Quote:
Originally Posted by philmcneal
i keep telling people, sure you won't have the power of a manual transmission but you can still save gas. Just abuse N and don't use your brakes.... but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO people think I'm rubbish....
enjoy paying for the gas sucker. If you haven't noticed, in D there's a potenial truth that somehow the gasoline engine is still feeding power THROUGH the torque converter which in turns go to the wheels. With it in N all power to the torque converter is now CUT and enough gas is pumped into the engine to prevent stalling.
By putting it in N you elminate the middle man, doesn't matter if D coasts as well as N, there's still resistance from the torque converter!.
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Fixed.
A torque converter is bolted to the flexplate (in a manual car, called the flywheel), bolted to the back side of the crankshaft. You have the rotating mass of the TC spinning which gives momentum unless you turn the ignition off and let the engine stop. You have to imagine a torque converter as a giant fluid filled metal doughnut. Spin the fluid inside, the metal fan-like vanes direct the fluid towards the input shaft and that is what spins the transmission and eventually, the wheels. It's a fluid coupling, not a physical connection. Now then you have lockup torque converters which can physically grab the input shaft and these are very close in efficiency to a regular manual transmission. Feels like letting out the clutch, if driving an automatic normally feels like driving with your foot resting on the clutch pedal.
That is how it's always felt for me since 1994, when I taught myself to drive standard, by myself, in the dead of winter, by buying an '86 Lynx with a 4-speed for $60 at an abandoned car auction. I rode my bike to the auction, wasn't planning to buy a car. I actually bought two, but the '80 Civic 1300DX I got had a thrown timing belt. I did actually drive that Civic. I would leave the clutch out, and crank it in gear long enough to get up to 4-5mph and then I'd jam on the clutch and coast 40-50 feet at a time. That's how I got it out of the impound lot and across the street to a mechanic shop to have it checked out. You can't do that in modern cars. Thought it was something simple, it wasn't. Fix was $700 on a $40 very rusty car, I scrapped it. But I kept the Lynx, sold it later for $350 still with no brakes and no muffler.
I do want a manual shift car for my next car. It's hard to do that though, with the wife demanding a family type vehicle, and I prefer cars with enough metal around me to not die when I get broadsided by Escalades and Land Cruisers. I may have found a solution in Mexico. They made the Chevy Celebrity down there like they did up here in the USA. But the ones in Mexico ALL have a manual transmission. 4-speed through 1986, 5-speed through 1989. Not a single automatic unless it was imported from the USA. Only downside is they're all V6 models, but at least it's only the 2.8L and with that overdrive 5-speed in a lightweight non-AC Celebrity coupe, it should do quite well. Coupes thru 88 only though so I'm torn between the 87-early 88 speed density and the late 88-89 MAF version as they didn't make the coupes in 89 and those late 88 coupes with the MAF system might be hard to find. Then again I like four doors, I have been called a four door ***** before and it won't be the last time.
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