Peeve Farm

g r o t t o 1 1

Peeve Farm
Breeding peeves for show, not just to keep as pets

Brian Tiemann
~~Silicon Valley~~New York-based purveyor of a confusing mixture of Apple punditry and political bile.

btman at grotto11 dot com

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Tuesday, May 13, 2008
08:02 - Bueller? Bueller? Bueller? http://www.autoblog.com/2008/05/13/new-ferrari-california-exposed/	(top)
It's a whole new Ferrari, the California: Looks pretty sweet, if a bit audacious and not so much "beautiful" as "striking", what with those weird side creases. Also: This car of firsts also debuts the production application of a dual clutch gearbox from Ferrari. The 7-speed unit is mounted in a rear transaxle configuration and should provide smoother shifting and even better performance than the existing hydraulically-actuated units that Ferrari currently uses. So no manual option, even? Maybe we should be talking about the previous models as "cars of lasts"...

1. Mr. Lion - 09:48 Tue 5/13/2008 ( email | web )

No man pedal, no sale.

2. Chris M - 11:22 Tue 5/13/2008 ( email )

Well, cancel my order, then :)

Seriously, the more automakers take this Father-Knows-Best attitude to something as basic as changing gears, the less interested I am. And this will trickle down, I'm sure, except that in the mass-market products it will be mandated in the name of the environment; the claim will be that more efficient shifting = less carbon dioxide.

The last refuge is the small airplane, where the pilot still controls things as basic as the fuel-air mixture.

3. B. Durbin - 12:58 Tue 5/13/2008 ( email | web )

On something that high-priced, they shouldn't offer automatic at all. My car (a Ford Freestyle, hardly sexy) has a variable rate transmission, which is a definite step up from automatic. No feel of shift at all, just spin up and down as appropriate. (They've downgraded it to just automatic on the new models, the "Taurus X.")

And yes, they should have a manual transmission version. Know your market.

4. bob - 17:47 Tue 5/13/2008 ( email )

Am I dumb, but I don't see where it says that there is no manual option.

Normally when cars have these dual-clutch systems, the driver can switch between fully automatic operation, and manual operation.

This is totally different to an automatic transmission, where you can have a sort of tiptronic mode where you can send hints to the autobox as to when to shift.

It's true that these transmissions have an automatic clutch, but that's all really. They are a manual gearbox with an auto clutch. No slushbox. It's the kind of gearbox F1 cars have, and they are pretty cool imho. Most users I guess would never engage automatic mode.

5. cq - 20:55 Tue 5/13/2008

As long as Ferrari continues to sell every car it makes, for any price they ask (which is the current state of affairs), limiting their potential audience doesn't hurt them. That whole exclusivity thang...

6. Brian Tiemann - 21:01 Tue 5/13/2008 ( email | web )

Audi-style DSG (which is what they're talking about here) is cool and all, but it's still "automatic" to me�it will still launch from a stop just by stepping on the gas and will shift automatically if you put it into that mode, and at all times there's always a computer between you and the actuation of the mechanism. When I test-drove the A3 with DSG, I concluded almost immediately that it was cool, but only in a "I would only use this once per friend" kind of way�I'd show it off to whoever wanted it demonstrated, and then I'd put it in auto mode and forget about it. It wasn't worth the $1800 extra that it would have cost, which is why I got the A3 with the standard 6-speed, and I've never once regretted it.

Certainly true that Ferrari won't have any trouble selling these, though; if this is the market they want, then they're welcome to it. They'll be parting ways with a lot of purists in the process, and Enzo probably wouldn't be any too happy with that development, but one can hardly argue with success.

7. Mr. Lion - 21:14 Tue 5/13/2008 ( email | web )

One can argue with success just fine-- by buying a Lamborghini. A trend that has been ever-increasing among the ex-diehard Tifosi, from what I've seen.

One can also argue that Ferrari selling every car they make is proof of the current trend of ever-more removing the driver from the equation, but in my opinion banking on the sales numbers alone is flawed. The fans of Ferrari, as much as its racing heritage, made the company what it is, and continue to make it what it is. Cheese off enough of them, and they'll find somewhere else to go. If Lambo were interested in racing at all, my guess is Ferrari would be listening to their fan base a whole lot more.

8. Wonderduck - 22:54 Tue 5/13/2008 ( email | web )

I don't believe it... a Ferrari I can actually stand. I'm a huge Formula 1 fan, and absolutely despise the team, and by extension the auto manufacturer as a whole, but I like the looks of this car.

Still rather have anything by McLaren, though.

9. bd - 20:53 Wed 5/14/2008

So what is the theory here? That Schumacher's car had a semi-automatic gearbox because he's not enough of a man? Or doesn't like having to become involved with his car?

Every F-1 team developed this technology at huge expense because they are girly men who'd rather be scrap-booking than driving?

:-)

10. bd - 20:58 Wed 5/14/2008

BTW: Wonderduck, , , why do you despise the Ferrari team?

11. Mr. Lion - 22:02 Wed 5/14/2008 ( email | web )

Schumi drove a race car in an environment that became one to which a missed or slow shift meant lost positions that were next to impossible to get back, hence the F1 gearbox consistency bandaid became a universal theme as you needed one to be as artificially good as the next guy. See also, traction control, launch control, anti-stall, etc, etc. All things designed to save a driver from an error in a sport that is almost completely unforgiving of them. If I were driving an F1 car, I'd want the most advanced electronic gearbox and driver aids my team could come up with, because winning means more zeros on the paycheck.

But, road cars aren't used in an F1 environment, so the sole argument for an F1 gearbox becomes one of pseudo-convenience rather than competitive necessity. Road cars of a prancing horse nature are about pleasure, first and foremost, and I have no doubt Schumi would rather shift his own gears carving through Stelvio Pass in a road car.

Call me old fashioned, but I like a driving experience that has more in common with an apprenticeship than a high score.

12. Brian Tiemann - 22:07 Wed 5/14/2008 ( email | web )

[puffs on a pipe in a mahogany-paneled library] Mmm. Indeed! Quite.

13. bd - 09:34 Thu 5/15/2008

Hmmm . . too many things to say. . will hit high points and wander away musing and mumbling.

(1) F1 has always been extremely competitive and intolerant of error. It was that way before electronic gearboxes, traction control, what-have-you. These tools are more symptoms than causes.

(2) Every technological development in racing: fuel injection, disk brakes, radial tires, better rubber compounds for those tires, seat belts: was excoriated by fans (and some drivers) when it first came out because they were believed to reduce the skill needed to drive the car.

(3) These complaints have, with few exceptions, been baseless. None of these developments reduce the skill needed to drive well. They change where that skill is applied. This can be annoying for people who have a deep investment in the old skill set. The person who learned how to manually adjust his ignition timing for best power while driving briskly was probably deeply annoyed by the development of vacuum advance; and let's not even consider modern ignition systems.

Manual advance ignition systems are not "the way it's supposed to be". They were just the best we could do at the time. I doubt that an engineer, given free rein, would specify a manual advance ignition system. Whether a manual shift gear box is the best way to handle the torque multiplication issues in Otto cycle engines is a similar question. Just because it was first doesn't make it best, even if people derive pleasure and sense of self-worth from developing the skills to work around the limitations of the technology. If steam power had taken off, we might not have ever needed transmissions in this sense, and we'd be complaining about modern flash super-heat technology as "reducing the skill and pleasure in driving a car."

(4) In any driving/riding situation, you have $10 of attention. You have to decide where you spend it. Technological developments reduce the amount of attention needed to address that particular sub-system. It's true that some folks use that reduced attention requirement to daydream. Others use it to attend more fully and subtly to what is left, or even a completely new area. But that difference is a function of the driver, not the technology.

(5) A lot of pleasure pursuits are partially about artificial constraints, balanced by a desire for the best tools possible. So we don't ride helicopters to the peak of Everest, but we do make use of oxygen bottles and titanium pickaxes. This behavior is a little odd, looked at from the outside. There is a big Goldilocks problem when it comes to these things, because what is too techy and modern for one person is too retro for another. It depends on what you think mountain climbing is about. Is it cheating at mountain-climbing to have gear you don't worry is going to shatter if you drop it? Depends, I suspect, on which mountain climber you had posted on your bedroom wall when you were 10. Which is in turn a function of the year in which you turned 10.

(6) There is pleasure to be found in doing a difficult thing well. Like shifting your own gears. But that's also true of driving quickly in a 73 Cortina with bald tires and dead shocks. Road going Ferraris are about pleasure: no dispute. But that pleasure is not solely about doing a difficult thing well. It is also about historical and technological context. Things like exclusivity, price, and technological development are all part of that package. Ferrari would not exist in the way they do today if Enzo had turned his nose up at radial tires and disk brakes because they reduced the skill needed to drive the car.

(7) None of this is an argument against driving for pleasure, or stick shifts. If you maximize your pleasure by rowing your own gears: fine. If you prefer driving a Miata over a Ferrari because you can probe a Miata's limits while staying within your own: fine If you prefer a Moggie trike (none of the 4w blasphemy): fine. I'm just thinking aloud about the historically and personally contingent forces that seem to affect what people find fun.

(8) As I recall, Schumi's road 430 is an electronic gearbox model.

14. Mr. Lion - 10:52 Thu 5/15/2008 ( email | web )

A debate that can no doubt go on endlessly, and one likely better undertaken over scotch rather than syn/acks, but I digress:

F1 has indeed been intolerant of error-- however, never before to the degree it has been for the last decade and change. There was a time, not very long ago, in which passes could not be counted on one hand, and losing a position did not mean settling for a placement to be determined hours later. F1 has become expensive slot-car racing, largely due to the rule structure and meddling by the powers that be, to the point that it became little more than a technical showcase for the various marques. For evidence of this one needs look no farther than the current banning of traction control in an effort to make the racing more involving and less slot-car-ish, and other not-so-recent things like the massive grooves cut in tires purely so they could be made wide enough to be aesthetically pleasing. At any rate-- I would say, as would evidently the many others required to make large rule changes happen-- that F1 has gotten considerably less about driving skill and considerably more about engineering skill to the point that those wiz-bang advances make the driving less of a consequence.

However, with all that said, the discussion is about road cars and the use of transmission types that while marketed as F1 technology, really are not. They're marketed well, though, which is responsible for the popularity as evidenced in everything from the 360 up. As soon as the systems became reasonably usable on the street, out came the faster-shift marketing gobbledegook. Bottom line, for me at least: A 430 pops a shift off in around 100 miliseconds when set to "kill" mode. So does my brain, left foot, and right hand. However, when stuck in slow traffic or on a hill, I'm not endlessly feathering the clutch to a consistency of charcoal, because, in a nutshell, I can still do it better than the current computerized systems can, and have a clutch left after 10,000 miles. And, as I don't have a Ferrari team handling my maintenance for free, I consider that a rather good thing.

Now, on another point-- The anti-technology-purist argument isn't a very good one. Nobody, at least not I, are saying that things like fuel injection and disk brakes are bad things, and that it's better done the old fashioned way. To quote the Ikea guy: That's just crazy. What I'm saying is that some automobile systems, namely transmission, brake and throttle control, are best left up to the driver assuming he or she is competent.

I'll take the most advanced wiz-bang fuel injection, carbon/ceramic brakes, hoover-grade ground effects, uber-crazy zillion dollar alloys, fly-paper multi-compound tires, zillion-lumen carbon-arc headlights, magnetic-goo shocks, and any other technological advancement that makes a car, and only the car better.

The problem I have is when manufacturers start making decisions for me in an environment in which I don't want them to, largely because I can do it better than their systems can. I don't want to manage my own timing advance, because a computer can do that better than I can. But I do want to control what my brakes are doing, I do want to be able to shift a gear without the request going through the UN council for warranty approvals, and when I mash on the gas, I want the butterflies open half a second ago. These simple things are slowly being designed out of cars, chiefly by those who profess to build them out of passion and pleasure for the act of driving. To me, these systems are counterproductive, and while they may save poor drivers from silly mistakes (after all, Britney can't well drop a tranny out of an F1 Ferrari), or make marginal drivers feel like Schumi (Porsche, call your office), they completely, entirely destroy the experience and pleasure of driving a true sports car.

So while I'd rather not be behind the wheel of a Mercer Raceabout versus a Gallardo, I most certainly would rather be in an F40 than an Enzo.

And yes, Schumi's 430 did have flappies. So did his FXX, and likely every other car the factory has given him. He sure seemed to be having a ball popping his own gears on Ducati's Desmosedici, though, and I would be very surprised if he didn't have a similar opinion when it comes to road cars.

15. Wonderduck - 16:59 Thu 5/15/2008 ( email | web )

10. bd - 20:58 Wed 5/14/2008: BTW: Wonderduck... why do you despise the Ferrari team?

Because they nearly killed off F1 with their complete dominance of the series. Because Slappy Schumacher wasn't afraid to cheat whenever he thought he could get away with it. Because the team has received preferential treatment from the FIA ("Ferrari Is All") constantly. Because they're friggin' obnoxious.

I became a hard-core F1 fan in 2004. My favorite team then was Minardi (Zsolt Baumgartner is God); when they were sold to Red Bull, I shifted my allegence to SuperAguri. Now that they're gone away, I don't root for any team (though I make fun of them all over at my blog).