Michigan Gear Shift

[tonio]

OK. First, let me assure you, I am not bashing Michigan. I'm from Michigan.

BUT, when I first moved to southern CA (along with a couple other guys I worked with), a couple of us took up mountain biking. One of the first things we noticed in CA was that the hills came up alot faster and were alot steeper. Usually, we were not ready for them and found ourselves in the wrong gear at the wrong time (especially when starting up a new hill!).

One of the CA natives, having observed this bumbling maneuver a few times, name it the "Michigan Gearshift", in honor of us MI guys who had not yet adjusted to the CA terrain. Well, as much of an honor as it might have been, none of us wanted to be on the receiving end of that comment as a description of our hill climbing prowess, so we all eventually adjusted our shifting strategy.

I mention this story, because I personally have taken a similar approach when driving my H3.

I ordered my truck so I could get exactly the options I wanted, and after much back-and-forth deliberation, I decided to get the automatic transmission. I did not want to, but after driving a 6-speed Z-28 on the 405 for a few years, the idea of not having to juggle my phone, a cup of coffee and the stick shift all at the same time was REALLY appealing. The off-roader in me was saying, "Manual, Manual, Manual", but the freeway driver was saying, "95% of your time will be on the freeway, not the trails!" The freeway driver had a strong arguement.

Well, once I got the truck and was over the thrill of just having it, I started to evaluate its performance. One of the first things I noticed about performance was the anemic shifting algorithms in the transmission. I really longed for a stick. With only 4 gears, there are a lot of speeds where the transmission picks the wrong gear for the situation and you end up with no torque. After thinking about it, I guess this makes sense. The transmission does not know what's coming up (like a steep hill!). So, I found that when I hit a fairly steep hill (and there are plenty of them here), the truck would slow down significantly before automatically shifting gears. Not pleasant.

So, I've adopted a new strategy. When I see a hill coming up that I know will be a struggle for the automatic to properly manage, I simply shift into 3rd gear (or 2nd, depending on speed) BEFORE I get to the hill. That way, I don't slow down at all when engaging the steep part of the hill. When I crest the hill, I just shift back up a gear.

Just because the truck has an automatic transmission does not mean you can not MANUALLY use the other gears.

Personally, I find 3rd gear to be a very responsive gear to use for climing freeway hills or for passing. Considering the fact that you basically need to be over 3K RPM's to be in the engine's torque/horse power comfort zone, and you are still a long ways from the red line, I can see no reason not to use the automatic in sort-of a manual mode when performance is important. If I'm just cruising (or drinking coffee and talking on the phone), then fine. Let the automatic do what it does. But, when I want the truck to perform more predictably, I tend to treat the automatic more like a manual.

I've read the reviews that complain about having to use 3rd for passing or whatever, but I don't agree that this is something to complain about. The way I see it, letting the transmission do its thing is going to give me the best fuel economy. But, when performance is the goal, who cares about fuel economy? On its worst day, the H3 is going to get 50% better gas mileage than other similar trucks (no specific names mentioned here), so why not use the lower gears and higher RPM's?

To me, this is not a bad thing. It's just the way it is. We all would like to have more horse power (another topic), but we all like the fuel economy. A truck of this weight, with full time AWD and big-@ss high-inertia tires on it is not going to give both. So, we live with the power it has. Which, in my oppinion, is plenty if managed properly.