Jazzy

I use this as a method of slowing the car down in conjunction w/ the brakes.

Can this be a long-term bad fun habit?

ryoung

if the tranny would downshift on it's own anyway, it probably doesn't make much difference.

FWIW, I do downshift under braking for corners, down to the gear I'll be using driving out of it. When coming to a complete stop, I let the tranny do the downshift even when I'm in TIP mode.

barryl

Hello,

The brakes are for slowing the car. The trans is for making the car go.
Yes, you are wearing the trans more than if you left it in the higher gear.

As Randy wrote, when performance driving, you downshift before the
corner so that you are in the proper gear to exit the corner. Note that
the downshift is NOT for slowing the car, but to prepare for accelleration
when you exit the corner.

The days of downshifting to slow down ended when disc brakes
were invented.

Barry

mclarenm8d

... it depends, on many factors, including what you specifically mean by "slowing the car down in conjunction w/ the brakes". If you have leased or bought your A8 with the intention of giving it up when the warranty expires, my recommendation is to live the life of a high roller and drive it any way you please.

IMO, you can't intentionally do as much damage to a ZF transmission as what the Audi "lifetime fluid" maintenance fallacy does.

I have been fortunate enough to know people with street cars that put out 2, 3, even 4 times as much torque and horsepower as the A8. Quite honestly, coast-face ("downshifting") wear on transmissions has never been an issue relative to power-on destruction of input shafts, U-joints, and differential spider gears.

I have never been witness to an automatic transmission failure caused by coast-face abuse. Have you? Sure, on a 1200 hp twin turbo Camaro with a manual transmission and a 12 ton drivetrain it may be possible, but an automatic?

There are two excellent books, "Think to Win" and "Drive to Win" by Carroll Smith and Don Alexander. I recommend you read those and formulate your own opinion.

Carroll Smith's book will give you a perspective on the concept that the "engine builder's lost the battle." What upper-class drivers think they are doing is often not what they are actually doing.

D3AeighT

I don't know how many times, right after I've had Black Beauty cleaned up, that I dreaded having to put on my brakes and screwing up my just cleaned wheels, so I used the TIP to slow down.

So, if you had a "manual" transmission you should NOT downshift to slow your car? Ya right! So why have a TIP then?

ryoung

and I never downshifted to slow the car and for essentially the same reason -- it's easier to replace a brake pad than a clutch. I use the TIP to control when upshifts occur, same as when using a manual.

It's all a matter of priorites, but I don't worry about the extra effort to wipe brake dust of the wheels more frequently (and if I did, I wouldn't be using the relatively dusty Ferodo DS2500 pads on the street).