Hey everyone,

I'm new to the forums. I got a Mazda3 4-door Auto w/ Manual option for Christmas and have been impressed with it so far. My questions concern the manual option.

Which gets better gas mileage, auto or manual option? And, in what situation should the manual option be used?

 

You got a car... FOR CHRISTMAS!!!!??? Can I belong to YOUR family? I have been asking for a new, or even a used Porsche for Christmas for 30 years and all I ever get is a bag of coal.
Well, not to look a gift horse in the mouth, after all it is a very nice, thoughtfuland expensive gift, and it is a Mazda3... Not to make you feel bad, but it is the general consensus that the auto-stick, Man-U-Matic as I like to call them,sucks.
Here"s the deal from my experience:
1) You will likely get overall better mileage by leaving it in auto mode. The trans will up-shift at a boring 1500rpm and downshift at idle.
2) If you leave it in auto-mode you will have a very boring time driving the car.
3) The trans does not match speeds for downshifting so DSing manually sucks.
4) The trans does not up-shift any faster in manual mode, so except for holding a lower gear longer what's the point?
5) It"s a shift-able automatic.
6) It"s a shift-able automatic!!
7)It"s a shift-able automatic!!!! But it is just an automatic. Nothing new about those.
8) Trade it in now and get the 5-sp. If you don"t know how to drive a stick, LEARN.You"ll be much happier, and your mileage will improve too, if you can keep your right foot out of it.
Hey, at 26-28 mpg(some say they get 30) around town, who needs to keep their foot out of it??

 

Good point...but some up us have stupid V6's. [8D] I can still get 31 on the highway though.

Btw, when I quote your posts I notice that you have color tags for each line. Do you do that intentionally? If not, you can simply open one color tag at the beginning of your posts and close it when you're done.

 

i has an autotragic and i regretted it ever since i drove my friends 5-spd crx.

 

hehehehehe. i believe your wife bought you coal there rich. anyway thats unreal that you got a car for christmas. your parents bought you it i guess? and know what the slapstick is crappy. i had one for a rental.. and between standard and the slapstick there is a huge difference. i hated it. no clutch, its the lazy man's standard basically. but anyway if you drive in the standard option you shift when your supposed to if you were driving a standard.btw rich i always wanted my dodge ram 3500 Dually diesel but you dont see that in my driveway

 

I got 32 max with the ATX (normally around 30-31), with my manual all highway I have gotten as high as 37 and normally around 33-34.
You didn't say what motor you had, if it is a 2.0 you will probably do better than that.
The only time I really used the Manual mode was when passing to hold the higher RPM

 

when i had the slapstick i always used standard and every light i would put it in neutral. its interesting lol

 

Quote:

ORIGINAL: VB
Btw, when I quote your posts I notice that you have color tags for each line. Do you do that intentionally? If not, you can simply open one color tag at the beginning of your posts and close it when you're done.

As a Moderator on 24/7 I am not "suppose" to use anything other than std forum text.No caps, no bold, no italics, no color, no strike-throughs, no underscoring. Moderator rules. BORING!!
[color=#000099]On M3F Icopy and pastea single command line and insert my post, i.e. [font=******] [/c][/f]
But here I usually just write the post, highlight the whole thing at once (or right click> select all&gt, open the color box and insert my "signature" blue.
When I open my posts for editing or to quote myself (how embarrassing) I am not seeing what you obviously are. Must be your browser??
My old PIII computer, I loved Firefox 1.5, but this Vista thing ([:@]) IE is simply less trouble.

 

I LLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL LLLLLLLLLLLLOVE my automatic.
Here in the land of cars, cars, everywhere, I would hate having to shift that much.
A stick is great if you live in the boonies of away from any large metropolis.
For me, it is automatic now, and forever, plus when I really nail it, this little bomb really moves, without all that dammed shifting.
Bob.

 

automatic is gay.. that is all