Originally Posted By: Jarlaxle
My stepfather has a 300 with the same shifter...he says that anyone needing more than 2 days to figure out the shifter should have his license revoked. (It took him about an hour.)
The primary control for an automobile should be simple enough for any trained driver to figure out in 2 seconds, not 2 days or an hour even. I once figured out how to drive a car in which the steering direction was reversed reasonably well in about a minute but that doesn't mean it would be an OK way to make a car!
The case study of the DC10 cargo door is illustrative - the latching handle could be closed and secured in the locked position, but due to a problem with the actual locking mechanism, the door might not be locked. So the operator would think the door was locked, but it really wasn't. The 747 had a similar problem though I don't believe it resulted in any crashes like the DC10's.
It appears these FCA trannys allow the operator to make a control motion that they believe puts the car in park, but it's really not, and since there's no physical or tactile feedback it's not necessarily obvious without checking a visual indicator, unlike just about every other design out there.
jeff
My stepfather has a 300 with the same shifter...he says that anyone needing more than 2 days to figure out the shifter should have his license revoked. (It took him about an hour.)
The primary control for an automobile should be simple enough for any trained driver to figure out in 2 seconds, not 2 days or an hour even. I once figured out how to drive a car in which the steering direction was reversed reasonably well in about a minute but that doesn't mean it would be an OK way to make a car!
The case study of the DC10 cargo door is illustrative - the latching handle could be closed and secured in the locked position, but due to a problem with the actual locking mechanism, the door might not be locked. So the operator would think the door was locked, but it really wasn't. The 747 had a similar problem though I don't believe it resulted in any crashes like the DC10's.
It appears these FCA trannys allow the operator to make a control motion that they believe puts the car in park, but it's really not, and since there's no physical or tactile feedback it's not necessarily obvious without checking a visual indicator, unlike just about every other design out there.
jeff
