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Revolutionary Audi A4 Transmission
You know, car makers are always going on about all-new this and all-new that, but it's not very often we see something that's truly revolutionary. But the new transmission in this Audi A-4, well, it doesn't just change gears, it changes the world. Now, Audi's calling this thing a "multi-tronic", which I think is a stupid name. It sounds like an engine management system. What it is is a continuously variable transmission or CVT. Now, I don't want to get all technical on you, but listen up because this is something you gotta know about.
It's sort of like the gearing system on your bicycle. You know how you got big sprockets and little sprockets on the pedals and on the rear axel and, as the chain jumps from one sprocket to the other, you change gears? Well, that's how this thing works, except there are pulleys in there with a steel belt. You can have a really low gear for good acceleration; you can have a really tall gear for good cruising on the highway. The way it all works out is this car is faster in acceleration than a manual, it's smoother shifting than an automatic, because no matter how good an automatic is you can still feel the car bump a little bit when it changes gears, and it gets better fuel economy than either of them.
What's not to like? It's unbelievable. It's the transmission of the future. Now, Audi is not the first company to make CVTs. A Dutch company called Vanduren way back in the 50s had this concept. Volvo bought that company and now several car makers do have CVTs, but only in small engines. The beauty of this deal is: this is the first transmission strong enough to withstand the kind of power that Audi's new V6 puts out. You can be sure that Audi and others are working on CVTs to handle even bigger engines. As a matter of fact, any transmission engineer who's working on anything but a CVT... well, he's just wasting his time.
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