The Gear Box (Transmission)

We decided to take the Smart on a country drive last night so that my Wife could get her first drive away from the traffic around town. She is still not quite ready to use the manual paddle system (or even the stick) and preferred to keep it in automatic for the time being.

As I mentioned before, automatic mode does labour a little at the low end of each of the 4th and 5th gear ratios. As is the case with all automatics (my Beemer is automatic) it can't predict a corner, a hill or even a slight incline coming and change down early. This requires the use of the kick down here and there when driving in fully automatic mode. Clearly the automatic system is designed with maximum fuel economy in mind because (unless you have your foot down) it likes to change up in to 5th at around 45 mph. I would prefer it to wait until around 50-52 mph.

Paddle Shift Manual Mode

Once we arrived at the place we were turning around at to head home again we changed over and I drove home. This is the first time I have really driven in manual only mode using the paddles and I have to say I really enjoyed it! The car seems to come alive (as much as a tiny CDI can do) when you tap the down shift just entering a corner or about to hit a slight incline.

I've read many reviews on the web where people (mainly motoring journalists who should know better) talk about the sluggish unpredictable transmission (gear box to those in the UK !) but fail to realise that in manual mode this thing changes gear in about the same time a 'normal' person changes gear manually using a clutch. When I say 'normal' I am specifically excluding the times when you are in a real hurry, or boy racers trying to prove a point. What I am talking about is the clutch-in, change-gear, blend the clutch out again process.

Changing gear 'at the right time' seems to be 'almost' seamless, and certainly improves upon the automatic change that most people seem to hate. Clearly if you change gear at the 'wrong-time' the engine needs a little longer to adjust it's speed to match, but this is your fault, not the car.

Since most Americans (this is where most of the negative comments come from) are not very familiar with a stick shift , perhaps they are lacking this basic driving skill, and it's going to take a little time for them to be comfortable with it. It's not the car's fault, it's their driving style that simply needs adjusting. Being so easy to use, I absolutely recommend the paddle shift system to any one, and it can't take more than a few minutes to get used to.

When in stop-start traffic I will probably just stick it in automatic mode - because that is where automatic really shines.