Quote:
Originally Posted by Rock-It Man
My personal cars were manuals from 1970 to about 1995. I went out of my way to own manual cars.
But today's automatics are so much more advanced, with 6,8, or 10 speeds, torque converter lock-up, performance driving settings, and of course paddle shifters.
My 2010 Camaro is an automatic. I can't think of a singe reason to own a manual car in 2019. Once you have accidentally shifted to 2nd instead of 4th at 60mph and over-revved, or paid to have a clutch rebuilt, you will know two reasons NOT to own a manual.
If you care to investigate further, iconic supercars like Ferrari and Lamborghini have left manual transmissions behind. Porsche is still offering manual, but their autos equal or exceed manual lap times.
And at the drag strip, automatics have been beating manuals since the stone age.
As to your question about downshifting to brake: it's not bad for the engine as long as you are not going too fast for the lower gear. There's no protection against mechanical over-revving a manual.
In summary, it's not hard to learn driving a manual at grandma speeds, but performance driving a manual is a whole 'nother country.
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and 10yrs later, whenever somebody argues auto over manual, lap & trap times being fractions of a second faster still gets brought up... supporting that small percentage of owners who primarily track the vehicle & actually need minuscule amounts of time to outweigh the driving experience & tougher skill/coordination (not saying proper auto launches don't take skill at all - just less).