How come we can’t just add X amount of gears to a transmission and have one of the most efficient cars ever?
In: 95
We can add more gears, but it’s diminishing returns. We need space for all those gears, then we need an increasingly complicated transmission to manage the gears. That’s weight and expense. Of course, as others mentioned, we already have CVT transmissions that do effectively have infinite gears.
Then there’s the driving experience. Trying to get a standard transmission to select the optimum gear out of a massive selection means lots of shifting everytime the smallest thing changes, such as the grade of the road, or a gust of wind. CVTs can at least adjust with out you noticing.
But, wait a minute… If we already have infinite ranges in transmissions why are cars equipped with them already the most efficient ever?
Well that’s because the biggest factors in efficiency have nothing to do with transmissions. The best internal combustion engines are still throwing away ~60% of the available energy as heat. So simply getting rid of the internal combustion engine in favour of an electric one nearly triples the efficient use of energy. But that’s not even the biggest way to improve efficiency. That comes down to aerodynamics, especially as you go faster and faster.
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