A note to the anti-auto crowd

The Mack M-Drive I currently drive has an anti-rollback feature. It applies the trailer parking brakes when stopped on an rearward incline and hold them until you depress the accelerator. Not a bad feature, and it can be manually disabled for backing maneuvers.

 

I have two gripes against auto-shifts.

I had one 2 years ago in my 9400, I wasn't able to make it 300 miles without it flashing failure codes. Some days it wouldn't go into gear, some days it would run perfect, and once or twice the #### thing popped out of gear on a downgrade. Employer refused to fix it, and said to drive it til it dies. Yeah...

I have this thing against entrusting my life to a computer.

My other problem is that it doesn't feel right! I love driving trucks, and there's just something gratifying about rolling through those gears...

 

Popping out of gear sounds like an actual gearbox problem!

If you have an autobox that's based on a synchro you won't have many problems with it, syncros are far more suitable for this application, try an Volvo Ishift someday, those are excellent!

I understand how a piece of crap one might turn you off but new one are like driving a modern auto car with hill hold and seamless gearshifting, and if you wanna roll through the gears well you can, for instance my ones got a paddle under the steering wheel a bit like an f1 car, press it down to go down the gears and up to go up the box, you can skip gears by pulling/pressing it twice or 3 times, what ever gear you like and because it syncro it will always go in, you cant miss a gear, of course the computer limits the amount of gears u can shift down relative to your speed to stop u driving the engine tru ure hood! I've had no reliability problems in the last 10 years either, one speed sensor on a new scania but that was a warranty issue and was fixed in 10 minutes.

 

In the time that I've been driving, I've driven 3 trucks with Auto shifts, not one of them was anywhere near as reliable as you have described!

I have yet to try an I-shift, but I have heard positive things about them.

I'll still take my manual over an autoshift. Have you ever took off towards the sunset in Wyoming while listening to nothing but the engine purring and the gears grinding?

If you aint shiftin', you aint truckin'!

 

I think we need to forget the crappy auto shifts of old, and welcome the newer breed of i shift and m drive and ultra shift plus.
I think the missing link was the engine and tranny couldn't openly communicate.

With fully integrated units like volvo/i-shift, mack/m-drive, freightliner/dd tranny (soon to come) and kw(paccar) working with eaton, we are going to see better working auto's.

Will the manual be special order, I doubt it, but I also doubt I will be less of a driver with an automated.

 

Karhaulr you've hit the nail on the head! Engine /gearbox communication was the breakthrough here too, I should have realised that Alot of you guys spec different engines and gearboxes , here the truck manufacturer has their own tranny and engine so all the electronics are integrated perfectly, add that to a synchro box and you got a Volvo ishift or something very similar .

KD8FQB, Volvo ishift is available in the US, you should try one out, it will impress you! I garuntee it, and they are very reliable because unlike older auto shifts they are very simple, a standard gearbox with an actuator that changes the gears, no fancy stuff just simple solution that works!

As far as Wyoming is concerned I haven't got that far yet but I like heading up through the French alps with 97,000lbs the truck operating quietly and smoothly, no sound only the turbo then I'll open the window on a hard 9% pull and listen to the v8 rumble and let the truck change it's own gears while passing almost everything else on the way up and when I'm coming down the other side I'll let the gearbox handle the retarder so while other guys are going down in low gears with hot brakes I'm flying past drinking a nice cup of tea with no stress or worries about the brakes overheating and me slamming into the canyon floor below! With these new technologies I can save myself well over an hour going over the mont-blanc route so my days are shorter, I'm home quicker, I'm not stressed it's just a more pleasant way to work and my maintenance bills are waay less, my last truck I sold after 800,000kms, still had it's original brake pads , the only money I spent on it was a broken tail light , tyres and servicing, no auto box problems or any other problems at all! Embrace these new systems , life is tough enough being away from home so there's no need to make your working life any harder, that's my motto! Or maybe I'm a lazy fecker!

One thing, if any of you are gonna buy an ishift, get the retarder too, trust me, it completes the system, you won't regret it! It's total relaxation

 

Could be

I guess it just comes down to your driving style. Some work smarter, some work harder. Some drivers embrace new technology while others tend to be set in their ways. Nothing new there.

One day I hope you come over to the states to check out what the industry has to offer. There are some beautiful sights to see out here.

 

I think the I Shift and M Drive are one and the same.

 

Yeah of course you are right, at the end of the day it's down to personal preference.

Yes I fully intend to go check out trucking in the US. Id love to experience your wide open roads and beautiful countryside as well as your friendly people, it's definately on the bucket list for sure!

 

I think so too, I believe there's a selector panel instead of volvos joystick but I could be wrong!