Control the Behaviour of an Automatic Transmission Just as You Would on a Manual

How to Make Your Automatic Car Dance to Your Tune

The most common complaint and comment about an Automatic transmission car, is that "You have less control over it, there is less involvement, compared to a manual transmission car". Agreed, you can't dictate the car to change to any gear that you please when you have an automatic transmission, but from my experience, I can tell you, if you know your know your car well enough, and if you are able to feel what it is doing, you can make even an automatic transmission car do whatever you please (well almost!).

First of all it's possible due to the fact that most engine management system of today's cars are intelligent and are based on a feedback system. The car does not just do preprogrammed actions irrespective of anything anymore, but on the contrary, listens to the driver input, tries to gage the intention of the driver and tries to act accordingly, producing wonderful results almost always.

Next is your talent, how much you know your car and can understand what it's trying to tell you.

Down-shifting in an Automatic car

Apart from the obvious manual change to"L" or "2, the modern day cars down-shift when you floor the throttle (full(open) throttle), provided the current revs of the engine can accommodate a higher rev as a result of a down-shift. Imagine, you are cruising along at a rather relaxing speed of 70 km/hr in Overdrive(highest gear), when you need to pass a lorry in front of you, and an intersection is approaching, so it's a case of now or never. But since you are in Overdrive, obviously you may not have enough acceleration to complete the overtaking maneuver before the intersection. No problem! You just floor the throttle, the car immediately shifts down to the previous(lower) gear, u get a jolt of acceleration, the next thing you know is you have passed the lorry at a speed of 90 km/hr. No more waiting for the speed to build up and no more nervous times during a pass