Yesterday I was out on a small trip and hiked in the mountains with some friends. I drove all the way to the starting point for the hike alone. But on the way back I got 3 passengers in my car. There was just some small rucksacks as baggage, not much weight at all.
This was the first time I have droven the car with so much load. But it went just marvelous. Just a little higher rev up hills. But on flat road and downhill it was the same as if I was alone in the car.
As I have said earlyer I has a CVT tranny in my car and it is little strange to drive with when you are used to normal MT or AT trannys.
Yesterday I also tried downhill motorbraking. The CVT in normal auto mode in "D" does use the engine a little to brake when going downhill. It's just enoug when it is not too steep downhill. And when I had 3 passenger it was not enough to brake much, but just a little. Therefor in the steepest hills I just hit the "7 speed mode" button and touched the paddles one time and the tranny was then in manual mode. That worked fine for engine braking in the steepest downhills when I had passengers on.
If the enging revs too much it switches gear atomaticly even if it is in manual mode. I guess it is a safety feature so I do not blow the engine.
Have never being in the rear seats on the car myself in the Jazz when driving, so I asked the passenger in the rear to give me a nice report on how it was to sit there on the 65km drive home.
The girl felt asleep after just a few km and she told me that it was the most comfy backseats she has been in. And she was suprised how much legroom there was in this small car.
The boy on the other passenger seat also said it was comfy and he also was suprised of the size of the seats and legroom. The passenger in front was quite satisfied and thought it was much more comfy than his BMW 320i driver or passenger seats.
I'm not sure how much space there is for 3 people in the back, but two grown ups and one child should not be a problem.
None of the passengers did notice anything while I used the paddles. First afterwards when we arrived at home I asked if they had felt any jolt when I was "changing" gears. Then they said they didn't actually felt anything. The girl said is was like cruising in one steady speed all the way (that was the reason she felt asleep). But the road actually had a lots of up/down hills and tight turns and there where many 30, 40, 60 and 80km/t zones on the 65km stretch. When at close to home there was even some roundabouts going in and out of.
Linear Mode
