AJF

Thanks, Miles. We do get a little ice around here in the winter, especially west of Austin where I am, so I appreciate the suggestion. Andrew

Thanks, presslab, for your post and advice. Andrew

Good morning. I am the proud new owner of a 2013 Impreza 2.0i premium 5DR with auto. transmission. While there is a full time "Manual Mode", you can also stay in auto mode but use the paddles to manually downshift or upshift at times. My instinct is to leave it in auto mode but use the paddle to downshift as I slow down to approach stops and turns, in order to save wear on the brakes. My question is whether this is a good idea or bad idea---am I helping the brakes at the expense of hurting the transmission or gas mileage or....? I asked this question of the good folks at Subaru and their reply was that they would not say one way or the other, which seemed a bit odd. Any advice or insight would be appreciated. Thanks, Andrew