Do you notice your gas mileage differs between you and your wife? My wife drives with a heavier foot and her gas mileage has been terrible.
No, not really. For the most part, she doesn't drive faster or harder than I do...she just doesn't tend to take off as gently. That seems to be a relatively small part of the fuel economy equation.Do you notice your gas mileage differs between you and your wife? My wife drives with a heavier foot and her gas mileage has been terrible.
When you write that letter would you consider posting it here for us to plagierize?I've been drafting an email to SOA about this, as a satisfied Ascent owner who has a suggestion for product improvement (and hopefully a software update for existing vehicles). Motor Trend's acknowledgement of this attribute of Subaru's FA24/CVT programming may help our case.
Sure...I just cross-posted the letter to the "Letter to Subaru" subforum:When you write that letter would you consider posting it here for us to plagierize?
I need to try this. I too dislike the throttle map at high rpm.We've been talking about the throttle response in "normal" mode vs. the smoothness in how ACC operates. I got to thinking, "I wonder if the throttle mapping while the ACC is engaged applies if I'm actually controlling the speed with the throttle pedal, such as if the ACC set speed is 20 mph and I'm actually driving 30.
It does!
With ACC set at its lowest setting, resume the car from a stop, but accelerate it with the throttle pedal. Once you get faster than the set speed (or even before then, as you're accelerating), you'll notice the throttle response is 100% predictable and the CVT is completely smooth. Dip into the gas some and the CVT will quickly and smoothly ramp up the engine speed (rather than you having to give it more gas and more gas until it decides that you really want to go, and THEN it changes the CVT ratio).
Obviously, this isn't a safe way to operate the car (let off the gas, and the car will try to aggressively slow down to whatever your set speed is), but I think it's very interesting that the throttle maps the ACC uses apply when the ACC is engaged, even if you've sped up and are using the throttle pedal to drive the car.
This seems like an easy fix for Subaru -- throw the "gas pedal" throttle map away and just use the "ACC" throttle map for everything.![]()
Ooh -- I wonder if it won't simulate upshifts in this scenario (ACC engaged even though you've got it to the mat). That would be interesting to know -- I didn't try that.I go from 25mph side streets straight to an inclined on-ramp to the interstate. As long as I remember to set it to highway speed before letting off the skinny pedal it should be fun!
I’ll let you know 🤔Ooh -- I wonder if it won't simulate upshifts in this scenario (ACC engaged even though you've got it to the mat). That would be interesting to know -- I didn't try that.
The shifts are still there...Ooh -- I wonder if it won't simulate upshifts in this scenario (ACC engaged even though you've got it to the mat). That would be interesting to know -- I didn't try that.
This has been discussed a lot on this forum. It's one of the things I don't really care for on our Ascent. I thought it was the torque converter engaging aggressively, but it's actually not. I've been watching the CVT ratios on the Active OBD app on my phone, and it's definitely the CVT adjusting to a lower ratio fairly quickly after first setting off. It starts at a ratio of about 2.45:1, and will quickly cinch down to about 1.2:1 or so on light acceleration. This is somewhere between the 3rd ratio in manual mode (about 1.38:1) and the 4th ratio in manual mode (about 1.10:1). So it's as if the transmission quickly upshifted from 1st speed to 3rd or 4th speed...which is something no stepped transmission would ever do. I think this is goofy. I understand aftermarket tuners fix this, but I'm not interested in that.
The more I tried to "work around" it, the more it would frustrate me. To get around the quick throttle response, I'd gently lean into the throttle to get going, and the CVT ratio change a few seconds after you get moving is most aggressive under these conditions. So I'd start with really light throttle, and then try to quickly ramp in with more throttle just as the ratio was starting to change. With some practice, that worked pretty well, and quickly increasing the throttle would stave off the aggressive ratio change...it was a "dance" that I had gotten fairly good at. I still thought it was goofy.
I noticed that my wife didn't have as much of a problem with this as me. She just puts the gas down and the car drives away fairly smoothly. So I tried just giving it more gas right from the off. That really seems to change the mapping for the better. I quickly move into an indicated 20-25% throttle (on the upper screen), and the CVT will let the engine flash up to about 2k RPM, but it'll keep it at about that speed as the car accelerates, rather than bogging the engine down with a sharp ratio change. I find it a lot easier to drive this way, rather than trying to time more throttle with the ratio change (to minimize it).
So for what it's worth for those who think this is goofy, who don't want to install an aftermarket tune, and who try to tiptoe around it with light throttle. When you can, give it more gas than you think you'd want to, and it actually drives pretty smoothly. Only after watching my wife drive it with a heavier foot did a realize that I was being too ginger with it.
I thought so, too. I downloaded ActiveOBD to my Android phone and used it for quite a while to 'see' what was going on with the powertrain. That app will show you the CVT variator pulley ratio and also the torque converter lockup %. I found that the "bog" isn't when the torque converter finally does engage (even though that's what it feels like)...rather, it really is the CVT aggressively lowering the ratio after you get going with a light throttle. I found the torque converter to almost always be locked in at 100% at speeds over 5-10 mph, which did not correlate to that bog.This is good to know. I always thought it was due to the complex handoff between the torque converter locking up and the needed CVT ratio with an unlocked vs locked torque converter.
Ours will do this under certain circumstances. It's like it lowers the ratio too much and then thinks, "oops, who did that...I need to raise it back." For some reason, ours will tend do this when re-accelerating after a slowdown (such as when turning a corner through a green light). And it tends to do it only when throttle input is in the 20-27%ish range (according to the dashtop monitor). With heavier throttle, it won't do it. And when accelerating from a dead stop, ours doesn't tend to do it. I agree that it's pretty aggravating.Something interesting I have found about this quark. I figure the car thinks I have reached some leisurely acceleration pace and lowers the ratio. I then hold the throttle in that position and the car tries to maintain that ratio for a couple seconds but inevitably has to raise the ratio for the same throttle input. It is impossible to continue without the CVT needing to increase the ratio. Saying you have to "dance" around this issue is a good way to put it because it is difficult not to give it too much throttle to overcome the ratio.