Today, in the Indian car market, at least if you live in a city, an automatic transmission is a must have. Traffic has increased so much, that you would want the convenience of an automatic transmission. It is less stressful if you do not have to deal with a third pedal and shift gears. But there are just so many automatics. Which one to buy? Confused, right? Don’t worry, I will help you.
1. Continuously Variable Transmission (CVT)- This is a good solution if you have a lot of driving in city traffic and are a calm driver on the highway. The main benefit is that it is extremely smooth and gives good fuel efficiency. The disadvantage is that if you are a faster driver or an enthusiast, you will not find it fun or involving, and the rubber-band effect (there is a rise in engine RPM but no actual increase in speed when you give a heavy throttle input) will make it not a fun experience. Also, the maintenance cost is slightly expensive.
2. Automated Manual Transmission (AMT)-This is a good solution because it is cheap, reliable, and gives amazing fuel-efficiency. Maintenance cost is extremely cheap for an automatic. Also, for enthusiasts, you get complete manual control in most AMTs. The catch is that there is a lot of head-nod between shifts, by which I mean that shifts are slow and jerky, and it gets confused when you are driving it hard.
3. Torque-converter- This is the oldest and most reliable automatic. It is not the smoothest, but quite smooth, and it also gives some feel and manual control to driving enthusiasts. A reliable choice. The only downside is that it does not give the best fuel economy, especially with aggressive throttle inputs.
4. Dual-clutch transmission (DCT)- If you are a driving enthusiast, and just cannot deal with a manual gearbox because of the traffic, and love banging through the gears, a dual-clutch transmission is what you want. It will give you a lot of freedom to upshift and downshift aggressively and quickly. It will give you the quickest shifts, and with paddle-shifters in almost all DCTs, it will give you the feel of a Formula 1 car. The enthusiast’s choice indeed. The cons are low fuel economy, jerkiness in city traffic, and high maintenance cost. Also, you might want to be careful because they aren’t always the most reliable.
