My week with a CVT, or How I learned not to hate the slushbox

I forsee a lot of CVT equipped cars hitting the salvage yards in 5 to 10 years after a CVT failure once their extended warranties run out if those kind of prices are the norm. A 2008 Versa is a $6,000 car on Auto Trader today, in 5 years will it be worth 3,500? Who will have a transmission repair done if it cost more than the car it's going in is worth? I think economies of scale will drive the reman prices down, and I guess that's no more expensive than a comparable 6, 8 or 9 speed auto..

bastomatic wrote: Conversely, I am stuck in a base model Versa Note this week while the Leaf is in the shop. The Versa sucks. I think the thing that gives CVTs such a bad name is the droning engines they're attached to. A 1.5 liter with poor sound insulation and Eco tuning isn't bad to drive when you're distracted by a clutch pedal and stick. It's downright awful when the CVT pegs it at 6000 RPMs for about 10 full seconds while you try to get on the freeway.

This X 1000. I have a good friend with a 2005 Prius. He is nearly incapable of analog inputs. All digital. I despise the sound of the gas engine in the Prius because he floors it everywhere. Bleh. He's allowed me to drive it a couple times. I'm a leadfoot and it's plenty torquey at half throttle to scoot away from traffic. No need to hear that horrible engine giving it's all.

When mine died I spent a lot of time staring at my welder. In theory, Ford sold a five speed manual gearbox which fit behind older duratecs. Should have done it, but we offloaded the car instead.

06HHR wrote: I forsee a lot of CVT equipped cars hitting the salvage yards in 5 to 10 years after a CVT failure once their extended warranties run out if those kind of prices are the norm. A 2008 Versa is a $6,000 car on Auto Trader today, in 5 years will it be worth 3,500? Who will have a transmission repair done if it cost more than the car it's going in is worth? I think economies of scale will drive the reman prices down, and I guess that's no more expensive than a comparable 6, 8 or 9 speed auto..

Sure, but I see the same thing in the junkyards with conventional automatics. A workmate just got a $2500 quote to replace the automatic in his (whatever the last year of) Chevy S-10 Blazer. He dumped it and walked away. I don't see CVTs being any better or worse than conventional automatics in this regard.

I just need to quit being a whiny cheap E36 M3 and go buy one, I really did like the way that Sentra I rented drove.