Are there any opinions out there on how the clutch will feel, my wife will be driving the rx8 most of the time and she is concern that being a sports car , the cluth may be heavy, she felt the clutch in my TT was too heavy, she currently drives a Jetta VR6 and the clutch is reletively light.

 

I'm guessing it's going to be very similar to the Miata- so you might want to let her test drive one. I'm not sure what you mean by heavy, exactly- but I have a much easier time driving Miatas than I do our BMW, which seems to be really picky to me in the clutch department.

 

i believe he means the effort one needs to input to operate the clutch...

this vehicle, having fairly low torque and a low mass, shouldn't have one of those muscle-car leg presses, but if the TT was absolutely "too" heavy, well...??

 

I haven't driven the car, but did play with the clutch with the pre-prod model at the LA Auto Show. Not a gearhead, so you big dogs can correct me if this has no true bearing on what the clutch will actually feel like. I currently drive an SUV (ok, flamesuit on, hahaha) and it has a particularly heavy clutch, so my left leg is pretty buff, but I would compare the RX-8's as similar to my sister's Civic Si. It's very light, but there enough that you can really feel it. I remember thinking "Sweet! After I get my RX-8 I'll be able to walk normally after 3 hours of driving in LA traffic instead of having 1 sore leg!" :p

 

I pressed it at the NAIAS.. it seemed light, no par with my Prelude. Since the torque is not very high comparitvely speaking, I don't think it will be a "heavy" clutch.