acadian

169stang, the TMS member who got the 12 second run and has the video on the site, said that his experience at the track was that '05 Mustangs with auto trannies were getting the best times by manually shifting their autos. I thought I'd start this thread to discuss this idea and hopefully get some feedback from those with experience.

I have a couple questions to start this off... first of all, will this hurt your transmission over time? And second, obviously you start in 1, then go to 2 and 3... but then do you go one more and put it into D? And if so, will that put the tranny into 4th and then it will continue as it would if it had always been in D? Or if you manually shift it, can you not go higher than 3rd gear? My first thought would be that manually shifting up from 3 to D would put the tranny back into first gear and mess something up.

If manually shifting the first 3 gears of the auto can save us auto drivers a tenth of a second or maybe more, this is very interesting to me. Plus, it would be cool to every once and a while have the illusion that you are driving a stick and controlling the gears. I have always driven sticks, and although the auto in this car is great, I miss the manual from time to time.

96vert

Hmmm sounds scary to me - like I would hear a huge CRUNCH and see the transmission sitting on the road under me.

Anyway, give this a read, may aid the discussion. (I haven't yet, but plan to)

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/automa...ansmission.htm

acadian

Good read, but nothing there on manually shifting it.

slegos888

pros-nothing
cons-say goodbye to your tranny!

Purple Hayz

:scratch: not sure what that's about.

You won't do any harm to the trans by manually shifting it, and it certainly won't go into 1st gear at 90 mph when you put it in drive. I've shifted dozens of autos this way and have never had a problem. Most people who manually shift an auto do so because the computer won't hold a gear long enough, is slow to shift, etc. etc. Given all the praise the A5 has gotten, however, I'm not sure you will shave much time off your ETs by shifting yourself.

incorrigible

Not advisable! Better to take that $2,000+ (the cost of replacing your torched tranny) and put it into performance parts. Compromising your transmission for a few tens of a second gain is not a good trade off IMHO!

acadian

I thought the same thing, but I am trying to hold off all judgement here and stick to facts only, not opinion or even logical guesses. Do you have concrete proof that manually shifting an auto has hurt the transmission? And I am not talking about doing this all the time. Just when I may be at a light and want to street race, given my conditions and surroundings allow, and I want to stay in those lower gears a little longer.

So, Purple Hayz, you are saying that when you manually shift it from 3 to D, it will go directly into 4th gear?

incorrigible

I thought you were asking for advice from forum members? :scratch:

If you want serious answers from people in the buisness, may I suggest talking with these guys... http://www.performanceautomatic.com/ Call and ask to speak with one of their techs. See if, along with the pros and cons, what they might suggest to help out your automatic.

They helped me in the past with an AODE!


J.

SixtySix

Ok Fella's, all those who say NOT to manually shift the auto. What real experience do have with this? I'm thinking NONE.

Here's a FACT. The very auto transmission in our Mustangs is the same one that comes with a manual shift option on the Lincoln LS. It is the exact same transmission.

In my many years of driving, I've owned a few auto's and many manuals. I've NEVER toasted an auto tranny by manually shifting it.

Sure this one is a lot different, but I don't think they would put the same transmission in another car designed to be manually shifted. The only difference is the shifter.

Back to the original question of what are the advantages and disadvantages.

The advantage is that while this transmission is more than capable of providing snappy shifts while just leaving it in drive, especially at WOT, you can still gain an advantage by shifting it manually due to the dropoff in RPM's between shifts.

At WOT leaving it in "D" will take the shifts all the way to just short of redline, but the RPM's between shifts drop off more in "D" than if you manually did it.

The disadvantage is that it will make it easier to hit the rev limiter. But let's remember something. There is a rev limiter in place to prevent you from going to far, so the only thing to get hurt is your ego

The same goes for downshifting manually with the auto. The car will not let you do something real stupid. You won't be able to downshift to first gear while you're doing a hundred, you'll only hit the next lowest gear as long as the rpm's are within acceptable limit's.

GhostTX

Remember, only when you downshift do you need to hit the button. Most automatics you can upshift without depressing the button from 1-D. You always need to push the button to get to R or P.

So if you are manually upshifting, just slide it up. Since you are not depressing the button, there's no fear of accidentally going into R that would potentially hurt the tranny.

acadian

I'll at least try this once when I have a open and dry road (it's been storming over here as of late). And I'll see how it feels.

SixtySix

True, and even that's nearly impossible even if you do depress the button.

The only difference between the "manumatics" and what we have is that on a "manumatic" you would have a shifter that would lock in every gear change.

What we have just "slides" into the next gear, you could easily slide right past your intended gear and go on to the next one.

Like I said in the previous thread sooner or later the aftermarket will come out with a performance oriented shifter for these.

The other question that went unanswered is what gear is "D". "D" is fourth, and if OD is on, 5th as well.

Jim

The owners manual goes over this a bit. I shift manually all the time, if you go to D it will shift to 4th gear. The computer still monitors the shifting for safety, it will
not allow you to downshift if it is unsafe to the system, if you try to shift from a higher gear to a lower one and the engine speed is too high or MPH is too high, it
will stay at the present gear until you slow down. However I still would like to "beef" it up some as it is rated at 400HP at flywheel, before you ask thats what I got via email from Whipple. Thats why their SC kit for the auto will have lower boost and some tricks with engine management. I would like to install a external cooler as that will always help. but don't know how to add fluid or check level after doing this. I'm waiting for the tranny shops to get up to speed on this box so
I can have this done with other mods.

Jim

Jim

I'm a slow typer, SixtySix said what I was trying to say.

incorrigible

" Ok Fella's, all those who say NOT to manually shift the auto. What real experience do have with this? I'm thinking NONE. "

Four Mustangs (2 of them AODE's), plus several other automatic equipt cars! Ya I have SOME experience!

B)


He can obviously go ahead and do it, I just gave my OPINION. I would hate to see Acadian, slowely or otherwise, reck his transmission for the sake of a few extra .10's.

I'm obviously no expert and never claimed to be.

Purple Hayz

As many have said, exactly

check out the following for an awesome read on the joys of shifting an automatic: http://www.thecarconnection.com/index.asp?article=3835

The guy runs a racing school, btw

Snikt

I've got a solution, just buy a manual tranny?

incorrigible

That makes too much sense Aaron!

SixtySix

Sorry if I called you out Jake, it's all good.

I like options

acadian

I would have got a manual, but my wife shares the car with me and she refuses to learn how to drive one. Plus, I do 99% city stop&go driving. There is nothing wrong with this auto at all. I love it... just might feel the need to go through the gears myself once ina while. And thanks for all the info.