Ray’s newspaper column today (11.25.23) , the topic is driver forgets to replace radiator cap and the engine overheats & is ruined. Just curious, anybody here know the appx % of OBD II era vehicles that have an audio alarm warning for engine overheating?
A 95 Ford Windstar has a digital dash and it will make a ding. I assume the Volvos which don’t have a temperature gauge will make a dig for that, or at least the low coolant level warning.
A fair number of cars go in to limp mode.
Neither of my pre-OBD II vehicles produce an audible alarm. The Corolla turns on a warning light, and the Ford truck only shows the coolant temperature on a scale.
It’s sort of wondering why manufacturers – even pre-OBD II - wouldn’t at the very minimum produce an audible alarm? It is sort of like why e-mail providers don’t tell you when your account is attempted to be accessed using an incorrect password. Or why a telephone answering machine doesn’t tell you if remote access is attempted using an incorrect password. Simple enough to do and could well mitigate a lot of password-cracking attempts.
We have alarms for various things with the Honda 225hp outboard from 2009 that’s installed on our family’s boat. You still have to figure out why the alarm’s sounding.
I recall that VWs of a certain age would display a message telling you to check your gauges.
In this day and age where you can sit at breakfast and look at your phone to tell you how much gas is in your car it’s a simple thing to do. But OBDII came out 27 years ago. Adding audible alarms just wasn’t something done on mid-line cars.
Answering machine? Really? I would think a man of your stature would have your own switchboard operator. LOL 
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At one time I hired an remote office assistant from a office-help firm, she resided in India. She would listen to my answering machine & transcribe the messages and email the transcript to me once a day. It worked out pretty good, except sometimes I’d get embarrassing messages from gfs … lol …
The manual in my Pontiac just says it will reduce power to compensate to keep the temp down. The only warning I ever had was a low tire and I just don’t remember if there was a ding ding in addition to the note on the dash.
I seem to recall that VWs have (or had??) a chime noise to notify drivers to check their gauges/warning lights.
Maybe a lot of cars have an audio alarm for overheating and low oil pressure, but since most cars are driven their entire lifetime without ever experiencing either of those problems, the owners don’t even know there’s an audio alarm. My late-70’s VW Rabbit never overheated, so I don’t know if it had an audio alarm for that. My Corolla did have one overheating incident, so I know for that particular car there is no audio alarm. It’s possible its audio alarm system is broken though.
One disadvantage of an audio alarm is that it might just be a sensor problem, and the audio alarm would be distracting, could make continued driving unsafe.
I don’t know. I guess it would be the same alarm as the seat belt alarm. Just a din ding. Just depends what the computer is programmed to turn it on is all. I often refuse to leave the driveway until the wife buckles up, but sometimes don’t have the time and after a few seconds will start to ding and Karen comes on the line. It’s probably all recorded and sent to the cloud along with the ensuing conversation.
How about a voice that says “look at your gauges, dummy”, then gets louder and louder as you continue to ignore temperature in the red, low oil pressure, or alternator failure?
Y’all not remember the Chrysler “your door is ajar”?? lol… Hated those things while working on them under the dash… I am pretty sure but not 100% sure that they gave a voice warning about overheating… That is one thing from the 80’s that I don’t care to hear again… lol
The first Electronic Voice Alert (EVA), launched in 1983, offered 11 different vocal warnings ranging from the classic “Door Is Ajar” to the soothing “All Monitored Systems Are Functioning.” It was available on a wide range of vehicles, including the LeBaron, the Fifth Avenue, the Laser/Daytona twins, and the Town & …Dec 30, 2019
