No 4th gear in A/T?

[talnlnky]

Originally Posted by bronsin

Yeah its just a stupid design to waste gas. The manual transmission can shift into fifth before being warmed up so why not the autos?

waste gas? thats one dimensional thinking sir. As said above, the car runs most efficient when its hovering in the 180's - 190's. Until you reach that spot you are wasting gas. By getting up to that point as quick as possible you minimize how much gas is wasted.

I bet under the right conditions I could do my 20minute commute to work without the temp reaching 188F (where it normally hovers). All I would need is cool temps (say 40F or lower), a light foot on the gas, and drive my normal route which is basically 35-45mph the whole way, but do it in 5th gear and use DFCO as much as possible.

Even this morning with temps around 60F when I left, it took probably half the distance for my car to get up to temp, cruising in 5th gear. A little 3rd gear action is not wasting fuel for the autos... similar to me using 4th gear probably warmed up my car in half the time.

Funny, I watched the temp this morning for the first time after changing my route to work about 2 months ago. I think I will try running 4th gear for the first 2 miles to see if it does have a significant impract, negligible, or non-noticeable.