Quarter mile speeds and trap times for a street car are meaningless. WHat matters is having to power and speed to enter a freeway safely. 0-70 mph time is far more important than drag strip performance.
It could be at speed with ease on the on ramps but more fun was not needing to sow for the off ramps!
A car needs to be comfortable for the driver, have ample power to be able to accelerate our of trouble if necessary, it needs to be able to enter a 70MPH freeway safely, even with 4 adults in the car, it needs to stop and handle well in emergency situations, again, with 4 adults, in the car, and it needs to have excellent crash test results.
It was VERY comfortable. Stopped well and exceeded the F150 for crash test safety. It won the safest car in a crash award in the early 2000's.
I wouldn't even recommend a manual trans for a daily driver, unless you live way out of town. City driving and manual transmissions are a pain the in the ***, and besides, most people when driving a manual trans get worse MPG's than they would with an auto, simply because they don't drive for "economy" they drive for power.
My wife WON'T drive an auto. She's getting mixed 43 and hwy 51. I like a stick but they are hard to find in a truck and also jack the cost of the truck up unlike a car.
Think about that realistically.. How many people do you know that drive manual shift cars, actually drive it to get better MPG. That's a fallacy.
Pretty true. The MPG on the auto TDI's is literally 1 MPG less than the stick. 1.. I'd have to agree with you that is very negligible.
On average, with today's automatic transmissions, cars with auto transaxles will yield better MPG than a sick ( because of driving habits) and in most cases, beside normal maintenance you'll have no issues, and you'll never have to change a clutch.
