DSG gearbox experiences

[Sam_68]

Would anyone who owns a Volkswagen Audi Group car (preferably diesel), fitted with the DSG gearbox, care to share their thoughts and experiences?

'Tis approaching the time when I've got to start thinking about a replacement company car. I'm thinking of another Octavia VRs estate (boring, I know, but being a tight-fisted Yorkshireman, I hate the idea of paying large amounts of extra tax for the privilege of a more prestigious badge on a less practical car, just for my employer's benefit).

Question is, do I stick with the manual box that I know and love, or do I give the DSG a go, for novelty value (bearing in mind that I'll probably end up running the thing for 80K miles, so the novelty might wear thin if it's not actually any good)?

[Sam_68]

jamoor said:

Why not test drive them?

I will, but there's a world of difference between a half hour test drive and spending 80,000 miles with the thing. Hence I was hoping for comments from people who've lived with one, day in, day out, for a while.

Maintenance costs aren't a factor (neither is fuel consumption, for what it's worth); it's a company car, so they're paid for. Similarly, reliability is only an issue if it becomes a serious pain in the arse having to take it to the dealership every other week.

neil_bolton said:

Very very smooth, changes are impressively smooth under power, but prone to wrong footedness at times when you want a different gear to what the car reckons it needs and finding a balance when pulling off or reversing the clutch 'banging in' can be annoying.

It makes sense around town, better than a normal auto certainly, but MPG is affected and ultimately it doesn't give you anything an normal auto doesn't.

In a larger engined car I hazard it'd be ideal, it can swap cogs quicker than you can, however, when in 'manual' it is annoying - the gearbox upside down, and a pain to drive quickly with - you have no way of engine braking in the way that you can accurately with a normal clutch.

If it were me:

Tootle about town and motoways - do it.

Something you want fun in? Don't.

This is the sort of opinion I find valuable - thanks!

I don't do much town driving. Lots of motorway stuff, and lots of rural roads. The hope was that the 'auto' mode would make the motorway stuff less of a chore, whilst the 'manual' mode would be fun on the back roads.

One of the things I like about my current manual Octavia is that the pedals are about the best I've encountered for heel-and-toe wearing my normal size tens, so I was hoping that the manual mode would be good enough to compensate for the loss... sounds like it's not that transparent to use, then?

I don't know that the lack of engine braking would bother me - I match revs or H&T down the box anyway; I don't like using the clutch to slow myself down. Does the DSG auto-blip the throttle effectively to simulate rev matching, in manual mode, or does it sometimes get that wrong as well?