Lamborghini E-gear

Lamborghini's automated manual — in the Gallardo and Murciélago, and, as Audi's R tronic, in the first-generation R8.

The R8 and the Gallardo share a platform, so an R8 owner's gearbox questions are Gallardo questions and the far larger Lamborghini specialist knowledge applies directly. Neither car's own literature says so.

It is a manual gearbox with a hydraulic robot on it, not an automatic, and every complaint about it follows from that: there is no torque converter, so it does not creep smoothly; there is a real single clutch, which wears like a manual's; and the pause on the change is the actuator doing what a left foot would.

The clutch is a consumable and its life depends almost entirely on how the car is driven from rest. Slipping it in traffic is what wears it, and these systems report clutch wear through the diagnostic tool as a percentage — which is the single most useful thing to ask for when buying one.

The failure that strands a car is the hydraulic accumulator and pump, not the clutch: the system loses pressure, refuses to select a gear and shows a warning, often after standing. It is very commonly replaced as a clutch, and the symptom returns immediately.

A clutch change is not finished until the system is re-taught its bite point. Skip that and the car judders from rest — the complaint the new clutch was meant to cure.