Yup. That was the old “seatbelt interlock”. Ford had a red button you could press under the hood to temporarily bypass the system if it malfunctioned.
Yet another way Detroit could delay installing airbags was by installing those evil automatic shoulder belts. I was in an early 90s Festiva and got assaulted by one. I just got in the passenger side of the car with an ice cream cone when I noticed it was leaking. I leaned over to the right and held the cone outside. At the same time, the driver started the car. The shoulder belt came around and pinned me down so tightly I couldn’t move. As soon as the driver stopped laughing, she came over to my side and hit the emergency release button. Good times…
I think the reason nobody has made a push for amber turn signals for trucks, trailers, and buses is that they have longer stopping distances. If you need special color coding to keep you from rear-ending one of these slow moving and slow stopping vehicles, for goodness sake, don’t get behind the wheel.
I agree the turn signals should be amber on all vehicles. There is an obvious benefit, but I think the safety improvement would be marginal.
How many of the ideas expressed here are for inattentive drivers? Have you ever worked for a boss who tries to solve personnel problems with systemic solutions? Sometimes it works, but it is never as effective as solving the personnel problem. Similarly, the best solution for the problem if inattentive drivers isn’t necessarily to add more equipment. The best solution would be to improve driver attention on the task of driving.
I apologize if I suggested road rage shootings are a daily occurrence in those areas. I meant to simply speak of road rage without the shootings.
I have worked as an over the road truck driver and I have lived in South Florida. I can personally testify that drivers in South Florida and the Baltimore area are very aggressive. My ex-girlfriend in Miami has been stalked by a couple road ragers over the years, and she should be able to call the cops for help without pulling over when that happens.
A woman in the midwest (I think in Oklahoma) was kidnapped and locked in the trunk of a car. The only reason she is alive today is that she was able to fish her cell phone out of her purse and call for help. She is alive today because she was able to make a call from a moving car. You might be willing to let defenseless women like this woman and my ex-girlfriend die, but I am grateful that common sense prevailed when they decided to make cell phone jammers illegal here in the U.S.
Your failure to acknowledge the safety advantage of cell phones is perplexing. Are you really that obtuse? I believe it should be illegal to use a cell phone while driving in non-emergency situations, but as obtuse as I can be sometimes, even I can recognize that there are legitimate reasons to make exceptions.
A few months ago I witnessed a college student who rolled her SUV because she wasn’t paying attention, strayed from her lane, and over-corrected. I pulled over, pulled my cell phone out of my pocket, and called 911. If the moving cars passing by were jamming cell phone signals, I might not have been able to place that call.
azimuth361, you are preaching to the choir about the use of cell phones while people are driving. I think it should be illegal and should include stiff punishments. However, as adamant as I am in that belief, I recognize that in a few emergency situations, there are legitimate reasons to place a call while driving.
I am happy for you that your beliefs are so rigid that you make no room for exceptions. That kind of determined clarity frees you from having to consider scenarios that might conflict with your beliefs and means you don’t need to ponder the issues. That kind of relentless outlook must be liberating.
This isn’t about fear. Road rage was just a simple example of what I think should be an exception to the rule.
My, what sanctimony. According to a study by the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis (HCRA) conducted in 2002 (The most recent study I could find in the amount of time I’d like to devote to this topic) researchers estimated that the use of cell phones by drivers caused approximately 2,600 deaths and 330,000 injuries in the United States. You can cherry pick and find the occasional anecdote, just like I can find people who have died because they were trapped by their seatbelts. I’m glad we can agree that there are a few emergency situations, but they unfold an exceedingly number of times.
Once again, the holiday weekend has ended. I need to get back to work. As always, I enjoy a lively exchange. Gentlemen may agree without being disagreeable.
How about standardizing oil filters??? There cannot be any reason to justify the hundred or so models. Maybe four but no more…a short fat one, a short narrow one, a long fat one and a long narrow one. AMEN
Exactly,I’m sure there are many part store owners that would agree.This brings to mind an old friend of mine who owned a grocery store,complaining about the different brands of cigarettes he had to stock.Of course its not the same thing but its similar(brands of course not style of course the poster meant style not brand) anyway its about reducing inventory,nothing more fun then destroying the old filter or getting it full of crud,then discovering the replacement at hand wont fit-Kevin
Fuel intake on the same side of every car. Imagine how much more efficient gas stations would run if everyone had to pull up to the tank with the gas cap on the same side; they’d all be facing the same direction and moving through a lot smoother.
That’s one thing that really surprised me about the US - in the UK, refuelling is a LOT more orderly. For one thing, the station has a designated entrance and exit - all the cars are going the same way. That on its own speeds things up, and as long as you know which side your filler cap is (and many cars over there now have arrows on the gauge to show this - some even light up along with the low-fuel idiot light), you can join a line that runs to pumps which will be on the right side. It’s considered polite to use the pump that’s furthest along, and when you’re done, you can just go without having to hope someone’s not coming the other way. Efficient fillups are far more a matter of station design than car design.
Of course, that’s dealing with the English, the inventors of queueing.
I Agree Totally With RJ Kaufmann. It Sounds Like I Wrote His Response.
I don’t really mind it being in my car (except the extra parts and potential problems), because I never drive in a manner where I’d need it. I think on most road surfaces it would help almost everybody stop quicker and still have steering in a panic stop.
However, I drive on icy, slushy, and snow covered roads for nearly 6 months of the year. I have both cars with ABS and without ABS.
Trust me, our ABS equipped cars are not as safe and are scary to drive on our slippery roads. They probably allow one to steer better while braking, but the ABS increases stopping distance, sometimes a considerable amount.
I don’t know what’s at work there, but I’m guessing it has something to do with snow / slush being built up in front of the sliding tires and the frequency at which the ABS activates doesn’t allow it to clear adequately as does manual pumping.
I Speed Things Up At All Gas Stops By “Paying At The Pump”.
The stations may not appreciate my not going inside to buy junk food, drinks, lawn chairs, road maps, deer bait, “I’m with stupid” T-shirts, etcetera, but I don’t hold anybody up.
Except on the rare occasion that the pump doesn’t spit out a receipt, I’m down the road in a very short time.
I always thought I prefered the stripped down models. Back in the late 1950’s, I thought that the Studebaker Scotsman would be just fine. The first almost-new car that I purchased when I got a permanent job was a stripped down 1965 Rambler Classic 550. However, I just completed a 5 hour trip in what must be a bottom of the line Nissan Sentra that my institution rented for me. There is no power socket to plug in my cell phone charger, and this Sentra doesn’t have a cruise control. I did miss these features that I have in my own vehicle. Otherwise, I was favorably impressed with the Sentra.
This won’t appeal to the purists who think we should go back to crank up windows, but how about a the same processing power and memory as a cheap computer. This could greatly simplify the wiring harness with relays being controlled by coded signals and allow the car to inform the driver of mechanical and maintenance problems in English, instead of a check engine light. In addition options could be customised by downloading apps. like (light on with wipers) just like you do on an I-phone. A myriad of options like cabin and running light controller, sound systems, GPS, climate controls, and even the configuration of instruments, could be added and customized by the owner after purchase.
Well E5 this would probaly would be a little too complex for some folks,but the reasoning behind your statement makes a lot of good salient points.
Car designer guys paying any attention to what the public is saying?-Kevin
Dash lights that don’t come on when only the parking lights are on. Headlights must be on before you get dash lights. How many times do you see someone driving at night with their parking lights on.