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why no 6th gear?

13K views 93 replies 21 participants last post by  Mazingo 
#1 ·
Im curious why they would limit the manual trans to 5 gears instead of 6 like the automatic. It would most likely bring better gas milage that the 5 speed and would be more traditional for the focus. Any ideas?
 
#2 ·
The cost is probably a likely factor, after all they didn't plan on building or selling more than 10% of all the MK3 Focus models in the U.S. with a manual, actually they initially predicted only a 5% take rate, where as it was running at nearly double that to nearer to 10%.

As well as the fact that they had already bolted up the MTX-75 to this basic block and its less expensive to certify only one or two power train options than it is to certify a whole raft of them like are available in Europe, including an MMT6 Ford-Getrag 6 speed manual transmission.
 
#3 ·
Cost and supply, most likely. The MTX-75 transmission has been around for a LONG time. It is available and has proven itself to be very durable. It was probably cheaper to stick with this proven, inexpensive trans than to ramp up production and distribution of the 6 speed available in Europe.
 
#4 ·
Agree the current five speed is 'good enough' and they had it.
Making a new transmission for the small number of manual cars in the USA would have been folly.
When they change engines in a few years they probably will have the six used on the ST with it.
Too many gears sucks anyway*. The ONLY useful sixth gear would have been higher than the current fifth for high speed cruising.
The current compalint of a 'gap' in the gearbox? who is running races all day every day?
Damn, I have to row enough as is..And the only gearing i would want aded is a one further top gear for loafing along at 65 .. 70 mph..

* for all you ready to pounce, i am just making excuses why i should like my 5 speed and be happy.. So get over it.
 
#6 ·
The MTX75 is akin to the TR6060 or T56.

The transmissions refuse to die and when they do they are hilariously cheap and easy to work on.

The 6 speed would have been nice, but a 5 speed works better for wringing what you want out of a engine like ours.

Cost is a big issue as others have mentioned, even with the higher take rate on the manuals it still wouldn't have made much sense for them to offer the more expensive manual here, and I say that with a chuckle because we are now in the kind of market where making a 6 speed DCT gearbox is considered more cost effective then it is to bring over a 6 speed manual.
 
#7 ·
I believe that if Ford offered the car with a 6-speed, they would've lost their argument for buyers to purchase the DCT. I believe the Focus would be capable of better MPG with an additional cog.

"Why get a manual? Our DCT trans gets equal or better fuel economy!"

They couldn't say that if the MK3 had a 6-speed.
 
#15 ·
You guys simply don't understand Ford.You don't know what you need but FORD DOES.A few months ago I went to a Hyundai dealership and asked for an Elantra with a 6 speed manual.And do you know what happened?The salesman looked at me and said:"No problem we got one right here,wanna try it?" I did,and 30 min later the papers were signed and the day after I was picking it up and never had a problem since.Yes ,I was happy ,but it's easy to see that Hyundai is not gonna make any money like that.And it's sad that they will probably close their doors soon.

They got to learn ,that they CANNOT give the customers what they want.If they make those transmissions available,they can't force their buyers into the automatic tranny that they should sell.Hyundai,Mazda,Dodge,... got it all wrong.Ford knows.If they say you don't need a 6speed manual it's because you don't need it,and if you buy a 5 speed ,you'll pay for it because you'll take more gasoline.Ford hasn't been in business for so long because they don't know what they're doing.If you buy something else,yes you'll get what you want ,but you will hurt these company who will suffer because they will give you what you want.

So remember this:If Ford says the powershift is what you need it's because they know so!And you say you don't like it ,it's because you don't understand and you are not a true Patriot.Keep this in mind before complaining again about a 6 speed manual transmission.[mad]
 
#37 ·
By popular demand,here's my part two of my pseudo-rant against the non-patriotic members of this forum.

Some will say "Well the ST has 6 speed manual???" The ST is NOT a passenger car.It's a RACE CAR, a state of the art racing machine.You don't choose the ST,Ford will decide if you got the driving experience to handle this kind of vehicle.It's NOT because you owned a Corvette,WRX STI or an Audi TT that it means that you can handle the power and G Force this car will put you though!.
Some will even say that it's kinda like an RS! "Blasphemy!!!". The ST has ONE thing that the RS never had.It has ECOBOOST!!! This means the car is so clean it will actually bring the dead back to life!You know when you are driving and you see leaves on the road? Do you think they come from trees?No ,they come from the tailpipes from ECOBOOST engines.
So you think Ford will simply shove the perfectly calibrated 6 speed manual transmission of the ST in your average Focus?Are you out of your mind?Do you think you can simply put racecars parts on a passenger car,of course not!

Again ,if you want a 6 speed manual tranny ,go see those irresponsable fly by night car companies.But if you want to get what you really need and can handle ,trust Ford.

God bless America.
 
#38 ·
What are you smoking? The Focus ST is not a racing car. If you wanted a racing car you have to be prepared to part with 98,000+ dollars in order to get a hold of an ST-R, or to spend a load of money to strip out an ordinary ST and convert it for racing purposes. The standard Focus ST is very much a road going car.

If you have nothing intelligent to say its best that you keep your mouth sealed, rather than to open it and remove all doubt.
 
#52 ·
The only adavantage of the quicker gear shift of the DCT is in a straight line and the DCT is still not a joy to drive at slower speeds and on a road course I'll take the true manual over the DCT which is still an automatic in my eyes and still acts like one time to time. I've driven much more pricey cars with quick automatics or DCTs and the Focus' DCT doesn't compare.

The tiny toggle shifter is also a crappy design and they need proper a manu-stick or paddles to be fun to drive.
 
#53 ·
Well, duh.

More expensive cars have DCTs engineered and geared for more power and gearboxes like Audi's S Tronic and BMWs DCT shift much faster and more aggressively.

That's kind of obvious...

The only thing a DCT is missing in our Focus is paddles to give you that sensation of better controlling your shifts, that nub is pathetic.

But DCTs in general are 2 manual gearboxes put together without the clutch pedal for you to push, everything else about them is grounded in how a manual works.
 
#55 ·
I use sports mode as economy mode.... Granny shift, save on gas (course in 6th it doesn't help). I'm waiting to have problems with the DCT though, wish I had found this forums before making my purchase. But then again it may never happen, and all cars seem to have their problem areas.

I really wanted a manual with a 6 speed and taller gearing,. I liked the dodge dart (on the freeway it seemed to operate at lower RPM"s and used a much smaller engine (1.4 liter turbo charged). But I was a bit worried since it was so new, and a dodge, and they would not budge on the price yet.

I like MFT, I really don't understand all the complaints. I checked and I have the most updated version. Are most of the complains from the previous versions?
 
#56 ·
To clearly answer the question of the thread:"Why no 6th gear?" I think it's obvious that the answer was that Ford wanted to put all his eggs in one basket with the DCT.While the horror stories with the Fiesta with the same tranny should have been a big red flag.Ford went a head offering mostly the DCT instead of having more manual transmissions available ,or even a conventionnal automatic as a "plan B".Last year it didn't took long for sh.. to hit the fan.And when the bad reputation of the powershift spread and the demand for manual transmission grew, Ford was pretty much caught off guard even if all the red flags were there.

Did other manufacturers notices?Sure they did.When Mazda released the "Skyactive" powertrains,they still offered the old engine and transmissions to customers who didn,t trusted the new technology.Dodge,with the Dart ,offers a choice of 3 engines and three 6 speed transmissions(manual,Conventional auto and DCT).Got to admit that I wouldn't touch a Dodge with a 50ft pole and even less one with a DCT,but knowing you got a choice of two other transmissions and engines does make the car more attractive.

In 2014 or 2015 ,the Ford DCT should be more reliable and a 6 speed should be available,but will people who had bad and very bad experiences and those who were turned off by the lack of powertrain choices be back to give Ford another try?That ,only the future will know.
 
#57 ·
SkyActiv is still a traditional automatic transmission modified with a weaker torque converter and a larger lock up clutch. It also suffers from a shudder issue and can be even more ill-tempered than the DCT in the Focus as it combines the feeling of a lossy torque converter with a wet torque converter lock up clutch just as in a normal automatic, but one that's a lot more aggressive.

What problems with the DCT in the fiesta? As far as I know the only issues that cropped up were as a result of a ground bracket being painted when it shouldn't have been and improper contact being made.

The Dart uses a Hyundai engine and transmission as a base (The GEMA engine technically is assembled by chrysler now but it was primarily developed by Hyundai, and is mated to the torque converter automatic from the Elantra). The 1.4L Fiat engine uses essentially a similar if not identical DCT as its optional automatic, but its programmed to slush a lot more and therefore will likely have an even shorter service life than the transmission you love to trash.
 
#63 ·
It would be interesting to see the failure rate of the DCT compared to past manual/slushbox transmissions. There some very vocal people on this forum and people with some very serious issues, but does that mean the transmission is a failure overall?

Ford has sold well over 200,000 Foci across NA and the DCT uptake is probably at least 80% of those. What percentage of those sold would be problem transmissions? Even looking at this forum the polls I've seen about the DCT have less than a 100 people praticipating and off the too of my head the last one about issues with the latest uorate had less than 30 people unhappy with it. Does that show major issues with the transmission? To be generous lets say there are 100 unique individuals posting on this forum complaining of major issues with the transmission does that show that there is a systemic problem across the board with all Focus with the DCT?

That's my only issue with some posters here. Since they are having issues they lump all DCT together when the reality is that their particular DCT is the issue.
 
#65 ·
Like all things from a forum, the pissed off minority make It seem like it's an epidemic.

Nothing is perfect and while issues suck that doesn't mean the entire population has them.
 
#70 ·
Bad CSR service doesn't mean the product is bad.

If DCTs were actually this problematic, VW would've dropped them years ago and Ford would never have brought it over for us.
 
#73 ·
I never said DCT's were bad.I,like many here,like many car critics,said the Ford DCT was "half baked" and not really ready for the market.This was made worst by the fact the dealership didn't knew how to sell and maintain them.And also because Ford decided to put all his eggs in the same basket by limiting the sales of the manual transmissions.Not giving a real choice for buyers.

It's a series of bad decisions that gave the Ford DCT a bad name.
 
#84 ·
I'm sorry,

I had DCT problems but never reported it to NHTSA. I'm confident there are many many others like me.
So this only applies to the Focus? Kinda invalidates your whole point. Guess I'm not smart enough to see what you're saying.

The complaints vs 1000 is more telling, but, is it to the point that you can claim the Powershift is half-baked as a whole?

Guess it comes down to how you come into the issue. We all have our biases. My experience from the different Focus that I test drove to the one that I bought the DCT worked flawlessly. For the first 500km I had a bit of a low speed shutter when I started out into a creep, but that went away as the transmission broke in. Now it is smooth in every situation. When I test drove a different one the transmission was smooth. When I had my car in for a day to get a backup camera my loaner with a DCT drove smooth. If you got into the car and had issue after issue, then I would expect your viewpoint to be different.

I won't deny people having problems and the issues per a 1000 cars is higher than it's contemporaries, but that doesn't lead me to the fact that the transmission as a whole is a lemon. Yet.
 
#85 ·
I'm sorry, So this only applies to the Focus? Kinda invalidates your whole point. Guess I'm not smart enough to see what you're saying.
No, that was in response to your claim that since there were only 56 complaints to the NHTSA, there are only 56 Foci in the whole world with a tranny problem, for a .000003% failure rate or whatever it is you said. My counter is that there are many many more than 56 Foci with a tranny problem out there due to people like me who aren't going to take the time to complain to the NHTSA or similar body.

The complaints vs 1000 is more telling, but, is it to the point that you can claim the Powershift is half-baked as a whole?
Now you're putting words in my mouth. Look at my post a few posts earlier, I said:

kam327 said:
I completely agree, the DCT is not inherently flawed. I know that mine has performed perfectly in the past so I know it's possible. I think it's just that Ford is letting too many of them get too far off specs, probably mostly in terms of the software but clearly there are numerous hardware problems too. They need to keep perfecting it to make it bulletproof no matter what type of driver is driving it.
My reason for bringing up these NHTSA numbers was in response to your post.

DayGlow said:
Ford has sold well over 200,000 Foci across NA and the DCT uptake is probably at least 80% of those. What percentage of those sold would be problem transmissions? Even looking at this forum the polls I've seen about the DCT have less than a 100 people praticipating and off the too of my head the last one about issues with the latest uorate had less than 30 people unhappy with it. Does that show major issues with the transmission? To be generous lets say there are 100 unique individuals posting on this forum complaining of major issues with the transmission does that show that there is a systemic problem across the board with all Focus with the DCT?
This Forum is not a reliable source for judging how many people have an actual problem with their DCT because I believe that for every person who seeks this forum out just to bash their DCT, there are dozens more that don't even know this forum exists and have no desire to seek it out to vent. My gut feeling is that somewhere on the order of 10-20% of Ford DCTs out there have some sort of a shuddering, shifting, or stalling issue caused primarily by the software and secondarily by a small amount of bad hardware. Why would Ford spend the money developing new software updates every 4-6 months otherwise? If it wasn't a significant problem, they would just hang the unfortunate out to dry and accept the fact that they won't get their business again.

You have no more evidence to refute my claim than I have to support it. So it will continue to be an eternal debate.
 
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