+1
The placement of those push buttons was very convenient, but they required electrical relays to transmit to the transmission, and Ford failed to properly shield those relays underneath the car. The result was a LOT of needed repairs.
Ironically, this was only true with larger Edsel models which used the Mercury chassis, namely the Citation and the Corsair. The smaller models (Pacer and Ranger) used the same shift lever as the Ford sedans to which they were mechanically identical.
The perception that the more expensive Edsel models needed “luxury” features, such as those push buttons, led to the problem.
On my car I have 4 ways to control the radio. I have the touch screen but also have knobs for the volume and tuning. I have switches behind the steering wheel to control the radio and also could use voice command. (which I have not tried yet)
I never knew my Lexus could do that. Or if it can. While I’m profoundly deaf, I can speak vocally, and very clear. I’ll look into this but if the system responds back to me with a voice command, I won’t be able to cooperate.
Knobs are good if you are familiar with the vehicle. If not, you still have to look for it. Maybe knobs for the frequent common things and a touch screen for the rest.
Even if I am in an unfamiliar vehicle, and I have been in thousands over the years, I can find the knob required to adjust the radio, or to adjust the temp/blower motor/mode door way easier than looking for a button or scrolling through a screen to find what I am looking for…
Now that I 100% agree with… That is basically how my truck is set up…
I understand the button layout on my 23 trucks steering wheel better than the 04 Infinity, I never did get used to it.. lol
It’s taken some getting used to…along with prodding from my tech saavy kid…but I have found voice command and response to be superior to physical controls in most cases. The system also speaks back to you if it needs clarification. For example- Call {wife}…cell phone or home phone?..cell phone…ring-a-ling-a-ling…
You obviously have not taken dashes apart looking for the stupid dry rotted and broken vacuum line, or have them break while doing some other work and now you have to find a problem that wasn’t there before you started working around the POS vacuum system… Good friend fighting one on his S10 right now…
I think one of the worst I’ve encountered so far are some of the Econoline vans . . . on those the vacuum reservoir is REALLY buried, meaning you have to remove part of the plenum in the engine bay, but also a bunch of stuff on the inside, just to get to it
And the vacuum hose going to it WILL break after some years, and it’s going to break right at the reservoir, not somewhere easily accessible. And then you’ll be hating those hvac systems that use vacuum, @Old-Days-Rick
While I won’t applaud the vacuum control junk, I will say if you drove a GM vehicle and rented a GM vehicle on a trip, the basic controls were pretty standard.
When I worked for GM, I hopped into a lot of GM rentals in the dark. Key in the column, twist to start, left hand to the headlight knob, right hand to shift into drive and go.
Competitive vehicle evaluations presented similar controls from Ford or Chrysler products. A little more differences in the imports but still pretty familiar.
I let friend drive my Honda S2000 when I got it. It took her a while to find the left mounted Start button!
If she had ever gotten used to driving a Ford/Mercury/Edsel/Lincoln manufactured during the period from the early '50s to the mid-'60s, she would have instinctively looked for an ignition switch on the left side of the steering wheel.
The Honda had the ignition switch on the column in the normal spot, but the start button was on the left. She’s old enough to have driven an older car with the ignition on the left.
My first car, a 1964 Pontiac, had a left hand dash mounted ignition switch.
Back to controls… the high beams on my 1972 Datsun 510 was stalk mounted. I had a hard time finding that with no owners manual! Many cars still had the floor mounted high beam switch back then.
