{"id":20474,"date":"2017-04-26T18:06:54","date_gmt":"2017-04-26T22:06:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/henrypayne.com\/?p=20474"},"modified":"2017-04-26T18:06:54","modified_gmt":"2017-04-26T22:06:54","slug":"the-stick-shift-is-dead-long-live-the-stick-shift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/2017\/04\/the-stick-shift-is-dead-long-live-the-stick-shift","title":{"rendered":"The stick shift is dead, long live the stick shift"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"CivicSi_stick\"<\/p>\n<\/div>

New York<\/em>\u00a0\u2014 The news of a five-door Porsche Panamera Sport Turismo rocked the New York Auto Show last week. A Porsche station wagon? Hell must have frozen over.<\/p>\n

But the indignation from performance purists was tempered by the fact the German sports car manufacturer was bringing back an old friend: the manual gearbox in its Porsche 911 GT3 track animal.<\/p>\n

Porsche isn\u2019t the only automaker making manual news as the stick defies its long-predicted demise. To paraphrase Mark Twain, the death of the stick shift has been greatly exaggerated. In the last year Ford, Honda and Hyundai all have touted their manual options as automakers vie for an important niche buyer: the enthusiast.<\/p>\n

News that the 911 GT3 was stiffing the stick back in 2014 seemed the nail in the coffin for a transmission option viewed by many as an anachronism in the 21st century. Stick take-rates peaked at 25 percent for cars in 1987, according to EPA figures, and have plummeted to between 3 percent and 7 percent over the last decade. In 2016 just 3.8 percent of sales were manual, according to Edmunds.com.<\/p>\n

Once a rite of passage for 16-year-olds to master, the stick shift used to boast better fuel economy and better acceleration than its automatic counterpart. But with the advance of modern, multi-ratio automatic gearboxes, the stick\u2019s advantages have melted away. Automatics do everything better, it seemed.<\/p>\n

Except, automakers are learning, stoke passion.<\/p>\n

Porsche\u2019s state-of-the-art, dual-clutch, seven-speed PDK automatic transmission vaulted the 2014 GT3 to performance heights unseen by its manuals. Lightning-quick, 100-millisecond shifts, head-snapping launch control, and 3-second zero-60 acceleration \u2014 more than a half-second quicker than the previous generation\u2019s stick. But purists complained that the technology was removing the fun factor from the legendary driver\u2019s car.<\/p>\n

\u201cThough a lot of our customers want the performance advantage of the PDK, there are still some who want the engagement of the manual over the lap time,\u201d says Porsche Product Experience Manager Frank Wiesmann.<\/p>\n

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