Why are AT shifters so prominent?

[JCE]

It's a good place to rest your hand, like a king on his throne, septer in hand, so you can pretend you have infinite control of the car.

He's half right. I always rests my right hand on the auto shifter knob. Then again I do the same when I drive a manual transmission. I like that BMW auto shifter, I think it should just be a small lever on the dash and leave more space for other things on the console.

 

[=V8 Power=]

It's so that, on right hand drive cars, you can rest your left hand on the shifter, your right arm on the windowsill and look cool.

Wait a second, one hand on the shifter... one hand on the windowsill...that leaves nothing to steer the car!! LOL, I assume you mean not at the same time.

 

[skip0110]

Wait a second, one hand on the shifter... one hand on the windowsill...that leaves nothing to steer the car!!

Thats what your knees are for, silly.

 

[Sniffs]

i HATE a damn floor shift. it's too easy to bump the damn thing into second doing 80 MPH down the interstate while fumbling for your ashtray, cupholder, radio (friggin old fords), etc...

 

[TopHat]

Ummm, okaaay...

What kind of shift are you using that moves that easily, and is driving said car a life risking expierience?

 

[Metar]

Well, when my mom drove a rented automatic Daihatsu YRV, I once accidentaly pushed the stick into neutral. It's not too tough, it happened on our ex-car, a Citroen ZX, as well as on a Pajero '97.

Luckily my father only drives manual. It's cheaper, more reliable, and you have more control.

 

[Omnis]

my friend Lawrence used to always knock his mom's pathfinder into neutral. I knocked our Stanza's stick into neutral a few times too. If it were a stub of a stick, it wouldn't have done that.

 

[iceburns288]

AT levers are large because they're easier to operate quickly and without looking. Check out one of the SMG/F1-style shifters from, say, a modern Ferrari. There's a dinkly little lever about the size of a zipper pull on the console. First off, it looks about as useful as an appendix sitting there. Second off, I can imagine myself driving the car every day: back out of the parking space, then sit diagonally across the traffic aisle blocking traffic while I squint and search around trying to move that little vestigial thing from R to D.

Nah, the reverse lever is no problem at all. You pull it back to put it in reverse and then just upshift on the paddle to put it back into first. Easy.

The buttons on the center of the DB9 are for the transmission, R, N, D, etc. THAT is how to do a shifter with class!

 

[TopHat]

Waitasec, Aston using a Push Button Transmission.... ITS 50'S Crhysler ALL OVER AGAIN!!!

 

[Firebird]

Waitasec, Aston using a Push Button Transmission.... ITS 50'S Chrysler ALL OVER AGAIN!!!

 

[B_B_B]

What about brake torquing?

I thin one reason they use a long shifter is it is seen as "sporty" to have a floor shifter. In the early days of autos it was three-on-the-tree (column shifter, auto) or four-on-the-floor (manual transmission). Putting the auto shifter in the floor console was thus seen as the sporty option. Even late-model Crown Vics had a sport package which moved the shifter to the console from it's normal place on the column.

Automakers have not had luck with smaller systems...Mopar tried pushbutton shifters in the late 50's but people were lunching their trannys by accidentally hitting reverse while moving forward.


The Corvair had a small, t-shaped in-dash shifter, much like a modern Sienna minivan (the newest models). I can't find an image, though.

The biggest, strangest automatic shifter arrangement I can think of was Oldsmobile's Lightning Rods on the 80's 442's.

To upshift, you push the rods forward sequentially from right to left.

lightning rods shifter is also known as his and hers shifter ala reg auto for the lil lady and manual shifting for the guy

 

[Duke]

lightning rods shifter is also known as his and hers shifter ala reg auto for the lil lady and manual shifting for the guy

No, actually, that's incorrect.

The Lightning Rod operated as described above. A His-n-Hers is different. My sister's '68 GTO has one. It's effectively the ancient equivalent of your typical modern "sport mode" automatic.

To the right of neutral on the floor shifter, there was a little gate that you had to slide back. Then you could slip the lever over and down a separate track to 1st gear. This let you make quick up- or down-shifts with less danger of nailing reverse accidentally. Also, the detents were a little stronger to help yopu shift only one gear at a time.

It was actually kind of worthless, but it did let you control shifting a little better than just the regular ATX did.

 

[skip0110]

Cool info, Duke. 👍 Never seen one of those before.