Buttons and Knobs May Be Coming Back

[Nancy Hart]

Yes, Those Big Touchscreens in Cars are Dangerous and Buttons are Coming Back <--link

Some studies suggest using touchscreens may be even more dangerous than texting while driving. The evidence is being translated into car safety assessment programs. From this year, ANCAP Safety and its counterpart in the European Union, Euro NCAP, will require physical controls for certain features to award the highest safety rating for new vehicles.

It’s up to manufacturers to decide whether to comply. However, some car makers, such as Volkswagen, Hyundai, Kia, Porsche, Audi, and Subaru are bringing back knobs and buttons in certain models. Touchscreen control is much cheaper than knobs and buttons for the manufacturer, but more expensive for the owner to replace. Expect the price to go up.

 

[Joe Riley]

Some People Hated Seatbelts In The 1950s And They Actually Had A Good Reason​

"Today, the seatbelt is revered as one of the most important advancements in automotive technology. The modern seatbelt is designed to keep you contained in a vehicle during a crash, and with the use of ample airbags seatbelts should help keep your vital body parts from mating with the hard surfaces of a vehicle. But it wasn’t always this way. Back in the 1950s, the seatbelts of back then were seen as messy, and both proponents and opponents made convincing arguments."

"One of my hobbies is reading old vehicle periodicals. For as awesome as the internet is, so much information still isn’t on it. A lot of what was written down and published in magazines has never been digitalized. This might not matter so much if you’re talking about an icon like the Boeing 707 or a Volkswagen Beetle. But all sorts of more obscure subjects have never made it to the digital era. So, I like to see what I can learn from the nooks and crannies that aren’t crawled by search engines or just aren’t available online." (MORE)

 

[Nancy Hart]

I was a hold out on using seatbelts for a long time. Even after they made it a law for the driver to wear them, I wouldn't use them as a passenger. In Georgia you were exempt for several years if you drove a pickup. Then a friend convinced me to grow up. Having said that, the worst permanent injury I've ever had so far was due to reaching for the seatbelt with the wrong arm.

 

[Nancy Hart]

I am dead serious about this touch screen for my own driving. There have been a couple of occasions I've swerved out of lane while tinkering with the "Climate" settings. Many rural Georgia main roads have no shoulders. If you're going 55 mph a few seconds can make a big difference. I've seen at least two cars overturned down the embankment at this location, possibly to avoid a head on collision.



I'm going to try and force myself to learn to use the buttons. They are way down below the touchscreen.