Top ten list of endangered automotive trends forms and features (part 2)

April 16, 1:46 PMRoad & Driver ExaminerRoman Mica

Previous Next

2 comments Print Email RSS Subscribe

Subscribe

Get alerts when there is a new article from the Road & Driver Examiner. Read Examiner.com's terms of use.

Email Address   Include other special offers from Examiner.com Terms of Use

                  Will the Tesla sedan be the prototype model of the electric car of the future?

Concept cars are both extremely fascinating and frustrating because, if and when they eventually go into production, they never look like the shinny ultra cool cars spinning on display at your local auto show. 

So while it may be very difficult indeed to discern the future of automotive style and substance from concept cars, it is not to hard to predict the death of trends from current productions cars.

So here's part 2 of my Top Ten List of Endangered Automotive Trends, Forms, and Features (To first read part 1 please click HERE.):

4) Full sized spare tire

The full sized spare tire has been dying a slow death with the introduction of run flat tires and temporary space saver spare tires. The only reason that the full size spare can still be found in some cars is because it is the most supreme useful thing you will need when you flat.

Have you ever tried driving 50 MPH up a mountain pass (on a highway with a 75 MPH speed limit)---in the snow with a space saver spare? I can tell you from personal experience that I have never used so many expletives in a row as when I discovered (on a Sunday afternoon in the middle of nowhere Idaho, and on a much anticipated vacation) that my car had one of those tiny little space saver spare tires, and I still had over 150 miles to go to get to my destination.

I wish the exact same circumstance on any automotive engineer or bean counter accountant who thinks that run flat tires or tiny space saver spare tires are just as good as full sized spares.

3) The cigarette lighter

Have you ever noticed that when good friends stop smoking the first thing they will tell you is that they never realized how bad their clothing reeked of stale acrid smoke?

I always give them the stunned "well I'll be...." look as if I had not noticed myself, because frankly that's what good friends should do in my book. But I will never give a car this same courtesy. Somehow people who smoke while driving also firmly believe that by cracking the window all of the smoke gets sucked out of the car.

Sorry, I hate to break it to you but the acrid smoke still permeates every pore of the poor car. Thus I will personally never purchase a car that has been used as a giant ashtray.

For this simple reason I do not mourn the death of the cigarette lighter, but instead assign it to my painful childhood memory file along with that Lawrence Welk eight track cassettes my mom played over and over and over again, vinyl roofs, and power antennas that either jammed or snapped in the first car wash when my dad forgot to turn off the car radio.

BTW: Even Quadraphonic sound could not make the unique Welkansian combination of the tuba and accordion sound cool.

2) The internal combustion engine

The internal combustion engine is dead, we just refuse to admit it.

My 11-year-old son grew up riding electric scooters, electric go carts, and driving electric RC model cars. To him the sound of a whirling electric motor is just as pleasing as the roar of a big V8 is to me.

It really is just a matter of flipping a switch in your mind, and getting your head around the notion that electric engines can be just as sexy, fast, and as fun as gas engines.

So why are there no electric dragsters to speak of?  An electric engine, unlike a gas engine, has 100 percent of its torque at 1 rpm. And torque is what drag racing is all about. Plus, you' don't need a lot of battery power to race a quarter mile.

Image how fast a dragster could accelerate with two 500 horsepower engines strapped (one each) to the massive rear wheels.

If you can image this, you can image a world where volt heads instead of gear heads design cars. What is really holding the electric car back these days is not battery technology, or the cost of electricity, or any technical issues. After all the electric car was invented before the motor car.

What's really holding back the electric car flood gates is:

1) A real and valid fear on the part of many drivers about what happens if and when they run out of juice. You can buy gas on every corner, but what happens when the snazzy new electric car dies like your cell phone?

2) A serious commitment on the part of the manufactures to the technology. Until recently the big leading car makers in Germany, Japan, and America were not ready to go all in on electricity.

Rightfully so they hedged their bets with hydrogen, natural gas, ethanol, diesel and all sorts of other types of car technology. But this only created confusion in the market place keeping car buyers betting on the old standby:  petroleum in the U.S and subsidized (or perhaps less taxed) diesel in Europe.

But the time has come to go all in.

Will they?

Will you?   

1) The unwired car

Do you recall the not-so-distant days when you could get into your car, crank up your favorite AC/DC or Stephen Wolf Album, and head out on the highway, and really be away from it all.

Not anymore.

The modern car is quickly becoming wired and connected to everything. It could be through the Bluetooth in your cell phone, or the GPS in your car, but now you have the ability to stay connect to everyone and everything---at all times.

This means you can have "those long serious" conversations with your boss on the way to or from work. You can get those much loved billing inquiry emails from your favorite "challenging" customers as you drive to a nice restaurant for dinner. You can chat with your mother or father for hours about your kids lack of enthusiasm for math or science. Your kids can watch their favorite cartoons, commercials, videos from the on board satellite television or CD. And of course this means you won't ever have to say a word to each other.

Better yet, soon you'll even be able to browse the internet on your cars in-dash screen and/or tweet, text, pay your bills online, check your bank account, efile your taxes, and in general be completely connected to it all, all of the time, in all of the many ways possible.

You know maybe that Lawrence Welk greatest hits album wasn't all that bad after all.

To read part 1 please click HERE.

Click HERE to follow me on Twitter for the latest news and updates.