With its 2007 models, Maserati incensed a lot of old-school, sports-car fans by doing away with traditional manual transmissions, with their clutch pedals and stick shifts. Maserati went over, along with a herd of other automakers, to what lovers of great Italian sports cars today refer to as “freakin’ automatics,“ or words close to that.
These new “automatics” come with complicated labels— “sequential manuals” and “automated manuals” and “dual-clutch manuals” and require lengthy explanations. Some of them are herky-jerky, maddening devices—the goofy SMG seven-speed sequential gearbox in the BMW M5 comes to mind. For the most part, though, today’s automated manuals have advanced to become slick and rapid gear-changers, so their ascension seems certain. Even Ferrari has been bailing on clutch pedals and stick shifters.
Automatic, But Still Italian at Heart
Which brings us to the third model in Maserati’s GranTurismo lineup—the “Automatic” S model. Its gearbox is not of the tech-chic modern variety, but instead is a rather unspectacular ZF hydraulic six-speed automatic with a traditional torque converter—very similar to what you’d find in a BMW 650i. What it accomplishes are impressively smooth gear changes to go with the company’s impressively smooth grand-tourer image. The ZF shifts the 4.7-liter V-8’s 433 hp with an impressive fluidity that causes not so much as a whiff at the hairline through the gears. Long paddle shifters in the shadow of the steering wheel send the signals, and are amusingly embossed with DOWN on the left paddle and UP on the right. Zero to 62 mph should come in 4.9 seconds, Maserati says, and top speed is governed at 183 mph.
Keep Reading: 2009 Maserati GranTurismo S Automatic - First Drive Review
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