Your Next Vehicle Is More Likely To Have A CVT: Here's Why - The Car Connection
Like it or not: Nearly every new vehicle—we're talking around 95 percent—has an automatic transmission of some sort. And manual transmissions are rare today, except among a few performance-oriented models. What might not be so apparent to new-car shoppers is that the portion of vehicles with automatic transmissions—or at least automatics as we know them—is falling, too. So-called conventional hydraulic automatic transmissions, typically today with five to nine dedicated speeds (gears), aren't going away anytime soon. but two other alternate designs, dual-clutch gearboxes and continuously variable automatic transmissions (CVTs), both claim improvements in both performance and fuel efficiency. Both of these newer types boast some pretty pronounced advantages in mechanical simplicity over those conventional automatics, with their multitude of gears, solenoids, and hydraulic valving (they’re often the single most expensive component in a... As for dual-clutch gearboxes, there are two separate automated manual gearboxes, each with its own clutch, but one containing the odd gears and the other the even ones. Source: www.thecarconnection.com
