.

My lust for the Roadster is at least partially offset by my desire not to be the kind of guy that drops $250K on a car. We'll see which wins out ...

It's only $250k for a "Founders Series" Roadster. The base model Roadster is only (hah..."only") $200k. So far, there haven't been any features announced for the "Founders Series" other than being one of the first 1,000 Roadsters to come off the line.

Not exactly a feature I give a damn about. Hell, by the time I'm ready to buy a Roadster, there will probably be some used ones available that I will pick up.

I have a manual transmission CTS-V and having a manual is a significant performance disadvantage these days. A 10 speed auto transmission will shift much faster than a 6sp manual driven by anyone even a professional, and it has more gears to sit in the sweet spot of motor torque/horsepower. If I buy another fast car it will 100% be an automatic. One thing I like about manual transmissions though is the reliability and maintainability. Problems with automatic transmissions can basically total a higher mileage car.

Some years ago, Brammo developed, but never sold, a 6 speed electric motorcycle:

https://www.wired.com/2011/05/brammo-six-speed-tranmission

The idea was that you got the low speed torque of an electric motor and the high top speed of a ICE.

It was probably a marginal improvement though, and really more of a manual transmission nostalgia play.

That is interesting. The one electric motorcycle that I heard of that was super fast was the KillaCycle[1]. I think it only had one gear though and a 0-60 mph of 0.97 seconds. The motorcycle nearly killed it's owner[2].

[1] - http://www.killacycle.com/

[2] - https://www.engadget.com/2007/09/13/all-electric-killacycle-...

is....is that how it got its name? (serious question)

LOL, I think they named it the Killa Cycle before the owner almost killed himself. A bit of foreshadowing I must say.

Mission Motors did one too. See https://www.fastcompany.com/1578451/object-desire-yves-behar...

> EV > Manual > Automatic

Same here. I drive an EV every day but have a 6 speed Miata for fun.

Yeah, my inner gearhead was a bit sad when I sold the manual car and we picked up a Tesla. That said 1-pedal driving is pretty great for curvy roads.

However we acquired an old '81 ford tractor a few years ago so I can wrench on that all I want while still enjoying the EV for daily driving.

I'm with you on the Miata being a super fun car. That's a great car for a track day.

"Automatic" is way to broad to be correct.

A DCT (Dual Clutch Transmission) like the Porsche PDK is not remotely comparable to a torque converter based transmission. Yet, both are categorized as "automatic".

And one of those cost approximately my annual salary and the other doesn't.

Telling people automatics are great when you are referencing a type that the majority of people will never have a chance of owning is a classic Hacker News manual-vs-automatic discussion trope.

Plenty of cars cheaper than a Porsche have a DCT.

Golf R, many Kia: e.g. a brand new Kia Soul for $22k.

I bet you dollars to donuts that the average person doesn't spend 5 figures on a car. They spend 4 figures on a second hand model.

100% agree. The only fun transmissions are manual or none at all. Automatics -- even the newest ones -- are good for driving minivans in traffic and nothing else, IMHO.

Looking at the replies to your comment, it appears that few repliers realize that Tesla S/X/3 all have just one gear.

Ditto for the Bolt and Leaf. This is the future of cars.

Hybrid cars too - Toyota, Ford, Chrysler, et al - almost all use a dual-motor/generator system with a planetary gearset to allow direct drive. At slow speeds, the engine is basically just to power the first motor/generator, which powers the second one. The transmission shifts power to direct engine by spinning the first motor/generator less, causing physical force to instead be transmitted through the planetary gearset. It's ingenious, and was invented in 1969.

Honda uses a different system where the engine is just a generator until highway speeds, when a wet cluch engages engine to wheels.

OK, I've never driven an EV.

Although I've mellowed a lot, what I love about manual transmissions is the ability to instantly ramp torque. It's especially useful for extreme turns. Do EVs have so much torque that it's not necessary?

EV's torque curve is different than a manual. Torque on an EV is instant so it available faster than a manual, but then tapers down (Because the cars are programmed that way). If you had performance manual transmission car, the torque curve keeps going up.

That's what when people drag race a Tesla, the Tesla wins in a quarter mile, but then all of these other high speed automobiles end up catching and passing the Tesla a few seconds afterwards. This video explains it[1].

[1] - https://youtu.be/KFol2ZQnASI?t=389

I get that torque for EVs is ~independent of rpm. But still, there's just one set of gearing, right? So the effective torque at the wheels is also ~independent of rpm.

And yes, torque at the wheels is likely much greater for Teslas than for my Civic VTEC in third gear. But I wonder about second gear. I mean, the car has wide low-profile tires, and I can spin them on dry pavement in second, from a standing start. And it takes some skill to avoid doing that when starting in first.

Get a sports car, put it in manual mode, and you get the perks of choosing gears during the drive without stalling your engine.

But you can't skip gears like you can in a manual, which matters more when you have 10 speeds reaching mass market.

I hate using manual mode in an automatic. I love driving stick. The fun in driving stick isn't from being able to pick gears.

What does skipping gears get you that quick sequential shifts don't?

My feeling is the opposite. Paddle shifters are the closest I'll get to driving an F1 car, and I've put a decent amount of time in with a racing wheel and pedals and racing sims and that's where I get all of my muscle memory for my Golf GTI.

I can still skip from 2-6 on a freeway onramp or 6-4 for passing faster than 8/10 speeds can go 2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10.

There's no point revving out all my gears in real world driving, I just want to reach the speed limit as fast as possible then go into overdrive. DCTs are very fast at switching into what they think is your next gear. They're quite slow at switching if you want to switch more gears.

2-6? That never happens. You'd probably blow your engine before you did it. Not many people hitting 50 mph in 2nd gear.

Tell that to Porsche who thinks 85mph is a reasonable top end for 2nd gear. Even a Miata will hit ~60 in 2nd.

Given the low end for 6th is around 35mph, 2-6 is plenty doable without going anywhere near redline.

My Subaru WRX would beg to differ... 60 Mph in second gear, then shift to 6th to do highway traffic, just fine.

After a week of driving manual you will never stall the engine.

When people learn to drive it's usually the panic rather than technique that makes people stall, anyway

For me it's not really about choosing the gears, per se. Yeah I can do that in an automatic, but it's hardly the same. With a manual you get coordination between foot, hand, brain, and you are one with the car. For an enthusiast it matters.

My automatic is terrible and has had several software recalls. I wish I’d chosen manual.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com