Manually Shifting Ford's Select Shift Transmission

roswelltop · Aug 14, 2016

90% of my time behind the wheel is driving within a 10 mile radius of home, on 2 or 4 lane roads with speed limits of 35 to 55 miles per hour.
And Monday thru Friday, the traffic around Metro Atlanta is mostly heavy, stop and go.

In addition we are approaching 65 days of temps of 90 degrees and over for this summer.

I've come to believe that the DCT is most satisfying under the conditions described when I am using the buttons on the shift selector and "shifting" thru the gears. This has become my routine driving default position.

Interested in knowing who else routinely "defaults" to SST ??

felixthecat · Aug 14, 2016

roswelltop said:
90% of my time behind the wheel is driving within a 10 mile radius of home, on 2 or 4 lane roads with speed limits of 35 to 55 miles per hour.
And Monday thru Friday, the traffic around Metro Atlanta is mostly heavy, stop and go.

In addition we are approaching 65 days of temps of 90 degrees and over for this summer.

I've come to believe that the DCT is most satisfying under the conditions described when I am using the buttons on the shift selector and "shifting" thru the gears. This has become my routine driving default position.

Interested in knowing who else routinely "defaults" to SST ??

Last time I heard Ford's Select-shift was in the '60's,,,,,,,

zehkaiser · Aug 15, 2016

I've always shifted my car myself using the buttons on the shifter. I have 70k miles on it now, and haven't had any issues. I hate how the car shifts on its own (holds gears when I want to cruise or shifts up and won't downshift if I need to get moving quickly). I haven't had any issues. It drives much better for me like that, aside from the shudder I get in 6th gear when I give it a little gas on a hill.

That being said, if I'm coming to a stop I put the car in D to let it downshift on its own. It will neutral the transmission once you get to a low enough speed instead of grabbing each gear on the way down. Less wear and tear that way. Also, if I'm in stop and go traffic ( < 10 mph) I'll leave it in D to let it decide how best to handle the gears.

If you're in D coming to a stop and get a green or need to move quickly, you can pull it back into S while holding the up/down button and it'll go directly into SST mode without you needing to press another button. The transmission will also grab immediately instead of flaring like it doesn't know what's going on in D.

sailor · Aug 15, 2016

Nice description of what works well for you.

Shudder in sixth though, with a little gas on a hill, sounds like it really wants a downshift to get it out of the "lugging" zone.

zehkaiser · Aug 15, 2016

The only issue is that it won't downshift if I pop it back into D. The shudder goes away, though. Pull it back into SST and it immediately shudders again. I attribute it to Ford pushing a billion updates to fix problems users had while driving normally, and that doesn't include the different transmission behaviors when in SST mode. The motor doesn't typically lug, as I'm not on that steep of a hill or trying to accelerate. It's just another annoyance that had disappeared until I had my TCM replaced a few months ago.

felixthecat · Aug 15, 2016

zehkaiser said:
The only issue is that it won't downshift if I pop it back into D. The shudder goes away, though. Pull it back into SST and it immediately shudders again. I attribute it to Ford pushing a billion updates to fix problems users had while driving normally, and that doesn't include the different transmission behaviors when in SST mode. The motor doesn't typically lug, as I'm not on that steep of a hill or trying to accelerate. It's just another annoyance that had disappeared until I had my TCM replaced a few months ago.

A tune can possibly help that^^^^^^

roswelltop · Aug 15, 2016

When shifting I want to hit 2nd as soon as possible, but unlike the software which wants to go immediately into 3rd, I want to stretch out in 2nd and then get into 3rd which is where this engine really starts to come into it's own.

I had a 2007 BMW with "Steptronic" which had a "manual" mode with paddles. If I am recalling correctly, when starting from stop, the default position of the transmission was 2nd gear. I never once saw a "1" on the readout. And when asked, the BMW service writer said something about the transmission being programmed that way to meet overall fuel economy standards.

Manually Shifting Ford's Select Shift Transmission

roswelltop

felixthecat

zehkaiser

sailor

zehkaiser

felixthecat

roswelltop

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