drjochen

SMG is the greatest invention - the e60 is super smooth, I just added the dinan lightweight flywheel - acceleration is blistering, you can hear the flywheel spinning like crazy!! and the shifts are super smooth - someone had posted that the m3 is smoother - there's no way.
[/quote]

I drive am M3 SMG for 2 days at the Salzburgring this summer. Its just different, but frankly, I liked it better.
I can't put my finger on it, but it gave me more control and feedback.

What difference exactly did you get with the Dinan flywheel? How much was it to install?

JDN

I've gotten over it, rody. I did miss the stick/clutch at first, but as I was paddling my way around Dallas and through traffic yesterday, I realized what a pleasure it was to drive the SMG. For the first time it dawned on me that I was no longer having to feather the engine to get a smooth shift. I guess ver 18.? smoothed the shifts.

I had some real pangs at first because, like some others, I had driven manuals for years and had a ball with my 540-6. But I did miss a couple of shifts with the 540 and had missed some with other manuals, too, but never experienced a debacle. Not having to worry about hitting the sweet spot on a speed shift is enough to keep me from wanting another stick manual.

If I were inclined to go back, I would rather go back to a real stick rather than one that was a switch selector as you described. The reason being that one of the thrills of the stick was the speed shift and the associated tire chirps as the torque hit me the butt.

545smg

I drive am M3 SMG for 2 days at the Salzburgring this summer. Its just different, but frankly, I liked it better.
I can't put my finger on it, but it gave me more control and feedback.

What difference exactly did you get with the Dinan flywheel? How much was it to install?
[/quote]


I drive am M3 SMG for 2 days at the Salzburgring this summer. Its just different, but frankly, I liked it better.
I can't put my finger on it, but it gave me more control and feedback.

What difference exactly did you get with the Dinan flywheel? How much was it to install?
[/quote]

I can honestly say that the revs/acceleration is much quicker to the redline - its not going to give you more hp - its will take advantage of the hp you already have by reducing the energy it takes to move the heavy stock flywheel - the new flywheel is 7lbs lighter!!!

Basically its more efficient. Also the gear shifts in manual mode is much smoother!!

However, having said that - there's a problem now in auto mode - The flywheel is moving so quickly that is confusing the software in auto mode - so while in auto - it will from time to time kick into manual. But I never use auto so I don't really care.

The flywheel was a bit over $2000.00 - your bmw dealer can install if its a certified dinan dealer. And it will be covered under your existing bmw warranty. I wouldn't have it installed by your dealer if they are not a dinan certified dealer!!!!


I've gotten over it, rody. I did miss the stick/clutch at first, but as I was paddling my way around Dallas and through traffic yesterday, I realized what a pleasure it was to drive the SMG. For the first time it dawned on me that I was no longer having to feather the engine to get a smooth shift. I guess ver 18.? smoothed the shifts.

I had some real pangs at first because, like some others, I had driven manuals for years and had a ball with my 540-6. But I did miss a couple of shifts with the 540 and had missed some with other manuals, too, but never experienced a debacle. Not having to worry about hitting the sweet spot on a speed shift is enough to keep me from wanting another stick manual.

If I were inclined to go back, I would rather go back to a real stick rather than one that was a switch selector as you described. The reason being that one of the thrills of the stick was the speed shift and the associated tire chirps as the torque hit me the butt.
[/quote]

As a manual driver, for more than 10 years - The change to smg was a at first a difficult decision, but now that I have the smg, I don't think that I would go back.

the downshifts in the smg are glorious, the paddles are never wrong - never misses a gear. The E60 paddles are intuitive - vs. the m3. Since you pull back for upshifts and push down for donwnshifts.

The m3 requires both hands all the time - right lever upshift -left lever downshift

As for chirping through gears - in sport mode and the lauanch mode - there's nothing like it!!! You can chirp through second with ease - smoke the tires endlessly - at will!!

The throttle blips are awesome!!

As for regulating the throttle, you have to do that with a manual stickshift anyway, after driving for a week - you don't even think about it-

And most of all you're not ruining your dress shoes when you go to work by depressing the clutch to the floor and creating an annoying crease at the lip of your leather shoes - no more shoe trees!

Rudy

545smg gets it!!

EBMCS03

Hahhaha I know! my left boot has creases on it and my right doesnt! (I still have the MINI)

rodybmw

Thanks for posting that link Eric. After receiving a leukwarm reception to my initial post from a couple of months ago (see the top of this thread) it's nice to see that I'm not the only one thinking along those lines. I still say that it would be great to have the flexability of both the SMG and simulated manual as I have described in the above posts........and I still believe that technologically it is VERY do-able, and without that much work (for a company like BMW). All that is needed is a couple of extra input devices (clutch-by-wire + a shifter with a few more switches than the current SMG shifter), and modified software.......everything else in the system stays as it is now.



Hmmmm.........That's strange. I am replying to posts one at a time but they all seem to end up in the same post. In the above post I replied to JDN's post and it looked fine, then I replied to Eric's post and it put both my replies in a single post. I edited and started over but it did the same thing again. Have I accidently turned on a forum option that I don't know about?



It just did it again even though this time I wasn't even replying to anyones post in specific, just a general reply to the thread. I have a feeling that this is also going to be put in the same post. Let's see.

Rudy

There's a new bug (or feature?) in the version of forum software that Lomag upgraded to recently. It seems that if you reply to a thread where you were the last poster, it appends the new message to the old one.

Now that I've posted, your next message will be in a new reply...

EBMCS03

I think its a new feature to hold peoples post down.