Newsgroups: rec.autos
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From: callison@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu (James P. Callison)
Subject: Re: Manual Shift Bigots
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Date: Fri, 23 Apr 1993 22:37:10 GMT
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In article <1993Apr22.112904.6771@ericsson.se> etxmst@sta.ericsson.se writes:
>But why not turn the question around, why are automatics so common in
>the US?

Because some people like them (and some people actually need them).

>My guess is that when they tried to couple manuals to the torque-rich
>V8's in the sixties the clutches turned out as real killers you had to 
>use both feet to depress, and that this has just lived on.

Yeah, right. Real muscle cars had a manual transmission, and their
clutches aren't that heavy. Shelby-American used plenty of
high-powered, high-torque engines, and Carroll only put autos in
his cars because people wanted them. (Blasphemers! Heretics!
Burn them, burn them for defiling a Shelby with an auto! ;-)
Real Cobras (and they were the ultimate sports car at the
time) had big-block Fords which turned out prodigious amounts
of power and torque, and _none_ of them had automatics. 

>And also, an automatic with a V8 engine can be real fun to drive.

Yeah, if you call a gear shift in the middle of a curve "fun." :-)

I personally would _love_ to have a '66 Galaxie 500 7-Liter Coupe,
with a fire-breathing 427 and four-onna-floor (to go along side
my '66 Galaxie 500 pillarless hardtop with a fire-breathing 390
with three-onna-tree; I love the sound of dual exhaust in the
morning! :-). There's no comparison between a REAL American
Muscle Car and a car with a big engine and an automatic, IMHO. 

				James

James P. Callison    Microcomputer Coordinator, U of Oklahoma Law Center 
Callison@uokmax.ecn.uoknor.edu   /\    Callison@aardvark.ucs.uoknor.edu   
DISCLAIMER: I'm not an engineer, but I play one at work...
		The forecast calls for Thunder...'89 T-Bird SC
   "It's a hell of a thing, killing a man. You take away all he has 
	and all he's ever gonna have." 
			--Will Munny, "Unforgiven"
