Welcome to Further Details , a series dedicated to ubiquitous but overlooked elements hidden on your favorite products. If your car has an automatic transmission, the different positions you can shift into follow a specific pattern: P-R-N-D, usually followed by either a couple of lower gear options or the chance to shift it into a manual control mode.
When the automatic transmission was young, carmakers would often set up their own shifters however they damn well felt like it.
One common layout, found in General Motors and Chrysler models, among others, placed Reverse at the far end of the shifter, past Neutral, Drive and the lower gears. In one sense, it made sense; after all, you want Reverse to be easy to find, so why not put it at the very end of the shifter? The problem that arose, however, was one of user error: people attempting to shift into a low forward gear would wind up overshooting into Reverse without realizing it, or vice versa.
It took none other than noted safety advocate Ralph Nader to help bring the problems with this arrangement to light. In the second chapter of his seminal book Unsafe at Any Speed , Nader raised five ripped-from-the-headlines examples of death, injury and destruction caused by the poor design of this P-N-D-L-R shift arrangement.
The driver has to lift the lever to go into reverse. Should he not lift it enough, the car will remain in forward low while the driver is looking backwards and expecting the car to move in that direction.
Sticking neutral between forward and reverse, Nader said, was a commonly-accepted trait of mechanical design in things like mechanical tools.
But the design of the Hydra-matic transmission used in these models made it cheaper to put reverse next to the forward cogs, according to an automotive transmission engineer Nader cited; while that obstacle was gone by , GM reportedly stood by it — using the rather circular reasoning that, in effect, there were already too many cars on the road using the P-N-D-L-R setup to stop using it now.
Select position R to reverse. The car must be stationary when reverse position is selected. No gear is engaged and the engine can be started. Apply the parking brake if the car is stationary with the gear selector in N position. To be able to change from the neutral position to another gear position, the brake pedal must be depressed and the ignition position must be II. D is the normal driving position.
Shifting up and down takes place automatically based on the level of acceleration and speed. The car must be stationary when changing gear from R position to D position. The manual gearshift mode can be selected at any time while driving.
The car engine-brakes when the accelerator pedal is released. Select manual gear position by moving the gear selector backwards from the D position. The driver display shows which gear is engaged at the time. Change car. Starting and driving. Gear positions for automatic gearbox. In manual gearshift mode, the gear being used is also shown. Changing gear The gear selector is the shift-by-wire-type where shifting is performed electronically instead of mechanically.
Gear positions Park position - P The park position is activated via the P button next to the gear selector. To park - first apply the parking bake and then select park position.
Warning Always use the parking brake when parking on an inclined surface. Note The gear selector must be in P position to allow the car to be locked and alarmed.
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