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Hey Sev if you dont like automatics why not shop around for a car with a Manual.

the 5% figure for automatics is for trucks. few trucks are sold with manual gearboxes anymore and many are not available with them anymore.

The % of cars sold with manual gearboxes has actually gone back up in recent years thanks to the sport compact crowd. And more and more cars are offering manual gearboxes again. Sequential gearboxes (constant mesh type like a motorcycle transmission) are also starting to find their way into production cars.

Actually the automatic transmission we are all used to (the torque converter type) is headed for extinction, the manual transmission we are used to is also on its way out. Electronically shifted manual boxes are becomming increasingly common in high end cars, most of these are of the constant mesh type (BMW, Ferrari, Mercedes, and Audi all offer sequential boxes). These still retain manual control over gear selection though they operate through a servo clutch, the best of these so far is on the Ferraris which can produce fast agressive shifts that would be the envy of an F1 driver and then at the flick of a switch it becomes a very efficient automatic.

The popular alternative for the shiftless crowd is now the CVT (which truly is shiftless). CVTs are now available on a wide range of cars.

I don't own a car. The one I drive isn't mine, though I'm thinking about picking one up next summer. I don't drive often enough now to make it worthwhile to own one.

As it stood I had a choice between spending the money on a bike or a car, and it wasn't a tough choice. Car is next...

I'll find a manual something or other, preferably used, something that I can spend a little time wrenching on as well.

Honda civics are actually pretty easy to wrench on, part of why they are so popular with tuners.

If you want to be different and still drive a Japanese car go for a nissan, they are easy to make stupidly fast though it can take some hunting around to find the good go fast parts for em. Nissans tend to have the best handling among japanese cars and a Sentra SE-R or 240SX/Silvia can be almost as much fun as a sportbike for canyon carving. The Sentra SE-R is the original pocket rocket (cheap, fast, and good handling).

If you just want a car that is easy and cheap to make stupidly fast just go for an eclipse, nice part is eclipses have gotten a lot cheaper since the EVO came out.

jmillheiser wrote:Honda civics are actually pretty easy to wrench on, part of why they are so popular with tuners.

Not true: I still have nightmares from when I replaced my Civic's timing belt and water pump. Keep in mind my Civic doesn't have power steering or cruise control and there was still about a metric ton of junk to unbolt, move and keep track of. No fun.

And Civics are popular with tuners because they are the usual family hand-me-down cars. They just keep running until the male teen in the family takes posession of it and "modz it out" to make it "wicked sick, yo."

Skier wrote:

mydlyfkryzis wrote:There was an article in this weeks newspaper about the Hummer that passed the DARPA test for the self driving military vehicle. Thge vehicle had to pass a a long desert course, avoiding obstacles and reaching its destination without human intervention.

The article talked about the future of this technology and that one day, we would give the keys of the car to the car and the car would drive us where we wanted to go without our help at all.

Don't worry, they had a two-wheeled prototype do a very impressive job at tackling their course fairly recently. So while we may not be able to provide steering input, we could stay on two wheels.

I will be dead before it comes to that..... one way or another.

I've got a Yamaha Majesty 400 scooter, with a shiftless transmission. This is my first motorcycle of any kind, and couple of reasons I got it were (1) I'm basically lazy, and didn't want to shift gears. (2) Two less things I had to worry about while learning to ride.

So far it seems to work just fine. At 60 mph the engine is turning 5300 rpm. The red line is 8250. I don't know how fast it will go, but I have had it up to 75. Didn't look at the tach that time. It handles well enough for me, although I freely admit that I don't know anything to compare it too. Since I use it to ride to work, (78 miles one way) it rides and handles good enough for me.

I know a lot of people don't consider "scooters" to be motorcycles. That's ok with me. I'll wave to them anyway.

When's the last time you had to use a kickstarter on a bike? Do you miss drum brakes? Progress in engineering allows us to enjoy the ride more. Automatic transmission is certainly not new to motorcycles. My first bike was a 1980 Hondamatic 400. No clutch. Honda also produced a 750 Hondamatic. Do you drive a stick shift or automatic car/truck? My point is that you still have a choice so there's no need to flame choice if is doesn't meet your needs.

CajunBass wrote:I've got a Yamaha Majesty 400 scooter, with a shiftless transmission. This is my first motorcycle of any kind, and couple of reasons I got it were (1) I'm basically lazy, and didn't want to shift gears. (2) Two less things I had to worry about while learning to ride.

So far it seems to work just fine. At 60 mph the engine is turning 5300 rpm. The red line is 8250. I don't know how fast it will go, but I have had it up to 75. Didn't look at the tach that time. It handles well enough for me, although I freely admit that I don't know anything to compare it too. Since I use it to ride to work, (78 miles one way) it rides and handles good enough for me.

I know a lot of people don't consider "scooters" to be motorcycles. That's ok with me. I'll wave to you anyway.

This is a wave from me, anyone who rides 78mls one way on two wheels in a day is well Ok in my book.

sapaul wrote:

CajunBass wrote:I've got a Yamaha Majesty 400 scooter, with a shiftless transmission. This is my first motorcycle of any kind, and couple of reasons I got it were (1) I'm basically lazy, and didn't want to shift gears. (2) Two less things I had to worry about while learning to ride.

So far it seems to work just fine. At 60 mph the engine is turning 5300 rpm. The red line is 8250. I don't know how fast it will go, but I have had it up to 75. Didn't look at the tach that time. It handles well enough for me, although I freely admit that I don't know anything to compare it too. Since I use it to ride to work, (78 miles one way) it rides and handles good enough for me.

I know a lot of people don't consider "scooters" to be motorcycles. That's ok with me. I'll wave to you anyway.

This is a wave from me, anyone who rides 78mls one way on two wheels in a day is well Ok in my book.

+1 this post. I'd wave - only a few snobs here. Most of us just love the road on two wheels.

BobMielke wrote:When's the last time you had to use a kickstarter on a bike? Do you miss drum brakes? Progress in engineering allows us to enjoy the ride more. Automatic transmission is certainly not new to motorcycles. My first bike was a 1980 Hondamatic 400. No clutch. Honda also produced a 750 Hondamatic. Do you drive a stick shift or automatic car/truck? My point is that you still have a choice so there's no need to flame choice if is doesn't meet your needs.

I hear ya, but still I'll go kicking and screaming into this "advancement". I think the last bike I'd pick would have automatic shifting/clutching. I'm the same with my car. I own a Subaru WRX and it is a manual. I don't understand even selling this car with an automatic myself. Subaru is one place you can find half the cars still with manual tranny.

I don't miss your point the Bob. I fought the wars to bring Windows OS into an office where everyone used WordPerfect pre-Windows. Everyone said Windows was junk and fought me to not use it - 10 years later there is no computer with out a GUI OS of some sort.