Okay, I going to sound stupid here but then again I heard there are no stupid questions! Can someone explain the six speed automatic to me? What gear other than normal D can I safely drive in? What is the purpose of the six gears?
6 Speed Automatic
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HowStuffWorks "How Automatic Transmissions Work"
You can safely drive the RAV in 4th, 5th and 6th gear at speeds > 40 mph. But gas will take a hit in less than optimal gear selection.
D just means that you are letting the car decide the best gear, anywhere from 1st to 6th. Choosing "5", means that you are letting the car choose any gear between 1st and 5th and so on.
You can safely drive the RAV in 4th, 5th and 6th gear at speeds > 40 mph. But gas will take a hit in less than optimal gear selection.
D just means that you are letting the car decide the best gear, anywhere from 1st to 6th. Choosing "5", means that you are letting the car choose any gear between 1st and 5th and so on.
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I like using 2nd gear when going down steep hills. Acts like a standard tranny and slows me down. That's basically the only time I take my Rav out of 'D'.
I leave my 4Runner in Drive 99% of the time. The Sport shift is useful to quickly downshift if you are making a pass on a country road (on my 5AT 4Runner, it defaults to 4th when I go to sport shift). The other time it is useful is to force the vehicle to engine brake. You are basically setting the top gear you want the vehicle to go into. So, in snow and heading down a long downhill, you can put it in sport and slowly work your way down the gears to slow without having to use your brakes. I'll post a followup when we get our Rav4 on Monday.
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Side note: wouldn't it be sweet if these came with a manual trans option? The rav is pretty fun to drive and I think a manual would make it more so. The "tiptronic" or sport shifter is so 15-years-ago-Honda-prelude.
Sadly, in the US, there are around 4 of us that would want a stick shift. And they wouldn't offer it in the Limited... or the AWD model (which is what Mazda does with the CX-5). My wife's MINI is a stick and we'd both love a Rav4 Limited with a stick, but I doubt there is a business case for it.
You can bet that if we had 8 dollar a gallon gas in this country, you would see a lot more standard transmission around. But then we would have 8 dollar a gallon gas.....
In the era of 6+ gear transmissions, ATs are more efficient on the EPA test* than stick shifts as a rule of thumb. If we had $8/gal gas, we'd see more stick shifts because people would want the car as cheap as possible to help offset some of those fuel prices.
*It often doesn't pan out in the real world, but Ford, for example, has shown us that an AT and turbos make it easy to teach to the test. Fuel economy numbers sell vehicles.
Many discussions on this subject. The eCVT used in the Toyota Hybrids is nothing like the CVT Honda has started using in recent years. Calling it a CVT is a total misnomer since it has no belts or variable pulleys.
I'm also a Honda guy. Starting back in 1978 I've owned many manual or automatic Accords and a couple Civic wagons, none with CVTs. But now with my 2018 Accord hybrid which Honda "officially" says has an eCVT, nothing could be further from the truth. It, in fact, literally, mechanically, anyway you want to look at it, has no transmission at all, being a one-speed direct drive like a Tesla.
Point is you just can't believe the supposed technical BS auto makers are putting out and to my knowledge (someone please correct me if I missed one) Toyota has never had a true CVT. Sadly the good old manuals have been missing from the North American market since 2006 but they got replaced by automatics not true CVTs.
I'm also a Honda guy. Starting back in 1978 I've owned many manual or automatic Accords and a couple Civic wagons, none with CVTs. But now with my 2018 Accord hybrid which Honda "officially" says has an eCVT, nothing could be further from the truth. It, in fact, literally, mechanically, anyway you want to look at it, has no transmission at all, being a one-speed direct drive like a Tesla.
Point is you just can't believe the supposed technical BS auto makers are putting out and to my knowledge (someone please correct me if I missed one) Toyota has never had a true CVT. Sadly the good old manuals have been missing from the North American market since 2006 but they got replaced by automatics not true CVTs.
2013-2018 gas engine all use a regular 6-speed transmission, no cvt
2019-2024 gas engine all use a regular 8-speed transmission, no cvt
2016-2024 hybrid models use an electronically controlled cvt (ecvt)
Cheers
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