F10 F13 DCT Behaviour

[Palmball]

I'm a couple of weeks into ownership of my new M6 and, slight steering wheel shake at high speed aside, I'm largely very happy with it.

The DCT gearbox is particularly effective but I do find one aspect oddly inconsistent about it - the behaviour from a standing start in auto mode. Sometimes it pulls away in 1st, other times in 2nd and I cant seem to work out why it's chooses one over the other.

My preference would be for it to start in 1st every time because, if it decides to pull away in 2nd and I haven't spotted it first, it feels lethargic. I'm fairly sure that during the 1st week of ownership it didn't do this so it definitely feels something has changed over the last few days.

So, are there any other F10/12/13 owners experiencing similar things with your gearbox's and if so, have you found a pattern as to why it does this or, even better, established a way to get the car to pull away in 1st gear every time?

[Fezzaman]

I don't have any experience myself on the issue...

http://f10.m5post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8236...

as for general sluggishness pulling away, there's another thread on there about that as well

[Palmball]

Cheers - reading that and another thread elsewhere, it unfortunately seems pretty typical.

I can only assume that it wasn't apparent in the first week of ownership as the 'box has now had time to 'adapt' to my regular urban commute....brilliant!

[Skrambles]

Driving in D1 Auto, mine tends to leave the car in 2nd once fully warmed up. Moving to D3 does stop it happening, but I tend to leave it in D1 for very slow moving commuting traffic and have got into the habit of selecting 1st gear (which switches the car to manual) and immediately switching it back into Auto.

The car moves off quite quickly in 2nd, but it doesn't feel right not using 1st from a complete stop and I can't really understand what benefit a 2nd gear start is supposed to produce.

Other minor annoying feature of the f10 is that it starts up with Start/Stop enabled - usually I remember to disable it, but on a few occasions have forgotten and had a bit of a shock when it cut out at traffic lights. Does anyone actually use this feature? It can't be good for the longevity of the starter motor / engine, can it?

[pjv997]

Skrambles said:

Driving in D1 Auto, mine tends to leave the car in 2nd once fully warmed up. Moving to D3 does stop it happening, but I tend to leave it in D1 for very slow moving commuting traffic and have got into the habit of selecting 1st gear (which switches the car to manual) and immediately switching it back into Auto.

This ^^

Although I drive most of the time in manual mode and it always goes into 1st gear when you come to a standstill.

[Palmball]

Thanks chaps, glad to hear it's not just mine!

I think I've sussed it over the last few commutes. Come to a stop for the first time and it'll go into 1st. If you then do another one or two stop starts and don't exceed a certain speed, it'll stay in 2nd (for what purpose I don't know as I cant imagine it being more efficient). Only once you exceed a certain speed (which seems to be around 25mph) then the next time you come to a stop it reverts back to going into 1st.

So, it seems to sense stop-start traffic and in this situation keep it in 2nd. I'd still rather it didn't but at least having some sort of idea when it's going to stay in 2nd

Does this reflect other experiences to either prove/disprove my theory?

[Skrambles]

Palmball said:

I think I've sussed it over the last few commutes. Come to a stop for the first time and it'll go into 1st. If you then do another one or two stop starts and don't exceed a certain speed, it'll stay in 2nd (for what purpose I don't know as I cant imagine it being more efficient). Only once you exceed a certain speed (which seems to be around 25mph) then the next time you come to a stop it reverts back to going into 1st.

So, it seems to sense stop-start traffic and in this situation keep it in 2nd. I'd still rather it didn't but at least having some sort of idea when it's going to stay in 2nd

Does this reflect other experiences to either prove/disprove my theory?

This is also my experience of the car.