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Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

theautopian.com

171–180 of 392 posts

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#171

Well how are you going to make Passenger Storage+ a $2.99 monthly subscription if the latch isn’t software controlled? Is a robolatch cheaper, compared to a manual latch? Is there a cost saving for the manufacturer?

> Is a robolatch cheaper

Doubt it. It's still a latch but now you need a power release and some wires. Glovebox cover is still made in 1 operation regardless if it have the opening for the latch on front or not, you still need someone to install that latch in the cover, but now you need to trace wires to it.

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#172

It's worth watching the other few dozen seconds of the Cadillac video; not only is the glovebox overengineered, but so are the other doors on that car. Then again, it is a Cadillac, so "luxurious excess" is not surprising, but I'm not sure how having to go through that awkward indirection could be considered a luxury.

Excellent point. There are a lot of people for whom the #1 goal when purchasing a car is to stake out as high a spot in the "Who's Got More Bling?" pecking order as possible. If a car company CEO developed some weird obsession with maximizing profit, it wouldn't take much genius to start ignoring the practical & thrifty car buyers in favor of the bling maximizers...

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#173
post #30
post #18

I like it. It means if someone breaks into the car they can’t get into the glove box. Also, with a Tesla, the car is never off so you don’t need to turn the car on again to get access to it.

You know that most gloveboxes are already lockable weirdly a touch screen, yeah?

Word “most” doing a lot of heavy lifting. I drove a lot of different types of hire car, and I’ve never seen an option to lock or unlock the glovebox, nor had a situation where it’s been locked.

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#174
post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only stupid. That is plain criminal.

I was in a car crash as a child. Two cars caught fire, although I didn't realise it until I got out. My door was blocked by another vehicle, as was my dad's. He was busy trying to get my sister to open her front passenger door, so he could clamber out after her. The other rear door was damaged, and I had to pull the latch and then kick it to open it. (Not sure how that would work with one of these small manual releas…

How does this work in a plain-old car with child locks set on the rear doors?

My children had opened the doors while the car was moving at least once before I had to use the child locks; now, as far as I can tell, nobody is getting out of the back doors unless they're opened from the outside.

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#175
post #34

People raise their blood pressure for nothing. You could have both a touch screen glove box release and a discreet manual release for emergencies. It’s just for aesthetics.

> It’s just for aesthetics What about form follows function?

The function is to sell more good looking cars.

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#176

This is a gem (emphasis mine): "The touch-screen-actuated glove box is terrible because it’s one of those examples where carmakers have found that they have the technology to do something, so they do it, without considering literally anything about what they’ve done . Did anybody want this? At all? It takes something that has never been a problem, opening a glove box, and added cost and complexity to the construction…

Remember curved TVs? Remember 3D for TVs? That was essentially technology bullet-point features, but since they flopped hard you can no longer buy curved TVs or 3D TVs. Turns out if people really don't want shit, it disappears again, no matter how hard various corporations push the shit.

Except that you can't "not buy" a vehicle you need for transport just because the manufacturers decided to remove the latch from the glove compartment.

Your logic only works in healthy markets like TVs where you could buy _EQUIVALENT_ device without the curvature or 3D.

Meanwhile with cars this isn't true - the touchscreen crap trend is being implemented across the market (since its cheaper) and many people can't freely choose a model and brand of their car (either due to costs, dealer availability or other factors like interior space or fuel consumption requirements).

If you'd be able to buy the same car, just with different control stack, THAT would enable the behaviour you describe.

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#177
post #58
post #5

A conversation that should have happened during the development of this car, but didn't: "Remind me again why the brake pedal isn't a button buried in a sub-menu? Because that would be inconvenient, unintuitive, and doesn't allow quick access? Then why the fuck would you do this with anything ?"

> Remind me again why the brake pedal isn't a button buried in a sub-menu? “Because title 49, subtitle B, chapter III, subchapter B, part 393, subpart C, paragraph 393.40 of Federal Safety Regulations requires us to install brakes as specified by subpart B, paragraph 571.105 of the same regulations, which require a pedal. And if those did not exist, then we absolutely would install some other bullshit, make you pay e…

Invisible hand etc

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whisker controls are even better. No need to take hands off the wheel.

> whisker controls Tried a quick search and couldn't find it. Is it like the scoll wheel on a mouse? Would be nice to have those on the steering wheel instead of up/down buttons.

I assume they mean the levers on the steering wheel, indicators and wipers... They look like whiskers in a cat's face that is the steering wheel (and you find them by touch, which is a nice double entendre)

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#179
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a fantasy scenario. In what world can someone force their way into to your locked car but can't force their way into the glove box?

Most glove boxes don't have large panes of glass? The sound of a broken window to get in will also motivate a thief to not stick around messing with a glovebox very long. Maybe leave something worth running off with in the center console as a deflection.

This is a seriously marginal bizarre contriviance of a scenario to piss off people daily who use the glove box.

For your benefit, you'd need to have a thief that somehow can break class (which is suprisingly hard to do if you ever tried it) and then can't defeat a simple latch on a glovebox where they now for sure valuables lie?

Get out of here.

Re: Nobody wants touch-screen glove box latches

#180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 1930, laws were proposed in Massachusetts and St. Louis to ban radios while driving. According to automotive historian Michael Lamm, “Opponents of car radios argued that they distracted drivers and caused accidents, that tuning them took a driver’s attention away from the road, and that music could lull a driver to sleep.” https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/29631/when-car-radio-was...

I am not sure what your point is here?

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