Illsic_Design
Well-Known Member
I don't know if/when they will have something for the ZF8, but the ZF 6 speed in my 335i has tunes available for it. XHP makes flash tunes so you can adjust damn near anything you want with the tranny. Shift speed/points change for D mode, remove throttle kickdown, true manual mode(rev it to the moon without it shifting itself), shift aggressiveness, adjust throttle blips/rev matching, etc..I'm definitely still excited. This is still one of my favorite car models. The two-seat-only configuration in the A90 definitely puts prospective everyday use of it into a different category than the 2+2 A80... but then I have to remember that this time they're trying to get a little closer to their two-seater 2000GT heritage. And personally I really like what I've learned so far about the new top-line I6 turbo engine. That's one of the big aspects that I am looking forward to.
However the strong likelihood of no manual being available on THIS particular car, and in a car market where even no-brainer-just-offer-a-manual enthusiast cars are beginning to show a lack of manuals being available, does turn any kind of serious thought on purchasing to other performance cars that do still offer a manual.
I'm also open to the possibility of being blown away by this car even if it does have a sole ZF8 auto transmission. But I've been thinking about it for a bit since manuals are becoming more scarce these days... what would probably not replace my preference for a manual but rather make me more interested would be some kind of user-definable shift logic and other transmission parameters.
If the R35 GTR was marketed partly on all the different settings you can play with on its dash screen then why can't the A90 Supra do this in terms of personalizing exactly how and in what style we want the auto-only transmission to shift and behave?
See, this wouldn't necessarily be about making the gearbox faster but more interesting on an owner-by-owner basis. You could focus on just shift speed but just as with a traditional manual I'm much more interested in how interactive and fun the car is to operate and tailor to my own style.
Cobb Tuning is getting into transmission shift logic flash tuning these days. Toyota could hypothetically offer owner definable shift logic menus with a lot of in-depth parameters to choose from.
Something like that would still never replace a traditional manual transmission with a third pedal but I'd probably be more interested if such extensive user-defined auto transmission control options came standard on a non-manual flagship Supra.
^^ Just my speculative hypothetical ideas but really... this is the kind of thinking that should be more prevalent when it comes to non-manual transmissions: ie "screw faster shifting... that's easy in default mode... so what can we offer or change in order to make this less interactive transmission much more FUN to use?"
Regardless, I'm still very interested to see and learn about the A90 once it's revealed. Also, what else they will develop for it over the model run.
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