![]() ![]() You can brake deep into bends while pressing buttons for perfectly timed downshifts that match wheel and engine speeds exactly. The car is great fun to drive, engendering many of the same F1-style fantasies you get in the Ferrari. The quarter-mile time of 16.2 seconds (versus 15.6 seconds) is similarly prolonged.īut don't write off the MR2 SMT just yet. So the 0-to-60-mph time - at 8.2 seconds - is 1.4 seconds slower than the last MR2 we tested. Any one of our test drivers could stab the pedals and snap the lever through the gate in half the time. Although this isn't a problem during normal or even sporty driving, the shifts seem agonizingly slow at the drag strip. Then, once under way, the shifts are made slowly and deliberately. Thus, even with the accelerator floored, the launch is conducted gently, with just enough revs dialed up to allow a gentle clutch engagement. Unlike the F1 system in expensive Ferraris, where you're allowed to exploit an ultra-high-performance strategy that permits high revving of the engine before the clutch is dropped for a smoking wheelspin launch, Toyota's mechanism puts the emphasis on durability. On downshifts-as in Ferrari's $155,000 360 Modena F1-the system provides a blip of power to match engine and transmission speeds for seamless events.Īnd we can report that the system works pretty flawlessly, although cautiously. Both controls initiate a sequence in which the throttle is closed, the clutch is disengaged, and the shift mechanism is activated. Yep, Toyota now offers a five-speed manual in the MR2 Spyder that you shift using buttons on the steering wheel or by bumping the transmission selector on the center console, and without depressing a clutch pedal. Convertibles for $5000: Window Shop with C/D.But what about an electrohydraulically automated manual from Toyota? Convertibles, Old and New One expects high-tech F1-style paddle shifting from Ferrari and Alfa Romeo, and rallylike sequential manual shifting in a BMW M3 comes as no surprise. From the September 2002 issue of Car and Driver. ![]()
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