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On Friday, 19 October 2018 09:32:41 UTC+1, NY wrote:
"Richard" wrote in message
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When have the French ever done things like the rest of the world? SECAM
television, non-self-cancelling indicators (Citroen), single-spoke
steering
wheel, rubber pad for footbrake "pedal" (Citroen again!), "hockey-stick"
dashboard-mounted gear lever (Renault and Citroen).

There is a lot to be said for the world devising a common standard for
things like wheels and tyres, to reduce the variety of sizes that need to
be
stocked.

And don't get me started on the pillock who invented the space-saving
spare
wheel. If I was "king" I'd make it mandatory that every car had to be
designed to accommodate a spare wheel which was fully-interchangable with
the running wheels, with no speed or distance restrictions, to allow you
to
take a flat tyre to the garage when *you* want, rather than being
stranded
overnight because you are about to start a long journey (or are even
half-way through it) and you get a puncture late at night or on a Sunday.
And wheelbraces should be cranked, to make it easy to hold the opposite
end
with your hand as you apply pressure with your foot on a wheelnut that
refuses to budge; the modern L-shaped ones pull off the wheelnut. And on
my
old Peugeot, the long bolt that released the spare wheel from its cage
under
the boot had a crude semi-circular notch nut in it, into which you put
the
flattened end of the wheelbrace as a crude screwdriver. What a stupid
design - if the bolt jams, you can't apply enough force before the
"screwdriver" jumps out of the notch. How difficult would it have been
for
them to put a hexagonal head on the bolt of the same size as the
wheelnuts?
That would have been a proper solution.

The one rule about innovating and being different in the hope that people
will adopt your standard is that your non-standard solution must be
*better*
than what's already there, not worse :-)


Your proposal would in reality make things worse. Progress depends
on trying various changes, many of which don't turn out to be keepers,
but some do. Stop that process & you hinder product improvement.
Imagine if you'd insisted on a set of universal tyre sizes in 1910, people
would have kept driving on 2" wide tyres for years longer than was
appropriate. Or again in 1980, tyres have gotten fatter since then to
reduce loss of grip incidents.

Yes.

Re no spare tyre, that does suit some people, some it doesn't.
I can't see a sound reason to prevent people making their
own choice on whether they carry a spare and what type.

Gets tricky with the design of the car tho, particularly with the
smaller cars. Mine came with a full sized spare, and it goes
well in the hole for it in the hatch boot, leaving a flat floor
there with the full sized spare in the hole it belongs in.
It goes inside the boot, not in something under car.
There is a quite solid flexible mat thing that goes
over that so that you end up with a flat floor. If
a skinny temporary spare was used because the
owner was happy with that, the boot space wouldnt
be very usefully increased because you've have a
big hole in the floor of the boot which nothing
much would fit given it would have to be round.

AA/RAC/etc can alter their premiums based on spare ownership
if they want, but I'm sure they're better off not doing.

Re standardising tyre sizes to less types, the result
would be more rubber & cost used pointlessly.

It would sort of make sense to standardise the wheel
rim mounting detail tho. We have the bizarre situation
where the two main manufacturers of the most popular
6 cylinder cars dont even have the same arrangement
of 5 stud rims, they are incompatible. Let alone the
bigger Jap 4WDs which have their own arrangements.

Fwliw I've never liked self cancelling indicators,
they always cancel at the wrong time.

Mine dont. They do fail to cancel on a couple of
unusual road corners, but that the only downside.

Just been reading the owners manual of the Hyundai
i30 I am considering buying and its got a different
system again, one tap on the stalk has it do 3,5 or 7
flashed and only does that and you specify the number
in the setup menu on in the dash. And the whole thing
is configurable so you can have the normal self cancelling
approach if you prefer that too.

OTOH I did not like the manual reverse light.

Yeah, but that doesnt have the self cancelling problem, it will
always be completely reliable based on the gear selected.