At first, I thought I was just imagining things, but after a couple of drives I've realized my 2nd gear is really short...it only lasts about a second, if even that, and I'm not accelerating too fast. Is this a common thing, or do I need to get it checked?

 

Perfectly normal. Unless you have it in L, the transmission just shifts to the highest gear as quickly as possible.

 

You wanna talk about a short gear? Try first in an SC.

 

x2

Even the LS's 1st gear is short as ****.

2nd gear in the auto Cobalts is pretty tall.

 

at 10mph, i'm afraid to go into 1st

 

Yeah first gear is really short.

 

Why would you downshift into 1st when you're going 10mph? If that's what you're trying to say.

 

car bogs going into 2nd. like coming to a red light and it turns green right at 10mph. gets me every time. am i the only one?

 

Get your foot in the mat and the tranny will hold 2nd (or 1st or 3rd) till pretty much red line.
Drive it like gramps and it is going to uphift as soon as it can.

More throttle / higher loads = higher shift points.

 

Yeah that situation scares me because I can imagine 1st or 2nd causing the car to break. Makes me angry everytime, 1st forbidden, 2nd bogs, seems like a lose-lose situation. Everyone says to never shift into 1st gear when moving, in contradiction to the Cobalt Owner's manual that says 1st can be engaged at 20mph or slower. Doesn't this bother anyone else out there? I will select 2nd gear, let the clutch out- the rpms drop below idle, maybe 700rpm, and then I press the gas. The car bogs and makes bad sounds, the rpms are very slow to rise no matter what level of throttle is applied until about 2k rpms with some boost and then everything is back to normal.

 

I absolutely hate when that happens. It does so at least once a day when I'm going to work.

I just stay in second gear. Going into 1st wouldn't be good at 10 mph. if you keep doing it.