Featured Ads on the infotainment screen

For the very best performance, yes. But many of us have other constraints and hassles to deal with. A great antenna in a convenient but sub-optimal location can be much more practical than a minimum antenna in an ideal location.

No surprise, it is part of the multi-bay bow-tie group of antennas.

My local PBS station, and one mainline legacy broadcaster, also stayed on VHF. But their signals are very strong, such that the low efficiency of my UHF antennas in that band doesn't matter.

 

"Dilly, Dilly"!!

 

I really don't want a big flat screen as the only interface in my car. Sorry, Toyota, it's too distracting, especially in Plano TX! Consider the human factor first.

 

Nor do I want commonly used indicators like speed and fuel status and car-in-distress signals to be located in an area where to look at them I must make more than two adjustments to my sight (witness the Prius and its speedometer located where the eyes must adjust to the right and then down and then nearer. An idiot design.).

I like things I might need to use quickly for safety to be located where I never have to move my hands or line of sight to pick between 20 buttons but rather can turn my lights on, my wipers on, my turn signals on, adjust my cruise control, with my hand still on the wheel. I love my stalks.

I like volume and tuning for a radio (fast becoming an old guys source of sounds, I know) to be by easily distinguishable by touch knobs.

When the kids are chattering and I absolutely have to make an adjustment, I don't want to stab for an icon or try to make a voice detection device figure out what is cockpit chatter and what is my desperate attempt to have it do something right now for me.

 

Well, the entire point of the "idiot design" was to get the thing far enough from you under the base of the windshield, and then optically farther still by means of the mirror trick, that you are not making nearly the adjustment from distance to near vision that you have to make when shifting your eyes to the traditional speedometer location. When I get into another car, I do notice the added effort to focus on the nearer speedometer ... but my eyes don't focus as effortlessly as they used to ....

Also, I'm pretty sure if you diagram the cockpit, locate your head in it, and draw vectors in your usual out-the-windshield view direction and in the direction of the speedometer, the angle you have to shift your eyes by is smaller in the Prius layout than for a lot of more traditional ones.

Not as small as with the HUD, of course....

-Chap

 

But if I move my eyes to the side, I don't have what is happening in front of me still within the top edge of my vision. Even after 5 years of owning a Prius, I find it distracting especially if I am looking at one of the smaller indicators located to the far right (on a LHD car). Perhaps why I probably have covered half my miles under cruise control so I don't have to worry over my speed (and perhaps it helps my 11+ years with no tickets record).

We all have different perspectives. Not right or wrong. Just individual.

 

There's no need to suspect what their rationale was—it wasn't secret. There's a four-page section devoted to it (pp. 134-138 in the English translation, The Prius That Shook the World) in Hideshi Itazaki's book on the development of the car, covering the history, the ergonomic considerations and the associated testing. The book was about Gen 1, which just took a conventional meter and managed to move it better than arm's length from the driver without any extra optical tricks.

The mirror trick to move it even further out of your near-focus range was added in Gen 2, and covered in the 2004 New Car Features manual. It's still in use in Gen 3; I haven't pored over a Gen 4 in that level of detail yet....

-Chap

 

I believe that Sir Alec Issigonis started the trend with more modern international cars with the Morris Mini. That had one circular display in the centre with all the warning lights and dials within its circumference.

Mini - Wikipedia

 

I wonder if Gen 3 (or V in your case, if there is a difference) have a different instrument arrangement from Gen 2. My Gen 2 speedo is directly in front of me and a little down from the road. I can not read it with my peripheral vision because it's digital, but it certainly is the best digital speedo I have ever experienced (I am not a fan of digital speedos). It is super easy and clear to read and it does not take me any more time away from the road than say checking a rear view mirror, which I do constantly as part of my scan. I never just stare into the road statically. That's a good way to fall asleep.

Is Gen 3's speed more to the center? Mine is right where I am used to having it, but yes, it does seem to be further out because of the mirror trick and that is a good thing.

 

I say the heck with the Japanese Market, move all the instruments to the left like God intended with some minor shuffling of the modules in that particular display.
Then you take the area for the GPS move it where it belongs up higher in the line of sight, and make it a modular situation where you can replace that factory GPS with a Garmin or other add-on.
Add a tach, and all the proper gauges, manual controls for radio, CD (yes CD as I have a ton of them), and heating/air conditioning, and I'm a happy camper!
Remove rear seats and 2 doors; make body out of carbon fiber!! Am I beating that poor dead horse here!! Oh, and never buy anything from Ford, ever!! My son, his girlfriend, my daughter, and my ex-wife can all tell you horror stories about Fix Or Repair Daily!
Sorry about off topic; should have posted on Ford sedans death... That rascally Mr. Leisk's post triggered me!

Posted via the PriusChat mobile app.
AChoiredTaste.com

 

I agree with you about Ford, but...

There are other countries that use right hand side outside of Japan.

The Lexus LFa (one of my favorite cars, and one I'd buy if I were insanely rich) has a body which is mostly carbon fiber. Toyota had to go back to its roots and create a loom to weave the carbon fiber. That's one of the reasons that car costs $300,000. They were all hand-built and only a few were made.

I know someone who worked on the transmission and steering code for the LFa, it was the car the Toyota F1 team was promised if they won a race. Although they never did, they got to build the car anyway.

 

I disagree about Ford. They've been the most dependable cars I've owned(haven't actually owned a Toyota for as long). The Taurus was even rear ended twice, and I once cut it too close to a utility pole, but it just kept going. The first rear ending buckled the hood on the minivan.