> - Manual transmissions in cars
Only in US, in EU about 80% of new cars have manual transmission.
Only in US, in EU about 80% of new cars have manual transmission.
Not aware of any eu stats
https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/analysis-are-man...
An automatic transmission is a non-trivial amount of weight--especially on the small cars present in the EU--and affects gas mileage tremendously.
Driving a manual in heavy stop and go traffic, however, sucks rocks whether you are in LA or Palermo. You are continuously playing the "rolling game" in order to minimize stress on your clutch to avoid burning it up.
I presume these same forces will be the ones that cause the EU to switch to electric cars first.
This is a case of 'citation needed'. It's not like manual gearboxes are weightless. Then there the likes of CVT.
What do they add is to manufacturing costs. A simple manual transmission is, well, simple, and has looser tolerances (the driver compensates). Automatic transmissions require more exotic materials - in the past we had to use whale oil, which drove their costs to unsustainable prices in non-US markets.
> Surprisingly, the fuel prices in Europe are quite exorbitant. The automatic cars tend to be heavier and can even lead to a loss in the drivetrain, thus more of fuel consumption. On the other hand, the manual is much more economical and affordable to drive. The technological advancements are making the automatic more fuel efficient though.
modern automatic, the 7-10 gear kind with a high end smart enough controller, and even that is not a given. It's basically an epicyclic gear train + a torque converter sloshing in oil (basically using fluid as a clutch that never wears out), which has big loss overall (because fluid dynamics), and the added gears+smarts in control offsets that, but they're generally less efficient mechanically than a simple manual gear train.
That said, the "automatic" moniker these days covers a whole lot of varying technologies, including CVT, and automatic (single or dual, wet or dry) clutch+gear change, which are basically manual gearboxes except stick and clutch are not mechanically user operable but driven by servos. And there you get the benefit of the more efficient gearbox and the smart control (a.k.a shift to the higher gear possible ASAP when little torque is needed instead of having the engine stay at a higher RPM, which means more travel, which means more friction)
All things being equal, MPG ratings are usually (there are exceptions) a dead giveaway of the kind of gearbox.
(Oh, and I wouldn't be surprised the least if tomorrow I learned that gearbox control programs would be "tuned" to get good MPG tests with flying colours, the VW way.)
But all of this doesn't really matter, parallel hybrid (e.g Prius&al) basically requires a more complex drivetrain involving an epicyclic gearbox+torque converter (thus auto) (+ IIRC some kind of differential gear train) to mix the two mechanical power sources that can rotate at different speeds (including not rotating at all), and serial hybrid is basically an EV, except with a power generator on board, and EV means either no gearbox or low-count gear one that is entirely driven automatically.
So, manual is going to die anyway as we're being pushed towards low emission vehicles.
Also, a factor of stick being popular in EU is also that in most countries its product bracket and image used to be placed as luxury/high end, and thus used to be subject to higher taxes/insurance premiums for some reason, which pushed the market towards the cheaper option.