Obsidian3K

I think what you're describing is throttle linearity.

Mazda (and others, I'm sure) used to have a very front-loaded throttle, where the first 20% of throttle application could summon 80% of engine response, then you had to dig waaaaaay into the rest of the throttle to eke out that last 20%. Mazda did this because it felt sporty; you tapped the throttle and the car took off.

Circa 2014, Mazda switched to a linear throttle, where a 20% application resulted in 20% response, 40% for 40%, etc. I believe they made the change primarily to improve fuel consumption numbers, but it didn't hurt that the change coincided with their introduction of higher-compression engines that could provide a lot more torque lower in the power band.

The German habit (also present in large FCA cars like the Charger and 300, thanks to their legacy as Daimler-Benz products) of having the throttle do absolutely nothing for roughly a full second after you press the gas pedal is something else entirely. Apparently it's behavior that the German market likes--Mazda claims that they had to add it in for cars they sell in that market--but I wish it could easily be disabled for those of us who expect our cars to respond to inputs in a timely manner.

carkarl

Yes, control linearity is what I am talking about. Swapping between our previous Toyota and Audi, it was striking how differently the pedals worked. Not just throttle but brakes too. I have an engineering/systems background and immediately noticed the control differences. I thought maybe this is what the original poster was experiencing, coming from a Honda Civic to an A4.

I don't think there is any 1 second throttle delay in any Audi I've driven. But I think torque converter transmissions can *feel* like they have a 1 second delay when you stomp on the pedal and have to wait for either an inopportune down-shift or for the torque converter to lock up from a standing start. I don't find this a distinguishing characteristic between Audi and other brands though... I've seen it in all different brands of rental cars I've ever driven. It's one of the reasons I held out for nearly 20 years driving a manual transmission before finally reaching our current marital compromise on a new Q3 with tiptronic.

Obsidian3K

My Audi sample size is admittedly tiny--one B8 A4 at a dealership several years ago and a diesel B9 A4 this spring in the UK--but they behaved the same way that the (20+) Dodge Chargers and Chrysler 300s I've driven over the years have; completely ignoring throttle input for somewhere between 0.75 and 1.25 seconds; on the low end for the Dodge/Chryslers, on the high end for the Audis.

It's long enough to cross the threshold from annoying to (at least in my opinion) dangerous. If I spot an opening in a busy highway roundabout and apply the throttle, it's because I'm expecting to start moving... you know, now-ish. The ~1-second dead spot often meant I had to anticipate my need for power by that same time (sometimes incorrectly), or push the car harder to "catch up". Putting the UK B9 A4 into Sport or Dynamic reduced that delay to ~0.5 second, which was back in the "annoying but not dangerous" zone, but the behavior is completely at odds with every American or Japanese car I've ever driven, which is probably 20+ every year due to work travel.

If none of this matches your experience with Audis, I'd be perfectly happy--relieved, even--to chalk it up to a couple of misbehaving cars.

carkarl

My days of frequent business travel are almost 10 years behind me, so I've sampled fewer of the latest cars. If there are torque converter transmissions out there without any of these delays, I think that is a new thing. The one in our Q3 has the same basic character as every slushbox I've driven since 1990, other than having 6 gears instead of 3 or 4. Even the hybrid cars I have test driven seem to emulate the feel of a conventional torque converter transmission.

The trend towards ever more gears may help, as in theory the closely spaced ratios mean that the engine could be kept in an ideal RPM band and the transmission could more quickly lock up rather than having to slip the torque converter to keep the engine from bogging. But, from what I have read, the typical consumer familiar with traditional slushboxes actually likes the mushy unresponsive behavior and the manufacturers may keep programming the transmissions to retain that feel. It's one of the reasons the various sequential manual transmissions have done poorly in the market here, as people complain they are "rough" or "jerky".

Obsidian3K

I should have specified that the behavior I'm talking about is most noticeable from a complete stop. All of the cars I've experienced that with also have some degree of throttle lag (if that's the right word) while in motion, but it's usually less noticeable in that instance.

Delays for things like shift changes or RPMs needing to build to useful levels I can definitely understand, and I do see those in other automatics, although slush boxes in the past 5-6 years have gotten surprisingly good about choosing the right gear.

From a stop, the LX platform cars and those two A4s seem to need about a second to "notice" that I've applied the throttle. There's no shifting (they're already in 1st) and no movement on the tach, it's just like they need a moment to put down their knitting and respond to throttle input.

Versprechen

Brake pedal feel is supposed to be a gradual process for better control and to prevent fade. I wonder if the engineers at Toyota, after the sudden acceleration scandal in which a major culprit was their gas pedal design -- attaching to the top of it instead of the floor like many other cars so that you can't jam it to the floor from below, like with a floor mat under it, for example, and of course with a floor mat that doesn't pin to the floor -- intentionally redesigned them to be very catchy, which is really not a best practice as far safety goes if you think about it.

Obsidian3K

Thought I should provide an update on my minor thread derailment, in case a future poster came along and was concerned by what I'd said above.

I drove a 2017 A4 (Quattro, Progressiv) with the 2.0TFSI and DSG yesterday, and it was markedly different from the 2.0TDI/DSG I had in the UK. The TFSI had no discernible throttle lag when underway, and although there was some lag from a standstill, it was on the order of 0.75 seconds, rather than the 1.0-1.25-second lag on the TDI.

Also, in contrast to the TDI--which seemed to completely ignore throttle input during its "lag" period--the TFSI's revs increased for the first 0.5 second or so, then dropped, and then increased again and the car began to move. This felt very manual-like (throttle and clutch in, then clutch out), so I'm guessing that it's the normal DSG behavior that I've read about on several occasions.

I would still prefer not to have that lag at all, but with the TFSI it was minimal enough to be manageable, and didn't leave me feeling like I was waiting for the engine room to throw some more coal in the boiler, like the TDI did.

A4Driver

I agree. I was in a traffic jam on the highway the other day, and it was stop and go for a couple of miles. I would get up to about 5 mph, and then have to hit the brakes. The transmission was doing some really clunky shifting. 💩 All other times it has been extremely smooth.
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lowjdml

A DSG transmission is about anticipation... you're speeding up to 5 mph, the transmission is preparing to upshift... instead, you hit the brakes. Now it needs to downshift back to first to startup again. It's trying to second guess what we're doing and getting it wrong.

Stop & go traffic is surprisingly smooth with the DAP.

VM

As I've understood it, DSGs are only smoothly-shifting if the correct gear is pre-loaded on the other clutch...

(My understanding is that on the Audi unit in our cars, it's R-2-4-6 on one clutch, 1-3-5-7 on the other. Other dual clutch transmissions, e.g. Hyundai's FWD one, don't seem to stagger gears that way)

So, if you drive away from a stop, one clutch (the currently active one) will be on 1, the other clutch presumably selects 2 (or I guess it could do 4 but that's a little crazy?). Transmission switches between clutches, you're now in second. Now the transmission will likely load 3rd (or potentially 5th) on the other clutch, expecting a further upshift. When, instead, you slow down and need first instead, whoops, jerkiness.

I do wonder if the DAP is integrated enough with the transmission control system that it wouldn't upshift the 1-3-5-7 to 3rd if the adaptive cruise is reporting that forward conditions make it very unlikely you will need an upshift.

That being said, now that I think about it, I don't think confusion between 1st and 3rd is what causes the jerkiness. (I am assuming that it would only use first to start from a complete stop... and if you are at a complete stop, the transmission would have enough time to switch to first to get ready to move again). I think it's probably the transmission being in 3rd, the other clutch being in 4th, and instead, in order to start moving again from a slow speed, it needs second... that being said, if anybody has enabled the setting where the VC shows you your current gear in D, you can confirm that.