My car in general feels quite fast, but I find that if I leave the car in strictly automatic in 5th gear, and gun it while going 60 km/h or 38 MPH, I find the car doesn't boot like it should. When I put the pedal to the metal, I find the car only gears down and hits 4000 RPM's initially, which is not enough for you to take off because the VTEC hasn't kicked in yet.

Even when shifting into SS mode and putting it in 2nd gear, it doesn't feel as fast as it should. Has anyone noticed this?

Other than that, the only gripe I have is with 4th gear, but so do all of us. The gear ratio is horrific once you pass 3rd gear. Basically our car is great from...

0-55 km/h
70-120 km/h
120-175 km/h

then the power drops off, and the car feels like a turtle up to 240 km/h. 4th gear really hates pulling its weight.

 

4th isnt bad if you run 3rd to just before the revlimiter. (105 ish mph)

 

Hey Jeff I don't understand something, you said in 5th gear (full auto) you are doing 38mph?
In full auto, mine never shifts to 5th unless is above or around 45mph.
Now as far as 2nd and in SS, I can tell you that mine jumps like a cat if I step on it. You might want to check on it or lets wait and see what other fellow members said about it but I think you could have a problem if yours is acting like that.

 

I'm still lost in Metricconversionland...

 

1 kmh = 1.6092 mph


@cUr@-TL

 

<<My car in general feels quite fast, but I find that if I leave the car in strictly automatic in 5th gear, and gun it while going 60 km/h or 38 MPH, I find the car doesn't boot like it should.>>

I think Jeff meant that he was driving @ D5 at around 38 mph, not that it was actually in 5th gear.

<<Now as far as 2nd and in SS, I can tell you that mine jumps like a cat if I step on it.>>

As far as I understand, the tranny behaves different if it's in any of the the D modes than in SS, (Correct me if I'm wrong).

I use D5 only for highway driving as the revs drops too low and the car behaves funny if I use it in the city. D4 I use for most city roads and D3 when I'm around school zones so I don't get a ticket.

A mechanic friend told me before that driving with the revs close to idling makes the tranny much hotter. I also used to drive rally during my younger days and we don't keep the revs below 2000 rpm unless we're to do a full stop.

As far as the sensation of going fast at SS mode, I don't know. The car may "feel" too fast or too slow to some people. It's not like driving an NSX or a Porsche where you're constantly in touch with the way the car behaves and the "feel" of the car is actually different. The TL after all is a sedan, and at it's class is supposed to give you a predominantly comfortable ride, with a little bit of OOOMMPH!. After 4th gear, the car is supposed to cruise comfortably, and not many near-luxury sedan owners do cruise at 100+ mph in low gear. 5th gear was probably added for fuel efficiency.

For a sedan, the car has a lot more to offer, but maybe some drivers think that car is actually more than that. And i don't think it should be driven as such. Enjoying to drive the car means that we do it also in a safe and responsible manner. Otherwise, we would end up like those younger types with their newly acquired 5.0 liter Mustangs wrapped around a pole.

Vicman

_________________

03 TL Type-S SSM
K&N

 

yah, what I was referring to was when I'm on a city road, and I get stuck behind a grandmother going like 60 km/h. If I see a bunch of people pulling up quickly in the passing lane, and I wanna make it in before they get close to me, I will go left and gunn it. When going 60 though, I find that if I don't have time to switch into SS mode, and I simply leave it in 5th gear, and let the car decide where to gear to, it doesn't always select the right gear, or maybe it is 2nd gear, but too low in the gear range that it doesn't give enough boost. Who knows, I just find that in order to get a good boost at 60 km/h, I have to put it into SS mode.

Anyways to fix this?