[svxistentialist]

Originally Posted by dcarrb

I don't buy the premise that Subaru used an automatic due to the unavailability of a sufficiently beefy manual. They wanted to showcase a new transmission that at the time a unique piece of work, and I suspect they also misread the sport/luxury market, which really didn't even exist back then. (Automatic=Upscale.) Had the SVX sold in sufficient numbers to be profitable I'll bet they would have read customer and dealer feedback, made some engineering changes, and introduced an MT by 1994 or '95.

dcb

I don't accept the "auto gearbox was the only available model that could take the torque from the EG 33" reasoning either.

Twin turbo Legacys dish out more torque and they could be had manual. Likewise the Sti Impreza made very high figures in Japan guise, no problem getting a manual to work with it. Subaru was insinuating that the new EG 33 engine was so powerful it needed a special gearbox. Marketing hype.

It was a conscious decision to go auto only, and the reasons are multiple. IMO the primary factor was the fact that you guys in the US have a strong preference for autos. Fuji saw the US as the major market for the SVX in a volume sense, and to keep costs as low as possible it was offered only as an auto. The numbers sold tell the story; USA 15,000, UK 260, Australia 250.

The other factor affecting the gearbox choice is what Fuji saw as competitors. The car was designed as a GT, a long distance comfortable cruiser, rather than as an out and out sports car. The Jaguar XJ-S would be a European equivalent. I'm willing to bet 90 plus percent of XJ-S Jags sold in the States are auto. They are often slated for getting the marketing wrong. Measured against those predictors they actually got it right. It's just that the world changed soon after the car was launched.