<VV> PG discusion (was "A good day in my little Vair' shop")
Tony Underwood
tony.underwood at cox.net
Sat Oct 29 08:39:27 EDT 2011
At 10:55 PM 10/28/2011, Karl Haakonsen wrote:
>This was copied and pasted (and edited) from a post I made last
>year. My old contribution was a "necro post" on an old discussion
>topic so it went ignored. I re-purposed it to this ongoing
>discussion (disclaimer: I have always preferred manual transmissions
>for the control they afford me over gear selection; yet, as a city
>dweller, I appreciate the convenience of an automatic and am
>generally more flexible about the subject).
>- - -
>For those who complain about the lameness of having only 2 gears,
>remember that the theory behind the PG was that there were two
>mechanical speeds and a theoretically infinite number of speeds
>handled by the torque converter which had a maximum reduction of
>2.6:1. (there's a great tech topic on this in the "Transmissions"
>section of the Corsa Tech Guides titled "Praise the Powerglide" or
>something like that).
>
>My guess is that modern transmissions with more mechanical gears
>perform better because the additional mechanical gears give better
>precision in terms of keeping the transmission in the ideal torque
>band of the engine than afforded by the two-speed PG-style. So the
>modern automatic doesn't really utilize the torque converter for
>gear reduction, but as just a clutch of sorts. The PG wasn't really
>as bad as some of its detractors think ... remember that it did
>somewhat better in 0-60 acceleration than the 3-speed manual Corvair.
It also was hooked to an engine with a broader torque curve than most
of today's space-age high strung engines that NEED a bunch of gears
to work best. Sure, modern engines have high horsepower but it
comes at a price. No pun either. It's easy today to buy a car with
200 cubic inches and 300 horsepower but it's gonna have a flock of
gears to keep that engine on its light-switch powerband. Even that
vehicle's automatic transmission is likely to have 4 (or maybe even
more) forward speeds.
50 years of technology and computerized engine controls and very
careful matching of components allows this sort of
engine-transmission combo to work nicely. This is why modern cars
are so insanely complicated and difficult to fix when something goes
wrong. I admire the simplicity of the Corvair's Powerglide and its
engine that is also rather nicely matched to that same
Powerglide. Sure, not a lot of horsepower but it's smooth and
tractable and easy to drive and nearly bulletproof. 4-speed
gearboxes are fun to play with but for simply cruising around
enjoying scenery that Powerglide is hard to ignore.
tony..
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