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Comments
Maybe it is just that I'm used to no shifts at all (CVT)!
But in any case, I decided to go with a more fuel efficient vehicle, since I seldom used the 7 passenger capability.
The dealer had 40 - yes, 40 - Escape / Mariner / Tribute hybrids on the lot, ready for delivery.
They had 3 T-Rex, and the only Limited was in black. I drove an SEL, which didn't even have the aux air conditioning. Unbelievable.
I can see why the car isn't selling. I was shopping at Galpin Ford, the largest volume dealer in the world.
Just a correction . . . you're used to LOTS of SMALL shifts. You'd hate something that never shifted.
It's just that there are so many small shifts (instead of a few big ones) that you don't NOTICE the shifting.
Long live the CVT!
CVT = CONTINUOUSLY Variable Transmission. There are no shifts at all, the power is continuously sent to the wheels.
"variation" = Shift.
If there's no shifting, there's no variation in gear ratio.
If the gear ratio CHANGES, then it must be SHIFTING. It's just doing it in very, very small increments. Almost like "continuous".
It is a matter of semantic in some respects, but I think the distinction is important.
Every point along the continuum is a ratio, but there are infinite possibilities within the minimum and maximum values. There are no defined points where the transmission "shifts" to a different ratio. The conventional definition of an AT "shift" is where the ratio changes. This happens continuously with the CVT.
Maybe it is just that I'm used to no shifts at all (CVT)!
Not sure what you mean by "abrupt" exactly. I've driven the TX for a total of 6 weeks now, and I have noticed a bit more shifting that I am used to. I attribute it to the fact that I went from driving a 4-speed to a 6-speed, so I am not used to the 2 additional shifts to get it into the highest gear. It isn't annoying by any means, just an observation. When it does shift, it is very smooth, and the extra gears means that I can cruise at 65 mph with the tach under 2000 rpm.
The dealer had 40 - yes, 40 - Escape / Mariner / Tribute hybrids on the lot, ready for delivery.
They had 3 T-Rex, and the only Limited was in black. I drove an SEL, which didn't even have the aux air conditioning. Unbelievable.
I can see why the car isn't selling. I was shopping at Galpin Ford, the largest volume dealer in the world
Dealers around here don't seem to stock a lot of them, either. I think it is a chicken-and-egg type thing. The TX doesn't sell so dealer don't stock them, but if they don't stock them, people are less likely to buy them!
Exactly . . . the CVT is (or at least can) continually adjust the gear ratio . . . thus, it is continually SHIFTING.
It's just that it's shifts are so small as to seem imperceptible, as compared to the larger shifts made by a normal automatic tranny.
- Chad
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Pivgetriebe.png
&
http://www.vibratesoftware.com/html_help/html/Diagnosis/Reference/CVT_Transmissi- - - ons.htm
& http://www.lasercannon.com/cvt.htm
- Chad
And.. by definition, a CVT is incapable of "shifting" gears. It has none to "shift".
Please define "shift".
I define "shift" as a change in gear ratio.
Thus, by definition, ANY transmission (including a CVT) "shifts".
In fact, if you didn't need to shift, you wouldn't NEED a transmission.
It is shifting the gear ratio. Just because it's not shifting GEARS to do it doesn't mean that it's not shifting.
This is just like trying to get to the bottom of the whole is it a wagon or is it a cuv debate...
LOL....
Nope . . I think continually SHIFT is better . . . that's why I used the phrase.
That one's simple . . . it's a CUV wagon. :P
This all got started when I described my T-Rex test drive, and I'll reiterate - I vastly preferred the FS to the T-Rex so far as "shifting" is concerned. There is nothing like a CVT...
Indeed, it is. And a lot of very minute "shifts" feels far better than just a couple of LARGE jolting shifts.
Saying that a transmission is continuously shifting is not complementary in a review because it implies repeated hesitating and stuttering
Only to the uninformed.
In a CVT one doesn't feel any sense of shifting
And that's the magic of it . . . you GET the shifting without FEELING it.
so saying it's always shifting leaves the wrong impression.
Does a 6-speed transmission shift more frequently than a 4-speed transmission? (I would say yes). Does it feel more SMOOTH than a 4-speed tranny? (I'd say yes). What's so confusing about it? More smaller shifts = smoother shifting!
So - correct - more gears = smoother shifts. Just like accelerating your car is smoother than increasing velocity in constant intervals (10, 20, 30 mph etc).
Rather than building 6, 8, 10 ... speed transmissions - Ford and others simply went to the end point. Same as snowmobiles have been since they were invented.
Shifting "gears" is just short-hand for shifting "gear ratio". Which is the same thing as shifting "leverage".
If a CVT isn't shifting anything, it has no purpose in life.
Bingo. An automatic transmission is just using gears to shift the input/ouput ratio. The CVT shifts this ratio by using pulleys/belts. And it does it in a lot more smaller increments.
I don't need a mathematician to explain it to me. I'm quite well-versed in the calculus, since I'm engineer.
You haven't lived until you've been through partial differential equations, tensor analysis and point set topology. :P
tidester, host
SUVs and Smart Shopper
In that case, if everyone understands the the mathematics, then I don't understand the debate.
When I drive a manual tranny or downshift my automatic or cause my derailleur to move my bike chain, I'm shifting.
When I hop on a snowmachine or steer my buddy's outboard or sit at my sewing machine, there's (usually) a belt from the engine to the track or prop or needle mechanism. I give it gas and it goes - I back off the gas and it slows. There's no "shifting." I'm thinking my tablesaw would act the same way if it had a rheostat instead of an on/off button.
The marketing people have figured it out - since many people expect their cars to "shift" some CVT transmissions have been configured to simulate shift points and bumps to reassure those drivers.
But yes, there are some technologies people just don't want to deal with and don't accept so they have to be simulated back to what they are most familiar with. I think many people would also be surprised that their car may not have a throttle cable either.
I've had partial differential equations.
Here's my summary of engineering mathematics:
Calculus 1: Anything can be differentiated (OK, the function has to be smooth and continuous)
Calculus 2: A lot of things can be integrated, though it's helpful to know which trick to apply when
Calculus 3: You can do some neat volume calculations with integrals
Differential Equations: Some of these are actually solveable. Laplace who?
Partial DiffEq: Hey, we can solve about 4 of these.
tensor analysis and point set topology
I'll leave that (along with proving that 1+1 = 2) to the math majors. :P
You just don't FEEL it, because it happens in such tiny increments.
If there were no shifting, you'd always be in the same gear (ratio).
The marketing people have figured it out - since many people expect their cars to "shift" some CVT transmissions have been configured to simulate shift points and bumps to reassure those drivers.
Always the IDIOTS who don't understand the concept at ALL. The whole POINT of a CVT is that you don't have to FEEL the shifts, dangit! :P
Besides, didn't Nissan have a commercial that extolled the benefits of the CVT in the Murano? Something with a woman trying to put on lipstick or something, waiting for the "shifts" before she could start?
It doesn't ?!?!?!?
Fly-by-wire is nice!
Engineers always break things down into black/white, on/off, yes/no.
Some of us view everything as shades of gray along a continuum. A handy word for a CVT, no gear of which can be distinguished from neighboring gears except by arbitrary division (to slaughter the definition a bit ).
I wouldn't let a math major anywhere near my car!
Who would ever have thought that we would get stuck on the semantics of "continuously variable" in an automotive discussion? I think we all know what it means.
I'm sure there's a joke in there somewhere starting with "A mathematician, an engineer and a physicist are examining a CVT ..."
tidester, host
SUVs and Smart Shopper
where's vad or albook when you need them, we'll get to the bottom of this???
lol
I'm sure there's a joke in there somewhere starting with "A mathematician, an engineer and a physicist are examining a CVT ..."
pass out the pocket protector's already...
But that's the easy way to think of it . . you just keep making the pieces smaller and smaller and smaller . . . . until you "approach the limit" of infinitely many infinitesimal pieces.
Some of us view everything as shades of gray along a continuum. A handy word for a CVT, no gear of which can be distinguished from neighboring gears except by arbitrary division (to slaughter the definition a bit
I'd say we're close enough, considering it took mathematicians about 150 years to precisely define what Leibniz and Newton came up with when they "invented" the calculus.
Or should we define it more properly, like "for any given ratio epsilon, there exists a delta that blah blah blah blah . . " :P
I think it's a bit more than semantics, though, when somebody says the CVT "doesn't shift". That's NOT the same thing as you can't FEEL it shift.
They remind me of Zeno (ancient mathematician) who had several paradoxes. One of which was that an arrow in flight can't really be moving because at any moment in time, it is "frozen" at that position, thus proving it's not moving.
The very fact that the CVT can go from a minimum (gear) ratio to a maximum (gear) ratio means that is MUST "shift" (change) from one (gear) ratio to another. Even if you have a hard time telling it.
Actually, I submit that you CAN tell it, because the rate at which the gear ratio changes in a CVT is somewhat proportional to how hard you're pressing on the gas pedal.
To the optimist, the glass if half full
To the pessimist, the glass if half empty
To the engineer, the glass is overdesigned. :P
George Carlin agrees: “Some people think of the glass as half full. Some people think of the glass as half empty. I think of the glass as too big.”
tidester, host
SUVs and Smart Shopper
An analyst says it is neither, it simply contains 50% of its potential capacity.
A realist says it doesan't matter. It's just gonna have to be washed later anyways.
A mathematician cannot decide since the glass can never be EXACTLY half full or half empty (except in the limit).
To the politician, somebody has taken half the contents of the glass, and something must be done about it!
A mathematician would say it's topologically equivalent to a Ford Freestyle and try to drive off with it like we did with this topic! :shades:
tidester, host
SUVs and Smart Shopper
You know, we went through this last year when Edmunds decided to break up forums into different topics instead of letting people determine where they wanted to post. There were fewer topics, but a bit more of a story line.
I point this out because you moved my "I prefer Freestyle over T-Rex" post from the Taurus-X forum to this one - but the post was really about the T-Rex, not CVT. Can we copy this message back to the Freestyle / T-Rex forum?
Not only that, but I note that the hosts keep having to tell people to post in an existing forum, which is a bit ironic when you think about it - we went from a very few forums to many, many forums, of which quite a number have 2 messages - the original and the host reply to post in a different forum.
tidester, host
SUVs and Smart Shopper