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The Direct Shift Gearbox –
How they work, how they fail and how ACTRONICS can help Whilst the production DSG gearbox is a comparatively modern revelation, the formation of the original conceptual development can be traced back to the 1970s, nearly threedecades before they would be supplied on mass into road going vehicles. Spurred on by the fuel-crisis of the period, the German government endorsed a series of research programs to develop new ways to improve fuel economy. One project worked on by Porsche engineers, determined that there was a possibility to greatly reduce the fuel consumption of vehicles equipped with traditional torque convertor automatic gearboxes. They built a series of prototypes to test the idea, some were built into un-assuming models like the lowly 924, but by 1984, a version of Porsche’s revolutionary design would be fitted to a 956 racer. The project was not a success at the time. After being plagued with reliability issues the technology was locked away in a back office, we’d like to imagine in a dusty folder. Nearly two decades later, Volkswagen would successfully launch the first production DSG Gearbox. Despite being fitted into a performance focussed MKIV Golf R32, Volkswagen claimed that the gearbox could be up to 20% more economical than a traditional automatic gearbox with a torque convertor. The first DSG6 units, sometimes referred to as DQ250, utilised a wet clutch system. 24
In 2008, VW continued to develop the DSG gearbox and launched a development of the original. Now with 7-forward gears, the DSG7 was available in a far wider range of vehicles; everything from the Polo to the Tiguan. The DSG’s gearbox ability to reduce the compromises of traditional automatic gearboxes resulted in a substantial increase in sales of “Automatic” transmission models. At the turn of the century, Volkswagen reported that more than 90% of all Golf models produced were supplied with a manual gearbox. By 2018, over 40% of all Golf models were supplied with a DSG unit, the rates are higher for other models, over 90% of all Tiguan Allspace models had a DSG transmission.