"The 2012 Acura TL is refined, yet aggressive," said Jeff Conrad, vice president of Acura sales.
A mildly freshened Acura TL sedan debuted at the Chicago Auto Show today with revised front and rear styling, as well as a changed interior. For 2012, two versions of Acura’s sedan will be offered: 280 horsepower, front-wheel-drive TL, along with a 305 horsepower all-wheel-drive performance model with either a manual or automatic transmission.
What’s really new here is a sequential shifting 6-speed automatic transmission. However, a so called “double-kick-down” mode allows the auto transmission driver get a double downshift, say from six to fourth, while the electronic throttle system – it’s drive by wire of course – creates an rpm increase or heal-toe like “blip” to help match gear speeds while downshifting, and presumably, but not necessarily, braking.
This increase in automatic transmission speeds is perhaps the most significant aspect of the new luxury Acura, as Honda – long-known for its technical innovations – had fallen way behind in the hardware induced aspects of improved fuel economy and performance recently.
This hardware gap was the inevitable result of drastic cutbacks in research and development funding several years ago, as Honda scrambled to stay profitable during the onset of the still ongoing global auto recession.
The Acura TL sedan posted 1,592 units sold last month, a sales decrease of 20% from January of 2010. Acura total car sales for January were 3,693 units, down 5.4 percent.
“The 2012 Acura TL is refined, yet aggressive,” said Jeff Conrad, vice president of Acura sales at the unveiling.
The new automatic transmission works with a new multi-clutch torque converter, which reduces heat build-up during operation, and also allows for lock-up activation during a much wider range of driving conditions without performance degradations. This results in improved fuel economy of As a result, city/highway fuel economy is now 20mog city /29 mpg highway – an increase of 3 mpg in highway results compared t 2011. Yes gears matter here.
