I was wondering if anyone knew the best points at which to shift the triptronic, is it at 5-6000 rpm, certain speeds, etc?

Thanks

 

It depends. Are you racing or going to the supermarket? For maximum acceleration, you should shift at 6200 RPM, but don't hit the rev limiter (at about 6500 or so).

 

shouldnt rev limter be 6600? but yeah shift between 64 and 6600 for maximam speed, dont worry, your not driving a real stick, it wont let you hit rev limiter, or it shouldnt anyway, itll shift for you. tho if your looking to redline, save the trouble and just do automatic and floor it, itll get the hint and shift at redline by itself.

for regular driving, shift whenever youd like. if you shift puts you under 2000RPM power wont be real huge, so try to keep accelerating revs between 2 and 3000 unless you want to go faster. cruise in the highest gear you can while keeping RPMS over 1500. unless you forsee a need to have power at your fingertips(in my manual I often pull onto freeways in 4th so I can merge with ease)

 

Actually, it DOES let you hit the rev limiter, just like a manual. Many reviewers have said this is one of the best auto's out there.

 

Yep. It does. I tried it

 

hmmm thats new, tippys that Ive driven have always done that. made me think it was pretty useless.

 

If I want max acceleration, I shift at redline. It does not hit the rev limiter. You can bang into the rev limiter in 2nd gear all day and it won't shift. The only time it shifts for you is when you stop, it defaults to 1st gear. This ain't no stinkin' Tiptronic.

 

well Im still not sure why shifting yourself would make it any faster than letting it shift at redline by itself. I mean when you floor it, it shifts at redline on its own right? tiptronic only really has a use for holding revs or did I miss something?

 

Will it screw up the transmission if you shift from drive to triptronic or triptronic to drive while at high speeds?

 

No, it will not damage your transmission if you shift back and forth from auto to "manual". If you are @ 30mph and higher
and not at wot, the tranny will drop to 4th gear (from 5th in auto)automatically when moving over from auto. You can then simply flip the shifter forward to 5th if you so choose.
I like the Sportronic for a number of reasons. If I am in cruise @ 40+mph and have to come out of cruise (braking) and then hit resume, it won't drop down a gear to resume, but remains in whatever gear I have selected while accelerating up to cruise speed again. That always used to bother me (car hitting "passing gear") to simply go from 40 to 50 mph. Also, here in the mountains if I have cruise on and hit a steeper incline with normal automatic transmissions, the auto tranny is constantly jumping in and out of passing gear trying to maintain. The Z has so much torque that I can pull anything in the mountains out here when running above 65mph in 5th gear while in cruise with no stepdown because of the Sportronic. Nice, and comforting travel too.
Of course I also enjoy hearing the (modified) exhaust talk to me while manually revving up thru the first 3 or 4 gears as you would with the manual only type tranny too! All this and no tired left leg/foot from 11,000+ miles since Nov. 1 either. Regards, Jim

 

well most cars don't actually make peak power before or right when the computer *****.. especially after modding occurs... Thats why I got a manual valvebody.. you can feel a big difference when you shift manually.. especially if you shift right at your peak ... Look at dyno charts and you will see why its a waste to go up to redline sometimes..all depends on your specific car though... A dyno would show you where you stop making power and you can shift there instead of just any ol where near redline

 

No, you didn't miss something. The Z is probably faster if you just bury the throttle in full auto, but that wasn't the question. It was "where do you shift the Triptonic". I prefer manual mode since Triptonic comes from Porsche, etc. My answer is still, shift at redline, however, you will be faster if you move to full auto, if you are in manual mode. Remember, I didn't say the manual mode was faster, its just more fun.

 

Actually, the Z's max HP is generated at 6200rpm, it probably doesn't help to go much higher, but shifting in the manual mode, I really just shift above 6000rpm, which is close to the HP peak. I don't race, so the question is academic. What is the best rpm to shift at w/either trans? I would guess, in an unmodified car, that shifting at 6200 is probably fastest w/either one, check the dyno power curves. Its peak HP and going to redline may create more noise than power. I just like to shift the AT in manual mode and like Jim H says, its very useful in terrain changes and its very easy to shift when full auto is "hunting" for the right gear.

With these comments, I will just say, over 6000rpm, probably between 62-6400rpm, and the AT doesn't drag out the shifts if you keep your foot on the throttle. Its not slow-shifting unless you ease up or take your foot off the throttle.

 

you shift at 6400, then your RPMs will drop to... lets just say 5400(making it up) youd want the mid point of this "window" to be your max hp. but in the Z its at 6200, so you have to figure out approx how much your RPMs drop between shifts in the redline area. then divide by 2, and add that to 6200 chances are 6600 is going to be lower than the number you come up with.

what your basicly trying to do is find the window which gets you the most area under the curve. this is more a calculus problem, but if you go that exact on it, youd have to have an equation for the dyno. which a computer could find a best fit graph for you. then you could use gearing to find the various shift points and their RPM drop and in the end, find the window that gives you maximum power.

this isnt quite as hard as it sounds, but its a bit overkill since I could tell you to shift at 6573.86436 for maximum speed. but you cant actually do that everytime.

personally if I want speed I go to redline, but I shift before it cause its like price is right, closest to 6600 without going over, cause if you hit the rev limiter, your not helping yourself.

 

The info's been very helplful, thanks a bunch. I seem to be making the newbie mistake that whenever I put it into manual mode and then hit a stoplight, I'll forget I'm in manual mode and punch it, causing it to hit redline and scare the crap out of me. Is redlining it in 1st causing major damage? Should I be shifting at around 2-3000 rpm in 1st and 2nd gear then between 6-7000 for 3-5th gears?

 

well... you could, in racing you redline all gears, but DONT hit the rev limiter, shift as close to it as you can.

as for 3rd 4th and 5th... seeing how 3rd redlines at mid 80s in the manual, and probably higher in the automatic, its unlikely that youll be redlining 3rd that much, and you will NEVER redline 4th and higher unless your looking to do topspeed on a long road, on the track you wont top 100 maybe on the straight away, and drag racing is at about 100 as well. not quite the 120ish that is redline for 4th.

 

I didn't notice what the RPM was but the digital speedo said 132mph when it shifted into 5th.

 

I shifted in the manual mode primarily during breakin, 1st to 4000rpm, shift to second w/ steady throttle pressure at 4000, then to 3rd /with steady throttle pressure to 4000. The shift was very fast from gear to gear w/about 30% throttle from 1st through 3rd. If you're car is broken in, you can take it to redline in EVERY gear w/o damage in manual mode, until you run out of road, top speed cutoff kicks in at 155 or 156mph, or you are arrested, have an accident, etc.

The Z's 5AT is engineered/beefed up/modifed, for a sports car, not a luxury sedan like the Infiniti Q45, which is where I believe it originates(if anyone knows for sure I would be interested to know I am correct). If you go WOT, and shift as fast as you can using the manual mode, it will shift as fast as you can push the lever(one inch of travel) to the next gear w/o delay. I believe the shift is faster than the 6MT, but the MT has lower gearing/an extra gear and its faster overall than the 5AT 0-60, 1/4 mile.

So, there is no reason I know of for you not to redline it in 1st, 2nd or 3rd and 4th, if it will reach redline in 4th, which I doubt. Maybe it will, given the previous post.

Boomer--my opinion, use it or lose it, I don't care.

 

you are most likely correct, the manual mode can shift faster than 99% of manual drivers.

however take a look inside an automatic transmission sometime. the torque converter for starters, just 2 fans facing each other, no DIRECT link, one turns pushing fluid throught the other, which forces that to turn, quite a wasteful use of hp. the whole thing is more of this, triplle clutches... its just very parisitic on hp.

itd be interesting to see how efficient theyve made manuals these days. are there any automatic Z dynos?

 

JimH did a dyno test on his AT and got 218hp on the best run which translated to almost 22% in parasitic losses. Dyno runs on the MTs were 15 or 16% in losses? Jim wasn't entirely sure the dyno he used was completely accurate and he's going to try again with another dyno shop when he has time. What's the lowest parasitic loss for an MT dyno, anybody know?