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Industry: Email Alert RSS FeedTransmission considerations: beyond the manual gearbox
Automotive Design & Production, Feb, 2006 by William Kimberley
These new transmissions are being employed primarily on rear-wheel-drive vehicles in the mid-range, luxury class and SUV sectors in Europe. More recently, though, automatic 6-speed transmissions have also made their appearance in front transverse applications. While the advent of the dual clutch transmission has raised the bar for the developers of the multi-ratio automatic transmission ZF claims that its newest 6-speed transmission, following an upgrade to the electronic control unit, matches the response times of a dual clutch transmission. "In the past, multi-ratio automatic transmissions based on planetary design principles were developed very much with comfort as the key priority," said Wagner. "Developers consequently paid relatively little attention to the notion of sports performance in gear change operations. However, the introduction of the 6-speed transmission has seen an improvement in the responsiveness, which is becoming more the focus of development."
There is not one transmission system that ideally satisfies all the applicable requirements, said Wagner. Selecting a transmission depends greatly on the vehicle parameters while different vehicle driveline configurations also require different solutions. There is also the factor of customer acceptance in different markets. "In the long term, the cheapest system will win over the largest section of the market," said Wagner. "When looking at costs, though, there is a key point that should not be forgotten and that there is not a one size fits all solution. Different systems can each constitute a commercial optimum for their respective and different driveline configurations."
By William Kimberley, European Correspondent, WilKimberl@aol.com
COPYRIGHT 2006 Gardner Publications, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning
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