AutoblogGreen

Making a sound or noise is the least of our problems. Even if manufacturers don't include it, a person can do it by himself without much spending. Even if this might raise eyebrows, it seems a natural issue for the visually impaired.

Reply

Instead of noise making cars, why don't the blind wear radar units to indicate moving things coming at them? I've never understood why something like this hasn't been developed.

Reply

Many newer non-hybrid cars make no noticable noise compared to the tyre's on the road. This is the case even at low speeds where road noise is lowest, and engine noise is potentially high. I find this road noise quite noticable in quiet environments. The problem is that these sounds are drowned out by quiet cars, not that quiet cars are quiet.

Reply

Aftermarket exhaust manufacturers should start thinking about their companies' survival by developing after market sound generators for electric cars.
By placing loud speakers in fake exhaust pipes and linking the pitch change to the accelerator and motor, unique, futuristic sounds could be generated, giving electric cars lots of street cred. Imagine downloading sound effects from the Star Wars Pod racers for example, now that would be cool!!!

Reply

The danger is of course real, but there has got to be another solution.
Noise pollution is as real problem as air pollution. Keeping a minuscule percentage of pedestrians a wee bit safer at the cost of keeping up or increasing the noise pollution for entire population is not an acceptable solution.
It is completely and utterly undemocratic.
Why cant there be a more reasonable technological solution, like ultrasound emitters that would be translated to audible beeps in earphones for blind people, or blind people employing ultrasonic rangers themselves when moving around ?
There are other solutions, portable sensors with enough computing power to analyze their signals competently are becoming cheap as dirt.
I'd propose that deploy range and speed sensors for blind en masse, either lidar-type or ultrasonic or whatever works out to be economic, its an available technology.

Reply

The solution is simple, inexpensive and at hand. It also will obviously apply to fuel-cell vehicles and pure electric vehicles.

Virtually all cars have an air conditioning system with condenser and fan. Simply program the fan to run at all times at the appropriately low speeds, as a noise-generator. No additional expense needed, no extra cost needed. Just a software change.

Yeah, it'll use up a little bit of energy, but for a good cause (the safety of some fellow human beings). If I thought that even a majority of humanity had any *(&*%* common sense, I'd say "put a switch on the car" but most people don't think or care, so it'd have to be automatic.

Believe me, the condenser fan in my Prius is loud enough to do the job, thought I can't hear it inside the car you certainly can outside the car.

Reply

Kert, your idea could "work the other way" so that a blind person could wear a small device which sends out a signal, and all modern quiet cars could have a receiver (perhaps the same type of tech already in place for the remote control locks, but obviously using a specific code or frequency). Then the condenser fan would come on appropriately only when NEEDED, cutting down on noise pollution when not necessary and reducing the energy loss. I think the system would also be very cost-effective. But there would have to be a single, world-wide "system" so that any blind person on vacation would have their emitter work and any cars would receive the signal anywhere the blind were walking. The added cost to the cars would be absolutely minimal, largely software with a hardware or software link between two systems already in place. Well, what do the rest of you readers think?

Reply

There is a noise producing device already on the car that warns pedestrians of impending collisions:
The horn.

Reply

This is absurd! Everyone on bicycles should be forced to make mooing sounds like cows just in case a blind person jumps out of a bush. The mooing sounds will alert the blind of the bicycle’s presence and calm the blind person at the same time just in case the blind person also has a heart condition. They should also carry defibulator, just in case. There are more people with heart conditions than blind people.

How about clipping playing cards to the wheels? There are those things that make high pitched noises that keep you from hitting a deer or a dog at night. With one sense down, maybe the others will be more sensitive? I know, pass a law that says if you come across a blind person when operating an electric vehicle, you should immediately stop. Get out of the car. Walk over to the blind person. Ask them in a polite tone if they would like to cross the street. It given an affirmative, you shall immediately pick-up that blind person and carry them to safety on the other side of the street. Punishment for disregarding this statute could lead to fines of $1,000.00 or 1 year in prison or both. There, problem solved! Your welcome.

Reply

Thanks to a couple of improvements in modern medicine, the number of blind people has rapidly decreased over the last four decades (1. more intelligent use of oxygen with newborns starting around 1952, and 2. better control of diabetes -- although the latter still needs lots of improvement, with better emphasis on prevention; but that's another rant).

While there are ways to make appropriate noises rather inexpensively, the most efficient and effective way to address the safety needs of a tiny (and shrinking) minority is to invent something that the blind person can use -- not legislate some stupid burden on the entire population. Making noise is the wrong approach.

This reminds me of the OSHA rules that require hearing protection in certain environments, and then require alarms to be loud enough to overpower whatever hearing protection is used. The actual specs were originally written so that it was not possible to be in compliance with both requirements (I understand that this was changed in response to a lawsuit).

Reply

Glenn, it could work that way too, whichever is more cost-effective or doable.
Having a range sensor on pedestrian side could have the added benefit of warning against other fast-moving dangers as well, bicycles etc, and in general i would think that audible range/speed sensor would help blind people.
It could be entirely passive system not requiring any cooperation from other party at all.

But wrangling added regulations and burdends on car users has obviously always been more fun, so an active system where both sides have to carry extra equipment could work too, and possibly have some benefits.

But resorting to something so low-tech and backwards like always-on audible sound is just horribly stupid and sorta like still being stuck in 18th century.

Damnit, i want my car to be silent so i can have a conversation or listen to music, and i want other cars around me to be silent as well. If the technology allows this, there definitely is technology available to help those that are unable to cope with that.

Reply

How about this: make it a nationwide rule that pedestrians have the right of way. When motorists see people crossing the street at a crosswalk or intersection, blind or not, they stop and let them go before they continue.

This would reduce accidents with all pedestrians and especially the blind. It's already in the books in many places but it's rarely enforced.

Reply

There are many moving dangers to blind people, not just cars. And noise pollution is a big problem. The solution is for drivers to respect crosswalks and stoplights, and for blind people to use handheld motion sensing devices.

Reply

On the ev discussion list, someone mentioned that the ev1 had 2 horns. One that was gentle and for pedestrians.

Reply

Toyota is using pulse width modulated fans, they are VERY quiet because they run slowly, and engineers are designing them to be quiet.

Their cheap models just don't have very good or much sound deadening.

Reply