351–360 of 448 posts
I’m on mobile so I don’t have ads blocked and Jalopnik is just awful to read. There’s a giant ad every sentence or two. The modern web is a disaster.
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This is the Pulse[0] "safety system". I was trying to buy a new truck this spring, and going through the back-and-forth of talking to a number of dealers. I had a vehicle specced out, and ready to commit to, and I asked to review the final paperwork. There was a $400 charge listed that hadn't been disclosed earlier. I was frustrated because I'd asked numerous times, "Am I going to see any additional charges on the fi…
I think in Europe in case of emergency breaking all turnsignals blink automatically for a moment (not the break lights). You can make all the turnsignals blink manually when you toggle "emergency lights" switch.
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>> when seeing the full rear of the car, I suppose the Mini designers have never driven in fog, poor lighting, storms, or at night? (When you might not see the full rear of the car) Imagine if you can only see the car's taillights and you see a blinking arrow move the opposite way it points. What would you think you saw? Or better yet, if one of the taillights is out, what would a driver behind the Mini think?
> I suppose the Mini designers have never driven in fog, poor lighting, storms, or at night? (When you might not see the full rear of the car) The full rear of the car is still illuminated.
Only if the headlights are on. And many do not put them on in rain/storms/fog.
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What goes into being a tail light enthusiast? I can’t wrap my head around this concept. He used the term Blinkie in the article but I thought it was a joke. Are you a blinkie?
I have strong opinions on their function, and have spent not-insignificant money to buy/install/modify various 'correct' functionality, eg, buying lamps and switches from Europe and modifying wiring to make the 'correct' functions work (amber turn signals, rear fog lights). I'm pretty sure Blinkie is facetious.
Turn signals that are also hazard lights are silly too. My personal pet peeve is the use of hazard lights to show a public transit bus is stopped for passengers. They'll then switch to a turn signal to re-enter traffic. There is no discernible difference to the lights when the right/curbside indicator light is obscured by a trailing car. And failure to yield to the turn signal on buses is against the law.
/I guess I'm a blinkie.
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What goes into being a tail light enthusiast? I can’t wrap my head around this concept. He used the term Blinkie in the article but I thought it was a joke. Are you a blinkie?
> What goes into being a tail light enthusiast? Watching the Technology Connections video on the subject is probably a good start.
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I'm still confused how they made it through regulation. Image you're a security-engineer and read "On average the indicator light runs at only 50% because we think it looks cool."
The average regular indicator is also only on for 50% of the time. You know the joke: works, doesn't work, works, doesn't work
Mini’s statement only highlights the absurdity (emphasis mine): >With regard to the turn indicator light pattern, there should be no trouble at all for a driver to understand, when seeing the full rear of the car , which direction is being indicated So what about when you can only see half of the car? Like when it’s changing lanes or pulling out of a parking spot? You know, like those times when a signal is MOST usef…
Even if I could see the full back of the car I think I'd still risk a brain-fart. It's like a driving Stroop Test (where words like "blue" are shown but you have to say what colour they are shown in, not what colour they say).
Mini Mk 1 (2000) was a beautiful minimal design by Frank Stephenson. Things started going downhill with Mk 2 (2006) and further models. He left, and I guess designers suffered from non-invented here syndrome.
I own a Mk 1 and I've leased or driven all other models. Aside from being uglier, many subtle things in the dashboard were tweaked making it a lot less intuitive. It makes me angry every time I see how they ruined a great design. Engines, on the other hand, have improved very significantly with each generation.
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Or when it's dark. I'm imagining a cyclist or pedestrian seeing only the blinking light and maybe a vague outline of the vehicle at best, seeing the 1 https://www.welovecycling.com/wide/2019/04/08/whats-a-right-...
If it's dark, I would assume it is likely that the taillights are also on.
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I've commonly seen people just throw on their hazard blinkers in case of drastic braking on the highway... especially in bad weather. I've done it myself when going from regular speed to unexpected traffic, in the hope that the person behind me is paying attention...
This is pretty common in Germany on the Autbahn - sudden change in traffic, i.e. much slower going cars and especially when approaching the end of a jam, you turn on your hazard blinkers to signal this to the following cars. It works pretty well and is very useful (especially because people might be going at 200km/h behind you, approaching the end of a jam). Newer cars have an automatic high-frequency hazard flasher…