I’ve dailied a mt in LA traffic since 2009. I’m one of those connected to the car people. I don’t even like cruise control bc I can’t feel what is happening.
That said, I will never buy another ice engine if I can help it. That’s coming for all of us ”enthusiasts”. For better or worse “boring” electric motors with all the smoothness and infinite torque across all rpm’s are the future…
Mt and even ice will be only for the affluent as a recreation item. (See who currently can own a horse and what they use them for as an example)
So what are the enthusiast masses to do?
My pitch is that electric sports cars of the future should have digital simulations of the mt experience. We just need to modulate the electric motors to simulate the torque curve of an ice engine.
Either put a real clutch and mt gear box in and pump the output into that. Or fake the whole thing with a haptic clutch pedal.
Sim racing has just about all the tech figured out for how to make it believable enough. And we already pipe fake engine sound around ice cars to make em sound better.
The best part is that you could simulate different types of engines and new and fun combinations of manual and auto stuff. And when you want efficiency just plonk it in the middle gear and let the electric motors be electric mode. You get all the options. Full manual, sequential shifter, paddles dual clutch, and full auto electric.
Maybe that would be better in electric retrofits but if Mazda made an electric Miata with that option the haters would hate until they tried it and saw how fun it would be. Really that’s the only reason anyone has to get a mt anymore. They are just fun as hell to drive so all we need to do is figure out how to make the electric cars we will all have to drive fun.
That's never going to happen en masse because petrolheads are always going to complain "But it's not the real thing and you're a stupid person for enjoying it!!!"
Yeah but people said the same thing about 4 cylinder turbo cars vs beefy v6s, but they made em anyway, they are super fun and people who want to drive a fun car but don’t have tons of cash bought tons of them.
This isn’t the solution for the purists with cash to spend 10-20$/gallon of gas it’s the thing for the rest of us who love to drive but cant justify an ice.
I mean I think you are right in that it’ll never happen. It would be a lot of engineering for a super small segment of the market, but I can dream…
That said, I will never buy another ice engine if I can help it. That’s coming for all of us ”enthusiasts”. For better or worse “boring” electric motors with all the smoothness and infinite torque across all rpm’s are the future…
Mt and even ice will be only for the affluent as a recreation item. (See who currently can own a horse and what they use them for as an example)
So what are the enthusiast masses to do?
My pitch is that electric sports cars of the future should have digital simulations of the mt experience. We just need to modulate the electric motors to simulate the torque curve of an ice engine.
Either put a real clutch and mt gear box in and pump the output into that. Or fake the whole thing with a haptic clutch pedal.
Sim racing has just about all the tech figured out for how to make it believable enough. And we already pipe fake engine sound around ice cars to make em sound better.
The best part is that you could simulate different types of engines and new and fun combinations of manual and auto stuff. And when you want efficiency just plonk it in the middle gear and let the electric motors be electric mode. You get all the options. Full manual, sequential shifter, paddles dual clutch, and full auto electric.
Maybe that would be better in electric retrofits but if Mazda made an electric Miata with that option the haters would hate until they tried it and saw how fun it would be. Really that’s the only reason anyone has to get a mt anymore. They are just fun as hell to drive so all we need to do is figure out how to make the electric cars we will all have to drive fun.