Quote:
Originally Posted by speede5
So now that these dual clutch paddle shifters are making there way into more mainstream cars how are we all feeling about reliability and maintenance cost?
Reason I ask; I was offered a 2012 mitsu evo on trade the other day and I was actually a little tempted, enough to show a friend the car. Turns out we have a mutual friend whose son bought one of these, used, and the tranny went the first week he had it. A replacement was worth more than half the cars value and he eventually found one used for around $4000 and went that route. Apparently the maintenance on these things is not your average plan, fluid change is quite expensive you are supposed to service it after every track day, which makes me think if someone before you drives the snot out of it you should be on a tight schedule as well. And due to cost and difficulty there's a better chance people wont follow the schedule.
I've had my eye on R8's and Gallardo's for a while and the trans seems to be an area where there are issues (clutch for sure), so while there are some deals to be had if you know how to wrench there's also going to be a lot of cheaper cars that may look great but are only worth what can be salvaged as these things become more popular.
Or they become reliable and a non issue. haha who knows for sure.
I'll take that Lotus with a stick though, very good looking car.
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I'm probably as good a person as anyone to answer as I owned a 2008 EVO X MR with the TC-SST, have owned VAG cars with DSG, and am now driving a BMW with ZF-8. DCT's are actually being phased out of mainstream cars as the ZF-8 has replaced DCT's in BMW and Audi's longitudinal offerings. VAG has been using them for almost two decades now and there's nothing wrong with them (I do not count Ford, Hyundai and some other manufactures have tried to build them on the cheap using dry clutches leading to poor results) outside the fact that they can be a little jerky or clunky in low gears. Despite the ZF-8 transmission closing the gap, DCT's still offer the fastest shifts particularly when it comes to downshifting which is why you will still see them used in a lot of performance exotics. The BMW DCT for example is a little more engaging when than the ZF-8 but it's not as refined as the ZF-8 upshifts just as fast and is butter smooth in comparison. When using the paddles I find that the DCT is quicker at downshifting than the ZF-8 but for the average person I would say the ZF-8 is the better transmission.
As for the EVO X DCT it's actually a pretty solid Getrag unit that was so impressive that after testing the EVO X, BMW decided to source a longitudinal version of it for the E90 M3 which was used for a few generations until the newly released G8x M3/M4. The transmissions are sealed units and Mitsubishi will not work on them and will only replace them. There are specialty shops that will work on them but I'm not sure there are any local. I imagine if your friend bought one that failed in a week that the previous owner likely had either not maintained it or knew it was on its way out.