Auto Electronics: How Much is Enough?

As far as I'm concerned they should have stopped at electronic ignition and a radio.

Soon a thief only needs a laptop/smartphone to steal a car

So there's an app for that?

Is there an app for taking out the rotor arm and putting it in one's pocket?

Rotor arm... dunno how many of these new fangled cars have them?

Automobile control system gets complicated by introducing electronic controls in some cars even up to 80%. Reliability of these controls are less and very sensitive and its needs special training to diagnose the fault. Old is good always. One can easily play with mechanical controls.

Rube Goldberg used to be a joke. There are too many things to go wrong on cars nowadays and they're too costly to repair.

It's gone too far too fast.
The next car I buy will have as few electronic gizmos as possible.
My current car (Nissan Micra) periodically decides that it won't let me lock the doors, because it thinks I haven't switched off the ignition despite the 'intelikey' (a misnomer) not needing to be in the ignition to work the car and thus there being no risk of it being locked in the car.

The ignition has an extra irrelevant push switch which may be causing the problem...
Reliability is inversely proportional to complexity.
Del

That is why I built one of these for a backup.

Ahhh...the glory days of the El Camino when it still used the Chevelle front clip. Very nice car!

I do own two late-model Chevy's, but about the only thing I can do to work on them is preventative maintenance, change the tires, swap out spark plugs, etc...hell, one of them has a sealed transmission so I don't have to check the fluid! I had to go to the dealer one day to tell me that my gas cap wasn't installed all the way and that is why my engine light was one. It's getting to be pretty ridiculous in my opinion.

That's why it's always nice to be able to pop the hood on my Silver Bullet (1959 Chevy 31) and see a carburetor. Hopefully gasoline will still be a fuel option when I pass this on to my son (I'm only 25 now so the odds are against me I suppose). There is literally nothing electronic on this truck except for the HEI ignition. There is no radio, there isn't an A/C, and the old gauges are all mechanical.

As a Plastics Engineer, I obviously am amazed by the many applications and benefits of using plastic in automobiles. However, I love the fact that every panel on the inside of this truck is steel; no plastic here except for the dash knobs and the lens over the gauges. There is not a single piece of plastic on the outside of the truck except for the window gaskets and and the front park lamp lenses (the taillight lenses are glass). All bezels and trim pieces are metal, the way it should be.

And when did they stop putting wood in truck beds?!? It's been a while.

NICE ride Smith, love it.

Here is the mill in my 71 El Camino.

that is really nice.

what kills me is the fact that my wife's 2008 Equinox with a fuel injected electronically-controlled V6 and 5-speed automatic only gets 22 mpg on the highway, and I can get 16 mpg on the highway with a carbureted 350 with and a mild cam backed-up with a 3-speed automatic with overdrive from the 1990's.

Removing 95% of the electronic stuff would be a great step in getting the cost of a car below $5000.

that would save a lot of weight too. it's amazing how complicated the wiring harnesses are for new vehicles.

Indeed... People will buy anything the car companies put on them, sometime they have no choice! Safety is costly but a good thing, however "Fly by Wire", self parking, heads up displays, voice commands, etc. is a little much for Gram-maw.

My Mother-in-law can not work the Sat. radio/cell Blue tooth in her new Camry!!

I think the new Chevy Volt has 100+ controllers and over a million lines of Code.

Now one could truly "Hack" someone off the road in that, talk about "Road Rage".

So far, the consensus seems to be that electronics is overkill in cars. I agree. But I think "applied technology" has gone too far in other areas, too. Smart appliances? I really don't need them. The thinking seems to be "because we can, we should."

Practicality has gone by the wayside. "My Mother-in-law can not work the Sat. radio/cell Blue tooth in her new Camry!!" Case in point. It's just one reason I have owned only 1 new car in my life (my first one) and probably never will again. I buy used and have had pretty good luck that way. Since I don't buy really old cars (generally not more than 10 years old), my next one will, probably, incorporate way more technology than I would prefer. Unfortunately. Actually, my 1994 Accord already does.

(Not to change the subject here, but I'd be curious as to what others opinion is of serpentine, timing belts. Do you think they have made car repairs more expensive or made cars more reliable? For instance, changing a water pump usually involves replacing the timing belt -- or at least removing it. It was simpler on cars that didn't have the water pump driven off this central belt.)

What I want to know, is, is the feedback from this thread going to be given to all the car manufacturers so they can stop already? And maybe even go backwards to a simpler design? (Of course not.)

Car manufacturers will always look to add the latest gadget to get one up on the competition and (hopefully) gain market share. The question that should be discussed is 'which electronic devices are appropriate to add to a car.' I'd vote against a device that facilitates 'Texting' while driving. Don't laugh, it might just happen. Mechanical or electronic devices that cause the driver to be 'distraced' are a negative as far as safety is concerned, period.

As I see it, there are basically two types of automotive consumers: those who want to DRIVE, and those who want to be DRIVEN. To those who want to drive, the act of driving is a challenge, and the simpler the machine the better (usually). To those who want to be driven, the act of driving is just a way to get from point A to B, and the less they have to think about and involve themselves in the process the better they like it. Therefore I would propose the there should be two basic classes of vehicles: those with all the electronic controls that can be afforded and those with little or no electronic controls. I personally want to be the driver, and have no problem with analog electronics controlling the battery charging system, fuel injection and ignition systems (and they are not easily hacked). It is the the digital controllers that try to out think me that I don't appreciate. However let the masses who want to be driven have their electronics, just please make them with double, triple or more redundancy because I don't want to be run over by them.