how do you operate a semi-automatic transmission?
9 Answers
well, the kind of semi auto I am wanting to know how to operate is the kind on porsche's and ferraris
i thought they were kind of like paddle shifter with the push of a button but i dont really know anything about those. could be totally wrong. im used to drag cars.
Its pretty simple its either paddle shifters around the steering wheel which you can use to shift up or down. Or the gear selector goes into a different position which lets you move it back and foward which shifts the car. None of these use a clutch.
so it is known today as "tiptronic" or "slapshift"?
Something like that, the transmission takes care of the clutch business for you.
now that is just too cool and I am stuck in the days when the automatic transmission was still on the column
Hahah, I know how you feel. A lot of newer cars are coming with semi-autos now. They kinda came about as a result of new emissions laws, auto trannys made it easier to meet emissions standards so they just stuck computer controled "manuals" into cars instead of a clutch.
Hi Josh... The trannys are pretty easy really... they usually have a automatic mode where the car just takes care of the gears for you and the manual mode where your doing the shifting (usually if your under-reving or bouncing the car off the redline the car will shift just to remind you that your being a idiot... ) The trannys are notoriously a pain the the ass to park with and are higher matinence than standard trannys... but they do offer fantastic performance figures and they are hard to beat as far as track performance goes... The ferrari 360 i drove was equipped with such a tranny... I found it a little slow but it was realitively new tech then and didnt see the benifit untill i was pulling from 60 to 90 through a corner... pull the paddle and it shifts Most wont let you overrev the car and just wont shift down if your revs are too high and they will display a warning on the dash... With the 599 the system comes with a launch control that uses the semi auto to get you to 60 in about 3.5 seconds... however for the driving enthusiast haha... and for the sake of saving your clutch... you can get it there faster by causing a malfunction warning to appear (pulling both paddles for 3 seconds when stopped in this case) putting the tranny in neutreal, then building the revs to 4 grand and then slipping it into first.... its a pretty cool way to make lots of smoke and generate lots of speed... haha... You should know that most ferrari and lamborghini trannys are notoriously hard on clutches and generally need replacing every 10000 miles... Cheers!