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A series of decisions were made at Mini which resulted in what is unambiguously the worst indicator design of all time. It is so bad that after seeing it on the street, I just had to post about it here.
Yeah, I could see it being an issue for some less-common type of indicator, but everyone who drives knows what a blinker looks like. Nobody would mistake it for anything other than the right hand turn signal.
Hell, I wouldn’t even notice the shape of the light; all you need to notice while driving is the presence of a flashing light on the right side of the vehicle - if you’re looking intently enough to notice the shape of the light, you’re not paying enough attention to everything else on the road.
In the dark, with the other side obscured (or just broken), you don’t want the blinker to actively prompt you to come to a wrong conclusion.
It’s better to see a blinking light and think “I don’t see enough, gotta slow down” than see a blinking arrow and potentially not even realize it’s a turn signal.
If you’re driving in the dark with someone whose entire taillight system is out to the point where you can’t immediately tell if his blinker is on the left or the right, you need to hit the brakes and put as much distance between you and them as you can… Then get better headlights, because even in that situation you should still be able to see them pretty well just with your own lights.
Frequently, only a single bulb needs to be out for an entire side of the car to be dark.
Brakelights are only active while braking. A dark bodied car is difficult to see and a tail light being out is sufficient .
Blaming it on someone else’s headlights isn’t reasonable- and “better headlights”=brighter has caused significant problems on the other direction.
It’s a mild issue that could have been solved by a designer spending 30 seconds thinking about what they were designing. Or somebody in that design chain spending 30 seconds thinking about it.
Dude, if your headlights aren’t enough to illuminate what’s in front of you, then it’s not that an upgrade would be too much, it’s that an upgrade would get you to the bare minimum… You literally NEED to be able to see what else is on the road with you at ALL TIMES. You’re complaining about the risk that a vaguely arrow-shaped blinker causes in the specific case where you literally can’t see the car it’s attached to. There’s a much bigger risk there, and while it’s not your fault, it’s definitely something your vehicle needs to have the tools to deal with.
There have been times where I was driving near someone who forgot to turn their headlights on at night. But that’s the thing - I knew they were there; I could see their car with the light from my headlights, and even in that dangerously-low vision, I could easy tell which side of their car a blinker came on from. Yes, I got off the road and waited a bit to make sure they weren’t near me anymore, but even in the time that I had to drive with them, I had the tools to resolve the situation safely for me.
Dude, if your headlights aren’t enough to illuminate what’s in front of you, then it’s not that an upgrade would be too much, it’s that an upgrade would get you to the bare minimum… You literally NEED to be able to see what else is on the road with you at ALL TIMES. You’re complaining about the risk that a vaguely arrow-shaped blinker causes in the specific case where you literally can’t see the car it’s attached to. There’s a much bigger risk there, and while it’s not your fault, it’s definitely something your vehicle needs to have the tools to deal with.
duuudeeee… you realize, of course, that it’s a least as much a question of alignment… and with a car in front of you you shouldn’t be using floodlights; which is blinding everyone in front of you. Which is as likely to cause problems as not.
Further, dark colors on cars are inherently harder to see, lights or no.
There have been times where I was driving near someone who forgot to turn their headlights on at night. But that’s the thing - I knew they were there; I could see their car with the light from my headlights, and even in that dangerously-low vision, I could easy tell which side of their car a blinker came on from. Yes, I got off the road and waited a bit to make sure they weren’t near me anymore, but even in the time that I had to drive with them, I had the tools to resolve the situation safely for me.
Good for you. Doesn’t mean the situation can’t arise where it is a problem. Stop defending idiots that put cool-factor before functionality on something that’s fundamentally meant as a safety feature. save the cool-factor for the union jack roof paint or something.
You think that headlights that can illuminate cars ahead of you are the equivalent to those shitty aftermarket LED floodlights? Really? If your car can’t see a dark car on the road with its lights off, you’re a much, MUCH bigger idiot than someone with a union jack blinker…
oh yes. I’m an idiot for recognizing that there are circumstances in which “ideal” does not apply.
Also define “ahead” of you? 30 feet? 100 feet? maybe 2,640 feet? Sorry. but you’re failing to understand my point: THAT CIRCUMSTANCES AREN’T ALWAYS PERFECT. And when someone designes a critical SAFETY FEATURE they need to consider the non-ideal. 30 seconds of thought about what the fuck they were designing, or the designs that were undoubtedly submitted for approval could have prevented this. Instead, Mini Cooper elected to put “cool” before anything else.
You’re absolutely right that circumstances aren’t always perfect… Which is exactly why you need a vehicle that can maximize safety in all situations. A union jack blinker is dumb, but if you’re EVER in a situation where you can’t tell what side of a car a blinker is going off on, you’re in a situation where you need to pull off to the side of the road, turn off your car, and call for someone to pick you up.
I’ve driven for tens of thousands of hours in my lifetime so far, and I’ve never even been close to a situation like what you’ve described. Even in a snow squall or dense fog I’ve always been able to see where other nearby cars on the road are, and where their blinkers are. Not being able to do so goes well beyond “not ideal;” that’s well past the line of too dangerous. And the fact that THAT is how extreme your scenario has to get before the union jack becomes a considerable issue shows how much more concerning your scenario is than that one.
Yeah, I could see it being an issue for some less-common type of indicator, but everyone who drives knows what a blinker looks like. Nobody would mistake it for anything other than the right hand turn signal.
Hell, I wouldn’t even notice the shape of the light; all you need to notice while driving is the presence of a flashing light on the right side of the vehicle - if you’re looking intently enough to notice the shape of the light, you’re not paying enough attention to everything else on the road.
In the dark, with the other side obscured (or just broken), you don’t want the blinker to actively prompt you to come to a wrong conclusion.
It’s better to see a blinking light and think “I don’t see enough, gotta slow down” than see a blinking arrow and potentially not even realize it’s a turn signal.
If you’re driving in the dark with someone whose entire taillight system is out to the point where you can’t immediately tell if his blinker is on the left or the right, you need to hit the brakes and put as much distance between you and them as you can… Then get better headlights, because even in that situation you should still be able to see them pretty well just with your own lights.
Frequently, only a single bulb needs to be out for an entire side of the car to be dark.
Brakelights are only active while braking. A dark bodied car is difficult to see and a tail light being out is sufficient .
Blaming it on someone else’s headlights isn’t reasonable- and “better headlights”=brighter has caused significant problems on the other direction.
It’s a mild issue that could have been solved by a designer spending 30 seconds thinking about what they were designing. Or somebody in that design chain spending 30 seconds thinking about it.
Dude, if your headlights aren’t enough to illuminate what’s in front of you, then it’s not that an upgrade would be too much, it’s that an upgrade would get you to the bare minimum… You literally NEED to be able to see what else is on the road with you at ALL TIMES. You’re complaining about the risk that a vaguely arrow-shaped blinker causes in the specific case where you literally can’t see the car it’s attached to. There’s a much bigger risk there, and while it’s not your fault, it’s definitely something your vehicle needs to have the tools to deal with.
There have been times where I was driving near someone who forgot to turn their headlights on at night. But that’s the thing - I knew they were there; I could see their car with the light from my headlights, and even in that dangerously-low vision, I could easy tell which side of their car a blinker came on from. Yes, I got off the road and waited a bit to make sure they weren’t near me anymore, but even in the time that I had to drive with them, I had the tools to resolve the situation safely for me.
duuudeeee… you realize, of course, that it’s a least as much a question of alignment… and with a car in front of you you shouldn’t be using floodlights; which is blinding everyone in front of you. Which is as likely to cause problems as not.
Further, dark colors on cars are inherently harder to see, lights or no.
Good for you. Doesn’t mean the situation can’t arise where it is a problem. Stop defending idiots that put cool-factor before functionality on something that’s fundamentally meant as a safety feature. save the cool-factor for the union jack roof paint or something.
You think that headlights that can illuminate cars ahead of you are the equivalent to those shitty aftermarket LED floodlights? Really? If your car can’t see a dark car on the road with its lights off, you’re a much, MUCH bigger idiot than someone with a union jack blinker…
oh yes. I’m an idiot for recognizing that there are circumstances in which “ideal” does not apply.
Also define “ahead” of you? 30 feet? 100 feet? maybe 2,640 feet? Sorry. but you’re failing to understand my point: THAT CIRCUMSTANCES AREN’T ALWAYS PERFECT. And when someone designes a critical SAFETY FEATURE they need to consider the non-ideal. 30 seconds of thought about what the fuck they were designing, or the designs that were undoubtedly submitted for approval could have prevented this. Instead, Mini Cooper elected to put “cool” before anything else.
and yes, that’s at least mildly infuriating.
You’re absolutely right that circumstances aren’t always perfect… Which is exactly why you need a vehicle that can maximize safety in all situations. A union jack blinker is dumb, but if you’re EVER in a situation where you can’t tell what side of a car a blinker is going off on, you’re in a situation where you need to pull off to the side of the road, turn off your car, and call for someone to pick you up.
I’ve driven for tens of thousands of hours in my lifetime so far, and I’ve never even been close to a situation like what you’ve described. Even in a snow squall or dense fog I’ve always been able to see where other nearby cars on the road are, and where their blinkers are. Not being able to do so goes well beyond “not ideal;” that’s well past the line of too dangerous. And the fact that THAT is how extreme your scenario has to get before the union jack becomes a considerable issue shows how much more concerning your scenario is than that one.