Toyota Patented an EV Manual Transmission That Stalls, so It Feels Real
thedrive.com
thedrive.com
But it also has the potential to confuse people. I saw a Reddit post about the same car where the OP was concerned because the car sounded like it was redlining too much before it shifted, and people had to tell him that the car has no transmission and thus no shifting. It’s all in your head, man.
While accelerating lightly, it just stays at a constant ~2,500 rpm. If I'm flooring it, it's at a constant ~5,000 rpm. Once I've reached my desired speed and let go, it tends to sit at about 1,500 rpm.
Taking a CVT and making it act like it has discrete gears absolutely destroys all the advantages a CVT offers. In theory, a CVT is the best transmission, as it can always precisely hold the engine speed at either max fuel efficiency for cruising, or max horsepower for accelerating fast, and everywhere in between.
Manual transmission cars are still way more fun to me, unless I had to drive through Seattle or SF or something.
The rest of the people who currently drive in Seattle are a bigger nuisance.
Toyota is in denial. They can’t imagine a future in which their expertise in ICE becomes obsolete and irrelevant.
Go listen to Red Barchetta - RUSH.
The idea that Toyota, a company that has nothing but stalled on EV and fought EV regulation at every step has internally already perfected every aspect of EVs is just nonsense.
Their initial products are not competitive in price or performance (or anything really).
Some people have really gone in the deep end with Toyota and believe that Toyota can not actually make mistakes. It all some 4D galaxy brain strategy. Its impossible that they simply bet on the wrong technology, had stubborn leadership, under invested in EV (and battery production) and are now paying the price. Of course not its all brilliant strategy. They fired their CEO, despite his amazingly brilliant strategy. They also invested billions in hydrogen with virtually no results just to throw people so they don't know that Toyota has already perfected EVs. And they invested billions in their solid state batteries, that will be in mass production by 2022 (what year is it?).
There is literally 0 evidence that Toyota has 'figured out' EV. And there is a literal mountain of evidence suggesting the opposite.
Why don't they put fake spark plugs in that need regular change?
We don't all live in the suburban highway hellscape. Try going for a mountain or coastal-cliff drive. I bet you'd smile.
As we speak right now there are robo-cabs driving themselves on the streets of San Francisco. Of course, they’re not perfect.
Maybe self-driving is further away than we initially thought and certainly further away than Elmo promised, but anyone who who runs a car company and thinks that humans will drive themselves in 10-20 years is being willfully ignorant.