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Newer car features that aggravate me

I've grown to hate auto windows. At one time I got parts to convert a car to auto down windows from a junkyard. Gathering dust somewhere. Window always goes down too far when I want to just crack it or doesn't when I do want it all the way down. Several vehicles I drive. All the same. I can tap the button or hold it in my older F150 and the windows do what I want.
Autolocks blow.
Alarms that go off when you unlock the door with the key and not the remote. Stupid.
Those wonderful "seed" lights. Great to have lit up window controls and cruise controls. (Wish I had them on my F150 and may yet figure out a way to get them). SWMBO's car has four buttons on her steering wheel. The bulbs are out in three of them. Non-replaceable, You have to change the entire switches. Stupid. Same with her heater controls. At night you had to turn on the dome to see to change from heat to mix or dash. Happily the controls burned out and I had to replace the whole thing. Now we can see what's what.
OEM design non-replaceable sound systems. If I want a feature the OEM didn't see fit to include I'm screwed. More a problem with used cars. If the previous owner optioned out the car the way you like but skimped on the sound system you about have to buy a different car.
Theftlock on OEM car stereos no one in their right mind would want to steal. That can only be unlocked if you lose the "code" or have to replace one because some of the stupid little lights inside don't work anymore by going through a bunch of rigamarole and paying through the nose at a dealership.
Lack of transmission dipsticks. First build a transmission that will never ever tear up, wear out, or leak. THEN stop including easily checked transmission dipsticks. Dumbasses.
So maybe an automatic will last forever. If I buy a car with a manual transmission everybody knows that at some point the clutch will have to be replaced. Design the freaking car so it doesn't take a whole team of mechanics two days to do so.
Manual transmission cars that you can't shift they way you want to. If you can't put it in the gear you want, when you want, and as long as you want, what's the point?
Inaccesible exterior light bulbs. Light bulbs burn out. Having to remove the bumper and entire front face of a vehicle just to replace a headlight bulb is really bad planning.
Plastic and hugely expensive headlight assemblies that fade so badly in a few years you can't see at night and look awful.
Rear "collision sensors" that beep and go off like mad about the car next to you in a parking lot yet don't work when you are trying to back into a tight spot inside a parking garage.
Any kind autodimming mirrors whose flicking motion momentarily distracts you from what you really need to be looking at.
Modern cars have all sorts of displays these days. Why can't one read out the code that has set off the Malfunction Indicator Light instead of just shining a stupid light at us. Check engine. Is it about to self-destruct or has the secondary downstream pollution sensor stopped reading?
With all the digital readouts these days we STILL have little problem lights with cryptic letters or symbols on them that you have to pull out the owner's manual to look up and see what they mean.
 
Technically, you can change the bulbs in the buttons and such. But it'll require a soldering iron and a handful of LEDs. Doable and cheaper, but a pain in the ass.
 
I've got some EATC (Electronic Automatic Temperature Control) bulbs for mid-90's Fords that I bought from Ford's supplier. Ford wanted $10 EACH for them but I got 100 of them for a fraction of that. The bag even had Ford's part number on it. I've sold off most of them to fellow SHO owners.

Gotta love the OEM sound system that uses 6 ohm speakers, aftermarket are either 4 or 8 ohm!

I really hate the new trend of tall doors and short windows. I like to drive with the window down and my arm on the door. Can't do that on a new car.

Frank
 
"GypsyR" said:
I've grown to hate auto windows. At one time I got parts to convert a car to auto down windows from a junkyard. Gathering dust somewhere. Window always goes down too far when I want to just crack it or doesn't when I do want it all the way down. Several vehicles I drive. All the same. I can tap the button or hold it in my older F150 and the windows do what I want.
Autolocks blow.
Alarms that go off when you unlock the door with the key and not the remote. Stupid.
Those wonderful "seed" lights. Great to have lit up window controls and cruise controls. (Wish I had them on my F150 and may yet figure out a way to get them). SWMBO's car has four buttons on her steering wheel. The bulbs are out in three of them. Non-replaceable, You have to change the entire switches. Stupid. Same with her heater controls. At night you had to turn on the dome to see to change from heat to mix or dash. Happily the controls burned out and I had to replace the whole thing. Now we can see what's what.
OEM design non-replaceable sound systems. If I want a feature the OEM didn't see fit to include I'm screwed. More a problem with used cars. If the previous owner optioned out the car the way you like but skimped on the sound system you about have to buy a different car.
Theftlock on OEM car stereos no one in their right mind would want to steal. That can only be unlocked if you lose the "code" or have to replace one because some of the stupid little lights inside don't work anymore by going through a bunch of rigamarole and paying through the nose at a dealership.
Lack of transmission dipsticks. First build a transmission that will never ever tear up, wear out, or leak. THEN stop including easily checked transmission dipsticks. Dumbasses.
So maybe an automatic will last forever. If I buy a car with a manual transmission everybody knows that at some point the clutch will have to be replaced. Design the freaking car so it doesn't take a whole team of mechanics two days to do so.
Manual transmission cars that you can't shift they way you want to. If you can't put it in the gear you want, when you want, and as long as you want, what's the point?
Inaccesible exterior light bulbs. Light bulbs burn out. Having to remove the bumper and entire front face of a vehicle just to replace a headlight bulb is really bad planning.
Plastic and hugely expensive headlight assemblies that fade so badly in a few years you can't see at night and look awful.
Rear "collision sensors" that beep and go off like mad about the car next to you in a parking lot yet don't work when you are trying to back into a tight spot inside a parking garage.
Any kind autodimming mirrors whose flicking motion momentarily distracts you from what you really need to be looking at.
Modern cars have all sorts of displays these days. Why can't one read out the code that has set off the Malfunction Indicator Light instead of just shining a stupid light at us. Check engine. Is it about to self-destruct or has the secondary downstream pollution sensor stopped reading?
With all the digital readouts these days we STILL have little problem lights with cryptic letters or symbols on them that you have to pull out the owner's manual to look up and see what they mean.
:stu Being a mechanic sucks these days!

Let me add TPMS (Tire Pressure Monitoring System)
 
Wow, nice thorough list Gypsy, I had forgotten about the full auto down window I can't seem to control either. It really sucks when it's pouring raining and you just want it down a little bit for a second and it goes all the way down and the rain pours in or it's freezing out...

A feature I used a lot but haven't had on a car since '85 is heater mirrors and I could turn them on/off! That is the biggest aggravation to me is that many of these features I don't like or want I can't disable :rant

The MIL had an '04 Caddy DeVille, she need not drive anymore so we 'used' it for a couple years to drive her around. After she moved to Tx stuff started going out electronically on it - TPS low pressure code when the tire had 32+psi, tracloc/ABS light stayed on, brake light came on, window regulator broke, etc. The FIL law bought the car new for ~$40K+, I sold it 7yrs. later with 120Kmi. for $3,200 and had to take that little amount and run as the Caddy dealer wouldn't even take it on their used lot. How can a premium car loose 92% of it's value in 7yrs. and common mileage?
Jon
 
Maybe I'm just really fitting into the grumpy old fart personna, but while GPS and mapping and all that shit is nice and all, having a computer touch screen in the dash is an accident waiting to happen. Maybe it's because I have 2 teenage girls and a wife who drives as well as a drunk asian deliveryman. Instead of just pushing a button or flipping a switch, you have to change screens to do everything. I'm sweating like I stole something and the Mrs says her feet are cold, the girls in the back can't feel the air. Wait this songs sucks,where are we? Hold on, let me switch to the radio from the climate control, no wait that's the nav system :char

At least on my car the radio controls on the steering wheel are on the left side where they belong. SWMBO's Explorer has them on the right with the cruise on the left. Why are they putting them on the right hand side? If my right hand is free, I can reach the radio. How am I supposed to hold the Mrs's hand, pull her hair back, slap the kids, whatever.
 
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