Difference between SMG and Sport Autos
A sequential manual transmission (or sequential manual gearbox) is a type of manual transmission used on motorcycles and high-performance cars or auto racing, where gears are selected in order, and direct access to specific gears is not possible.
With traditional manual transmissions, the driver can move from any gear, to any gear, by moving the shifter to the appropriate position. This type of transmission is often referred to as a H-pattern because of the path that the shift lever takes as it selects the various gears. A clutch must be disengaged before the new gear is selected, to disengage the running engine from the transmission, thus stopping all torque transfer. In auto racing, this process is slow and prone to human error; hence the development of the sequential transmission. A true sequential transmission will very often use dog clutch engagement rather than the more usual syncromesh as fitted to a normal H-pattern road car gearbox. Engagement using dogs only requires a very brief interruption of engine torque to complete a shift into any adjacent gear. This allows shifting between gears without the use of the clutch. The clutch would normally be used only for standing starts.
Sportronic or Tiptronic
Tiptronic transmission can operate in the same manner as a conventional type of automatic transmission, but the second and sometimes third mode also allows the driver an additional method of manually overriding the automatic shift changes, by moving the shift lever into a second shift gate, equipped with two spring-loaded positions: "upshift" and "downshift". Once the lever is in this gate, the driver takes over most of the gear shifting decisions, which would ordinarily be performed by the transmission's computer, permitting, for example, the delaying of an upshift for increased acceleration, to increase the effect of the engine braking, to prevent shifts in curves, to shift down before passing, or to shift early in economic acceleration. On some models, the upshift and downshift operations can also be commanded by push-buttons or "paddle shifters" installed on the steering wheel, with an optional display in the instrument panel indicating the current gear selection. And since adding Tiptronic to a (semi-)automatic transmission merely means to plug a new shift lever into the computer and update the software, it is light and cheap.
Though Tiptronic transmissions allow the driver a certain measure of discrete control, the Tiptronic design is implemented using a torque converter like other automatic transmissions. A true Tiptronic transmission is not a computer controlled manual transmission (with a conventional clutch), or semi-automatic transmission. Most Tiptronic implementations still make some shifts automatically, primarily to protect the engine and transmission. For example, as used by licensee Audi, their five-speed Tiptronic will automatically make the upshifts from 1 to 2 when moving off from a stop, even when in manual mode; the transmission then waits for the user's upshift command before proceeding from 2 to 3, 3 to 4 and 4 to 5, although the transmission will still upshift if the redline is approached. On deceleration, the transmission will make all downshifts automatically when close to the tick-over or idle speed, to avoid running the engine at too-low an RPM, although the user can accelerate any downshift (that would not violate the redline), thus allowing improved engine braking, or preparation for intended acceleration. There are some exceptions to this; the system used in the Aston Martin DB9 is designed to hold the gear at the engine's redline, though it will still downshift automatically.
Most luxury vehicles with a Tiptronic transmission have two fully-automatic modes: the primary mode, identified as "Drive", "Comfort" or similar; and another, usually called "Sport," which delays upshifts for a sportier driving at the expense of fuel, wear, comfort, and noise. Furthermore, because modern Tiptronic-type transmissions now utilise electronics, incorporating an electronic control unit (ECU), sometimes specifically referred to as the transmission control unit, the ECUs are able to use "fuzzy logic", which means that the operation of the transmission is said to be "adaptive", whereby it will "learn" how the user drives the car, and will tailor the automatic shift points accordingly. This adapts to the demands being placed upon the car by the driver. In this way, shift quality has been improved due to better electronic controls.
Some makes such as Aston Martin, Audi, BMW, Smart, Nissan , Subaru, and Volkswagen offer paddle shifters behind the steering wheel for controlling their similar transmissions.