I am a .... Dinosaur

[GRW]

I drive an 06 Fiesta van as the commuter & tools & crud hauler.
The camper is an 08 Master in poverty spec (windy-windy handle windows, no aircon, no DMF no DPF - and all the better for it... even if it does look to have more sensors than NASA).
Missus car is a 2011 1.4 petrol Kia Rio.

All manual cable handbrake, no beeps, gizmos or "driver hazards & distractions" (aka driver aids) & no stupid touchscreens that demand focused attention away from the road to do basic controls instead of simple tactile feedback buttons & dials.

I don't need or want any of that carp. I know where everything is, I focus on the road, my positioning, my mirrors and on what the other road users are up to. The controls are intuitive & memorised & can be altered/operated automatically, requiring virtually zero conscious attention.

The automated gizmos are IMO distractions and have a negative impact upon driving safely. As are screens instead of instruments - theres too many zero-attention-span screen strollers on phones already - without them scrolling through menu screens as well to alter the heater settings or whatever.
I reckon the speed limiters and beeps are a product of the focus upon speed as the root of all evil - instead of focusing upon driving standards (& removing the inept, clueless & distracted dangerous muppets - i.e. remove the disease, not pander to the symptom).

The only truly excellent and fit-for-purpose tech improvement has been ABS. Pretty much all the other stuff is just trinkets & unnecessary complexity.

 

[Craig-SM]

Friend of mine has a company E5 VW electric monstrosity. A few weeks ago all the windows decided to go on strike and open and close when they wanted, culminating in a 70 mile motorway trip home with one window right down, and -1° on the temp gauge.

The company gave him a rental Mercedes, real sleek thing. And diesel too. He came to the cafe last week and showed us, the light show is world class. When parked, with doors unlocked, a 18” diameter trirotor light thing is projected on the floor outside each door. There’s 3 main touch screens, there lines of lights around everything, that flash and dim and wow, and a hundred different buttons to touch. It’s quite frankly an exercise in over complication and extravagance. But he loved it.

Unfortunately they managed to fix the E5 quite easily and he had to give the Merc back.

View attachment 482120

I forget to whinge about the light show. When I picked it up it wasn’t that much of an issue but at night it became distracting with cycling through a series of colours and much too bright. Eventually found the menu to set it to one colour and dim it to minimum.

 

[Robotstar5]

Electric handbrakes. Did anyone ever ask for an electric handbrake I very much doubt it.

Is it possible to do handbrake turns with an electric handbrake?

 

[Bornfree]

Is it possible to do handbrake turns with an electric handbrake?

No that's 90% of the problem with them

 

[redlig]

Too hell with you.

Meant in the nicest possible way.

Again .Irony!

I think my Caterham has close to all the options you require. Four wheels, two seats, an IC engine, stop and go pedals. And something in front of the driver to control the angle of dangle of the rear around corners. And not much else.

Winscreen, heater, and even paint, were optional extras. Side screens and a hood certainly were.

My Liege was very similar but I did bow to modernism when I built it by having a ign key but the starter was activated by a push button. Idea being that in a panic with the engine stalled in a section it was easier to hit the go button and not faf about with the key. Never fitted the external door handles just a bit of bowden cable on the inside ,Al la 7 I think. A know-all told me that it was unsafe and anyone could open the door as it was not locked . Firstly , on being invited to get it he didn't know where to find the cable and secondly I just stepped over the door to enter.

 

[GRW]

Is it possible to do handbrake turns with an electric handbrake?

Most cars won't let you do one with a cable handbrake any more. The nanny systems intervene.
Ive had (rare) occasions in the past where suitable application of the handbrake has prevented a collision (hardly highway code approved, but better than a collision - an extra tool in the armoury).
A lot of the "safety aids" are also both intrusive and restrict/limit options.

 

[julianthegypsy]

Is it possible to do handbrake turns with an electric handbrake?

Yes. You can turn it on, and you can turn it off!

 

[Ian X]

I borrowed a motor that you had to do some sort of pedals dance to release the handbrake, had to phone the owner to ask how. I like cars that don't nag.

 

[julianthegypsy]

I borrowed a motor that you had to do some sort of pedals dance to release the handbrake, had to phone the owner to ask how. I like cars that don't nag.

I once had to repair an old Deutz tractor. It took me forever to start it. Handbrake on, gearbox in neutral, nothing. As above but press clutch down. Still nothing. As above but press footbrakes down too. Still nothing. Turns out that not only did the handbrake have to be on but you had to pull on the lever while turning the key. I spent years repairing tractors and never saw a system like it.

 

[Erie Fred]

That is one of the main reasons for all this carp. Don't educate the driver just redesign the car to avoid the problem and ignore the fact that a large % can drive properly but are stuck with unwanted garbage that slowly takes over the skills. Has anyone here actually been asked what gizmo's they would think essential ?
How about a theme of What essentials do you want to be on your next car ? I dread to imagine the answers.

I've never used a hand brake on a manual xmission truck.

 

[premmington]

I find the screen in our Seat Arona positively dangerous.
Far more difficult to do stuff than normal buttons, you have to look for where to touch the screen rather than press a physical button you can feel.

I think these big screen things in cars are dangerous to be honest.

At least if you using your mobile phone while driving - you might know how it work?

 

[MetalMonkey]

I always turn off lane assist, yes it beeps at me, but even worse it wobbles the steering wheel every time it sees a white line! Oh and that message that flashes up telling me that the car in front has moved off, just in case I've fallen asleep at the traffic lights.
One really, really and even more really annoyance is there are switches ( yes, real switches) in a centre console just in front of an even bigger switch that puts the "handbrakethingy" on and a couple of the aforementioned minor switches turn on the seat heating. ( You can do toasted sandwiches on these seats on the high setting). Alas when operating the "handbrakethingy" one it is possible to nudge the seat one backwards and it goes from heating to seat cooling. I have lost count of how many times I have had a wonderful bumfreezer experience and on looking down see that the switch has turned from a lovely red to a chilling blue!

A friend of mine took his car into a dealership and got issued with a courtesy car with lane assist.

He didn't realise it had it until he was driving home and saw a police car on blues behind him.
Dutifully he pulled over to the side of the road to let it past, and just as the fuzz went for the overtake - lane assist kicked in and attempted to propel him back into the path of said jam sandwich.

Impressed he was not. Dealership got an ear bashing when he took it back.

 

[frank horton]

sounds like ur getting to retirement age....
the only electronics on my reg driver is the alarm n thats disconected.....lol...

 

[Kayos]

Most (if not all) electric handbrakes operate as an emergency stop

I tested this at about 20mph in my ID4, had a seatbelt shaped mark across my body for a week

 

[jimbo84]

Our family cars are 10 years old, everything still works as it should, no fancy bits on them just knobs and switches to control everything although I must admit the A/C automatically turning itself on is annoying on the VW.

Imagine all this new tech, touchscreen beeping nonsense in 10 to 15 years time…nightmare.

 

[addjunkie]

Most (if not all) electric handbrakes operate as an emergency stop

I tested this at about 20mph in my ID4, had a seatbelt shaped mark across my body for a week

Just an observation….they are not hand brakes, they are a parking brake. The clue being the word “parking” where the car is normally stationary.

Having said that my Mrs has a Rav 4, I quite like it, being automatic it only ever uses the parking brake for me when I try to drive off with the door ajar passing through the gate at the end of the drive. I find this really annoying, in my pickup or the Landy I can drive where I like with doors open, must be a real pain reversing trailers with this modern jiggery pokery, I often lean out to see past the trailer!

 

[GRW]

The science of ergonomics worked for decades to ensure the old phrase "controls fall easily to hand" to be intuitive and thereby nit demand attention and focus away from the business of driving.
There's sound reasoning and science behind the positioning of stalks, instrument binnacles & controls, and why there were tactile switches, knows and dials (& why so many keypads have tactile feedback when to function they don't need them).

Now you have dirty great touchscreens with different menus and sub-menu. Touchscreens demand you look at them because you need to confirm your action has provided the correct selection - there is no tactile feedback, while it can be easy to not select, or select an unwanted option.
This makes them.a dangerous and retrograde "innovation" that should not be providing any driver-operated systems! (Of course they sell to people conditioned to want "tech" plus of course its cheaper for the Mfr to have a multi-system touchscreen over an array of proper buttons, switches & dials).

Anyone who has a Sat Nav will know how much attention is demanded to input anything via Touchscreens while driving (which is precisely why you're not meant to do so whilst driving) - yet vehicles are now using the damned things for controls a driver can be expected & need to operate!

The Mfrs knew this from day 1. The safety bodies must have also - and yet major distraction, unergonomic (non-ergonomic ) focus-demanding, vision-demanding non-feedback instrument panels have been allowed..... yet we must all crawl around everywhere in order to improve road safety.

It's so dumb its defies all logic & good sense (& of course is one of many things that flies in the face of road safety, and demonstrates that the war on the motorist is to screw funds).

 

[redlig]

I've never used a hand brake on a manual xmission truck.

And ?

 

[rtcosic]

I don't think I've used the handbrake for a hill start since 1983 when I passed my test.

Member of the Norfolk Mountaineering Society are we?

 

[Morrisman]

A friend of mine took his car into a dealership and got issued with a courtesy car with lane assist.

He didn't realise it had it until he was driving home and saw a police car on blues behind him.
Dutifully he pulled over to the side of the road to let it past, and just as the fuzz went for the overtake - lane assist kicked in and attempted to propel him back into the path of said jam sandwich.

Impressed he was not. Dealership got an ear bashing when he took it back.

First time I drove one was an airport hire car, fresh from 36 hours flying across the globe. I pulled onto the motorway and trundled along, then settled in and decided to speed up, pulling out to the second lane I felt this godawful vibration and juddering sound…. I thought I’d pulled out into the side of another car so whipped back to the left, looking in mirrors etc. Scared the shut out of me.

I tried pulling out again, which was when I realised what it was: lane departure warning.