"Real men drive a stick", I would agree with that. Automatics are for little old ladies and grocery getters. Ha, Ha.
"Manual transmissions are a giant leap backward in technology". I'll agree that other than syncronizers and adding a few gears, the manual trans has change very little in the last eighty years. It really hasn't had to.
The automatic on the other hand, has hundreds of designs and thousands of modifications. A couple years ago GM said the future was in "Continuously Variable Transmissions (CVTs) or what they call "Hydra-Matic Variable Transmission intelligent (VTi) that they were using in the Saturn. Now they are talking about several new versions of six speed automatics.
When they get the technology right, maybe they'll let us know.
"The Big Three" have spent the last 20 years working on getting an auto to work behind a diesel in a pickup and they still get complaints.
In the mean time.
High-stall converters, lock-up torque converters, manual control automatic transmissions. A multi billion dollar industry, trying to make a automatic transmission operate like a manual transmission.
A high-stall torque converter is not a performance upgrade. It is a band-aid to cover up a weak bottom end and for an engine that won't idle at a decent rpm in gear. A 350 with 320 hp is still relatively mild and should have very streetable manners with a broad power range and a good idle.
