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elfsI came across a report recently that said that the number of cars sold with manual transmissions had dropped from 18% in 2000 to 15% last year, and that driving schools across the country were disposing of their manuals and not giving classes in them anymore. This was true despite the fact that manuals are 5-10% more fuel efficient and, when push comes to shove (literally, in some cases), safer than automatics.
One of the driving school teachers stated that she had driven a manual for many years, but had switched to an automatic recently because "stop and go city driving took the fun out of a manual." I found that bewildering, because driving a stick is so instinctively easy for me that I find myself rarely thinking about what gear I need to be in. My cars for the last fifteen years have been manuals.
An automatic transmission is a computer with hydraulics instead of electronics and is powered by the torque from your engine. It's so inefficient a system that it eats a significant amount of the power your engine puts out-- more than your air conditioner, in some cases. It's also making decisions over a gross range of options-- four or five, in most cases. It doesn't take much brain power to replace that, which is why I've always been puzzled by the prevalence of automatics beyond, say, people missing their right arm.
The article went on to surmise that the reason so few people drove a manual was because in our high-tech, multitasking age, people wanted their right hand free to fiddle with their cell phones, the radio, their GPS, and their lunch. I suppose that makes sense. Not safety sense, but human sense.
I wonder, though, if you'd find a higher acceptance of manual transmissions among Linux users. Both, after all, have similar profiles: they offer more power, but to be capable of doing so you have to have a slightly higher skill level than the average user. I would think they'd have a similar amount of attraction.
One of the driving school teachers stated that she had driven a manual for many years, but had switched to an automatic recently because "stop and go city driving took the fun out of a manual." I found that bewildering, because driving a stick is so instinctively easy for me that I find myself rarely thinking about what gear I need to be in. My cars for the last fifteen years have been manuals.
An automatic transmission is a computer with hydraulics instead of electronics and is powered by the torque from your engine. It's so inefficient a system that it eats a significant amount of the power your engine puts out-- more than your air conditioner, in some cases. It's also making decisions over a gross range of options-- four or five, in most cases. It doesn't take much brain power to replace that, which is why I've always been puzzled by the prevalence of automatics beyond, say, people missing their right arm.
The article went on to surmise that the reason so few people drove a manual was because in our high-tech, multitasking age, people wanted their right hand free to fiddle with their cell phones, the radio, their GPS, and their lunch. I suppose that makes sense. Not safety sense, but human sense.
I wonder, though, if you'd find a higher acceptance of manual transmissions among Linux users. Both, after all, have similar profiles: they offer more power, but to be capable of doing so you have to have a slightly higher skill level than the average user. I would think they'd have a similar amount of attraction.
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Linux User here...
Date: 2006-06-26 04:24 am (UTC)Every single vehicle me and my mother own or have owned except for one has been, and is, a manual. The sole exception being the 1986 Jeep Comanche Pickup truck with an augmented factory towing package, which mandated an automatic with a transmission cooler with no option of a manual. 1990 Mitsubishi Eclipse GST, 1986 Honda Civic, 1987 Toyota Corolla FX, 1986 Porsche 944, and various 50's and 60's cars that my mom owned before I was old enough to even think about driving than I can remember, all of them have been manuals.
And oddly, I believe I heard recently that this trend towards hydraulic automatics is, like SUV's, something almost purely American in basis. That information was about a year to two years ago though, so it might have shifted some since then.
But I still find it baffling that more car's don't just come with some kind of electronically-clutched, electronically-shifted 'automatic' mode on a manual transmission if people want automation so much. Is the 80-100 or more moving gears and plates and parts in a pure-hydraulic automatic really cheaper to make somehow than the two-dozen parts and four or five solenoids needed to hook up a computer to a manual transmission?
Re: Linux User here...
Date: 2006-06-26 04:33 am (UTC)Re: Linux User here...
Date: 2006-06-26 07:22 am (UTC)It's certainly true that a lot of people don't know how to change gear at the right time. Go through the twisty bits in a clapped-out Mini (the original, not the modern fake), and watch the flash cars trail far behind.
Maybe it makes a difference which side of the vehicle the driver sits. As a Brit, I'm steering with my right hand when I change gear.
Re: Linux User here...
Date: 2006-06-26 07:37 am (UTC)As at that point one could devote one's entire 'left side' to gear-shifting, as I believe you folks still have your clutch on the left side as well if I recall correctly.
And most of the studies of 'an automatic can shift faster than a skilled driver' refer to computer-controlled 'clutchless' manuals that are still, at their core, a set of gears with each pair of gears attached to a fork. Just instead of having a clutch pedal the computer does that part, and some remove the 'standard' shifter and handle moving the forks as well. Those are much faster than any human being can physically move the lever, let alone time it with the pedal. :-)
Re: Linux User here...
Date: 2006-06-26 11:28 am (UTC)On reflection, that's a bit of an artificial situation in itself. For cornering, you need to be in the right gear at the right point, and I'm not sure how the traditional auto-transmissions handle that. Kick-down? The only car I drove with an auto-transmission was in the limousibe class.
Re: Linux User here...
Date: 2006-06-26 06:32 pm (UTC)