Toyota intends to offer its manual transmission for electric cars as an option on its next-generation of EVs to ensure they’re not a “commodity”, and remain as fun and involving to drive as internal-combustion-engined cars.
The systemm which has been in development for three years, will be a factory option buyers can select in models created on the new modular architecture being developed for launch in 2026. This will include a production version of the FT-Se sports car concept, which is being seen as a spiritual successor to the MR2. The system is likely to be standard in cars with this kind of performance focus.
The system is almost entirely software-operated, with hardware tweaks limited to a clutch pedal and gear shift borrowed from a Toyota GR86, and a rev counter and some new switchgear to select the mode. Paddle shifts are possible, too.
Engineers say the system is created as part of a drive to make electric cars “fun to drive” and respond to chairman Akio Toyoda’s brief to ensure electric cars are not simply a “commodity”.
Toyota is also developing ‘On Demand’ software for BEVs that changes the performance of the car to mimic certain other models. Installed on a Lexus RZ, a prototype version allows the performance of the car to cycle between a Toyota Passo supermini, a Toyota Tundra truck and a Lexus LFA supercar.
Driving the manual BEV
The system is both remarkable and unremarkable at the same time. It’s a manual transmission, and a pretty involving one at that. But countless cars have been made with involving manual transmissions over the years, yet this is truly a manual like no other given it’s fitted to an electric car.
It warps your brain to some extent and you are successfully tricked into thinking it is an EV. You start the car as normal, select ‘D’ from the automatic selector. Then there’s a secondary ‘Engine start’ button, which fires an engine sound up – and a familiar one at that: a Volkswagen Golf GTI.
You engage first gear as you would with any manual car. The shift is short and precise, the clutch has heft to it. You can stall it as you can a manual car and also slip the clutch, too.
Acceleration is strong and you’re far more involved in the process than you would be in a normal Lexus UX 300e on which this ‘transmission’ is fitted. You soon forget you’re in a UX at all, a fairly unremarkable car, such is the extra involvement the system gives its driver.
All the usual manual features are there: engine braking, coasting and most amusingly no torque when you suddenly try and accelerate in top gear, which then brings with it synthetic sound of parts of the cabin trim rattling. It sounds like a gimmick but it’s actually all rather believable.