Wooahh! Mine appears to be on...
 

...was having some fun in an empty car park in Nottingham in the snow without ESP. Mind you, if you're going sideways, it doesn't cut in much!!!

Then tried a 5th to 1st kick down at 20ish mph, and created a great deal of wheel spin:ROFL:

All good honest fun.

Interestingly, car seems to have a sharper throttle response since playing around with kick-down. Has it learnt my bad habits...?!:rolleyes:

Zip

Mine was on, will turn it off to see the diffrence now :rolleyes:

Kickdown off
 

Quite embarassed by this one. Years ago I had big time arguments with BMW over an inoperative kickdown on a 750, so I reckoned I knew what was going on with my autos.
However... I was so wrong... and now I have a different, an even more interesting, a fantastic car that has just got fantasticer.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you!

I found with my kick down switched off it feels a bit more responsive from the off from 0 mph. Is this real or my imagination?

Id say it has to be your imagination.... The kickdown switch, and its internal switch on/off mechanism are totally seperate to the rest of the car and connected only by a pair of wires that will say 'kick down' - The ECU has no concept of whether the kick down switch is switched off, or simply not being activated.....

I do find, particularly on the S8's that they rev a bit too high sometimes and waste some of the low down grunt that they have.... By not kicking down, It can feel faster IMO...

Hi There,

Mine was turned off....Wow...What a rush. I'd previously had to play with the tiptronic stuff to get that kind of power....However it can do a 4/5 -> 2nd which i can't, i had to shuffle down waiting a sec or so.

I wonder if this feature often being off is the reason the S8 is often touted as being refined effortless power with no pin you to the back of your seat rawkessness.....However a 30ish kick down can really get the beast out of the machine :love:

Thanks,
Lee

Mine's definitely on! Checked it yesterday after wondering why it didn't kick down when I gave it a bootfull with my dad and brother-in-law in the car, but obviously didn't push hard enough as it just gathered pace in gear rather than smacking heads against head restraints

Tested it last night and it kicked down to 1st and positively turbo-like shove in the back as it nailed to the red line!!

Mine was also off,switched it on yesterday.

Very interesting thread.

I'll resist the urge to go out in the dark for a quick try, and have a go at checking the kickdown tomorrow.

Mine was definitely active.