Actually I was pretty sure that I'd like to go with the sport because of features like Cruise Control, remote door locks, and USB Audio Interface that seemed absolutely necessary to me.
Now all those features come with the base in 2011 so I'm considering the base again.
If I compare base and sport the only added features I really care about are the map lights, and in case I go with the at the paddle shifters.
So unless I go with the automatic I'll almost definitely go with the base especially since now the price difference got even bigger.
But this arises the next question: at vs mt
I mostly drove mt in the past and my at experience is mostly from rental cars. And I actually like the fact that I have my right hand free in an AT and for stop and go it seems more easy going too. So in general I would probably prefer a AT but it seems as there are the following advantages of an mt:
- Some ATs tend to shift down even on really slight accents when cruising on a highway. I once had a pontiac vibe rental car which did that constantly (particularly on those 75 and 80 mph highways in Texas where I used it) and it really annoyed me. The rental SUVs I had didn't have that issue. But the engine of the fit seems to be rather on the small side so I wonder if this an issue with the 2g fit?

- I think to have read somewhere that on accents where a downshift to 4 gear would really make sense the automatic sometimes has a hard time identifying the correct gear and then shifting back and forth between 4 and 5. Is this true?

- On the other side in the fit the automatic seems to have an advantage over the mt as the gear ratio in the 5 gear are better and allow for less rpm at highway cruising and therefore a better fuel economy and a lower noise level...

So it seems as the at sport with the paddle shifters might be the best of both worlds. I get the better gear ratio in 5 gear and don't have to shift manually in city traffic but have the option to shift to 4 and 5 gear manually if this seems to be the best choice.
But then 1800$ more in MSRP just for map lights and paddle shifters (since I don't care about the other cosmetic enhancements) seem a little steep. And in addition the insurance seems to be higher on the sport as well...

Any thoughts?

 

What kind of driving do you do?
If the car is going to see most of its time in bumper to bumper traffic commuting to work go with the AT.

If the car is not going to see stop and go on a regular basis and you enjoy using a clutch, then get the manual.

For myself, I like my daily drivers to be automatics and my fun cars to be manuals. This way I don't have to clutch myself to work every morning, and if I need to let someone drive my car that can not drive a stick (like my wife) it is not a big deal. But if I want to go out and row through the gears on the backroads, well I can get into one of my toy cars and do that too. :-)

I have noticed with the AT that it does not seem to know where it wants to be while cruising up long freeway hills. If you get the sport with the flappy paddles, you can fix this by putting it in sport mode and dropping it into 5th, or taking it down to 4th if you need to. Its NOT a manual, for sure, but its better then the usual slushbox.

Zach

 

I have the 5MT sport but alot of it was due to the extras that are mentioned in your 1st post being now available on all trim levels. Of note, the sport has a Rear Sway Bar and larger wheels so if you like a more fun to drive experience the sport gets you closer without having to go aftermarket.

The 5AT has a taller top gear as you mentioned for better fuel economy but this will rear it's head in any inclines at highway speed where it downshifts. The fit has one of the smallest engines available on a non-hybrid vehicle so it is going to rely more on gearing and engine RPM's than torque. The Pros... better economy, the Con's more shifting.

If you do either city driving or a LOT of highway, the Auto is your better bet. If you are in the Middle ground, the 5MT is fun.

If this is your commuter car, the base works fine. If it has a part time job of providing enjoyment (even during your commute - if your commute has the potential to be fun) I'd recommend the sport.

IMO;
Highway Commuter = Base Auto
Backroad fun = 5MT Sport
Anything in between is a toss-up based upon your particular situation.

~SB

 

Since you're asking for our opinions, Sport MT. At least that's what I did, no regrets.

 

Many will just jump on this and got MT but in reading your post... it seems like SPORT A/T is where you want to be (that's just my comprehension, I might be wrong tho)

Justifying they $1800 difference is hard on your part as you don't care about the look. $1800 hundred for just paddle shifters is pretty high... but for some (like me and I too drove MT for most part in the past) paddles + how the Sport look... it's worth it

When I purchased mine... if I had it my way, I would have gone MT but the reason and purpose for the purchase calls for an AT.

 

Yea, I think the Sport A/T would indeed be my favorite and with the 2009 and 2010 configurations I'd likely have gone with it.
Now the $1800 premium seems a little steep. But we'll see what the actual price difference will be once the 2011 shows up on truecar.com

If the MT would have a longer 5th (or 6th) gear I would probably have an easier time going with that, enjoying the better acceleration, and saving a lot of money.
What I'm wondering: How big is actually the difference between an at and mt in 5th gear on the highway rpm, mpg, and noise wise. Maybe people that have driven both could provide me some insight...
I guess in the end it would be the best to test drive both but I think usually car dealers don't offer long enough test drives to really be able to get a good feel...

Another question regarding sport vs. base: I downloaded the 2010 owner's manual as pdf to get more infos about the cars.
On page 214 under Driving Guidelines it says:
On Sport model:
Your vehicle is designed to give you optimum handling and performance on well-maintained roads. As part of this design, your vehicle has minimum ground clearance.

● Use caution if you ever drive your vehicle on very rough or rutted roads. You could damage the suspension and underbody by bottoming out. Going too fast over parking lot ‘‘speed bumps’’ can also cause damage.
● Curbs and steep inclines could damage the front and rear bumpers. Low curbs that do not affect the average vehicle may be high enough to hit the bumper on your vehicle. The front or rear bumper may scrape when trying to drive onto an incline, such as a steep driveway or trailer ramps.

So it seems that the sport model has less ground clearance and can be damaged more easily? This would mean a be a big plus for the base for me...
On the other side this page in the manual is the first time I read about that and nowhere in the specs I can see a difference about ground clearance...?!?

 

I've also owned mostly MT vehicles. My only other one was a Honda CR-V, and this is the only one I've actively purchased (I drove the CR-V because I traded my truck to allow my exwife to get a new minivan).

I have no regrets about buying the AT in the Fit. This is worlds different from the automatics in the XJ Cherokee in which I learned to drive, or the CR-V's sluggish four-speed connected to a gutless B20.

I chose the Sport A/T for several reasons:

(Sport vs Base
- in 2010, the Sport added cruise, alloy wheels, and better suspension. Driving a small car with 14-15" wheels and spongy suspension is not a whole lot of fun, and the reviews praised the handling of the Sport over the base almost unwaveringly. In Consumer Reports road testing, the base passed the avoidance maneuver test at 51 mph vs 53 in the Sport... this actually isn't as insignificant as it seems - the difference between a Jeep Grand Cherokee and a Lotus Elise is less than 10 mph (48.5 vs 57).
- The Fit isn't a terribly expensive car - for the number of upgrades, the Fit Sport isn't much pricier than the base. If the difference between the price of a Sport and Base is breaking the bank, a new car probably isn't the best option anyway, ya know?

AT vs MT:
- more comfort: the footwell is rather narrow, and the dead pedal mounted close (because of the wheel well : the dead-pedal hides the shape of the intrusion). Getting rid of the clutch adds some left-foot space.
- more comfort part 2: Unless you are very short, your knee will be in the space where first gear resides. Manual shifters can be annoying when you have to constantly move your knee to shift.
- Better highway gearing: I got tired of the drone of the engine at highway speeds in my Element. At 75 mph, it was almost to 4000 RPM...
- The paddle-shifted transmission allows you the fun of manually selecting gears with the convenience of select-and-go driving for creeping in traffic.
- Finding a manual transmission car is a royal PITA these days unless it is a car with a large performance following. For a car that seems to be mainly a fuel-miser runabout for middle-aged folks, you're not going to find many on the lots.

 

dmy - If the highway RPMs and engine noise issue is important to you, you really need to test drive both on the highway. When I was looking at cars, every car I considered got a test drive at ~70 MPH on the highway, because I find engine buzz on a long trip annoying. I ended up with an '09 AT Sport for the low highway RPMs, and the paddles to play with if I want some control.

 

Everything I've read so far.... you're at least in it for an auto on the base and depending on price, would prefer an Auto on the sport.

For the extra $1800, you get:
Paddle shifters
Rear sway Bar
tweeters (6 speakers instead of 4)
16" Alloys (vs 15" steelies)
185 width Tires (vs. 175)
body Colored Side Mirrors (vs Black)
Keyless entry W/ Alarm (vs Keyless, No alarm)
Foglights
Front, Side body Kit
Rear wing
Chrome Exhaust Finisher
Chrome Headlights (vs dark grey bezels)
Leather Wrapped Steering wheel
Map lights
4 cargo anchors (vs 2)
Floor Mats

Cut this list down to things that interest you (even slightly) as these are the things that you might miss if you go with the manual. Figure out how much each would cost to install (including shipping, tax, etc...) and add that up.

Wheels & Fog lights are usually the most costly and also some of the most preferred upgrades for people. They'll run likely $1000 or more combined but offer no warranty.

As for the RPM's. At 60, the 5MT is just under 3000 rpms. I believe it is around 2300-2500 on the 5AT. when you get higher it definitely gets louder. Most of my commute is 50mph +/- 10mph and the fit is my commuter on country roads. That's why I've got the 5MT. If I had to do 70+ for extended periods, the 5AT is likely what I'd have.

~SB

 

In reading thru it seems no one addressed the ground clearance issue. The suspension is the same. The side spoilers as they call them do reduce the ground clearance and the corners of the front bumper are lower but the rear bumper is the same. Having swapped a base bumper for the sport I can tell you both Will scape in the center on steep angles and parking blocks. I think that the Sport offers more amenities than you could install with $1800 after purchase. If not for you than resale value, but you will find yourself using some of those features if you have them. Whats worse is if you realize you really want something like in my case cruise control. Not too expensive but aftermarket. IMHO the kits available look terrible! That would have made it worth it alone if they could have found me a 5spd Sport. Anyways, you'll find that the extra $ doesn't mean as much if you finance it. This is of course just my opinion.

 

Get the sport MT, unless you are going to tear it apart and customize it.
I was thinking A, but decided MT. Funner to drive is the reason. I don't like the paddles, why pretend when you really don't have to pretend. I wish the MT did have a 6th gear.

 

I tested it myself a while back... on the 5AT, at 70 mph (with the torque converter locked/unlocked:

4th (unlocked): 4000 RPM.
4th (locked): 3500 RPM.
5th (unlocked): 3100 RPM
5th (locked): 2500

At 60 in 5th, it's around 2100.

According to a chart that 555sexydrive once posted, at 70 MPH the 5MT should be at:

4th: 4300
5th: 3300

At 60, it should be at 2800 in 5th and 3700 in 4th.

 

Here is my short and sweet answer: SPORT MT.
No regrets, I find the MT more responsive, more fuel efficient, cheaper, and just all around better. I would say that many of the features on the SPORT like cruise control, foglights, alloy wheels (16s over 15s), and a little more of an aggressive look thats nice. IMO

 

Thanks to everyone for your valuable information so far
Once the cars are available in my area I will definitely have to go check them out in detail. So far I just had the chance to check out a 2010 base model in the showroom...

A few more questions to the sport model:
As far as I understand it from the manual the car has two drive modes, d and s.
D is the regular 1-5 drive mode and using the paddle shifters in this mode will just perform temporary shifts...
The S mode seems to be a more sporty mode (car just uses the lower 4 gears and shifts up later) but here the paddle shifts are more permanent. Question: Even through the car itself won't shift in to the 5 gear in S mode, can I still manually do so or will the paddle shifters in S just work 1-4?

Another question regarding the fuel efficiency. One of the my reasons to prefer the AT over the MT is the lower revs on highways and therefore lower noise and better fuel efficiency. While this part seems to be consistent with the EPA rating for the base model the epa estimates for the sport model aren't better in AT than it MT...
Why is that?
Maybe because the epa used the s mode partly? Or are there other reasons?
I wonder if I could expect the same fuel efficiency as the base model if I would strictly keep it to D???

Thanks. As I mentioned I'm not that familiar with ATs. What is the locking all about?
On wikipedia it says:
What I am interest to know is when does the transmission usually decides to lock/unlock?
Is there a difference between d and s mode here? And how does the lock/unlock behave when using the paddle shifters? Can I somehow see if the transmission is locked/unlocked or even influence this?

Thanks again to all for your help!

 

From personal experience getting the MT is hard as hell to do. I managed to get the last one in Louisiana. But in my opinion it was worth it. The MT is much faster than the automatic and my fuel economy can get as high as 38 avg on highway trips cruising at 75. But if you arent one for MT in traffic then go with the AT and the Sport for the paddles.

 

Out of curiosity, do we have any data on the long term reliability of the two transmissions? One of the reasons I went with the MT was that I plan to drive my Fit until the wheels fall off (I'm averaging 21k miles per year) and I theorized the MT would be more reliable, as it has fewer moving parts than the AT and therefore less could go wrong (although I have no idea if that's actually true). Thoughts?

 

I use to have a 95 Integra LS that I bought used with 30k miles that was stock and made it my own. It was an AT but I didn't care because I drove city alot. I put 175K miles on it...never once had a problem with the transmission. Only changed the fluid at 100K...I sold it for $6K btw in 2005.



My buddy by the way has a VW GTI MT with 106K miles. His clutch is going out. In this case...my AT is more reliable than his MT...but there are a lot of variables obviously to this comparison.

My point auto's can be just as reliable as manuals.

 

Actually, in S mode, the car only goes through the first 3 gears, I think. Once you touch the paddles, the car will not shift gears unless you come to a stop (at which point it'll drop into 1st). You can paddle shift up to 5th gear in S mode.

I think the body kit on the Sport model increases the drag slightly... the sport model is also 30 lbs heavier than the base, and the sport has wider tires.

The transmission decides to lock/unlock based on load. For example, on a flat stretch of highway, it'll probably lockup. You come upon a slight incline, or try to speed up slightly, the transmission will likely unlock.

The only way you can really tell if the transmission is locking/unlocking is, once you're in paddle mode, the RPM will change slightly without you changing gears or altering the throttle position.


I'll also throw in my 2 cents about transmission reliability. My family has 2 older hondas, a 97 CRV and a 97 Odyssey, both AT. The Odyssey is nearing 200k on the original transmission with only regular fluid changes after 100k, with mostly city driving too. The CRV has about 150k on the original transmission, again with regular fluid changes. So they can be pretty reliable; if they were MT, they would have probably needed a new clutch by now (both cars are used mostly for city driving in hilly areas).

Then again, Honda did have the huge problem back around 2000 with their new (at the time) 5 speed ATs on their V6 engined cars.

But, at the same time, Honda's had a problem recently with their MTs in the Civic si (Protesting Honda Civic SI Get Transmission TSB - The Consumerist).

In summary, I don't think there's a huge difference in reliability between the MT and AT.

 

.....

I happen to drive both a 2009 Fit Sport automatic and a BMW 335i with Steptronic automatic. The Fit AT will not lock the torque converter until you are cruising at 45+ mph typically. Almost any positive throttle input will cause the torque converter to unlock, and will frequently cause a downshift. The BMW Steptronic is a 6 speed which much more closely emulates a manual transmission. At any speed above 30 mph, the converter locks up and stays locked. A substantial throttle adjustment will result in a downshift, but most of the time it appears that the torque converter remains locked. The feel of the BMW Steptronic is thus much less 'rubbery' than the Honda's AT. As one who is used to a manual transmission, I thus do find the Honda AT a lot less satisfying in terms of response characteristics. That said, however, I still prefer the AT to the MT because of longer gearing. The AT in 4th is almost identical in revolutions per mile to the MT in 5th, and thus the AT Fit is really quite and smooth at highway cruise speeds.

 

this basically comes to drivers preference. I have had 2009 5MT sport and a 2009 5AT. Myself I prefer the 5AT, no manual shifting. Manual shifting becomes a pain in traffic.
The 5MT is fun to drive and you get more peformance out of the car as you control the shift points, but that will cut your fuel mileage.
5MTs are hard to come buy as the supply is limited, most dealers only had a few 5MT sports.
The 5MT will be replaced most likely in 2012, as if you read here, the japanese version already has the 6MT.
I drive a 2009 Honda fit sport, Black, 5AT with Navigation. Luv the car.