All entries for March 2008

The sun is shining

Today in Indy it is a crisp spring morning, the temperature is around the freezing point, but the sun is bright and high in the sky. In the UK its the kind of day where you’d either go for a walk along the Surrey Hills or you might take a trip out into Derbyshire for a nice drive followed by a walk along a river. It’s just a nice day to be outside and enjoy the scenery, the only trouble is that Indiana is Flat. It’s as though when America was being formed a massive force flattened the entire eastern side of the country then got bored when it reached the Rockies. I honestly can’t think of a single thing to do within 30 miles of Indy. There are no rolling hills to go walking in, no Yorkshire dales or variety, just a patchwork of farmland as far as the eye can see, and trust me when the world is this flat you can see a fair way.

Having driven round this part of the USA a fair amount now I’m left with the feeling that you could be anywhere, each little place is more or less the same as every other little place. Villages are so spread out that there is not much sense of community and what was there is dominated by huge chains of stores offering fast food or out of town shopping centres offering the same options as the last. I’m sure the west coast of America where you have Yellowstone and some of the more forested areas would be stunning, as would being in someplace more connected to the big cities like Washington DC, Chicago or New York, but here in Indianapolis there is little to see.

In a sense this is a shame because undoubtedly I’m doing a disservice and I just don’t know where to look but at the same time its pretty hard to find things to do, even a quick google doesn’t pull up much outside unless you like golf… there is a lot of golf here.

Christopher Hinds : 23 Mar 2008 14:43 |  Tags: Indiana Indianapolis Uk Weather |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

A little bit of a flashback

Over the last two nights I have woken up having had dreams of Warwick as I knew it, in spite of it approaching two years since I graduated and six years since I first started. Yesterday night I was dreaming of the Union and the Arts centre, mixed with a sprinkling of techie in there too. Of course this also include flashes of my current boss and other work related stuff in there too, which makes little sense. Tonight I’ve woken up dreaming of Arthur Vick, except the one I dreamt of was dramatically remodelled with a more open plan layout and many kitchens interlocked with the bedrooms. The strange thing is I was there with Emma and there was an Aga in one of the kitchen. I mean really… most people could barely cook pasta when they arrived at the time I did, how many of them could use an Aga?! The strange thing was all the names were on the rooms just as they were when I was there, every single one along the corridor was there and I was back in AV1, Kitchen 10 again in Room 220 just as before.

So what is going on in my head that is dragging me back to University? Is it that I’m ready to come home and it’s a reminder of familiar surroundings? Is it that I miss having a formalised learning program? Or is it just reminding me where so much of what my life is today was formed and not to forget it?

Christopher Hinds : 22 Mar 2008 10:13 |  Tags: Dreams History Life Past People University |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

7–Speed S–Tronic Gearbox

Writing about web page http://www.eurocarblog.com/post/677/the-new-audi-s-tronic-7-speed-gearbox

Today VAG announced they will be launching a 7 speed S-Tronic box suitable for use in longitudinal installations (think A4, A5, A6, A8, Q7), presumably as an alternative to the current Tiptronic offerings. Thinking about this a little, it is not really surprising, given that we’ve had the A5 for over a year now and we still have not seen any models featuring the ZF HP26 gearbox as used in all the other Audi Quattro cars with longitudinal engines. It would appear that VAG intend to replace the ZF box with the S-Tronic, rather than alongside it as the marginal cost of offering both would surely be prohibitive for the number of people in the motoring public who could tell the difference.

I feel however this would be something of a shame, because for a start the ZF HP26 is one of the finest automatic gearboxes you can buy today – its list of clients includes Rolls-Royce, Bentley, Jaguar, Land Rover, Audi, BMW and even Aston Martin. It’s a very smooth box with no perceptible changes whatsoever and fantastically responsive, it’s not even a very thirsty box thanks to lock up in each gear. OK if you are fussy then when you flick a downshift using the paddles then it does take a couple of moments but nothing terrible at all.

If you read (and believe) the motoring press, they will tell you the DSG/S-Tronic box is gods gift to motoring, they’ll spend hours extolling the way that a Golf R32 DSG shifts like lightning as you battle round Brands Hatch and how the GTI is the same but more agile. Clearly what none of them do is what people actually buy automatic cars for – they don’t sit in traffic on the M25 going from 0 – 15 – 0 again in three hundred yards. It is here that one of the DSG boxes least pleasant features becomes obvious, when moving off from rest there is more lag than with a conventional auto as the torque convertor is missing. That’s ok in most circumstances because the newer ones apparently creep at idle (link) now.

The second big issue I have with DSG boxes is the lag when accelerating. DSG works by guessing which gear the driver is going to want next and getting it right more than it gets it wrong. The trouble is when you are coming to a roundabout and want to squeeze into a gap, a DSG car reacts somewhat differently to a conventional auto. In a conventional auto as you apply lots of power to get into the gap, the transmission senses the increased flow and slips the torque convertor long enough to allow the downshift. In a DSG in the same situation (say 2nd gear is active), the transmission will have preselected 3rd already anticipating a nice smooth transition through. When you ask for lots of power from low (coasting) rpm there is a long delay while the gearbox works out that you actually might be better off with 1st. Meanwhile the car has picked up just enough power in 2nd to be accelerating somewhat, so by the time it shifts down to first all you succeed in doing is launching too fast into the gap because you suddenly got way more acceleration. The problem is especially bad with a 2.0TDI because the turbo lag means you accelerate slow slow slow downshift FAST, it is not progressive. This can lead to some really nasty situations as you wait for the gearbox to make up its mind what the heck it wants to do. For me this is the major one because it can be a safety issue though you could argue if your gap is that small you shouldn’t be trying to take it. I would return by saying that you need to be able to respond quickly to maintain a smooth drive too. Note you can confuse a DSG box in the same way with roundabouts and the like on hills… you know motorway junctions, that kind of thing.

Lastly, a DSG just is not as smooth as a ZF box no matter what they say and at the top end when shifting “on the red line”, the DSG holds fractionally too long with the diesel engines because it seems to be set to change at a specific rev that the governor may not necessarily agree with.

Now I really hope that Audi have managed to correct the second issue in particular, because what you don’t want to do when introducing a gearbox to your key model (and rest assured if it’s designed for longitudinal installs that means it will be in the A4) what you don’t want is a series of drivers who avoid your high end models because they aren’t as smooth and predictable as the others. Of course the motoring press will love them, but then they don’t have to live with them every day for the lifetime of the lease.

Christopher Hinds : 20 Mar 2008 00:22 |  Comments (0) |  Close comments |  Report a problem