Antonov, developers of a radical new form of automatic transmission for small and medium sized cars, have just announced two new six-speed automatic concepts.
Antonov’s unique feature is that it uses naturally-occurring forces in the gearbox to shift gear and operate the clutches (assisted by an electronically-controlled low pressure hydraulic system), which offers improved efficiency whilst at the same time benefiting size, weight and number of components (hence lower cost). Capable of being produced using existing manual or automatic transmission manufacturing techniques, the concept offers significant efficiency gains over the conventional automatic gearbox, but without the torque breaks (during gearchange) that are a feature of current automated manual gearboxes.
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The improved and very compact six-speed automatic concepts both use two simple planetary gears, three clutches and three brakes for operation. One is a twin shaft design, dubbed CDM, which measures just 250mm in length; the other is a single shaft design, with a length of 330mm, dubbed GFB. Maximum torque handling capacity is in line with small and medium size cars; 250Nm. Interestingly, the new designs (on which patents are pending) may also be utilised for a conventional automatic transmission using hydraulic control of the clutches.
In tests, the six-speed Antonov (250 Nm) in a Chrysler Neon with lock-up torque converter achieved 13 percent and 36 percent fuel saving over a conventional three-speed automatic Neon on the US urban and highway circuit respectively. Although this is an impressive result, the highway figure improvement is significantly contributed to by the much higher top gear ratio available with the Antonov.
At a projected manufacturing cost of around $US600 per unit, the Antonov concept offers some 30-40 percent savings over the manufacturing cost of a comparable conventional automatic transmission. These low cost manufacturing aspects alone will make the concept worthy of consideration for emerging Asian markets in future.
Reporting by Mark Wilkinson
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