racetested

This may be common knowledge or mentioned before but searching by title brought up no results.

In the past if down-shifting or up-shifting manually with the automatic I assumed you had to do it by each gear at a time. Well the other day I read a post in another forum of this site for another model and the trans acts the same way.

You can just hold the shifter (left) if down-shifting or (right) if up-shifting and the car will automatically go to the best gear. Example: cruising on the highway and getting ready to make a pass. Instead of waiting for the slow automatic down-shift you can hold the shifter to the left and the car may jump down to 3rd gear from 6th or 7th to put you in a nice powerband so now when you get ready to pass you are in much better power and sooner.

From there the car will shift automatically at redline so no worries of shifting manually anymore.

Same goes if manually shifting but you decide I just want to be in full automatic again, you just hold the shifter to the right and the trans goes to "D".

These are nice tips for getting the most out of the auto-stick trans the dealer never mentioned to me. Here I am shifting one gear at a time. The owners manual may have covered this but I guess I missed or skipped this part when reading it.

Uga Uga

Thanks very useful info, I will give it a go

Mu9enx

thanks. i always wondered what would happen if i did that while driving. always thought it would flip back to gear 1 and i'd f cked up my tranny. thanks!

AsianML

The electronic safety nets in place with TouchShift make it very hard to screw up the tranny.

chilledbenz

Yes it shifts automatically which makes it useless from a performance stand point. Although you would want to shift it yourself once it got to the redline there are instances when you want to hold a gear a bit longer and it won't let you.

Sanjuro Makabe

yea I've been using this method as well, works great...

however can anyone tell me if downshifting gears to slow down a car is safe with this transmission?

I used to drive stick and I always use downshifting to slow down the car...now with auto, can I do the same? (a habit I guess)...

TIA

ManchesterMerc

To prevent engine from over revving, the auto transmission does not shift down if you push the selector lever towards D- while driving at to higher speed.

Thats what it says in the manual

RLE

Certainly. I do it every day.

Sanjuro Makabe

thx!

narky

You sure can, but why would you? By downshifting to decrease speed, you are essentially using a very, very expensive part of your car (drivetrain--engine, transmission, etc), rather than something much cheaper and much easier to replace (brakes -- pads, rotors, etc). It's "safe," but there will be more wear and tear with increased use.

I'm not sure why you would want to do that, unless you were in a racing/tracking situation and every millisecond counts. And if you were a real racer, you'd be racing with a car paid for by sponsors, at which point money is no object. In that case, you do what you gotta do to keep the RPMs high and ready for the go-go-go.

You can go ahead and drive as you like, but I always use my brakes to slow down. I only use my engine to go faster, not slower.

Oh, I drive a C300 stick now.

Carsy

I agree with Narky but in some instances on a long steep decline ( especially when towing) it is good in my opinion to use a little engine braking to keep the brakes from over heating. If you have ever experienced brake fade down a steep hill you will agree!
I have a very steep 1 mile dirt track ( trail) to our house.On the way down I select 1 in Auto & put the Air Conditioning on . No brakes are used , minimum fuel & the A/C gets it weekly run which lubricates the seals & gives longer life.!!
Carsy.

narky

You are absolutely, 100% correct. Thanks for pointing that out. I forgot to mention the need for engine braking on steep declines. I do the same as well. Gotta save the brakes on long, steep hills (EX: descending a steep mountain--coming from skiing maybe?) Good point!

Thankfully, I live in California, where such terrain is quite rare.

Sanjuro Makabe

thank you so much for the replies, I will definitely keep them in mind!!

narky

Feel free to punch me in the mouth if I'm wrong, but I'm guessing you're Japanese, judging from your ID. Watch a little Initial D, lately?

Dun worry, I'm not hatin'. Initial D pretty much shaped my adolescence. That show is also the reason for the last line on my signature.

c350blknav

Yup I knew that before my test drive so when I downshifted from D5 to D2 my salesman was like WTF? LOL he didn't even know. HAHAHHA You just hold it to the left, all the way for like 4 -6 seconds or so. I wonder if the paddles on the 63 do that also? Or does it go down one gear at a time only?

Sanjuro Makabe

lol, thats funny coz I actually don't like Initial D...I mean I don't hate it, o/w I would go for a Jap rice box rather than this

I guess the bottom line is I used to drive a stick and I'm just not used to semi-auto

but honestly tho, all the opinions here make sense...

thanks again

narky

How could you not like Initial D?

I'm not much into the drifting scene and all, but I do like the show for the fact that it involves a lot of driving as part of the plot. Actually, to say that the show shaped my adolescence is a lie, as I first watched it when I was 26... I guess it sorta gave me a second one. It briefly made me wanna give up my job and become a pro racer.

djf1

Yes it will at the redline, but if you keep it below it will not. I use the manual mode daily as with traffic I like to be in the torque band of the engine and its been very useful. I find that in D mode it takes ages for the tranny to respond so you really have to drive it manually unless you are cruising.