niggles

stratos

has anyone got any pet niggles about the way our cars are designed. I have 2 seemly small niggles with car design but they are a real nuisance. number one is click on click off high beams, You know the ones you pull the stick back full beams on you pull it back full beams off. The problem is the stalk comes to rest in the same spot. I live in the country and drive quite fast on back roads at night. the problem is when approaching a bend and i see an oncoming cars lights I have to glance down to see if the blue full beam lamp is on. this takes my eyes off the road just when i don't need to. Luckily the car I drive now the stalk moves, I can just drop my finger down to see where it is, my eyes never leave the road.
The other one is the Hi aces i drove over the years, back when I was smoker the fresh air vents were just above the ashtray. You would tip your ash at the tray and have it fly into your face at 60 miles an hour !!!!

bp_me

stratos wrote:

has anyone got any pet niggles about the way our cars are designed. I have 2 seemly small niggles with car design but they are a real nuisance. number one is click on click off high beams, You know the ones you pull the stick back full beams on you pull it back full beams off. The problem is the stalk comes to rest in the same spot. I live in the country and drive quite fast on back roads at night. the problem is when approaching a bend and i see an oncoming cars lights I have to glance down to see if the blue full beam lamp is on. this takes my eyes off the road just when i don't need to. Luckily the car I drive now the stalk moves, I can just drop my finger down to see where it is, my eyes never leave the road.
The other one is the Hi aces i drove over the years, back when I was smoker the fresh air vents were just above the ashtray. You would tip your ash at the tray and have it fly into your face at 60 miles an hour !!!!

You mean you dont know wether or not you are driving on high beams????

What really annoys me about cars is that they don't all come with r/c for the radio on the steering wheel. It's a very important safety feature.

stratos

yes i knew someone was gonna say u dunno if your on high beams, maybe i should. What is it about country driving you don't notice ?

bp_me

I noticed you said country alright, but from personal experience, there is a fair difference between high and dip beams

unkel

bp_me wrote:

You mean you dont know wether or not you are driving on high beams????

Exactly my initial thought. Never mind if the visuals remind you that you are, or you are not on high beams, a boolean variable should at all times be set in your brain! Because your neurological system works many times faster than your senses, this should never be a problem

Maybe related - can anyone explain that it is always, yes always me that dimms the high beams before the oncoming party does on a single carriageway?

My reaction times are very good, but surely not exceptional. This country is the only place I have ever driven that dimming the beams only occurs when in full direct view of the opponent. I regularly use double flashing and even this sometimes doesn't make any difference

ds20prefecture

stratos wrote:

has anyone got any pet niggles about the way our cars are designed. I have 2 seemly small niggles with car design but they are a real nuisance. number one is click on click off high beams, You know the ones you pull the stick back full beams on you pull it back full beams off. The problem is the stalk comes to rest in the same spot. I live in the country and drive quite fast on back roads at night. the problem is when approaching a bend and i see an oncoming cars lights I have to glance down to see if the blue full beam lamp is on. this takes my eyes off the road just when i don't need to. Luckily the car I drive now the stalk moves, I can just drop my finger down to see where it is, my eyes never leave the road.
The other one is the Hi aces i drove over the years, back when I was smoker the fresh air vents were just above the ashtray. You would tip your ash at the tray and have it fly into your face at 60 miles an hour !!!!

The smoking thing used to drive me mad. Why is the ashtray always positioned just below a face-vent? The best design for this was the 80's Citroën CX with a spherical ashtray on top of the dash. Only the French could have come up with such a design (picture Galouisseseses Blondes precariously glued to lip or ashtray with pendulous ash). The worst was the late Audi 100 (or most BMWs). The ashtray was below a gauntlett of killer face vents and the gear knob - both dumped ash all over your suit.

My DS is OK in respect to both lighting and ashtray, but unfortunately I quit smoking. BTW: If you cannot tell the difference between high and low beam, perhaps your reflectors are a bit jaded?

For me, the greatest design flaw in most modern cars is the harshness of the ride. We seem to have flown in reverse in this respect almost without exception. Not every car must be a so called "sports car".

The ability to reach an appropriate compromise between ride comfort and perceived quality of "handling" - (generally accepted to be a lack of lean, but actually more to do with how a car loses adhesion) - seems to be lost to most suspension designers. An excellent exception to the rule is the Lotus Elan where the ride is suprisingly compliant for such a focussed car. The modern Hydractive Citroëns strike a reasonable balance, but you are constantly reminded of the compromise being made.

Personally, I'd rather excellent ride comfort in one car, and excellent handling in another.

BrianD3

On the subject of headlight dipping, one niggle with my current car is the headlight stalk is a little too far away from the wheel. To operate the stalk I need to slightly reposition and "extend" my hand. Whereas with other cars I've driven (incl other renaults) I can flick the stalk with one finger. BTW I have average sized hands

For me, the greatest design flaw in most modern cars is the harshness of the ride. We seem to have flown in reverse in this respect almost without exception. Not every car must be a so called "sports car"

I agree and it's not just the suspension that's at fault, it's often the seats too. Many manufacturers seem unable to comprehend that a seat doesn't have to be rock hard to be supportive.

The ability to reach an appropriate compromise between ride comfort and perceived quality of "handling" - (generally accepted to be a lack of lean, but actually more to do with how a car loses adhesion) - seems to be lost to most suspension designers. An excellent exception to the rule is the Lotus Elan where the ride is suprisingly compliant for such a focussed car. The modern Hydractive Citroëns strike a reasonable balance, but you are constantly reminded of the compromise being made.

As regards lean, I've always thought that just because a car leans a lot doesn't mean it's a bad handler. I'm just thinking back to seventies films where Rover P6 police cars were featured in chases - those cars had serious amounts of lean yet they seemed to hang on very well in the corners with good grip and not too much understeer despite the lean. Another example of such a car would be the Renault 4.

One car that I've always thought had a great compromise between ride and handling was the Peugeot 405. The suspension gave very nimble yet stable handling while at the same time being excellent at smothering bumps.

BrianD3

L5

I cant understand why all cars dont have a better system of changing gears than manually with a gear stick,. It seems a realy outdated way of doing it, surely theresa better automatic way for all cars ?

camarobill

wifes new focus,i might go down the shops in the evening,take her car for a spin,f.....g beeb beeb beeb,for not putin ur belt on;which i should ,and no ashtray or lighter,new cars a ****.wheres the fun gone,6 airbages who gives a s..t. :rolleyes:

mike65

L5 wrote:

I cant understand why all cars dont have a better system of changing gears than manually with a gear stick,. It seems a realy outdated way of doing it, surely theresa better automatic way for all cars ?

I guess the ideal would be a truely "lossless" CVT system, so many ways of swapping cogs have been tried. Manual, Auto, semi auto, CVT, padal shift, column shift you name it...

My own bugbear regarding design is why so many cars have such poor driving postions.

Mike.