ShaffNasty

If you have a manual you can always get the WOT box and then you never have to let off the gas to shift... ; )

P.S. anyone else getting Mormon ad banners at the bottom??? i mean WTF!

sugoxb2

They are useless .... if you want to play with the gears .... get a MT ....

cobb

Everyone can play with gears, only a few can really work the clutch.

I really enjoyed piissing off my dad who took a test ride with me last weekend. I used it a few stop to "shift" gears. He had the same attitude as some of the posters here who are against the feature.

Just think, many cars offer this feature with switches on the steering wheel

Next tank I will try shifting manually and see if I can beat the system when it comes to fuel economy. It seems to like most auto, down shift too early, but its great at upshifting once rolling.

1box2nv

i will agree that it is like an "old automatic" in the sence that it will allow you to shift through each gear but if you were just wanting to "get on it" from a stop i think the s mode allows it to accelerate quicker because you can wind the gears out more than if you just left it in drive....i havent ever tried to let it hit the rev limiter but it pulled all the way to redline before i shifted it....it wouldnt do that if i left it in "d"

buickid

I've never seen a dyno sheet for the xB, but I'd venture to say you wouldn't get much quicker even if you held it in gear. Peak torque comes at about 4000 RPMs in this car, so the point at which the computer upshifts when you're WOT probably brings it back down to around 4000 RPMs. Also, a review I read stated that the xB was quicker when left in Drive, rather then Sport Shift. The computer is quite smart...

Also, the xB will bounce off the limiter if you hold it in gear. ;)

FromTheOld

Really? It'll bounce off the limiter if you use sportshift to hold it in gear? Have you tried it first-hand? I ask because I've never REALLY tried to do it and I just assumed it would in one of my earlier posts (which I've now edited a little) because of how intrusive the transmission ECU is and also because I read from someone else that it would shift anyway. So yeah, just waiting for a confirmation

DJ_FroZone

iTrader: (2)

o it bounces rather nicely. :D

buickid

Well I've never tried HOLDING it at the rev limiter, to do so would be pretty stupid. What I did was, pulling out of a on-ramp, leave it in 1st, ran 'er all the way up the the limiter, bounced for about half a second, and then poped it into 2nd. You don't really want to hold at the rev limiter because a) 7.5k is a lot of RPMs, lots of wear and tear going on, and b) You're not accelerating any more when you hit the rev limiter.

FromTheOld

Of course you don't want to hold it there, but I just want to see if the transmission is "invasive" as I think it is.

Well thanks for the information. This is good stuff to know.

cobb

I mainly use it to stop hard. If you upshift to a gear it cant go into it just beeps 3 times. I also used it when I drove to wv to engine brake going down the grades. It easily braked me in 3rd to 60 and held it.

Ive notice once the torque converter locks it seems to accelerate faster. So, I give it 2 grand or less til it hits 40 and you hear it lock, then give it more gas to get up to highway speeds.

FromTheOld

Wouldn't that be downshifting?

xseveredveganx

If you're in snow, I think the sport shift would be helpful.

I know it helps me get started if I start off in first gear. Helps me from spinnin.

cobb

I guess it depends on how you look at it, like scroll up or scroll down. You press scroll down to move the page up. In up shifting, I mean from 3rd to 2nd or 1st, shifting up from previous gear.

buickid

Downshifting is what happens when you're merging and you push the pedal down to the floor for more power. Upshifting is what happens when you're accelerating from a stop, up to highway speeds. As you speed up, the gears need to change (upshift), or you'll hit redline.

CIONIDE

iTrader: (1)

What are you smoking?

See signature below.

cobb

Ok, so you down shift to get more speed or accelerate and merge and upshift to accelerate from a dead stop, what do you call it when you shift "through" to the lower gears to engine brake and stop faster?

cobb

I have an engineering background, plus I think I am autistic and a bad speller.

FromTheOld

I still call it downshifting, because the number is going down/being reduced (3rd gear to 2nd gear, 3 to 2).

Are you referring to me?

EDIT: Nevermind, just found out from your post that you were talking to cobb.

CIONIDE

iTrader: (1)

cobb, I was just kidding, and giving you a hard time.

To answer your question in a general sense; anytime you shift from a numerically higher gear, to a numerically lower gear, you are downshifting (e.g. 4th to 3rd to 2nd to 1st).

Conversely; anytime you shift from a numerically lower gear, to a numerically higher gear, you are upshifting (e.g. 1st to 2nd to 3rd to 4th).

buickid

That is downshifting.

I think you are missing the concept of how internal combustion engines work. They have a relatively narrow RPM "powerband" where they can put out the most power. The idea of a transmission is to keep the engine in this powerband. If the engine were directly connected to the wheels, you would either accelerate very slowly if at all, or you would not be able to go very fast, depending on the gear ratio in the axle.

The transmission uses a gear reduction in pretty much every gear except overdrive in most transmissions. (ie input shaft rotational speed is faster then output shaft rotational speed). This allows you to multiply the torque of the engine as you accelerate, and as you gain speed, shifting to the next higher gear gives less of a reduction. (Higher speed, less torque) Not sure if this makes sense, but I'm really tired. Haha

Think of it like a 10 speed bicycle. In 1st gear, its very easy to start going and pedal, but you might be going 10MPH even if you're cranking the pedals like mad. In 10th gear, you can go pretty fast down the street, but if you were to stop and try and start pedaling again, you would probably have to stand on the pedals to get moving.