Car Glossary India - Index T

Tiptronic allows the driver to override the automatic mode by moving the lever into a second (Tiptronic) shift gate and permits, for example, downshifting on winding mountain roads to increase the braking effect of the engine or for a particularly sporty driving style.

The TDI engine is a turbocharged and intercooled diesel engine with direct injection. In a TDI engine, the fuel injector supplies fuel directly into the main combustion chamber instead of a separate pre-chamber, thereby improving the engine’s performance.

It is an instrument which keeps track of the distance travelled by the car.

Traction control system regulates the power supplied to the wheels of a vehicle. It is an enhancement of an existing ABS system used to prevent wheel spin. It uses the same wheel speed sensors to monitor wheel speed during acceleration, but also needs some additional control strategies such as reducing the throttle opening, up shifting the transmission, retarding spark timing, deactivating fuel injectors and a pump to apply braking pressure to control wheel spin.

A turbocharger compresses the air flowing into the car’s engine. It allows the engine to push more air and hence, more fuel, into a cylinder. More fuel produces more power from each explosion in each cylinder. A turbocharged engine generates more power than one of the same kind but not turbocharged. A turbocharger derives power from exhaust steam.

A turning or twisting force. It is the amount of pull your engine has. It is a force that produces or tends to produce rotation or torsion (the act of twisting or turning).

Transmission (gearbox) is an assembly of gears in a car that changes the rotation ratio of engine and wheels. For example, in first gear the engine rotates at higher speed than the wheels and in top gear the wheel rotates faster than the engine. A manual transmission (MT) has to be changed manually and an automatic transmission changes gears on its own with the help of a microprocessor.