Manual Transmission? Yea or Nay?

ricatic wrote:

jayco...

The point I was making is that in today's world, and for the last 10 to 20 years, the manual transmission has not been the choice of the majority of new HD truck purchasers...yet...the manual remained the de facto "no charge" transmission. It only worked because the manual transmissions were up to the task when dealing with the power levels of the period...

This all changed in 2011. Ford and GM threw down the gauntlet and raised power levels above the current manual transmissions design limits. Ram followed suit when they introduced the H.O. version of their ubiquitous Cummins. The manual transmission option for Ram was not available in the H.O. version...the explanation from all three sources was the same...the manuals were not able to reliably handle the extra power. All three manufacturers had already spent the development money to provide stout and reliable automatic transmission's for the 98.5% of the HD buyer's. What they were not going to do was invest ten's of millions of dollars to develop a heavy duty manual transmission for 1.5% of the HD market.

To whom would they pass the costs of this development? The cat was out of the bag. There was no viable market share for a manual transmission that could support these costs. The development costs would either have to be recovered by making the manual transmission an expensive option...or again saddle the majority of the market with a patently unfair burden...why anger 98.5% of your customers to satisfy 1.5% of your customers?

This very discussion took place on GM and Ford forums in the 2011 model years. Over at the Blue KoolAid site, a thread ran for months asking for the manual transmission fans to petition the manufacturers to reconsider the death of the manual transmission. I asked the same questions on those forums as I asked earlier today on this one. I will ask again:

How many manual transmission devotee's would order an optional manual transmission that added to the cost of the truck?

How much would the manual transmission devotee's be willing to pay for that transmission?

How many manual transmission devotee's would not spend the extra money and just buy the standard automatic transmission?

No manual transmission devotee has ever answered any of these questions. A yes answer to the third question would be especially telling. Why? Because every yes answer to that question further reduces the already miniscule 1.5% market share the manual transmission has now...

Long live the manual transmission...as long as the person buying it is actually paying for it...

Regards

Well you are right that the market share was not there. But I also believe that at least GM has not wanted to sell manuals since the mid 80's And made them hard to find and less attractive to buy. The auto was a near 1K option, money they wanted. When the auto was made the "standard transmission" the base price went up. Base went up when OnStar was made standard, another feature I don't want. But when you go to the dealer every vehicle on the lot is loaded with options, options increase profit margins.
The other thing that I feel did in the manual is what has been termed "envelope protection" Total computer control. The OEM's can only do this with the auto, and most of North America has bought the marketing. It’s also much harder to pass the emission standards with the stick and still maintain drivability.
Again there is NO reason that a manual transmission should cost more. They are less complex and cheaper to make. They are still used everywhere but the US and Canada.

Notice the where the shifter is in this Chevy 3500 C&C. You can buy this truck just the other side of the Rio Grande
I would be very happy with a detuned Duramax, I'm happy with the HP of the stock LLY. I just don't need 400hp and 800tq, give me more MPG. Anyway this is all just my opinion, and I know what that’s worth. I doubt that I will ever buy another "new" car or truck. Way over priced, for what I just don't want.