actually I heard Renault and nissan had something to do w/ the transmissions in this car. If you all remember citroen, thats who did rally as well and werent bad cars either. But dont take my word for it...thats just a rumor in the development outta a mag I read also stating VW had their hands in it too. Which could be good or bad in a sense...good for UK and ASIA ...possibly bad for US in looks and styling...And i Think the car looks like the MAtrix and Vibes...I dont really care for em either but for the way they are appeal to the "other" crowd of drivers who want accessories and grocery getters...with a little zoom....and a compact appeal. But chrysler already has a PT cruiser, dont ask me why they made this car. Lets hope it does well...

 

First, I'm not saying I'm every gonna get real gushy over a cvt, but they do make good sense. I personally like the varied pitches (sounds) of a multi ratio trans and engine combo, but while a montone exhaust note from cvt'd car may be uninspiring, it could be set up to be reasonably economical while very good performing or very economical while reasonably good performing. By eliminating or significantly reducing an engines operating range, the engineers can seriously focus the power output of the engine and it will operate at its best all of the time. You cant really fault the thinking. Also, by setting an engine up to make really good power at a conservative rpm, the engine should last forever with no high rpms, no drastic temperature changes. It's an engines dream job.
I had just talked about snowmobiles (which have cvts) in another post that Posthonda started called "pretty funny" . Several weeks ago, I watched snowmobiles at our local dragstrip. The fastest sled ran a mid 7 second qtr at over 150 mph. All at a steady state rpm. Weird to hear, but numbers you can't ignore. Cvt's work.

 

I hope it is the same 2.4 because I will not upgrade to s3 untill my warranty is over (04' 7/70). It would kill me to have to buy the upgrade and shelve it because they were stopping production on the kits.

 

That thing is disgusting even tricked out, have u seen the pictures of it not all gussied up.... looks like that new chevy h4, so sad that they are gonna lose all that money on a car, why would anyone buy that thing performance aside, ewwww.

 

I still like it!!!!

 

Ill load my WIFEY in it and race ya to the grocery store on a wet day w/ my AWD!!!! Running over hamsties on the way!!!! Im with sparky on this one. Id pimp it....just wouldnt brag about it anytime soon.....lol