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NHTSA Delays "Quiet Car" EV Ruling

Discussion in 'Prius, Hybrid, EV and Alt-Fuel News' started by bwilson4web, Nov 27, 2015.

  1. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    Source: NHTSA Delays “Quiet Car” EV Ruling | TheDetroitBureau.com

    Pushback will delay program until 2018 model-year

    Federal regulators have delayed a proposed rule that would require new battery-based vehicles to emit warning sounds to reduce the likelihood of hitting a pedestrian or bicycle rider, especially those who are sight-impaired.
    . . .
    But NHTA estimates a hybrid vehicle is 19% more likely to be involved in a pedestrian crash than a conventionally powered vehicle. It estimates the new rule could ultimately result in 2,800 fewer injuries to pedestrians and bicyclists annually. Currently, about 125,000 are injured in crashes each year.
    . . .
    But NHTSA is looking to come up with something more standardized, and it will set specific speeds at which the vehicle will have to produce warning sounds. Currently, the plan is to require that when a vehicle is operating in electric mode at 18 miles an hour or less.
    . . .

    Every delay has come with lower probability, now "19%", and lower speed, "18 miles an hour." In effect, the additional data has pretty much confirmed what we knew five years ago. Now if they'll include a waiver for pedestrian, auto-stop cars . . . problem solved!

    This foolish sound should be biological: growing or barking dog; angry hornet; angry African bees; mosquito, or; angry cat. Test the candidate sounds on pre-school kids and take the one that is most effective. These have the advantage of little or no learning curve. But the simplest would be a click from the horn once per second.

    No extra equipment required but future horns would have a slow click, once per second. They would be connected to the 12V all the time and the click embedded in the horn. Ground the horn lead converts it back into a normal horn sound.

    Bob Wilson
     
  2. frodoz737

    frodoz737 Top Wrench

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    Rhetorical question: What happen to hitting the horn manually?
     
  3. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    What?
    In the 1960s my family took one of our vacations that involved driving from Oklahoma to Bar Harbor Maine. I remember Boston because:
    1. The constant background noise of car horns.
    2. All cars came 'pre-dented.'
    But here is another source with more facts and data:

    . . .
    The auto safety regulator has said that if the proposal were implemented, there would be 2,800 fewer pedestrian and bicyclist injuries annually. About 125,000 pedestrians and bicyclists are injured each year.
    . . .
    Automakers have raised concerns about the alerts, saying they are too loud and too complicated. They also want them required only at lower speeds.

    Under a 2010 law passed by Congress, the NHTSA was supposed to finalize the regulations by January 2014. Automakers will get a minimum of 18 months from the time the rules are finalized before they must begin adding the alerts.
    . . .
    NHTSA in 2013 said it expected the rules would cost the auto industry about $23 million in the first year, because automakers will need to add an external waterproof speaker to comply. (Reporting by David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by Dan Grebler)

    Source: U.S. delays 'quiet car' rules for hybrids, electric cars| Reuters

    When the "Bell the Hybrid" law was passed in 2010, Toyota hybrids, especially the Prius were the target. Nearly six years later, the number of affected car companies has exploded. But in 2010 the "Automobile Manufacturers Association" was all for this bad law. It is still a bad law, worse now, because accident avoidance systems are making this a moot point.

    Bob Wilson
     
  4. hill

    hill High Fiber Member

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    Best if all plug-in drivers simply install obnoxiously loud diesel truck ICE sound blasting speakers. You never know how loud some folks need - so ear piercing volume is the only way. Maybe throw in some sky-blackening rolling coal (simulated only, of course) smoke - so they can see & smell you as well.
    .
     
    #4 hill, Nov 27, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 27, 2015
  5. Zythryn

    Zythryn Senior Member

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    Pedestrians would hear hybrids and EVs if it weren't for all the racket coming from the ICE vehicles!
     
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  6. fuzzy1

    fuzzy1 Senior Member

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    Around here, some are oblivious to even freight train horns. Especially when listening to portable music players or gabbing on the phone with friends.
     
  7. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    don't they all have it by now, anyway?
     
  8. Zythryn

    Zythryn Senior Member

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    No
     
  9. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    It you have time to honk the horn, you probably have time to brake and not hit the pedestrian. Lots of distracted driving involved with these auto to pedestrian or auto to cyclist.

    My problem is I really doubt this will be effective at all. Hybrids and Bevs make up less than 2% of cars, and bob can probably tell us how many, but it is probably a small percentage (19% higher?) of these accidents, but slightly higher than louder cars. It would be interesting if age not hybrid is the reason hybrids have more of these accidents and they have a higher average driving age.

    I have also seen situations where cars hit people on purpose on bicycles, using their cars as a weapon.
     
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  10. fuzzy1

    fuzzy1 Senior Member

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    Last I checked, numerous very quiet traditional ICE cars need these noisemakers just as much as the hybrids and BEVs, but none yet have them.
     
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  11. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    when i'm in a parking lot, pedestrians can't hear the noisemaker. i'm afraid nhtsa will find this out and make it louder.
     
  12. frodoz737

    frodoz737 Top Wrench

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    Hey...let's outlaw smartphones. Then the dumb-sses that aren't watching where they are walking and the other dumb-sses texting while driving...well you get the idea.
     
  13. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    Its nice to blame the newest thing, but fatalities are lower than 2001. If smart phones were the only distraction then fatalities would have gone up instead of down. There weren't many drivers or pedestrians using smart phones on the streets in 2001.

    Driver training, sidewalks, shoulders, and proper controlled intersections would be the most likely ways to reduce these accidents.
     
  14. bisco

    bisco cookie crumbler

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    fatalities are a misnomer. it's really accidents that count. and how many people sitting in a traffic line fail to move with traffic because they are looking at their phone?
     
    #14 bisco, Nov 27, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 28, 2015
  15. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    And I was going to drink a cuppa espresso to wake up:
    Misdiagnosis is worse because it leads to the wrong correction leaving not only the original hurt but the side-effects of the bad repair.
    Yeap: Prius Fatalities 2001-2007

    Sharendipity, the answer jumped out with the 2016 Prius and the smaller "A" pillar:
    It is the "A" pillar (i.e., windshield side supports) which not only the Prius but many large SUV and pickup trucks became much stronger to deal with roll-over accidents: Rollover | Safercar -- National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)

    The NHTSA report showed an asymmetry in left and right turns in our USA driven Prius. Earlier this year, I heard an Autoline Daily report about a 'virtual car' that uses cameras and screens (Land Rover?) so the driver can 'see' through the body and "A" pillars. Then sitting in our 2003 and 2010 Prius I focused on the area obscured by the "A" pillar. Suddenly I understood how on a clear weather day, any Prius can run over and kill a pedestrian in the crosswalk.

    There is an "A" pillar obscured arc from the driver's eyes outward that extends to the area covered by a crosswalk sized larger than a pedestrian. In a left turn, that arc moves at just the right pace to obscure the pedestrian. This explains the double fatality rate of SUVs and pickups. It is also why the left and right hand turns are asymetrical.

    Now it took over a decade to get enough incidents to find '2,800 out of 125,000' accidents. Once the rule is put in place, say 2018, they will slowly enter the fleet that currently have few if any such cars. It will take nearly the same time interval before anyone will have enough samples to discover . . . IT DOESN'T WORK!

    Well this old man is wide awake now and only half of my espresso.

    Bob Wilson
    merged
    I fitted a reverse light, beeper in our 2003 Prius only to observe exactly what you've seen. Pedestrians will walk behind a car backing up with the beeper working.

    Bob Wilson
     
    #15 bwilson4web, Nov 27, 2015
    Last edited: Nov 30, 2015
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  16. HGS

    HGS Member

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    That futuristic noise maker sounds like a bad air compressor bearing, or something. The first time I heard my wife driving away in our new (used) Prius I thought it was broken,. I research all the time, so within an hour I was up to speed on our "special" noise machine under the hood.

    I don't like it.
     
  17. fuzzy1

    fuzzy1 Senior Member

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    In other news, preliminary figures for the first half of 2015 show traffic fatalities up significantly compared to the same period last year. Though it is still to early to point any fingers of blame.
    http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/812217.pdf
     
  18. El Dobro

    El Dobro A Member

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    My brother is a retired cop. You should hear his stories about people pulling or walking out in front of him, while his lights and sirens are going.
     
  19. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    Posted the whole thread for context. I've been hit twice on my bicycle, both minor with damage to the bike and bruses that didn't require a doctor. Neither were reported, the drivers at fault paid to repair my bike (different bikes years apart). I've since had an aquantance killed on his bicycle in houston. Believe me the fatalities are much more painful, even though the hits caused the personal bruises.

    Its not to say that some of these are not phone distractions or quiet cars, but these distractions were going on long before smart phones and hybrids. I don't know how many people I've seen putting on make up, eating, or yelling at their kids in the back seat. I've been hit twice in my car by distracted drivers - one was talking to her three friends in the car, the other was getting yelled at by his wife. If it was only the phones then fatalities would be much higher than before phones were out, but that is not what the statistics say. Our distractions may be changing;)

    One year does not make a pattern, and the press is so hungry for the story that they aren't even waiting for a full years data. Likely explanation is lower gas prices and higher employment. There was a drop after 2007 as the recession hit and gas prices went up, and some of that may be unwinding. The bell the hybrid laws and no texting while driving seems to have little impact, and to be clear I'm against the noisemakers but for the phone restrictions.
     
  20. RobH

    RobH Senior Member

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    I've had numerous occasions where pedestrians wander in front of me in parking lots. If my Prius made a little more noise, most would move aside and let me pass. It's not a big enough deal to blast the horn, so I just wait. So from my driver's perspective, a little noise is useful.