[jblackburn]

The 2.0 definitely has slightly more torque (264 vs 240 ft lbs) and delivers more of a rush of it when you put your foot down. The 1.6 is more refined and feels a little more like a gasoline engine (and the transmission is tons better sorted than the 6-speed in the Gen 1). Still a good amount of torque on tap, but light on higher end power.

Actual 0-60 acceleration times are about the same between them because of the ~600 lb weight reduction on the Gen 2.

 

[jblackburn]

It seems to me that the trans...aside from the actual clunkiness...is determined to upshift at all costs. I think if it would delay shifting in partial accelerator pedal modulation (25-40mph varying traffic) such that it never went down to 1100RPM, it'd be fine. I suspect the 9 speed is significantly more immune to such issues.

Sadly, this is just GM's 6-speed programming across the board for the Cruze. They're all designed to upshift ASAP to hit the highest MPG possible. My gas one will upshift to 5th at 27 mph on 25-35 mph roads, which puts it ~1100 RPM, and it's got absolutely zero acceleration there, so often clunks back down again.

A transmission tune would probably take care of most of this, though I'm not sure if anyone still tunes the diesels.

In a manual, I would of course not upshift until it is actually necessary.

While the idea of a manual diesel sounds great, the Gen 2's are well known for 2 MT issues:

• Slave cylinder failure from clutch debris. This is basically a 100% failure rate on the Gen 2 manual transmissions; the clutch line and slave cyl need to be replaced, which means the trans has to come out.
• The diesels destroy dual mass flywheels - I assume because of vibration/torque, and a new one will only fix it for a while. The Gen 1 1.4T's were known for this, but they seem to have at least fixed that for the most part on the gas versions of the Gen 2. One guy here was a GM tech and sold the car when he had to do the DMF for the 3rd time in his ownership.