I figured it wasn't harming anything, but thought I'd make sure.
Yeah I dont ever use it to help me stop.I really just use it to maintain speeds on a steep hill or slow down a bit if I'm coming down a hill and the speed limit is dropping.
It will, but this is because the converter is locked and by slowing down the rpms go low enough to make the car want to downshift. The op is asking about using the engine at the same time as or before the brakes, to remove wear from the brakes. Which is completely fine and works relatively well on a diesel.
Bingo. The computer will deny shifts that will cause harm to the engine. You will get a beep and a message on the DIC: SHIFT DENIED.
Yeah I know the computer will prevent you from damaging the car, I was more so wondering if it'd cause premature wear. I'm not nearly as concerned about instant damage, but the general consensus seems to be that it's fine todownshift to slow the car down
Not sure about the gassers, but even without the RPM's being at the bottom end, if you're going down a hill and begin slowing down, it will detect it and, in my experience anyway, downshift even if the RPM's are at 1500 or more to assist in slowing down. I really enjoy driving the car because of things like this. Makes it unique.
Well another thing that it seems like they do, at least on the diesels, is change upshift and downshift points depending on how you are driving the vehicle.
My Toyotas did that, but I did notice that driving a Gen 2 Cruze through the mountains that the transmission programming is awesome about downshifting when you're on the brakes - sometimes 1-2 gears if needed. Maybe the first gen automatics did that too, never noticed.
