Sales of automatic cars zooming: Is the old stick shift running out of road?

But the key factor is technological innovations and improvements that have allowed manufacturers to customise an array of automatic technologies across multiple price points. A decade ago, automatics were dependent largely on a technology called ‘torque converter’ — and were available only in top-end trims which cost a lot more than manual variants, and had poor mileage. Not any more.

Which cars, sold where

Maruti Suzuki now offers automatic transmission variants across almost all its 16 models. Sales of the company’s non-manual variants rose from under 10% in FY21 to more than 12% in FY23. Automatics make up more than 25% of overall sales for Hyundai Motor India, and more than 60% for Volkswagen Passenger Cars India.

According to data from London-based JATO Dynamics, a global supplier of automotive business intelligence, automatic variants as a proportion of total passenger vehicle sales have risen from around 15% in 2018 to more than 28% now.

Customers of Maruti Suzuki’s higher-end NEXA retail channel are about 58% of the carmaker’s total automatic sales; these buyers prefer high-end variants. Customers of Arena, Maruti’s non-premium retail platform, contribute 42% of sales, and prefer mid-variants while buying an automatic, according to the company.

Sales of Maruti Suzuki’s automatics are the highest in Delhi-NCR in the north and Maharashtra in the west, followed by Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, and Kerala.

Types of automatics

In manual transmission vehicles, the driver presses the clutch and slots the stick through a set of gears; in automatics, the engaging of the clutch and upshifting/ downshifting of gears happens on its own, depending on the car’s speed and rev range.

Broadly speaking, automatic transmissions available in India can be put under five broad heads: AMTs and iMTs, CVTs, DCTs, and torque converters. There is also the e-CVT option that is now increasingly being deployed in hybrids.

AMT: Automated Manual Transmission is the most common, especially at the lower end of the price bracket. It is similar in working to manual transmission, but sensors and actuators do the work of the clutch and shifting of gears. The actuator is operated by an Electronic Controller Unit; the system can assess dynamic driving conditions and adjust gear shifts to deliver optimal driving performance.

Given that the transmission is essentially a manual with add-ons, an AMT allows manufacturers to price models at a smaller premium. The AMT also does not compromise on mileage.

Downside: the shifts are less smooth compared to other automatics, even though AMTs have got better over the years.

Cars: Maruti Suzuki offers AMTs in the Celerio, S-Presso, Wagon-R, and Ignis. Renault uses AMT in the Kwid and Triber. Tata Motors offers AMTs in its Tiago hatchback; Hyundai offers this in i10 and the new Exter.

iMT: Intelligent Manual Transmission is a clutchless manual in which the driver has to still manually operate the gear lever to upshift or downshift. The gear lever in an iMT is mated to an intention sensor, an actuator, and an electronic control unit. As the driver slots the gear out of the gate, the sensor picks up the action and the actuator kicks in.

In city traffic, the iMT is far more convenient than a manual variant, fuel efficiency is almost as good, and buyers don’t pay a huge premium.

Cars: Hyundai’s i20 and Venue, and the Kia Sonet have iMT transmission in their turbo-petrol variants.

TORQUE CONVERTER: The most common automatic transmission globally offers reasonably good performance and fuel efficiency, is reliable, and not very expensive to build. It has three main components: torque converter unit, planetary gear arrangement, and hydraulic controls. The torque converter functions as the hydraulic coupling that transfers power from the engine to the transmission, and the planetary gear system helps to modulate speeds to meet different driving requirements. For seamless shifts, the gear ratios have a dedicated wet clutch system operated by the hydraulic controls.

Cars: Maruti Suzuki offers this in the Grand Vitara, XL6, Fronx, Jimny, and Baleno.

CVT: This is essentially a single-speed auto gearbox with two cone shaped pulleys connected by a drive belt. One pulley is connected to the engine, the other to the wheel shaft. They move in tandem with engine revs, with the two cones moving independent of each other, and thereby imparting the mechanism infinite gear ratios (depending on the length of the drive belt).

A CVT is extremely fuel-efficient and smooth compared to conventional automatics, but involves the so-called ‘rubber band effect’ — a lag between when throttle input is received and when it kicks in. As a result, in normal driving conditions, especially when the driver accelerates hard, there is a perceptible disconnect between the soaring engine rev and the actual rate of acceleration.

Cars: Toyota, Honda, and Nissan use CVTs in the City and new Elevate SUV, Magnite, and the non-hybrid Innova Hycross.

DCT: There are two clutch packs controlled by a sophisticated network of electronics and hydraulics. The clutches operate independently — one controls the odd-numbered gears, the other the even gears. When the first gear is engaged, the ‘odd’ clutch is in use, but the ‘even’ clutch has already pre-selected the second gear and is ready for the upshift, thus allowing quick shifts without interrupting the flow of motive power to the transmission.

The downside: the mechanism is complex, and could involve major repair costs if things were to go wrong.

Cars: Hyundai and Kia offer DCT gearboxes in Creta and Seltos, as do Volkswagen and Skoda in the Virtus and Slavia sedans.

e-CVT: The gearbox is distinct from the CVT automatic, as there’s no belt here. Instead, there are two electric motor-generators connected to a planetary gearbox, with the engine at one end and the driveshaft at the other. One of the motor-generators is deployed to start the engine, but can act as a generator to charge the hybrid battery at other times. The second motor-generator can deploy as a drive motor, on its own or with the engine, and also double up as a generator to perform a regenerative braking role when the vehicle is slowing down.

Cars: The mechanism enables electric-only drive by decoupling the engine (without the need for a clutch), and is deployed by Toyota in its hybrid Urban Cruiser Hyryder and Innova Hycross.