PDX991

I'm interested in looking for a sedan for family hauling when I have to carry people over 48" tall in my backseat.

I've been looking for CPO'd BMWs because they come with manual transmissions and can be fun to drive (of course not as much as the 991). Unfortunately as I look through the Autotrader, BMW websites, etc., apparently many BMW dealers claim that their DCT are Manual transmissions. And for someone who is looking for a clutch pedal, this is very infuriating. I expect some used car sellers to not be clear on that distinction, but these are dealerships who know the option packages and know that a manual tranny is a distinct option on these cars. Or maybe they don't know their cars at all, which is probably more the case.

I'm not expecting any solutions, just ranting to people who might understand.

titleistaddict87

This is infuriating. Having just gone through the search for a 7MT in my 991s, I basically resorted to flipping through the pictures to verify transmission. I would narrow down by color, year, miles, etc. and then would have to go through and look at each picture. Fortunately for dealer inventory, the Porsche website was pretty accurate but could see how BMW would be worse.

991carreradriver

I noticed the same thing with P-Cars. Descriptions are manual until you scan the interior pictures only to see that they are PDK.

pitt911

i have owned BMW for several years , unfortunately manual transmission has almost disappeared from their fleet other than few exceptions like M cars or few 1 series . What i can gather is you are looking at M cars as they are the only ones with DCT transmission. Be patient , you can find a manual, and resort to the trick of looking at interior pics to verify transmission

drcollie

Trying hunting for Ferraris and see how many have "manual" transmissions.

Four Ring Circus

This is a reader response about this rather infuriating issue from a Jalopnik article:

I work in online operations for a dealership group and can tell you exactly why (long explanation ahead).

When you’re looking at a basic VIN decoder that doesn’t belong to any specific car brand’s proprietary systems, it’ll give you only the base info of the car. Year, make, model, sometimes trim, sometimes body style, and engine size. If you’re lucky it’ll tell you if it’s 2WD or AWD/4WD but not always. That’s all the info the VIN carries. Note I didn’t mention transmission type. Before someone steps in and says “but the dealership can pull a VIN and tell you every option that came with the car!” let me remind you it’s a computer system specific to that brand, and it’s not decoding the VIN so much as just checking it against the manufacturer’s database and retrieving a record of the car’s specs. This is why the Honda dealership can’t pull an option list for a Chevy and vice versa.

So back to the online listing side of things. Dealerships have software that automatically creates inventory files for each car when they’re put in the dealership’s database. These inventory files get sent out to all the different vehicle listings to create the ads you see when you’re car shopping. This inventory software will fill in the blank for “Transmission” but since it can’t decode that info from the VIN it doesn’t know what to fill in. Cars that are automatic only are easy since there’s only one choice. Cars that offer either a manual or automatic, well... it plugs in the default (a.k.a. standard) transmission, which is usually a manual.

Someone from the dealership then has to go back in and fix it, and to do this they have to check every single car’s ad one by one.

Most dealerships stay on top of it. Some dealerships just don’t care. Most do care but sometimes overlook one. Hell, my company recently had a ton of ads go out incorrectly. Why? The guy that takes photos of all our inventory said he’d make sure the transmission was correct when he uploaded the photos. And he did just that, for about a year. Suddenly he quit doing it, didn’t bother to tell us, and next thing you know we’ve got customers on the lot saying “But the ad said this was a manual!”

So that’s how it works.

The original article:
http://jalopnik.com/why-are-so-many-...als-1715626627

_BK

Agreed. This isn't just a BMW dealer thing. I often see Porsche dealers categorizing the PDK as a manual transmission when I filter the for sale listings. As a MT enthusiast, it's frustrating.

Chris C.

I had the same issue looking for Porsche manuals on dealer's sites...maddening. Automated manual is not a manual!!

MJBird993

I ditto the frustrations. As for the OP's quest for a manual BMW, it's going to be tough. I wanted a manual 335i, but as usual I had to order a new one (I got a 340i). Typically, for me, because I buy lightly optioned cars (options are worthless at trade-in time) and flip them quickly, it costs me nearly the same to buy a new car (with manual transmission, natch) as a two year-old CPO car that's loaded with crap that I don't want. My last six out of seven new cars were ordered. The odd one was a Panamera S that I shouldn't have sold.

I'm now in the market for a Boxster, and for some reason the used 981s are holding their values quite well. I'm looking at something like a $10K premium to order a new one versus a used 2013 with mileage in the teens. 2014s are not too common and manuals are even less so.

Anyway, yes, it's annoying as heck, and really slows down the shopping process when you have to look at every single ad and go through the pictures until you can determine the transmission.

Noah Fect

The reason.

fast1

To be fair some look at automatic transmissions as being restricted to torque converters, which DCT and PDK clearly are not. I suppose a better description for this technology would be automated manual.

maxpowers

I don't know many people who think that way. Most buyers I'd wager don't know what a torque converter is vs. a DCT.

When you're looking for a car you either want the car to shift for you (automatic) or you want a clutch pedal so you can put the car gearshift in the gear you want (manual). Obviously with an automatic you can also sequentially shift with the gear lever or paddles, but there is no clutch pedal or ability to directly shift to whatever gear you want. The inner workings of the automatic have nothing to do with how you operate the car.

fast1

That's all true but there's a huge difference between an automatic transmission and PDK. You are defining the transmission by how the driver operates it. I prefer defining it by how the transmission functions.

Although I prefer a MT to PDK, it's still technically a manual transmission. Automatic transmissions have a torque converter. PDK is a clutch based system; the clutch is just operated by a computer.

Since BMW sells so many "real automatics" I can see where they try to differentiate them from DCT. For clarity it would be better if they used the term "automated manual".

Spyerx

^^^ BS, and automatic has he ability to shift by itself. A manual does not. The mechanism by which an automatic shifts has no merit on the definition. I'm not arguing that a DCT or PDK or similar is a much better and more efficient and faster design than a slush box. But if the car can shift on its own, it's an AUTOMATIC.

Id also argue a PDK is not an automated manual. That term away used to refer to the single clutch designs of the ferrari or bmw designs that were literally, an manual transmission controlled by solenoids. the PDK isn't that.

AF330i

I agree and was thinking the same when I read this thread ... The PDK, Dct, etc are manuals with automated clutches. When shopping for my R8 I would look at every ad regardless of what the transmission was listed at as the R tronic could be listed as either an automatic or manual.