When for example going from 3rd to 2 do you keep your throttle to the floor or try to keep a small amount of throttle or no throttle ? This to avoid a "hard" reaction of the car.

And, on the over way when you go for example from 2 to 3rd did you keep the throttle on the floor while changing ? Is it good to do that or is it better to lift your foot a bit, almost like you would do with a manual transmission ?

 

Since your ECU would help you "shift" and "transmit" your gears, no matter what status the throttle is, your TL should be fine.

But, when you try to downshift from 3rd to 2nd with the full of throttle and high speed, if the speed exceeds the limit of 2nd gear, you may not be able to command your SportShift to downshift.

Usually, 2nd to 3rd should be ok.

 

Yeah i am a newbie to using a shifter too, say if I was doing 40-50mph and wanted to pass someone or if someone wanted to "race" on the highway, and im in auto mode, do i switch to SS and drop it a gear or 2 (not sure which gear to down shift too) and gun it? Hypothetically what would be the best way to do it? just stay in auto and hit the gas?



thanks

 

also.. what if i was at a red light, or just doing a qtr mile run, how would I best achieve ultimate result? stay in auto? use SS? if using SS then how exactly would i use it? just shift 2,3,4,5 pretty much self explanatory?

 

i've read some other threads that say the sports shift works best on pass people on 3rd, they said it was rated up to about 88, then it goes into 4th-up to approx 115. i haven't tried it yet, but good to know i have it if i ever need it.

 

im not sure about my 05, but i know on my 00 TL, 2nd and 3rd are the most powerfull, id try to get into the top of 2nd and use all of 3rd when passing/racing. after 3rd and a lil bit of forth, its over, the rest is overdrive.

 

I would let the gas go when you want to hit the high RPM. if you are going 80 in 4th and step on it, then try to shift in to 3rd its not going to let you, but at 80 if you shift first then step on it, you'll have 3rd up until like 115. well that what i got out of it, only tried like twice.

 

I think you're wright that's the way i do downshift and floor it. It's very easy to reach the cut-off in 2nd gear on highway, and what a wonderful sound.

There's is much power and quickest action when you use SS, than let it in D and floor it.

The "L" position is not so bad on highways or city.

 

I've found that for unanticipated acceleration just letting the transmission shift itself is the fastest. If you know your going to accelerate then downshifting to a lower gear and bringing the revs up to reduce the VTEC lag works best. The tranny can downshift faster than I can reach over and slap the shifter into SS and find the right gear. I find SS works best for handling on the twisty roads. Downshift before the turn to engine brake, tap the brakes to compress the suspension, bring the revs up for accelerating out of the turn....... then go hunting for the apex. Great fun! Until you get to the ragged edge you hardly notice the TL is FWD.

 

At 80mph I am pretty sure my car is in 5th gear, so when I shift over that means I have to drop 2 gears to 3rd, is that safe?

 

i'm sure it is safe. the car won't let you do any harm to it. it's got a mind of its own. it will only let you go to lower gears if its not harmful to the car. Remember the car won't let you redline.

 

I just recently discovered how good the L gear is when you need instant acceleration and you are in D.

At 60-70mph (haven't tried it higher yet), pop the lever into L and it immediately goes into 3d gear, very smoothly, and you have all that power. If you are in D and want to manually downshift to 3d, you have to move the lever to SS, then pull it back twice for 3rd, which is two more movements than shifting directly to L.

It will NOT hurt the tranny.

 

Im not that schooled on trannys I have to admit, but wouldnt throwing it into L at that spead be putting it into 1st gear? and wont the car just rev high and feel like the tranny just fell out of the car?

 

It will only go into the lowest gear that will not over-rev the engine. The computer and electronics will not allow you to hurt the transmission. The "L" in this case does not mean 1st gear.

For verification, see the Owner's Manual, page 183, top left corner.

Try it at 60mph, shift from D to L. You will hardly feel the transition but you will have instant power for passing or emergency handling.

 

Great thanks! So if I am in 4th or 5th gear at 60-70mph, shifting to L and hitting the gas is better than shifting from 5 to 3 and hitting the gas in terms of the best speed/pick-up?

I tell you i need to learn the SS more, I was doing 80mph+ on a nice long empty highway, some souped up little Dodge neon (lol) passed me and then I floored it and it barely got up to 4200 rpm, it never hit V-tech again, I was waiting for a nice acceleration boost that just never happend, I was dissapointed.. it just gradually increased in spead up to 100mph or so until I slowed down.

Maybe I should have down shifted at that point? Who knows


....And yes of course I passed that little stupid neon, once I hit 100mph, he was done.

 

I agree with Ron A's tips on using SS for twisties and jumps from standstill. Dropping into the L gear and the ECU is the beauty of the control over the tranny for the straight-line highway pass. I'm pretty sure you can rev the engine into redline but then the throttle cuts in and out (according to the user's manual). But the SS won't even let the revs go to red in downshifts, so that means no fears and more "rice" hunting!

 

gq,

you can compare D -> L like going from 5th gear to 4th gear in a manual stick shift car or from overdrive to regular drive. I think the D or 5 is primarily to save gas!

 

If you are in D at 60-70mph, you will be in 5th gear, not 4th. In this case, shifting to L is better, but if you are already in SS, you might just as well pull the shifter back and put it in 3d that way.

This is not a normal way for the transmission to operate. When you floor it, it should go to the lowest gear that will not over-rev the engine, which would probably be 3d, and it should go up to around the 6,800rpm redline before it shifts to 4th. It should not gradually increase in speed, it should shoot you up there like a rocket. It’s got 270hp, don’t you know?

 

I like the SS for the twisty roads, makes it a lot more fun, but for some reason mine will not go into first until I am about stopped, that does not help for setting the car for the corner. Is it just me or is this the design?

 

Thanks for the info guys.

Ron A: Yeah weird, no idea why it just coasted up to 100mph and didn't pick up real quick, so if I am right, you are saying this would not have happened if I put it from D -> L? It would have shot up real fast?

As I said before, im "transmissonaly challenged" as I do not know how these things work.

Next time I will try D->L doing 80mph, then floor it and see what happens.

Thanks

 

What I was saying was that if you floored it, it should have downshifted and took off like a bat out of hell, about the same as if you had shifted from D to L. It is not normal for the TL to leisurely accelerate when the pedal is floored.

The main difference between flooring and shifting from D to L is that you will get just a little less lag in acceleration when going from D to L than you will when you floor it.

 

This is one of the great disappointments with the TL automatic......it shifts too early from 1st and once out won't go back until the car is stopped. You cannot downshift into 1st gear with SS, it won't let you. It was the same way on my 01 CL. Acura's way of protecting the tranny I guess.

 

For best quarter mile times and being quick off the line:

Start in L - no revving necessary, it will actually take away from your initial launch.

While in L, you will start in 1st and it will allow you to reach 6800 before automatically shifting to 2nd. You can either shift to SS at 6800 or simply let the tranny do all the work and shifting at your leisure.

While in 2nd Gear, let Revs go to approx 6500 -6600 and shift up to 3rd...it should go slightly past redline, maybe 6900.

It takes practice to get the hang of exactly when the SS shifts for you, so you just have to play around with it to see when the optimal time to shift would be in order to get maximum power, while avoiding the rev limiter.

Rule of thumb when downshifting to pass is 2nd for city, 3rd for highway. Personally, I don't use the SS very often because I don't want to damage the tranny and push my car too hard; I just let the AT do the work for me

 

Hmm then I realy do not know what happened... I could be wrong and maybe I was already doing 90pm but even still I would assume the car would have one last "shot" of acceleration before topping out... I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact the car is 1 month old and that is the 1st time I ever floored it, pedal to floor?

 

I (and probably everyone else) assumed you were going around 60 when you floored it, so telling us you were going 90 clears the matter up a bit. Next time you are going 90 you can put it in SS and put it in 4th, or 3d, and see how good that feels. If you put it in 3d, remember to upshift to 4th when you get to 6,800 rpm or the rev limiter will bite you.
If you are feeling brave you can drop it from D to L. Remember, the electronics will not let you hurt the tranny, but if it goes into 3d I think (no where around here for me to test this) you have to put it back in D to get into 5th gear. Anybody tried this yet?

At least we know now you don't really have a "leisurely acceleration" problem.

 

Couple times tonight when sportshift mode and second gear, I step hard on the gas and it downshifted to first. I was probably doing about 20 MPH. Manual and other people say it is only supposed to shift to first when you come to a stop. The delay while it thinks about 2nd, no 1st, is annoying, might as well be in full automatic. Is something wrong or do other people get this?

 

I think what everyone was saying is that the tranny won't manually downshift to 1st; not with SS or going to L. It will downshift under full throttle if your speed is low enough but you can't do it manually. You can't even hold 1st with SS or L. The ECU automatically shifts to 2nd at some ridiculously low speed and will only go back with a full throttle kickdown.

 

I tried out shifting to L at about 20mph, and it went to 1st gear. I did not have full throttle because if you use full throttle it accelerates so fast that you are past the speed for L to drop into 1st gear before you can even move the lever. But it did drop into 1st at part throttle at 20mph. Tach went to 3,500, then I put it in SS and of course only got 2nd gear, which was only around 2,500.

I was on a residential street so I couldn't test completely, but at least I found out that L will go into 1st gear under certain conditions. It probably wouldn't go into 1st at any more than part throttle, so you would have to back off the throttle if you wanted to get into 1st gear.

 

That's frustrating. The advantage to sportshift to me is to force it to stay in the same gear when I step on the gas and not have the delay while it downshifts. What purpose does this "functionality" serve?

 

This is what my thread is about also, my car does downshift into first if I put it in low, but not if I am using the SS mode. The TSX does shift into first with the SS. I would love to have the capability to use the engine to assist when slowing down set the chassis and come out full throttle in first gear but you can not do it with the SS in our TL... weird

 

For stoplite dragracing, when I race an automatic, I will footstall the gas up a bit and then either roll out fast or stomp on it depending on what tires I have on that particular car. Going off idle as it was posted earlier will not help at all because it will take you long to get into the meat of your power band. I'm not sure what the stock brakes will hold but for say a stock 20002 Camaro Z/28 4At I will foot stall it as high as I can stock which is about 1200 and roll out real fast. Generally speaking I would shift 10% past peak HP. If peak HP is 6200 I would shift at 6800 because typically HP won't drop off too too much past peak AND you will be concerned about having the engine drop back into the meat of your power band.

For my low 10 second 98 Formula I shift at 7100 and it drops to 5500 which is a bit for my goals.