Hyundai, Kia, and Audi EVs have paddle shifters which controls the level of regeneration braking and feels very much like downshifting. One paddle (+) steps up the regen to the point where the “drag” gets progressively stronger. The other paddle (-) steps down regen to 0 where the car can coast and there is no regen drag whatsoever. Note this is not the same as Neutral. The car is always in Drive. The function only affects what happens when letting off the power pedal.
The nice thing about the regen paddle mechanical control is the no-look ability at your fingertips to change the car’s response depending on driving context. There are moments when you don’t want the car to tip into a regeneration drag when letting off the power pedal and sometimes you feel the need for the “engine braking” to engage right away.
All the other EVs just have strong regen (B setting) or low regen and the selection is a preset you have to choose either on the screen or somewhere near the shift cluster and isn’t exactly a no-look control you can change on the fly. The older VW Golf EV used to have a stick where you can tap up and down two levels of regen on the fly and that was also a great experience but now buttons have replaced the stick. (Sigh, it was nice while you had it, VW!) The Chevy Bolt has one paddle but it’s designed like a brake-with-your-hands lever when depressed. Not quite the effect of stepping up or down.
In sum, the feeling of downshifting, such as into a turn, can be controlled. On the other hand, there is no need for “upshifting” if the EV had adequate power to get to a high speed. Tesla’s power and torque band is already covering high and low speeds with one gear, although an additional top gear would probably get them to a really insane top speed. I think Toyota’s goal is to eke out more range because they want to use less powerful motors where the power and torque bands would benefit from gearing. My dream is for Tesla to add mechanical paddle shifters and do what Hyundai does.
> Tesla’s power and torque band is already covering high and low speeds with one gear, although an additional top gear would probably get them to a really insane top speed.
Tesla tried that in their original Roadster. It had a two-speed transmission. The lurch when the transmission shifted during launch was too hard on the transmission, and many of them broke under warranty. Tesla had to replace many transmissions. It was easier to fix the problem on the electric side than the gear side.
There's something to be said for a paddle shifter, but mostly for better control at low speed. For parking and off-road use, it can be helpful to map more pedal angle to a range of low speeds. This is more like the high/low range lever found on off-road vehicles and tractors than like a stick shift.
Mode switches are undesirable because they lead to "wrong mode" accidents. This is an ongoing problem with aircraft automation.
Behavior with zero accelerator and brake is an interesting question. Should the vehicle creep slowly forward? That's a classic feature, or bug, of automatic transmissions. Some automatic transmissions had anti-creep mechanisms to prevent this. If the vehicle comes to a full stop, should releasing the brake initiate creep?
Should the vehicle roll back if on a hill? Some cars have "hill holders" to prevent that. For an electric car, those are all design decisions - the power train has no inherent behavior.
> The lurch when the transmission shifted during launch was too hard on the transmission, and many of them broke under warranty. Tesla had to replace many transmissions. It was easier to fix the problem on the electric side than the gear side.
Seems to me this was more a problem with Teslas build quality or design, because the Porsche Taycan and Audi e-tron GT have a two speed gearbox. From when I drove the e-tron GT this shifting was almost completely imperceptible, no lurching of any kind even when launching it in sport mode. If you're driving in anything other than sport mode the car will spend most of its time in second gear anyways, not even using it from a standstill.
Only using first gear for hard launches helps, as does the fact they are using dog clutches in addition to traditional friction plates.
The coolest part is the rear motor can be completely mechanically decoupled from the axel so it can just coast. Most other EV just shut of power to the motor, but Taycan can freewheel on the rear axle.
Jalopnik did a huge in depth on the whole powertrain that is really interesting.
How is the maintenance aspect of this? One of things I like about my EV (Tesla) is that mechanical maintenance is essentially zero, whereas I had to pay 1000 eur every second year to service my Mercedes automatic transmission...
Wrong mode accidents don’t need to happen. My Prius has three modes for acceleration curves: Eco, Normal, and Power. If you push the pedal down all the way, you get full power in any mode.
Note: power mode does not increase power, it just waits longer to turn off the ICE in order to improve throttle response
Nissan Leaf with it's single pedal setup is like a driving a car in 2nd gear, where the speed can go down to zero and accelerate all the way up to highway speeds.
In single pedal mode, slowing down to a stop is a lifting the accelerator pedal completely and it will come to a stop in predictable manner. The brake pedal adds more regen and stronger application applies the brakes itself. From a stop, pushing down the accelerator starts moving the car. On hills, there is brake assist and works without any drama. Operating in reverse is the same way.
In dual pedal mode, or classic operations. While under motion, lifting the accelerator has a bit of regen until about 7kph and then creeps forward. To come to a complete stop, the brake pedal is necessary. From a stop, lifting the brake pedal starts the creep forward. This being an electric, even on inclines, the creep forward is consistent. Reverse is the same way.
At slow speeds, ie parking, it is easier to have the creep mode. Controlling speed with the brake pedal feels better. However, with experience, single pedal slow speed works well, just have to feather the throttle.
I've set the car to default to two pedal setup on start. I hit the single pedal mode switch every time I'm driving. It works well in a shared car setup. I do find it more weird to now drive with two pedals, but using the brakes still comes up even with single pedal driving, so if I do "forget" which mode I'm in, I'll still use the brakes when the car isn't slowing down enough.
Regarding the simulated legacy behavior, ie rolling back on the hill or changing torque. This is in the same line as simulating gearing in a CVT and simulating engine noise. I don't find it appealing and do hope car manufacturers have it as a configurable item, like Nissan has done with the one pedal driving. Here in a Japan, even the noise generator to warn pedestrians can be turned off.
The first is "Creep" which behaves like a classic automatic transmission. It basically matches the dual-pedal mode.
The second is "Stop", which matches the single-pedal mode you describe.
But there's a third mode, "Roll", which essentially mimics a manual transmission in neutral once speeds get below ~7 mph.
When I first got my Tesla, I came from a car with a manual transmission, so "Roll" made me feel at home and I used it for the first couple weeks. But once I tried out "Stop" mode and tried out single-pedal driving, I was sold. There's no going back. It's now exceptionally rare for me to use the brake pedal.
Yeah, I can definitely see merit to having a control that alters the responsiveness of the go pedal. I have near zero experience behind the wheel of an electric but back in the days of stick I appreciated having a low gear to creep around in and would actually have liked a lower gear occasionally.
Leaf's switch in and out of the B regen by shifting into drive a 2nd time - however they also have an "eco mode" switch on the steering wheel - if you normally drive with it on then pressing it does feel a lot like a shift up
When would you actually need to not have the max regen braking? You can always just push the drive pedal slightly to let the car know you aren’t slowing down, instead.
I have the Niro EV, and it was my first EV. The paddle shifters are amazing, and you get used to them very quickly. I recently rented another EV and I was surprised it wasn't there.
Most of the time I can drive without even touching the brake pedal, since you can hold the left paddle and it will engage maximum engine braking, which it quite powerful. This helps with battery as well since there is less energy loss when braking.
Perhaps it does. When I use the pedal the display shows a amount of regen power. However, as I press harder there is no obvious transition where the actual brakes take effect. It feels completely natural, which is why I thought it applied the brakes immediately. Perhaps the design is just so good that you can't tell.
Their implementation of the paddle shifter was not the shiftable kind [1]. It was a lever you had to continually press to hold regen. Imagine your hand cramping up trying to keep it engaged. To this day GM has this odd implementation.
I love driving manual transmission cars but I really don't like this. It's like cosplay for cars. The simulated experience makes it very uncool. I'd rather just let the manual transmission have one last dignified drive into the sunset.
It all depends on the clutch to me. My ADHD is so satisfied by a manual. I’m engaged in the machine. It’s fun and you don’t need a real sports car.
But paddle shifters do nothing for me. There’s no feel to it. It’s more like 3 on the tree.
If the clutch gives it feel and control, I’m in.
Sadly, finding a real manual is hard these days. Most cars don’t offer them. My Honda is stuck in 1 package with a mid-2000s style dash. Still fun to drive.
I should look and see if I could retrofit an Apple Car Play/ Android Auto system in it…
A few years ago a manual could really help to fine tune car performance, but a modern automatic transmission is just superior to anyone switching gears. Especially if you have a strong motor with a high torque that can polish any slip clutch in a second.
I would really like a modern car without shitty media systems. A desktop PC with mouse and keyboard would be awesome, directly attached to any sensor periphery and the coffee machine of course.
Oh, totally agree. It’s not a performance thing for me. I don’t have a fancy car, just enjoy the activity.
I mostly envy the nav on my wife’s Apple Car Play. Otherwise it’s just a running map and an album art display.
We use Waze for interstate travel and Google Maps for local. It’s nicer than a “nav package” or my phone holder. Otherwise, I’m happy with whatever let’s me listen to my tunes and podcasts.
But I don’t need it that much. My little car is mostly for in town. We always use the van for trips.
You precisely set speed using your right foot with a regular manual too!
I don't have an ADHD diagnosis, but coordinating 3 pedals, the steering wheel and the gear shift with both hands and both feet is unbeatable, sublime even, when you hit the power curves you were going for.
Exactly: a fun activity that's enjoyable to practitioners, and doesn't hurt those who do not partake of it. You wouldn't ban cosplaying if you had the power, would you?
Electric motors don’t need manual (or indeed, any) transmissions because they have a basically-flat torque curve across their entire RPM range. The only options for an electric motor are fake transmission or no transmission, and the parent is arguing for the latter and against “transmission cosplay”. A real manual transmission on an electric car would have no point.
Torque isn't the only consideration, there's also efficiency and acceleration. Transmission aren't a necessity like they are in ICE cars, but they can improve the experience.
For instance the Porsche Taycan:
"Having a multispeed transmission in an EV provides the same benefits that it does in a gasoline-powered car: improved low-speed acceleration and increased efficiency at high velocity by lowering the rotating speed of the power source."
That's also the point to the transmission. A transmission (on the low end) is to enhance acceleration and efficiency (keeping you at an ideal ratio to maintain the speed you're going). Neither of these are issues when you have a flatter torque curve.
Another comment said the efficiency gain on the Taycan is 5% over not having it. Which is about what I would've expected to see, not much for all the added complexity and reliability issues it introduces.
Electric motors draw more current when starting up and when delivering high torque. It's conceivable that with a transmission, maximum current draw could be lowered, perhaps leading to longer-lived batteries or lower demand for battery cooling, smaller gauge wiring, smaller motors, or other cost savings. Don't know for sure on any of this, but it seems plausible. On the other hand, if it really made a difference, why aren't the EV makers already doing it?
A more complicated gearbox means more friction which lowers the fuel efficiency of the vehicle. Since the battery is the most expensive part of a BEV, maximizing fuel efficiency is always a priority. It determines the cost and the range for the car.
EVs with multiple gear ratios do exist though, the first of which was the 2020 Porsche Taycan. The first gear lets it maximize torque at low speeds (up to 62 MPH) so it can set 0-60 records, then the second gear lets it maintain a more economical motor speed for highway driving.
I remember reading somewhere that the estimated efficiency gain of having 2 gears on the Taycan is 5%. On a typical 60kWh battery car, that's 3kWh... hardly worth the effort nor the cost.
On the Taycan it makes sense because top speed. For any "normal" EV where top speed is not a concern, it's probably not a choice that makes sense.
Also people who buy manual transmissions in preference to autos rarely give a fuck about economy (this is my opinion and about every manual transmission aficionado I have ever spoken to)
I suspect it makes a big difference in range at higher speeds that Germans and Americans drive at on the highway. One of the most disappointing things about the Model3 is how quickly the range starts to dip at left lane traffic speeds here in the Northeast. There’s large stretches of the drive between NYC and Boston that have middle and left lane traffic moving at 80 MPH and what’s an easy task for a gas car means adding a recharge stop for anything except the Model3 Long Range.
Constant speeds on the highway should be the most efficient forms of driving. The only force the motors need to generate is the force required to overcome air resistance, this is going to be true of both ICE and electric.
The range dip may instead be because of lower battery temperatures (from all of the wind). Better battery thermal management at high speeds might help.
Higher energy density batteries will also comfortably overcome this problem. In the future I can see EV's that advertise fixed ranges, so that you don't get arbitrary range dips. They'll do this by over dimensioning the batteries and using better battery management software to make sure that more than 95-99% of your drives will be able to go at least the advertised range
To the contrary, the dip in range highlights that, as you increase speed, air resistance rises as a square.
Our Leaf could probably go almost 50% farther on a charge if we never exceeded 30 mph. 30-40 mph has a small penalty; freeway speeds exact a much larger penalty.
It increases as the square of air resistance compared to traveling at low but constant speeds.
But I find that when I'm driving at lower speeds I'm constantly stopping and starting for traffic.
Around where I live there are many roads posted at 80km/h (50mph) with traffic lights every km or so. So it's accelerate to 80 for a couple minutes, then come to a complete stop, then accelerate back to 80. That's clearly what swallows up most of the range.
Wind resistance increases with the square of speed so going faster than “normal” speed, i.e. the speed they use when calculating range, leads to dramatically less range.
> Electric motors don’t need manual (or indeed, any) transmissions because they have a basically-flat torque curve across their entire RPM range.
I would argue that for an EV that is not designed to be a sports car (ie, a Model 3), you are correct.
But one that is being designed to not just have power off the line, but also at the top end, will probably need a transmission.
I do wonder if the top speed of my Model 3 Performance is due to simply not having enough power to overcome drag, or if the motors are reaching the end of their RPM range.
Teslas actually do have different gearing ratios, in that for the dual motor cars the motors in the front and rear are geared differently. This is a cheap, effective way to get a good combination of acceleration and efficiency.
I can't decide whether this is dumber than Dodge making a huge deal about how their new EV Dodge Charger (car not car-charger, oh my god, what a branding screw up) makes authentic loud V8 noises, but they're definitely both stupid. Can we just fast forward to the future where EVs glide around silently and people look both ways before crossing the road?
Or imagine if you're a kid and it's physically impossible for you to see around an SUV parked adjacently to the crosswalk without actually sticking your head out into the street.
That said, the "cars make noise go vroom" argument hasn't really worked for decades now. Modern mufflers mean most unmodified cars aren't loud enough to be clearly heard over background noise in an area with lots of cars. Pedestrian safety is absolutely a problem that's worsening, but I don't think that "make cars noisier" is the solution.
Barring the ideal (to me) solution of fewer cars in the first place, what seems most promising to me is making the infrastructure itself more pedestrian-friendly. I was impressed to see what Amsterdam's city center did with encouraging cars out onto the thoroughfares and out of the places where people are walking. They didn't seem to have the same "Waze addicts blowing through stop signs on residential streets" problem that we have in North America. Nor did they have the same problem with stroads and their obnoxious traffic patterns that set everyone who uses the on edge. It seemed to make transportation both safer and more pleasant for everyone involved.
> That said, the "cars make noise go vroom" argument hasn't really worked for decades now.
Tires often make more noise than car engines nowadays. I live along a busy street and often I can't audibly distinct a Tesla from an ICE except for a faint hum. They are both as loud when passing by.
> Or imagine if you're blind. Trying to listen for tire noise.
When vehicles past a certain volume (which are not aggressively streamlined to shatter human-powered landspeed records) move faster than 25 kph (15 mph) they displace enough air that they are quite loud.
An automobile-sized vehicle isn’t some kind of terrestrial ninja when its engine doesn’t make noise. Depending on make, model and speed, the volume of displaced air is significantly louder than the engine running at constant velocity.
An EV going faster than 15mph is quite audible and one going slower than that can stop on a dime. If you can't hear anything it should be safe to cross.
There's a significant gap between theory and reality, but I'm not sure noise pollution is the answer.
Even with regular gas powered cars, the tyre noise dominates for a long time already, except at very low speed. A Tesla isn't much more quiet than any other modern sedan (thanks to wide tyres with soft rubbers). It's really just (wannabe) sports cars, old trucks and god damn Harleys where it's different.
This is only a problem when there are other loud vehicles around. If all vehicles are more quiet, you'll still be able to hear them, it just won't be as loud as it is today.
I wonder if we could have radio beacons for pedestrians, in addition to the current braking systems which use radio waves reflected from electronically passive pedestrians.
It might not even require GPS or anything complicated; just respond to car’s radar squawks, so that it can measure the distance and relative speed from the delay and Doppler shift. You’d need to use frequency that bounces around nicely, to “get around” other cars blocking the line of sight. We can’t do that with passive pedestrians, because we can’t tell the echo from pedestrian from the (also moving, like other cars) background. This could work more reliably and at much higher distances.
Of course someone must have tested that already; I’d be grateful for a link :-)
> EV Dodge Charger (car not car-charger, oh my god, what a branding screw up)
To be fair, the Charger name was created long before it meant "thing you use to plug into an electric device", and the Charger is a very popular vehicle in the Dodge lineup. And you don't abandon popular models without generating negative PR. So Dodge didn't really have a choice.
I know, they could have chosen the Dart or stuck with the Challenger. Or, wild idea, go for the Coronet, Plymouth Cuda, Roadrunner or GTX. I guess they're going to go with the joke, anyway.
They killed the Charger brand in 1987, then reintroduced it in 2006.
Fast cars are dangerous on our streets and responsible for a significant number of deaths on the road. It wouldn’t be bad if they killed the brand for society.
It’s too bad that “car that gets you great mileage and helps protect kids in driveways and crosswalks” doesn’t sell.
Every car - including Tesla - meets your definition of "fast car." The "most boring car in the world," the Toyota Camry, will blow the doors off supercars of 20 years ago, and is about as fast in a straight line than many so-called "fast" cars.
It also gets great mileage and helps protect kids in driveways and crosswalks, and sells rather well.
There’s a regulatory requirement that specifies how much minimum noise should be emitted in each frequency band. All BEVs need this pedestrian alert system. It takes into account that partially deaf people may not be able to hear certain frequencies say tire noise band.
There are a few models of ice cars that basically are very quiet when they drive slowly. Nobody ever complains about how quiet they are. It's not a problem. And it was never a problem in the past. It's only a problem when EV's are concerned. Or rather it's a problem people imagine is real because other people who also did not do their homework say it is so based on what they've heard.
I actually work for an automotive company and specifically deal with vehicle acoustics. Yes EVs at low speeds are imperceptible and a danger to even a person with baseline hearing let alone a partially deaf or blind person. These regulations are there for a reason. It’s not imagination. We measure quantifiable data using reference microphones.
Though I agree that some gas cars are extremely quiet and difficult to perceive, that doesn’t mean we should shackle ourselves and prevent meaningful change for next generation vehicles.
Tires have gotten quieter over recent history, not louder, as a result of better tread design. You are noticing tire noise now because drivetrains have become quieter even more so.
BEVs are not running tires that are any different sizes than similar positioned gas cars. The model 3 is running similar tire sizes to the German sports sedans of similar positioning. The leaf is running similar sizes to other hatchbacks. Etc.
In general, cars are running larger tires in every dimension, but cars are also larger in every dimension.
> Electrobat! Is that not a great name? It belongs to the first commercially viable EV effort. Philadelphians Pedro Salom and Henry G. Morris adapted technology from battery-electric street cars and boats and got a patent in 1894. At first very heavy and slow (like a trolley car, with steel “tires” and 1600 pounds of batteries onboard), their Electrobat [at left] evolved to employ pneumatic tires and lighter materials so that, by 1896, their rear-steer carriages used two 1.1-kW motors to move 25 miles at a top speed of 20 mph. Electrobats and another electric by Riker won a series of five-mile sprint races against gasoline Duryea automobiles in 1896.
My uncle has a country place, that no-one knows about
He says it used to be a farm, before the Motor Law
Sundays I elude the ‘Eyes’, and hop the Turbine Freight
To far outside the Wire, where my white-haired uncle waits
Jump to the ground
As the Turbo slows to cross the borderline
Run like the wind
As excitement shivers up and down my spine
Down in his barn
My uncle preserved for me an old machine –
For fifty-odd years
To keep it as new has been his dearest dream
I strip away the old debris, that hides a shining car
A brilliant red Barchetta, from a better, vanished time
Fire up the willing engine, responding with a roar!
Tires spitting gravel, I commit my weekly crime…
Wind in my hair –
Shifting and drifting –
Mechanical music
Adrenalin surge –
Well-weathered leather
Hot metal and oil
The scented country air
Sunlight on chrome
The blur of the landscape
Every nerve aware
…
The acquisition of a patent by a major corporation is not much evidence that it will ever be implemented; it amounts to a relatively cheap option on being able to do so.
Personally, this one seems about as appealing as bringing back the manual ignition advance on gas-engined cars.
It's not all about pedestrians. Take Harley Davidson motorcycles for example. The sound is the brand. It's what people buy (into).
Not saying that's right or wrong. Only that it's not strictly a pedestrian thing.
Since in EVs it's more or less simulated, it would make since to have more than one setting and one of those to be off.
p.s. The Dodge Charger has been ine of Dodge's most successful model. Gazillions of recognition has been invested in that model. They're not going to abandon that. In fact, the name makes more sense as an EV.
The first time I ever saw an EV was in San Francisco, an EV1, somewhere around 2000. It literally was silent at slow speeds. My own first EV was a Leaf which has a noise maker which starts audible and decreases with speed and cuts out at about 20. I don't think my S does this. It should. This sound is a little annoying for the driver but is necessary for pedestrians, particularly blind people.
Above about 20 mph, EVs naturally make plenty of noise for people to realize they’re there and moving. It’s only at low speed that they’re overly quiet for pedestrian awareness.
Getting hit at 18mph is still not a very good time. Sure it's better than being squished at 40mph, but that's still a lot of momentum in a couple tonnes of SUV.
If the silence of the vehicles increases the likelihood of lower speed collisions then that's potentially a problem.
This is a neat example though of how arbitrary EV drivetrains are. A Toyota marketing exec's (just guessing) FUD about imagined consumer FUD turns into, why don't we just ramp down torque in notches in relation to road speed increments? Of course anyone who buys this is going to try it once then leave it in all-the-torque-all-the-time mode, but that's not the point. I can't say I've met a single three pedal afficionado who bemoaned the lack of shifting after experiencing the mild concussion inducing levels of acceleration of some of these new EV's. If roadgoing gas cars had that kind of torque, they wouldn't shift either, just like the fastest drag cars. There's no point.
You're over generalizing. Not all enthusiasts value the same point. For some including myself, it's not about acceleration or speed. Automatic (DCT and the new ZF8) has long surpassed manual transmission in almost all aspects of performance. It's similar to how some people like manual espresso machines, film cameras, etc. It's a hobby and you enjoy the process. See how the newest Koenigsegg goes great length to make this weird automatic manual.
In snowy conditions you don't actually want all the torque available: then you'd want to control the torque applied instead of the power delivered when starting to move (similar to placing a restriction on the top torque by shifting into second gear on manual shift cars).
At least in a Tesla it will automatically dial torque down when slip is detected. It accomplishes this via lowering amperage to the motor, it also can adjust wheel spin using individual wheel braking.
All of this is already working fine with no transmission... Adding one to a consumer EV for snowy conditions is a step backwards in terms of more stuff to break and maintain.
I believe this makes more sense for heavy equipment and freight trucks. You wouldn't want to have the gear ratio for heavy load all the time, as it would require the motor to spin at high RPMs (inefficient) to maintain highway speeds even when the amount of torque required is low.
As a former driver of many Audi quattros and a Canadian who lives on top of a hill with a AWD Tesla 3 I can say it's the best handling car in snow that I've driven (given clearance limits of a sedan).
The instant reaction speed of its electric traction control to slippage will vastly outperform any manual transmission. You can drive like an idiot with the pedal to the floor and the car sorts itself out.
The real problem with electric cars and modern cars in general in the snow is the sheer weight of the vehicles makes it harder to stop in an emergency.
Most of the crummy AWD systems they throw in the majority of cars these days can get you unstuck or up a hill so that’s not a major advantage.
Also, car makers tend to throw on low friction tires on electric cars to increase range which invites another set of problems.
With proper winter or all-weather tires you'll actually get better stopping for a heavier vehicle (the tires will have more friction as a function of the weight so less chance of slip even though you have more to stop).
I haven't encountered snow since my last manual died but that's my understanding of electronic traction control--give the job to the computer that can do a far better job than any human.
When the computer can outperform a human let the computer do it! Only give control of things where at least some drivers can outperform the computer. And, while not relevant to driving, if there's a grey area let the operator hit an override to use it. (Boeing--the plane does what you tell it even if you go outside the envelope. Airbus--the plane stays in the envelope no matter what you tell it to do. The first makes for broken birds, the second means the pilot in trouble can't decide to risk breaking the bird if that's what's needed. If you need 4g to clear terrain you do it even if the bird is only rated for 3g.)
If the human is doing the traction control job, they know how far from the edge of the envelope they are (because the difficulty changes). If it's a computer doing that, it's hard to communicate that to the human (iiuc we don't even try). Unless this is improved, this means that sometimes it's better to leave a human in control of both strategy and tactics even if the computer would outperform on tactics.
Interesting. I have fanatical Tesla fanboy friends in Denver Colorado who don't drive their teslas much in winter because they handle poorly in the snow on steep inclines and declines. The door lock issues and cold weather battery energy life and charging issues were their other problems
Do you have snow tires? Living in a snowy region, I've learned that nothing makes as big a difference as snow tires -- whether the car has stick, automatic, AWD, whatever.
Admittedly, it's hard for me to directly compare stick and automatic because the cars with automatic were also much heavier -- a minivan and a SUV.
Traction control has all sorts of tricks it can use to get you pointed in the right direction. Traction control systems can brake individual wheels to apply rotational torque to counter excessive yaw like when the back tires come loose and the back swings out, the car can induce rotation in the opposite direction to sort things out before they get too dangerous.
The other common case is when taking off in a straight line, the car can limit power in excess of what the wheels are capable of putting down. This is usually accomplished with a combination of limiting power and in some cases braking individual wheels as they lose traction to simulate the effects of having a differential.
Electric cars do better much in the latter case because of how quickly they can limit power compared to an engine. It’s one of the reasons electric cars dominate 0-60 tests because they can adjust power hundreds of times a second whereas that’s simply not possible with a gas engine.
The argument was that the addition of a transmission would allow more control in snow. Is that only in situations where there isn't traction control, or where it is disabled?
Would traction control be expected to outperform a human on snow? Is the higher weight of an EV going to make it handle poorly anyways?
A transmission will do nothing for an EV in the snow. The existing traction management is more than sufficient for starting up but slowing down or changing directions in an EV in traction limited situations will likely always be worse than an equivalent gas car just because of excessive weight.
Traction control will outperform an above average driver on snow. I've driven lots of fast cars sideways and lived in the Northeast my whole life and I leave the TC system on because while I know how to control a slide on a racetrack, I don't want to do the same on a public road.
Agreed, and I’d go so far to say you don’t want all the torque on anything but a clean racetrack. Rain, oil, gravel, animal carcasses… there’s plenty of road conditions where a lead foot plus extreme torque will carry you violently off the road.
Once the wheels are spinning, its often too late. At least in my experience. Its best used to accelerate with minimal spin, and is mediocre - at best - at preventing traction loss in turns of any kind.
I am absolutely a manual gearbox fan for driving experience, and that's in Aus where it's not really idolized like it is in America. A lot more manuals here. But you are dead right. I think because it lacks all of the mechanical apparatus anyway, it's not like driving a regular car in automatic, it's like driving a different kind of vehicle. So you don't miss the gearbox.
All that said, I do appreciate the tendency for Japanese car companies to take care with the act of doing in their cars. I know Porsche gets the trophy for wholistic driving experiences, but Japan is doing a great job of bringing some of that back from the 90s bubble era cars.
It's not idolization it's identification. Americans have a tendency to identify with what they like. You don't just like surfing, you're a surfer. This leads to odd statements like, "I drive a manual, but I'm not a manual driver or anything." After my fellow American identifies with something, then its obvious superiority comes next. It's a complex. See our current political environment for extreme examples.
That's an interesting point, perhaps that's why seemingly simple preferences can be so divisive over there. If you identify as one tribe, you necessarily are not part of the other tribe. I find that come out in online discussions a lot, an advocate for one thing is often interpreted as an attack on the other. "I like muscle cars" can be met with "what's wrong with imports?" even when you never said anything ill against them.
The counter argument is that European vehicles are vastly using manual gear, despite the fact that except for a small minority, no one cares about the potential difference in torque.
There is just a lot of people that are used the a certain solution and are resistant to change.
There are economic and regulatory factors involved, it is more complex than people being resistant to change which no doubt makes up part of it.
In the UK, for example, automatic cars are more expensive to buy and insure [1]. They also tend to be more expensive to learn how to drive as instructors mostly have manual cars to teach with.
This incentivises new drivers towards manual cars, especially as younger drivers are more likely to be in lower-paying jobs and therefore more price conscious.
There is also a separate license category for automatic cars. If you have this license you are not allowed to drive manual cars, whereas the manual license entitles the holder to drive both. Therefore most new drivers opt to learn manual for the flexibility and the cost reasons.
I find it hard to imagine it would take significantly more than 15 minutes for most people to ‘learn’ how to drive an automatic car even if they only drove a manual before.
Muscle memory is a bitch. Two things I’ve done going from a manual to an automatic, sometimes a year after:
Slam on the brake as if you’re using the clutch. Automatic brake pedals are more than wide enough to accommodate two feet, and attempting to upshift and slamming on the brake instead can really rattle your brain bucket.
Throw the automatic into park. Less of an issue these days, but it used to attempt to actually go into park, with the shenanigans you’d imagine there would be as the parking pin attempted to engage with the forcefully spinning gears.
I've never pulled that one but I've done a couple of very hard stops coming off the freeway. Long drive, tired, I hear the engine RPMs dropping and my foot comes down on the "clutch" as my hand goes for the gearshift. I learned on a car with a very stiff clutch, I catch the brake pedal and it's going to the floor. (My father had a bad habit of riding the clutch while going through the gears. A mechanic friend deliberately put in a stiffer spring to minimize the damage.)
Smoothly operating a manual has to be muscle memory and whenever you're dealing with muscle memory there's the issue of unintended capture. It doesn't take much to reprogram things like learning the actual working range of *this* clutch but skipping it entirely takes a lot more learning.
Moving from manual to power brakes is also a recipe for slamming on the brakes..
In high school, I drove a really old car with manual everything (including brakes). Our drivers ed class was taught on 80s american sedans, with overboosted power steering and brakes where you could probably just touch them with a single toe to stop. Coming from the manual brakes in my car where I needed to stand on them to stop, I'd inadvertently slam on the brakes early in my turn at the wheel and throw everyone against the seatbelt tensioners..
I once had power brakes fail in my car, (vacuum line leak, rubber connections disintegrated with age, thus: no turbo and no brakes) but needed to go on 300 km trip (in hindsight, I contracted get-there-itis and this was unnecessary risk). At first: woah, I have no brakes! But after few minutes I got used that I need to stand on the pedal and it somewhat braked. But it was surprising when I finally replaced that rubber piece: obviously I knew about this, but for first few stops I slammed the brakes hard anyway.
The UK authorities agree with you: if you pass the exam with a manual car you can use both, but if you pass it with an automatic one, you can only drive automatic ones.
I'm not saying it's hard (I had to, given the automatic rental when visiting the US), but it's not just about learning how to do it, it's also about reflexes, which you don't unlearn in 15 minutes. Sure you can learn to consciously suppress them, but the habit of finding a pedal with your left foot when accelerating/decelerating lures behind it for a lot longer.
Are you saying that like it's an obvious and irrefutable benefit? Having driven two EVs, I can safely say that 0-60 times specifically, and acceleration in general, are totally irrelevant to me. As long as the vehicle has no issues accelerating on the on-ramp (so most cars from the last 30years), everything extra is useless.
The actual reason for having gears even with EVs in european vehicles, is mostly the "one plattform" approach which carmakers here afraid to go all in on EVs. Hybrids, traditional combustion and EVs are expected to share as many parts as possible - which of course as all engineering compromises go means you become 2nd best in all areas.
The Kia Niro is available in three models: Petrol, Hybrid and EV. Now, I have the EV and it doesn't have any gears, but I'm pretty sure there is a lot of things shared between these cars.
To your point, the Niro hybrid IIRC does still use a 6 speed transmission as opposed to something like a Prius, or Fusion. Those use an eCVT (much simpler planetary gearset to control power flow between ICE, electric motor, and the wheels.)
Electric engines are capable of insane torque, but prolonged operation in such a mode is far from efficient, cool and preferable from a reliability standpoint. Two seconds at the green light - yes, plowing your field with a Tesla - no.
So I can see it making sense for vehicles that have have two modes of operation, for example a tractor or all-terain vehicle that also need to work on public roads at relatively high speeds. A manual gear box is ideal in such a setting, because you seldom need to use it and it's very simple, cost effective and reliable. In any case, only useful for an extreme niche of applications.
Seems very similar to paddle shifters in a gas CVT. There's no mechanical connection between the "clutch peddle" and "shifter" to the actual transmission, it is all just fed into a computer and a simulation is created to give the driver a warm fizzy feeling.
If this makes people feel better during the transitional phase, I guess that counts for something, but this is a manual car simulation only.
I don’t see the point for EVs, but I actually somewhat regularly use the “gear down” paddle on my Honda Jazz (AKA Fit in other countries) CVT, but not for a “warm fizzy feeling”.
It actually “locks” the gears to a particular ratio which allows me to use the engine to keep the car from exceeding a particular speed when coasting down a hill. When I start using the accelerator after, it very quickly switches itself back to automatic as soon as the “locked in” gear ratio is clearly non-optimal.
I’ve never bothered using them for any other scenario though, I don’t see the point as the CVT (at least on my car) very intuitively adjusts gear ratio based on how far I’ve pushed in the accelerator, it’s such a pleasure to drive.
Yup, I've used a paddle shifter in a rental for this very purpose--using the engine as a brake while going downhill.
My Corolla only has two possible downshifts and neither is all that good for holding speed on a downhill but the cruise control is integrated into the system--I can set a speed and the computer will do a pretty good job of using the engine to keep from exceeding it too much and since it's adaptive it will always avoid the car in front even if otherwise it doesn't hold the speed that perfectly. Since I found that out I've never touched the downshifts.
My Current car does this when the the petrol engine kicks in (Hybrid with CVT), it does a tiny bit of "gear simulation" with the engine if you floor it and it uses the petrol engine together with the electric one and it adds a bit more of fake engine sound though the speakers to make it more obvious.
Strange thing is they chose to only have "three gears", no matter at what speed you do it the max is two shifts.
Not that it matters a lot, the shift in revs is not too much and if it gets petrol loving people into hybrid vehicles I'm OK with that.
Nissan does this with their CVTs as well. Apparently they found that people didn't really like the "all one gear" feel, so they programmed in "gear changes" where the CVT changes ratio like an automatic. You still get the CVT advantage when going up a hill or stomping on the accelerator, though.
They've been phasing out their CVTs in favor of traditional automatics, though.
They’re phasing them out because they’re total junk. The Jatco CVT is so unreliable it’s been known to die at 30k miles and has cost Nissan a fortune in lawsuits and recalls.
For some context, the first Tesla Roadster also had a transmission, but Tesla quickly realized that it's far better to simply scale up the motor so that the torque curve is high enough at higher RPMs, electronically cap the torque at low RPM, and remove the transmission altogether. Considering transmissions are one of the most expensive and common major parts to repair in a vehicle, it is astounding that anyone would try to bring it back.
You're assuming in your argument that scaling up the motor is somehow free and that's why the cost of a transmission is stupid. Well it's not free, that's why transmissions exist.
It's not about control. Transmissions in cars existed because internal combustion engines have a torque curve - the amount of torque you can get out of an engine varies with the engine speed, and so in order to maximize the torque at any given road speed you need to match the current road speed with the engine speed that produces peak torque. Now, there were different ways of doing this - manual transmissions vs semi-auto vs fully-auto and they did genuinely have pros and cons. For an ICE car there is genuinely a trade-off of how much control you have over the transmission.
BUT that's entirely untrue of electric cars, electric motors produce maximum torque at 0 engine speed and eventually drop at high speed. So there's simply no reason to be using a transmission at all. There is no decision to be made about gearing, you either have enough torque or you don't.
It is about the feeling of control now. The reason people who still choose manuals do so isn't because of the torque curves -- automatics are now better at handling that -- it's because they like the feeling.
When you're used to a manual, an automatic feels mushy. An EV is directly coupled, so adding a manual transmission makes it more must, rather than less.
Disagree--I used to have that objection with automatics, but the modern ones are good enough I no longer feel that way. Never have I felt my Corolla made the wrong choice about gears.
That's what I was thinking of, also--and I don't see it in my Corolla. It's always at least as good as the manual I drove before. It's got two downshifts rather than a paddle shifter, but since I discovered the cruise control does a better job than downshifting I haven't used them at all. The only case the cruise control doesn't handle is that for some reason it drops out at 28mph--I'm guessing it's a limit in the adaptive tracking. Thus you can't use cruise control to hold it to 25 mph going downhill.
I mean an EV will have a different feeling. No need to attempt to simulate legacy stuff. Learn to work with the new stuff.
The interesting thing is with an EV you can customize the crap out of how the thing feels. You can (theoretically) tweak all the rates used by the controls to make it feel any way you want.
I think it is kind of funny to come across video games that have crazy lens flare. I assume that is to give them cinematic feel rather than some nostalgic anachronism, but this reminds me of that too?
As someone with zero sense of time, analog clocks let me use my spatial reasoning to reason about time. I am much more aware of how much time I'm spending on something with an analog clock
You piqued my curiousity here - do you mean you would think to yourself something along the lines of "I have until the minute hand goes 60 degrees further than it is now" as opposed to "I have 10 more minutes"?
As someone who shares this perception, for me it's not nearly as analytical. I can physically see how much is left; I don't think in terms of the numbers. It's sort of like judging the distance between your workplace and the coffee shop down the street, in which if asked you'd make some heuristics to estimate how long it takes you to get there, but by default you just 'know' it is where it is, even if you don't think of the distance in meters.
So it's more like "I have <image of clock> left" because I intuitively know what the clock will look like when the time is up.
Pretty much what claudiawerner said in the sibling comment.
When I used to drink coffee, I took sugar in it. Sugar in diners often came in a dispenser[1]. I could tell when I had the right amount of sugar poured in from one of these even though it might clump on a humid day and pour freely on a dry day. With an analog watch, I can do this for time, but with a digital I cannot.
A digital watch requires much more conscious thought; if I log all my activities and make a spreadsheet &c. I can calculate a range of time it will take me for all my tasks, but with an analog watch I can just intuit it. To some personality types doing all of this seems to be enjoyable, but it's quite painful for me.
I would think think this is rather common for people with a strong spatial intuition. When planning a task in steps I mentally see where the hands on the clock will be at the start of each task.
I also have an image for the year in my head when long term planning. It is dynamic and I see it from “today” wherever that is, and I approach upcoming events. It is cyclic in years but there is a difference between looking back on January which was and looking forward to the next January.
AC clocks can sync their motors to the grid frequency, making it another perfectly valid mechanism of counting time. The grid frequency is very consistent.
This is not true. It does change a bit under heavy load and the req. to keep it constant are far from perfect. There are timers that use the AC freq. but they are far from precise compared to a quartz crystal oscillator ones. A low effort [0] stackexchange search.
I don't exactly keep up on these things, but at one time off-peak frequency compensation was done specifically to keep AC-synchronous clocks accurate. I wouldn't be surprised to find that's not really done anymore.
It looks like they do compensation for fluctuations. If done property it could basically be as good as the clock on your phone and never need to be set.
Analog clocks use much less power than digital clocks, by virtue of not having to continually emit light. That property may also be desirable for other reasons.
Pretty much - only LCD (no backlight/etc) can rival them.
In my opinion wall clocks that run on a battery are a lot better than any digital clocks perception wise. They are also super cheap to make nowadays. Recently I had to fix one by disassembling it, clear the plastic gears/cogs, and silicone spraying them. Nifty little machines. My only regret would be not having solar battery as a frame. That would extend its battery life immensely, adding a tiny LiFEO4 would make run for decades.
I can read an analog clock at a greater range than I can read a digital of the same size. Usually not that big a deal for me but without my glasses the difference is substantial.
I'm the target audience for this. I know it makes no sense, to make the car slower "shifting" through the gears, but for many of us it's the feel of full control over the car's mechanics. It's similar to the appeal of motorcycles, we ride them because every body input you make matters to the control of it. With all this said, there will still be a market for ICE manual cars for many years to come, it'll sure become more expensive to own one but I guess that'll be the price we'll have to pay. I also don't think the desire to continue driving manual will die off, anecdotally, I was talking to my 10-year old nephew and he seemed enamored with the idea of driving manual especially interested in early 2000s JDM cars, this was a really shock to me tbh I would of never thought this will be relevant with today's youth.
As a clutch enthusiast, I would welcome this innovation if it actually improved EV motor performance. If its only purpose is to simulate the ICE experience, I'm not interested.
A clutch-kick can dump more torque into the wheels than the motor could possibly produce.
Though a clutch-kick in an ICE operates based on the inertia of the rotating engine. I wonder how much inertia an electric motor has and if a clutch-kick would even be as effective.
What they really need is a hydraulic parking brake lever. Being able to lock the rear tires is a necessity for drifting situations when you want to increase angle while also scrubbing speed.
Based on my experience with the Volt, which already needed traction control to keep the tires from spinning, it probably will offer slighlty different driving modes. Torquey, smooth, low-rev/low-heat highway mode.
There are multiple types of electronic traction control, active brakes and active power; in a high torque situation, active power manipulation is required. Electronic throttle has allowed better ramping of ice motors since the early 2000s. In high power sports cars it was bettered to be called launch control.
There's little downside to active power control unless you want the effect of not having it.
Side note to locking and viscous differentials (and for automatic transmissions, the "slushbox" torque converter), which have been providing passive traction control in cars for 70 years.
It's also the same Toyota that did the Yaris GR, so they know a thing or two about manuals. They've always done what just works, for the target car.
Hell, the CVT in the Yaris can actually feel good, it's relatively responsive and gives a linear push (when the electric engine is charged, going on pure ICE is hell). You just have to enjoy the BRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
I had a 2015 model car without a CVT, but it was replaced with a next year model with a CVT after the non-CVT was totaled in a wreck. The 2 cars drove/felt completely different. It took some time to understand why (I'm not a grease monkey), but I'm not really sure I ever liked the CVT model.
>Funny that it's coming from the same Toyota that puts CVTs with no discrete gear steps in their gas cars and doesn't try to hide it...
CVT is, theoretically, infinitely superior to a traditional geared automatic transmission. They got a bad wrap at first (just like traditional automatics) when they were introduced, but the tech has matured and they are extremely reliable now.
Based on what metric? I play with new cars that come out, every year, for fairly low speed technical driving competitions. I get to try a lot of models. The CVTs always overheat. Always. I bring a spray bottle of water to cool the radiator down between runs (the CVT cooling is piped into the rad).
The current Hyundai's and Kias using traditional six speed autos never overheat. The Spark is one of my favorite cars to drive on these courses, and unfortunately even the 98hp 1.4L will overheat the CVT after a minute of hard driving.
That's because you just aren't pushing the car enough to have fun ;) I get to push these cars to their limit, in dirt courses. Lots of rear end sliding around and trying to be as fast as possible. Very fun no matter how much power or what transmission!
I would definitely prefer a manual. Just don't always get to choose.
I suppose I'm not the target market for this. To me this is just added complexity that increases cost and likelihood of something breaking. I'm still waiting for someone to make a "battery on wheels", an electric car with no extra bells and whistles. I think it could end up being so cheap to own, and also extremely reliable, since electric cars need no transmissions, and almost no maintenance of any kind for that matter. My Leaf needs tires, and... that's about it until 100k miles.
Yes. But they stopped making it like that. The new Leaf base models are $28k minimum, have lane assist, auto braking, high beam assist, smartphone integration, 8" multi touch display, voice recognition, and more. I paid around $12k in 2017 for a used 2015 Leaf. You can't do that anymore.
Many of those bells and whistles you don’t want are designed to protect other road users as much or more than yourself.
Not wanting the bells and whistles that only effect the driver and not others is fine, but it’s a bit selfish to discard the others.
And yeah Some people will be like “I am responsible and don’t need those” but 50% of those will be the ones that need them most and it’s hard to tell who is who.
I understand your point, the features are useful and they do save lives. It's just... where do you draw the line? You can't practically prioritize life infinitely above every other concern. If you did, the solution would be to not drive at all.
Like, maybe we can defray the costs of safety in a different way, such that cars, which are unfortunately a need for a lot of Americans, aren't outpacing inflation so badly. Such as increase licensing restrictions and make drivers' tests more comprehensive. Or lowering speed limits and enforcing them more strictly. These solutions do not have the effect of adding $10k to the cost of cars, which harms poorer Americans much more than wealthier Americans.
> an electric car with no extra bells and whistles
You can have this, but you have to import it from China, and the minimum level of bells and whistles required to legally operate it on the roads in the US is incredibly high.
A skateboard-style BEV sees significant benefits in crash performance from the battery, that's not something you get with hybrid platforms ("ICE and also BEV on the same platform") or conversions. Crash performance in cars has in general massively benefited from the trifecta of more stringent requirements, better processes and more compute in the last two or so decades.
Not exactly a battery on wheels. I don't see the middle ground between "no smarts" and "enough smarts to keep me safe". If you want a backup camera, blindspot radar, rollover protection, and A-pillar airbags then you could just buy a new EV. Is a touchscreen you don't need to touch an issue?
For one, safety issues. Conversions only make sense when you want to have some kind of exotic classic, and then make it even more exotic with your custom powertrain.
Toyota Tercel SR5, VW Diesel Rabbit, Toyota Pickup, Tacoma, etc. are all enjoyable to drive with a standard (manual) transmission.
It is also a joy to be able to service and replace the clutch when required. Here's to hoping Toyota doesn't break with their history of having vehicles that are easy to work on with cheap plentiful parts available from the dealer even 30 years after it rolls off the production line.
Trying to replace a battery pack on my Nissan Leaf has been a nightmare. Rather than supporting owners, they seem to prefer you treat the vehicle as disposable, given availability, cost, and needed tools to service the EV.
And I thought Toyota had a winner with the Prius. I really like mine (2nd generation, >100kmi, still going strong). I'm a big fan of their "power sharing device" (PSD -- otherwise known as planetary gears). Aside the economics and (fairly) eco-friendliness, it drives quite nice, very smooth. Under the right conditions (flat, smooth road), it feels like gliding. I ride motorcycles too and I learned to drive on a stick shift, but in a car, it's just silly. You want what from me? Selecting the proper gear? What next, adjusting oil pressure?
As a driver of a manual Miata older than I am, I was somewhat pleasantly surprised by this idea. I find this similar to the Fujifilm line of digital cameras with analog-style exposure dials and optical viewfinders; the affordances are objectively worse and largely unnecessary compared to the PASM mode selectors found in almost every other line of camera today, but they make all the difference between the feel of shooting a computer with a lens versus a proper dedicated camera.
I'm glad someone is trying to save the manual transmission baby from the ICE bathwater.
I have to imagine that a smaller torqueband but more gears would make for a more efficient electric vehicle.
The torque from 1000lbs of Li-ion cannot be denied, but are there other options here? Less torque, fewer batteries, less range but still the acceptable acceleration and cruising speeds?
The high end Porches Tycan proved that two gears is a good design, even at the highest end of performance, for example. Lower performance vehicles probably have more opportunity to use gears?
This is awesome, not having a manual transmission is one of the biggest drawbacks of modern cars for myself and presumably many others
Edit: I do have questions about efficiency because I was assume an EV manual may actually be less efficient than an automatic or single speed trans
I like the idea, but I'd rather an ICE conversion with a real drivetrain and transmission and an EV motor. I'll build it myself if no manufacturers will.
As an owner of both a manual transmission car and an EV, I enjoy driving them both, but I don’t want the manual transmission experience with an EV power train.
I don't even notice the stepped shifting when I drive my Soobie. In fact I wondered why it worked that way, and assumed it had something to do with minimizing wear and tear on the shift mechanism.
It's the closest thing to "get in and drive" of any car I've had. I especially love the adaptive cruise control.
Yes. I also think it works great including the lane change warnings. It is maddening that there is no way to prevent the radio from turning on every time the car does, though.
The nice thing about the regen paddle mechanical control is the no-look ability at your fingertips to change the car’s response depending on driving context. There are moments when you don’t want the car to tip into a regeneration drag when letting off the power pedal and sometimes you feel the need for the “engine braking” to engage right away.
All the other EVs just have strong regen (B setting) or low regen and the selection is a preset you have to choose either on the screen or somewhere near the shift cluster and isn’t exactly a no-look control you can change on the fly. The older VW Golf EV used to have a stick where you can tap up and down two levels of regen on the fly and that was also a great experience but now buttons have replaced the stick. (Sigh, it was nice while you had it, VW!) The Chevy Bolt has one paddle but it’s designed like a brake-with-your-hands lever when depressed. Not quite the effect of stepping up or down.
In sum, the feeling of downshifting, such as into a turn, can be controlled. On the other hand, there is no need for “upshifting” if the EV had adequate power to get to a high speed. Tesla’s power and torque band is already covering high and low speeds with one gear, although an additional top gear would probably get them to a really insane top speed. I think Toyota’s goal is to eke out more range because they want to use less powerful motors where the power and torque bands would benefit from gearing. My dream is for Tesla to add mechanical paddle shifters and do what Hyundai does.