Manual Transmission Option

[baron]

Gday all.
I just returned from Germany after having spent 3 weeks training with Lufthansa. I had a good chance to check out all the cars on offer. What I saw and liked was that nearly all VW's are available with manual transmission. I would love to buy a new Passat diesel out here with a 6 speed stick shift, they are everywhere in Germany and I can't understand why they're not available here. Has anyone got any inside imformation as to why VW Australia is not interested in bringing in this option. I asked this question at the Melbourne motor show and only got the sales pitch on how good the DSG system is. If DSG is that good why is nearly every VW owner driving manuals. Cheers.

[DiMmY]

I believe traditionally Australia just prefers auto's over manuals. It's not only VW that offers only auto's mostly.

[Swallowtail]

Europe is a much larger market, and as such market demand massively increases the range variety across all manufacturers. As a smaller market Australia gets a much narrower range targeted at what sells well here, and as DiMmy says, here that's mainly autos...

[rotelman]

Yes the DSG is that good... Why would you want to drive a manual...especially on our freeways which are always stop and start. DSG is as good as a Manual anyway. Just came from a 6 Speed manual and I have to say I wouldn't go back. If you are wanting diesel then a Manual would be a pain because the power band in diesels are narrow you are always shifting so much more. Petrol may be a differnet story. The DSG makes the most of the the power delivery of the diesel.

Rotelman

[Golf Loon]

When the DSG breaks, you will be crying and wish you had bought a manual.

I think it is narrow minded marketing by VWA not to offer a manual option.
They did the same thing with the Audis, very rare to find a manual no quattro.

If you are in the market for a passat diesel, why not get a Skoda Octavia, available with 6 spped manual, virtually the same car and heaps cheaper??

[baron]

[QUOTE=Golf Loon;292315]When the DSG breaks, you will be crying and wish you had bought a manual.

I think it is narrow minded marketing by VWA not to offer a manual option.

Gday Golf Loon.
Thats what my thoughts are. With a manual you have no electronics to play up and only one dry clutch to replace. The DSG is probably a great system, but if things were to go wrong it would be very expensive to repair the dual clutches and all the wizz bang electronics. Cheers.

[passatpout]

Yes the DSG is that good... Why would you want to drive a manual...especially on our freeways which are always stop and start. DSG is as good as a Manual anyway. Just came from a 6 Speed manual and I have to say I wouldn't go back. If you are wanting diesel then a Manual would be a pain because the power band in diesels are narrow you are always shifting so much more. Petrol may be a differnet story. The DSG makes the most of the the power delivery of the diesel.

Rotelman

It's not power that's important, it's torque. Diesels usually have a flatter torque curve compared to petrol engines, which means that they can hold higher gears at lower speed, not need to change down as much going uphill, lower revs for the same speed, smaller engines for same performance.

Most Australian cars are sold based on torque, not power, even if most buyers aren't aware of the difference, with comments such as "it has plenty of power, it doesn't need to change down on hills", which is due to the torque the engine is capable of exerting, rather than the power generated. This is one of the reasons why cars like Falcodores are popular - to provide a low-revving engine with a high torque output, which doesn't need to change down every time they hit a hill, although newer Commodores are a good example of how the engine characteristics have changed with Holdens - older (VN-VT) would quite happily go up hills in top gear, where my father's VE now changes down, and changes quite early in the piece.

The gearbox effectively converts power to torque, which is one reason why the acceleration rate reduces as the car up-shifts. A well mated engine-gearbox pair, which has a good selection of ratios and an appropriate number of gears, will be suitable for the properties of the engine. Some generalisations of poor engine/transmission selections include most small petrol-engined cars with automatics - they simply don't have the torque to drive the torque converter effectively until they are spinning at reasonably high speeds.

Torque in most load-hauling applications is critical. I deal with train locomotives quite a bit, and the important criteria for them is how much force they can pull a train with, power is secondary (similar concepts for most other heavy equipment, ships, trucks, mining equipment, etc). The torque is converted to a linear force by dividing by the radius of the wheels, and most heavy locos in Australia are capable of around 350kN, roughly the same as an Airbus A380 engine at take-off, whilst there are newer and heavier locos around that are capable of 600kN+, but the trains they are hauling need about 5000hp to maintain 110km/h on the flat, with individual locos rated at anywhere between 3000-4500hp.

At the end of the day though, the DSG is still a pretty good gearbox, and I've driven it with a combination of Golf GTI petrol, Jetta TDI, Passat TDI, Golf TDI, etc. If only I can just get mine to stop jerking on takeoff....