I think its a real shame US automakers have neglected manual tranny's like they have. I'll be picking up my 05 xfire this week and it will be my first vehicle with a stick.

The sad part is that I've always wanted a stick, but could never either find one or afford one. I'm not sure about the situation in other parts of the world, but here in central PA, any used, sports/sporty cars with an auto tend to be worth much less than a similar vehicle with manual trans. My junk cavalier z24 (which I'll be trading to the deal in a few days) has an auto (which I enjoyed for the convenience of it), same with my 2 corvettes.

In the case of the vettes, a 76 and an 84, the stingray was rarely produced with a manual after the early 70's (the going rate for the manual examples tends to be much higher as their generally in better shape, I'm assuming this is because they were more likely to be owned by gearheads) and the 84's auto manual is prone to all sorts of problems. So I was pretty much stuck with getting an auto in order to be able to own both of those without breaking the bank.

Take it from me, its hard for someone in the US to find a decent, affordable (and in some cases reliable) sports car with a manual transmission.

 

and the srt-6 doesnt offer a manual!

 

I can easily find a descent, affordable and reliable sports car with a manual transmission in the US any day of the week. It is actually very easy to do.

You guys are taking this thread to the extreme,lmao. You are falsely giving the impression to others that in the USA there are only 1 or 2 cars with manual transmissions made per year and they cost $400,000,000 and are faster than the speed of light simply because they have a manual transmission.

Again these threads are hysterical while us guys with autos continue to have all the fun.

 

^
That's really not what I meant. Its just that in my neck of the woods, all of the newer, used sports cars get purchased as soon as they hit the lot by younger guys like myself. Making it difficult to find the car you want assuming you prefer a stick.

Again, regardless of your preference, corvette owners of years past have really gotten the shaft as far as choice of decent transmissions. Generally autos are all that can be found leaving little or no choice for someone who prefers a stick. On top of that vette folks have gotten stuck with lame skip-shift manuals in the c5, poor 3+4 auto/manuals in the c4, and very few 4spd trannys in most of the c3/stingray generation.

 

I can do a quick search on ebay and on autotrader.com and find tons and tons of manual transmission corvettes. I had a 4spd stingray and found it with no problem. As for corvette owners getting the shaft as far as choice of decent transmissions? Have you ever driven a corvette? There are some FANTASTIC transmissions available for corvettes and there is no shortage at all for used manual transmission corvettes. you can do a quick search and find hundreds of them in a few seconds.

here you go, took 2 seconds, almost 8,000 used manual transmission corvettes listed just on auto trader:

http://www.autotrader.com/fyc/search...dsfyc=&systime=

here is over 700 with a manual transmission on ebay:
http://motors.shop.ebay.com/items/Ca...id=p4506.c0.m1

several hundred with manual transmissions are listed here: corvetteforum.com

hundreds of them here: http://www.corvettetrader.com/

and site after site after site of used manual transmission corvettes by searching for 1 second on google:

http://www.google.com/search?sourcei...used+corvettes

I would hardly call them difficult to find.

 

Even though I learned to drive on a stick, I never saw the appeal. It just seems like unnecessary work with little to no benefit. Plus when I was growing up, you pretty much got the manual trans only if you couldn't afford to pop for the auto.

I honestly didn't equate it to being a preference until a lot of my friends got on me for buying a Trans Am with an auto. That diminished severely when I challenged their Mustangs, Civics, and whatnot to races. No one could beat the automatic T/A (stock save for a K&N).

I get that some folks feel more in control or connected to the car when rowing their own gears. It's the same reason that I drop the AutoStick into manual mode on twisty roads. Other than those all-too-infrequent occasions of tearing up a windy road, I can't think of a reason to have a stick.

Culturally, I would guess that we simply have more traffic congestion and less fun roads that we regularly get to drive on.

 

Totally agree Philly, I think its mainly preference, but alot has to do with where you're driving (stop and go traffic during a commute, or fun backroads on the weekends).

This is probably blasphemy on this forum, but I was actually torn a few weeks ago on whether or not get a crossfire. I almost had a deal on an dark blue '00 trans am ws6 w/ an auto, mildly tuned, decent milage, all for about 10K! (and people say crossfires have depreciated in value...) I was fairly set on it, but by the time I called someone else had already put a deposit down.



*before I say anything else, I apologize, I'm not trying to hijack the thread, just replying to photoman*

I'll start by saying that I tend to get ahead of myself while typing. When I said all corvettes were auto, I meant that in context of the "in my neck of the woods" phrase. Here in central PA, I've got no less than 3 used vette dealers within an hour of my house. Maybe its just my region but I hardly see any used manual vettes around. Just as an example, the one used car guy has roughly 25 c3,4, and 5's sitting on his lot. While I was looking for an affordable c4 last year, I remember seeing 3 cars with a stick there, a c3, a c5, and a c4 parts car that wasn't even repairable.

all in all the production #'s for manual vs. auto vettes from the early/mid 70's through the 80's was extremely slanted toward the autos. I think it was '72 that started the trend where roughly 2/3 of the vettes were autos and from there the ratio of autos to manuals continued to rise. Anyway, point is corvettes were largely produced with automatics for several years.

As I said it is all about preference, I don't disagree that the 4spd stingrays were great. I just couldn't find one in my region for a price I could afford, again theyre harder to come by than the autos. I for one REALLY hate the Doug Nash 4+3's in the early c4's (clunky garbage imo, also know some guys who had strange problems with them). Going back to affordability, I could never find a working 89-96 zf 6spd vette for a decent price. If you've been in a c5 with the "skip-shift" manual (I'm not sure if it's in the c6's as well...) you'd probably agree that it's a fairly lame ploy to eek out an extra 1-2 mpg on the window sticker at the expense of the driving experience. On the whole, I have to agree that their are plenty of great options for transmissions in vettes. I just feel that there have been a handful of glaring spots in the generations where good transmissions have taken a back seat to inferior ones or unnecessary gimmicks (4+3 and skip shift are good examples).

 

you can easily disable the skip shift in a few minutes. read up on it at corvetteforum.com. i am am a member over there also.

 

I've heard it could be done, I just think its disappointing that it was included in the car at all. I'm a member on DigitalCorvettes.com, I think I may have found my way onto corvetteforum once or twice though. You said you sold your c3, but I'm assuming youv've currently got a vette? What year?

 

No I no longer have one, my last one was a 70 with a 454 big block.

i was going to get a z06 but i am going to wait for the c6's to drop in price a little bit before i get one. maybe in a few years i will get one.

 

How was the mpg on that baby ?

My '76 w/ a mild-tuned 350 averages around a pretty pathetic 12-15, so I can only imagine. That's the price to be paid for having fun I guess.

 

here is a pic
https://www.crossfireforum.org/forum...light=corvette

i never checked the mpg on it lol.