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COMMENT PAGE FOR:
HTML James Moylan, engineer behind arrow signaling which side to refuel a car, dies
janosch_123 wrote 2 hours 28 min ago:
His letter is from 1986. Mercedes W123 and R107 clusters had triangles
pointing in the filler direction in the 1970s already. (Granted, not
quite as clear as his next iteration).
lovegrenoble wrote 2 hours 52 min ago:
Indian vehicles do not have this arrow.
mrnaught wrote 2 hours 42 min ago:
Are you sure ? Have been driving car myself when I visit. Since 2018
I donât recollect a car without that arrow.
delaminator wrote 3 hours 8 min ago:
Or make it so you can pump on both sides of the car, like we have.
cake-rusk wrote 3 hours 11 min ago:
Cars in India don't have this arrow. The inlet is always on the left
(passeger) side. I wonder if there is some regulation governing this.
Edit: though I have never seen / noticed any cars with the fuel inlet
on the driver's side some imported cars may have them.
I guess this is a first world problem.
ultratalk wrote 1 hour 9 min ago:
I live in India and what I've noticed is that the position of the
"refuel your car" fuel pump icon shows where the inlet is.
delaminator wrote 3 hours 7 min ago:
When I lived in India you bought petrol from the petrol station in 2
litre plastic bottles.
ultratalk wrote 1 hour 7 min ago:
People still do this here.
cake-rusk wrote 50 min ago:
Why?
cake-rusk wrote 3 hours 3 min ago:
Really? When was this?
delaminator wrote 34 min ago:
10 years ago, in Calangute.
cromka wrote 2 hours 36 min ago:
When they lived in India
f4c39012 wrote 4 hours 11 min ago:
I prefer the pump that is on the side of the petrol cap, but filling up
from either side absolutely works for me in the uk, there isn't a
"wrong side"
tlavoie wrote 3 hours 47 min ago:
One side is "wronger" when driving an unnecessarily large land yacht.
My Civic, it's fine.
spenjovewkwhalo wrote 4 hours 15 min ago:
Who knew? I always thought this was a UX lore, and it was subsequently
debunked.
luckydata wrote 4 hours 34 min ago:
That's funny, I know someone that's fairly famous in the product
development world that claimed to be the inventor of the gas pump
arrow. Weird thing to lie about.
mongol wrote 4 hours 38 min ago:
Is the side to fill up evenly balanced between cars in average? I
imagine there is value to make it close to 50/50 to simplify the
logistics at the gas station. I was thinking car manufacturers perhaps
had agreed so that some brands do it one way and some do it another
gambiting wrote 2 hours 9 min ago:
Why would it matter? Just park on any side, I've never been to a fuel
station where the hose wouldn't reach to the other side if needed. Or
since you said gas and not petrol, is that an American thing? Do you
guys have short hoses thah don't reach?
lazide wrote 2 hours 2 min ago:
We have big cars that itâs hard to get the fuel hose to get
around without scratching the paint (or not reaching at all).
LordHeini wrote 4 hours 0 min ago:
No the filler placement is sort of a cultural or historical thing.
Usually European cars have filler on the passenger side while
American and Japanese put them on the driver side.
Afaik passenger side fillers are more safe if you run out of gas and
need to fill up from a canister at the side of the road.
While driver side fillers are more comfortable because you don't have
to walk as far to get there.
b112 wrote 2 hours 37 min ago:
I recall looking at a car to buy, and the salesman toted the gas
cap on the right as the "safe side".
The logic was, if you run out of gas, you can refill on the side
away from traffic.
Dumbest design reasoning. Plan the side, for an event most people
never experience?! Or if they do, once... and maybe on a rural
dirt road, not necessarily a freeway.
Probably wanted an excuse for moving it.
mlrtime wrote 11 min ago:
It's also nice not having to worry about opening your door and
hitting the pump.
cromka wrote 2 hours 34 min ago:
Do you also hate airplane regulations for their dumbest
reasoning? You know, when they try to avoid one in a million
situation saving mere 200 people?
b112 wrote 1 hour 22 min ago:
While I have no issue with pulling up to the pump, I think many
would prefer to pull up driver on the pump side.
And there is zero indication it will save even one life a
decade.
Think of all the drivers pulling over and (gasp!) getting out
of their cars for other ressons.
zmgsabst wrote 4 hours 26 min ago:
Even if there was a single side for filling, direction of approach
being random is enough for 50/50 utilization of the pumps â so
Iâm not convinced thereâs a pressure to spread which side the
tank is on.
namdnay wrote 4 hours 10 min ago:
> direction of approach being random
is this specific to a country? I'm not sure I've ever seen a petrol
station that wasn't one-way
alibarber wrote 3 hours 37 min ago:
Huh, youâve got me thinking now.
Here in Finland at least there are a lot of completely unattended
pumps that once you exit the road itâs basically just a patch
of land and you pull up in whatever direction you want to match
the side of your tank to a free pump.
But in the UK where Iâm from and just got back from this is
maybe less common.
zmgsabst wrote 3 hours 40 min ago:
Iâm not sure Iâve ever seen one that was one-way; but my
experience is limited to US, MY, TH, and VN.
In those four at least, traffic can come from either direction so
you can have left-handed fills use both sides of a pump.
daveoc64 wrote 4 hours 39 min ago:
I'm from the UK and had honestly not heard of the arrow.
I've checked my Toyota Yaris, and it's there!
sodafountan wrote 4 hours 48 min ago:
My Dad explained to me what this symbol meant when I got my first car.
We went to get gas, and I had no idea that I pulled up on the wrong
side of the pump. He indicated that the symbol told you which side of
the car the gas tank was on.
It was a 1994 Ford Taurus.
sumoboy wrote 4 hours 50 min ago:
Nobody getting gas at Costco cares.
schmuckonwheels wrote 4 hours 47 min ago:
Most people do, with the exception of the woman awkwardly stretching
the long hose over the roof of her minivan, scratching it in the
process.
arjvik wrote 4 hours 52 min ago:
One of the many patron saints of engineers!
If he so believed in it, may his arrow be pointing up! :)
schmuckonwheels wrote 4 hours 57 min ago:
2020s UX "experts" would bury the entire instrument cluster under a
hamburger menu if they could get away with it.
The fuel gauge would be moved three menus deep and thus impossible to
find, then removed in subsequent model years when their telemetry data
"proved" no one used it anymore.
toast0 wrote 4 hours 17 min ago:
Most of the instrument cluster is superfluous. My 81 Vanagon has only
these and it's fine:
Speedometer (which starts at 10 mph and I've managed to adjust so
it's about right at 40ish but reports 70 mph when you're doing 60),
odometer (5.1 digits), fuel gauge (non-linear, but consistent, the
top half is a lot bigger than the bottom half, no arrow because it
hadn't been invented yet). And then some lights: brake warning lamp
(but the bulb is burnt out and doesn't seem replacable), high beam
indicator, alternator indicator, turn signal indicator (one led for
both directions!), low oil pressure indicator, and EGR indicator
which really just turns on 10,000 miles after you push the button on
the box under the front of the car.
Don't even need a tach, cause they put one dot on the speedo where
you should shift out of first, two dots where you should shift out of
second, and three dots where you should shift out of third.
The gauge lights come on when the headlights are on, so that's a
subtle indicator too, I guess.
Don't really need much more than that. There was an optional clock in
my model year, but mine doesn't have one.
b112 wrote 2 hours 43 min ago:
Speedometer could be due to different size tires.
fragmede wrote 3 hours 32 min ago:
It's all optional if you have enough mechanical empathy. No speedo,
oil light, odo, gas gauge. You just get a feel for how fast you're
going. You haven't really lived until you've ridden a salvage
titled motorcycle with zero instrument cluster across 17 without
headlights after the sun's gone down. Sometimes I'm surprised I
made it this long.
hexbin010 wrote 4 hours 21 min ago:
BMW would put it behind a subscription
unglaublich wrote 4 hours 42 min ago:
In the end, these engineers' job is make profit for the company. If
the customer allows for all this crap, and still buys
cars/fridges/tvs with such horrible UX, then it's the way forward.
schmuckonwheels wrote 4 hours 25 min ago:
>If the customer allows for all this crap
You imply they ever had a choice.
Companies like Tesla and Rivian pioneered the trend of bringing
webshit-as-an-instrument cluster to the mainstream. Other car
companies saw dollar signs, rode their coattails and immediately
copied it.
What is a customer supposed to do? Buy a Mitsubishi Mirage? Build
their own instrument cluster?
cornichon622 wrote 43 min ago:
Well personally I bought a used car which got out of the factory
in 2010 and has a gauge cluster which isn't a screen.
I see no reason to buy new instead of used, and I see no reason
why I would change my car to a newer one anytime soon.
I agree that automotive engineers do not work for the end
customer leading to shittier cars, but I also think that most
people are unable to vote with their wallet (or just don't care).
eastbound wrote 4 hours 50 min ago:
It drives usage up! Seriously, I wonder whether this âMake things
to annoy peopleâ trend is a normal situation, or an emerging
behavior due to our era, and whether it will be solved one day.
Example: In 2003 all UX was abominable, programs were ugly and black
and white and text and boring, then came the iPhone with the idea to
hire designers for apps, it was entirely new and absolutely unseen
before. It was necessary during the take off phase of our industry,
but are we simply witnessing the regression to normal, with UX being
driven by corporate suits?
apparent wrote 5 hours 1 min ago:
I was like 20 when I learned about this trick. Before then I'd only
driven a few vehicles, and I just knew which side of the car the gas
tank opening was on. A friend mentioned it when we were going to fill
up a car a borrowed car and I asked which side it was on.
I've since met many adults who were unaware of this trick. It's like
the real-world analog of an insufficiently discoverable UI
functionality.
tiku wrote 5 hours 23 min ago:
One of my previous cars didn't have the signaling arrow and I missed it
instantly. Such a subtle great idea.
tjr wrote 5 hours 23 min ago:
Wow! I just used this a few days ago when I rented a U-Haul van. Such a
great user interface element.
weinzierl wrote 5 hours 35 min ago:
It's a convenient little invention but "the fact that there wasn't a
simple way to know which side of a vehicle the gas tank was located on"
is not quite true.
Usually, if the vehicle is of Japanese or British origin, the cap is on
the left, otherwise it is on the right.
Source: Iâve driven dozens of different vehicle models all over
Europe for decades. This rule always worked well enough for me.
wombatpm wrote 6 hours 17 min ago:
Which is great for new cars. I drove a 78 Buick Riviera. Friends
couldnât figure out how to fill it up. Because the gas cap was behind
the license plate in the back!
waldrews wrote 6 hours 6 min ago:
Why didn't they just ask ChatGPT?
Oh wait.
charcircuit wrote 5 hours 52 min ago:
For those curious, the first sentence of the response from ChatGPT
gets it correct.
>On a 1978 Buick Riviera, the gas cap is hidden behind a flip-down
license plate on the rear bumper.
IncRnd wrote 4 hours 8 min ago:
That's not what I received from ChatGPT. This is:
The fuel filler door is on the left side (driverâs side) of the
vehicle. Therefore, the little arrow on the dash fuel gauge
should point to the left to indicate that.
(Most Buick Rivieras of that era had the fuel filler on the
driverâs side, though official Buick manuals or build sheets
from 1978 confirm this location.)
fragmede wrote 3 hours 30 min ago:
[1] Paid account, ChatGPT 5.2
Share the links, people!
HTML [1]: https://chatgpt.com/share/6957819f-b9d0-8009-a5d2-cfbd...
iancmceachern wrote 6 hours 17 min ago:
I use his arrow all the time. I'm also a Ford Truck Fan. RIP James.
londons_explore wrote 6 hours 21 min ago:
You can do a while lifetimes work, and yet sometimes it's a tiny action
like this which can have the biggest benefit to mankind.
Just think how many billions of times someone has avoided pulling up to
the wrong side of the pump because of this arrow - literal lifetimes of
effort saved.
jstanley wrote 3 hours 3 min ago:
What's wrong with pulling up to the wrong side of the pump? I do it
all the time when the petrol station is busy, just pull the hose over
to the other side and fuel the car anyway.
tpoacher wrote 2 hours 48 min ago:
just because there's nothing particularly wrong with only getting
the usb in on the 3rd try doesn't mean it's not a minor
inconvenience worth resolving.
but if you want a more dramatic example, it's right there in the
text: Moylan got soaked because of this inconvenience. if he'd
gotten a pneumonia as a result of this and died, then that is
suddenly much more than a minor inconvenience.
xnorswap wrote 2 hours 31 min ago:
There's a trick to USB, the block part (in the wire) is nearer
the ground. ( motherboard-side for vertical desktops )
Since learning that, I have the confidence to stick it in first
time rather than 3rd or 4th.
That's not to say that USB-C isn't a huge improvement that has
thankfully resolved having to know that.
bdbdbdb wrote 2 hours 17 min ago:
I like that usbc is double sided but I find them prone to pop
out a lot easier than standard usb. It's a weird ask but wish
they were bigger
CoastalCoder wrote 2 hours 54 min ago:
The hose won't always reach.
jstanley wrote 2 hours 53 min ago:
In my experience that's only true in TV adverts from my
childhood. I've never had one unable to reach in real life.
lazide wrote 2 hours 5 min ago:
Apparently you have a tiny car? Iâve never had a vehicle
(even a small Subaru) that they reached.
cromka wrote 2 hours 40 min ago:
Try in Europe
LtWorf wrote 1 min ago:
I live in europe. It does reach the other side.
gambiting wrote 2 hours 17 min ago:
I'm in Europe, the hoses always reach to the other side of
the car just fine. Or maybe you know, remember that Europe
isn't one country and actually say where you are.
Podrod wrote 1 hour 43 min ago:
Try in The World
looperhacks wrote 2 hours 24 min ago:
I live in Europe, never encountered a problem.
paganel wrote 2 hours 33 min ago:
I'm in Europe, in case you're on the "wrong" side of the pump
you just have to make sure that you park the car a little
further, so you'd get the pump hose through the back and on
to the other side without scratching the car's paint. That's
all it is to it. I'm from Romania and I've driven (and hence
re-fueled) my car all the way from Bretagne, France, to
Peloponnese, Greece, never had a problem.
I also don't know anything about any "arrow" signalling
anything in my dashboard, maybe it's only on the US-made
cars, I wouldn't know cause I generally know on which side I
have to fuel my car.
stavros wrote 2 hours 14 min ago:
Agreed about never having a problem with this, but our cars
either have the arrow, or the hose in the icon is on the
side of the car that has the tank cover. This has been true
for all cars I've seen here.
bdbdbdb wrote 2 hours 15 min ago:
I'm also in Europe, I drive a ford, and the only fuel arrow
on my dash actually points to the wrong side for filling
lostlogin wrote 6 hours 3 min ago:
The person (committee?) who came up with USB A needs sanctions.
And Apple Needs more, for putting power buttons and key ports at that
back.
stephenr wrote 4 hours 36 min ago:
Which rear facing "key port" on a Mac are you suggesting should be
on the front?
lostlogin wrote 4 hours 28 min ago:
> Which rear facing "key port" on a Mac are you suggesting should
be on the front?
USB.
I used iMacs, mini and pro machines. Any ports in the front would
be nice.
My m4 mini does have some front ports. Itâs less of an issue
now with usb-c but the iMac presumably still rear mounts them.
stephenr wrote 1 hour 15 min ago:
The Mac Studio has two of 6 TB/USB-C ports on the front, and
has since inception.
So does the Mac Pro (well technically they're on the top now)
and has on most models since the G5 PowerMac 20 years ago; The
single model without front/top ports was replaced in 2019.
So does the Mac mini has two front facing ports now.
So your complaint is essentially about the extremely
minimalist, consumer-oriented iMac, or maybe older Mac minis.
Ok. Don't buy an iMac or an old Mac mini then.
qwertytyyuu wrote 5 hours 33 min ago:
No the people who decided that usb 3.2 gen 2x2 and usb 4 version
2.0 gen 4x2 were acceptable names are the ones who should be
sanctioned
ryandrake wrote 4 hours 5 min ago:
I still don't know by memory whether USB full-speed or USB
high-speed is faster. Boy, tech people just can't name things.
fragmede wrote 3 hours 50 min ago:
Hey, when we said naming things was one of the hardest problems
in computer science, we were right!
pa7ch wrote 5 hours 38 min ago:
whats wrong with usb-a? I feels more sturdy and less likely to have
connection issues then usb-c in my experience.
lostlogin wrote 5 hours 8 min ago:
> whats wrong with usb-a?
Which way up it should go.
perilunar wrote 33 min ago:
USB-C is better than A in that it works in two orientations
instead of one, but the correct answer for connectors should be
any orientation â the best connectors are cylindrical
connectors: barrel plugs, RCA, BNC, banana, phono, TRS, TRRS,
etc. Just make them round.
skywhopper wrote 16 min ago:
Man, thereâs nothing more satisfying than the feel of a
quarter-inch TRS plug slotting in to a high quality jack.
Truly one of the great plug designs.
bmicraft wrote 2 hours 40 min ago:
The side with the holes. That's true for 95% of devices, with
one of the few major exceptions being cheap chinese powerbanks
1718627440 wrote 1 hour 14 min ago:
Also the side that has the logo on.
saagarjha wrote 1 hour 34 min ago:
Which requires being able to see the plug.
YeahThisIsMe wrote 52 min ago:
As with most plugs that came before it.
silisili wrote 4 hours 15 min ago:
Simple. The third way you try, always.
thih9 wrote 4 hours 29 min ago:
Where the logo is.
lostlogin wrote 4 hours 26 min ago:
And when the port is vertical and you canât see it?
Iâm surprised how tolerable people seemed to find Apples
rear ports.
thaumasiotes wrote 4 hours 34 min ago:
It's very weird that USB-C solved the problem of "we can't tell
which way to insert the plug" by mandating that both
orientations should work, as opposed to just making the
exterior of the plug as asymmetrical as the interior.
haritha-j wrote 2 hours 35 min ago:
sometimes you're plugging in things at the back of something
nearly flush against a wall and you can't really see, its
quite useful for the connector to be reversible.
iainmerrick wrote 4 hours 7 min ago:
You mean something like HDMI? If youâve ever tried to plug
one of those into the back of a TV, youâll know itâs
still pretty difficult to get it the right way up.
thaumasiotes wrote 3 hours 9 min ago:
> If youâve ever tried to plug one of those into the back
of a TV, youâll know itâs still pretty difficult to get
it the right way up.
That's true, but the difficulty in that case comes from
being unable to see the hole or fit into the space between
the television and the wall.
For example, plugging an HDMI cable into the back of a
monitor involves none of the difficulty of plugging an HDMI
cable into the back of a TV, even though the connector and
the port are the same in both cases.
briansm wrote 2 hours 5 min ago:
At least HDMI is a 'low frequency' connector, often only
ever plugged in once, as opposed to USB (or refueling a
car)
bdbdbdb wrote 2 hours 13 min ago:
I bought a cheap USB hub so I don't have to reach behind
the TV to plug things in
dxdm wrote 4 hours 17 min ago:
I don't find it weird. Not even having to work out a correct
orientation is a great convenience. The micro-USB connection
(or is it "min"?), which I need to fiddle with to charge some
older gadgets, is a testament to how annoying an "asymetric
exterior" plug can still be.
lostlogin wrote 4 hours 9 min ago:
With micro USB you end up with damaged plugs and ports in
my experience.
rounce wrote 3 hours 16 min ago:
Yes, micro USB is far too flimsy for a lot of things
itâs used for from what Iâve observed. The connector
seems to have a lot of leverage for ripping its tracks
off, but often not a great mechanical connection to the
board.
asplake wrote 4 hours 21 min ago:
Less weird as they get smaller. Call it an accessibility
thing if you like, but I think it's better for everyone and
congrats to them. Isn't this what technology is supposed to
do, make things easier?
schmuckonwheels wrote 4 hours 55 min ago:
PS/2, which USB all but replaced, solved this by visually
keying one side of the connector as flat.
1718627440 wrote 1 hour 13 min ago:
And USB solved it by having the logo on the upper side.
gambiting wrote 2 hours 15 min ago:
And I have more than once bent the tiny pins by trying to
orient the plug by feel, and it was a nightmare to fix it
afterwards.
sitharus wrote 5 hours 5 min ago:
The other way
onion2k wrote 4 hours 45 min ago:
No, the other other way.
hexbin010 wrote 4 hours 22 min ago:
It's almost impressive that they designed a port that feels
so wrong when you actually get it right
lostlogin wrote 4 hours 10 min ago:
I worked in an IT department at one time and encountered
USB-A plugs forced into Ethernet ports.
It seems so unlikely that Iâve just searched it to see
if itâs possible, but am getting no hits.
lefra wrote 3 hours 6 min ago:
My laptop has one of these ethernet ports that half
close when not in use. It doesn't work anymore because
someone mistook it for the USB port that's right next
to it when distractingly plugging their keyboard in.
fragmede wrote 3 hours 30 min ago:
no, they definitely fit. They're just awkwardly exactly
the right size that while you're trying to plug things
in punched over under the desk and crawling around and
feeling around the backside; it just yeah.
ryanjshaw wrote 6 hours 24 min ago:
Anybody else get confused by whether the arrow represents where the car
should be or the pump?
Taek wrote 48 min ago:
The arrow indicates where the hole is.
Revisional_Sin wrote 2 hours 52 min ago:
Yeah, it's a bit counter-intuitive.
mongol wrote 4 hours 44 min ago:
I do. It is not obvious in any case
KellyCriterion wrote 5 hours 5 min ago:
Isnt it that nowadays usually on the side of the driving seat? Or
does this apply only to EU vehicles?
Im not a regular car user, if at all Im renting - but the last 10
times(?) it was always just on the side of the driving seat
Sebb767 wrote 3 hours 9 min ago:
Usually, it will be where the passenger side is in the cars home
market. That is left for Japanese and British vehicles and right
for US and German ones.
Fun fact, for single exhaust cars, the exhaust will usually be on
the driver side, in order to route around the fuel tank :-)
onion2k wrote 4 hours 40 min ago:
Isnt it that nowadays usually on the side of the driving seat? Or
does this apply only to EU vehicles?
That would mean designing two separate entire fuel tank placements,
fuel lines, etc for cars that are available both in left- and
right-hand drive variants, with different SKUs for each of the
parts needed. There is no way a car manufacturer would do that.
tripledry wrote 4 hours 43 min ago:
Im not aware of such a convention, I'm in the EU and most cars I've
owned or driven has it on the opposite side of the driving seat.
Might just be a coincidence
scott_w wrote 4 hours 38 min ago:
Itâs a coincidence because the UK uses the same cars and ours
are mostly on the same side (because weâre right hand drive
where youâre left hand drive).
apparent wrote 5 hours 3 min ago:
I think it depends. Especially with PHEVs, which also have a charge
port, whose location is determined by charging infrastructure, and
which is not IME on the same side as the gas tank opening.
dmead wrote 3 hours 16 min ago:
My phev has charging and gas on the same side. I'm american
gambiting wrote 2 hours 11 min ago:
My PHEV has charging and fuel ports on opposite sides. Volvo
XC60.
sublinear wrote 6 hours 7 min ago:
I agree. As much as people appreciate the factoid, it's not an
example of good design.
I don't ever recall the arrow being paid attention to until listicles
and other blog spam were born. It has all the elements of great
clickbait.
jquery wrote 4 hours 51 min ago:
Itâs terrible design. Until I encountered one of these listicles
I had no idea what that arrow was.
mayneack wrote 5 hours 19 min ago:
I use it regularly
gk1 wrote 5 hours 50 min ago:
I actually use it all the time when driving a rental.
jquery wrote 4 hours 50 min ago:
That isnât in conflict with it being bad design.
mschild wrote 3 hours 8 min ago:
True. Though im unsure of what would be a better one. Doesnt
get much simpler than an arrow.
Id think that for a car you own you wouldnt need it after the
first few times though.
chillstreem wrote 2 hours 10 min ago:
a better solution would have been to have an industry wide
standard icon for the fuel inlet and then an arrow would
point on which side of the vehicle it is. The way it is now
with the pump icon really can be confusing. If the arrow is
pointing right, it seems to be suggesting the driver should
go to the right of the pump which is obviously wrong.
I like the way EVs have the squiggly hose icon and that tells
you everyting.it doesn't depict the charger station, but the
plug point on the vehicle.
mhdhn wrote 5 hours 20 min ago:
I use it all the time because I switch between a lot of different
cars a lot, and my memory is not that great.
michaelmdresser wrote 6 hours 18 min ago:
I think this is the source of me misinterpreting the symbol a few
times, so yes.
LoFiSamurai wrote 6 hours 20 min ago:
No
anigbrowl wrote 6 hours 32 min ago:
Why would you not just always put it on the driver's side, since
they're the most likely to be doing the refueling?
npunt wrote 5 hours 58 min ago:
safest place is put it opposite of drivers side, because if you're
out of gas on the side of the road and filling it up, you won't be
standing right next to freeway traffic. Saab started this.
nullhole wrote 5 hours 44 min ago:
A linked article agrees:
"... many European cars have the fuel door located on the
passenger side, while many Japanese and American vehicles have the
fuel door on the driver side. Both techniques have valid reasons.
European automakers place the fuel filler on the passenger side for
the sake of safety when a vehicle has run out of fuel and has
pulled off onto the shoulder of the road to fill up from a
canister. Meanwhile, American OEMs tend to place the fuel door on
the driver side of the vehicle for convenience reasons, so that a
driver doesn't have to walk around the vehicle when filling up at a
gas station."[0]
Brings to mind the Dead Kennedys album name, "Give Me Convenience
or Give Me Death"
[0]
HTML [1]: https://fordauthority.com/2020/08/ford-designer-credited-f...
KellyCriterion wrote 5 hours 3 min ago:
thank you, didnt know that, although Im in EU :-))
charcircuit wrote 5 hours 46 min ago:
Is that actually safer? Both you and drivers lose visibility which
in my mind makes it more dangerous.
fourtwentynine wrote 6 hours 17 min ago:
My plug-in hybrid (Audi Q5) has the electric connector on the rear
left (driverâs side) and the gasoline inlet on the rear right. I
sure plug in way more than fill up.
The fuel side indicator is quite helpful to me.
apparent wrote 4 hours 58 min ago:
Funny, my PHEV had it on the opposite side. Did you find it
difficult to charge at stations, which are often designed for
front-left or rear-right charge ports?
netsharc wrote 6 hours 20 min ago:
And which side is the driver side? Surprise, it depends on the
country. And a Japanese car manufacturer will move the driver
controls to sell cars in USA/Continental Europe, but flipping
everything else will cost more.
I've driven 2 models of an Italian brand, my previous car had the gas
tank on the passenger side, and my current one has it on the driver
side. I do wonder why they changed it.
There's also the issue of pulling to a small road side petrol
station, having the fuel door on the passenger side means you don't
have to be standing next to the busy road while refuelling.
globular-toast wrote 4 hours 50 min ago:
I live in the UK (drive on the left) and my Honda had it on the
passenger side while my VW has it on the driver's side.
wickedsight wrote 4 hours 54 min ago:
> I do wonder why they changed it.
Depending on model years, it could have something to do with Fiat
merging with Chrysler in 2014. European brands usually have them on
the passenger's side, while US brands have them on the driver's
side. Maybe that new Fiat was designed in the US.
thomassmith65 wrote 5 hours 49 min ago:
As it should be. If the Globalist cabal had their way, everyone
would drive on the same side of the road (like mindless assembly
line workers) and traffic signs would be completely standardized,
and - yes - the fuel filler would be on the same side of every car
(welcome to a monotonous Communist dystopia). They already came for
Sweden ('Dagen H' Plan. Do your own research) /s
arijun wrote 6 hours 22 min ago:
What happens when they sell the car in a country that drives on the
other side of the road? They would have to move everything around.
aryonoco wrote 4 hours 48 min ago:
They donât. It stays on the same side as it was. They donât
move the bonnet opening lever or the indicator stalk either.
chongli wrote 5 hours 59 min ago:
They could design the fuel tank to be symmetrical about the axis
parallel to the carâs axels. This would let it be flipped during
installation at the factory to have the refueling port facing
either side. Then the only difference would be the body panel and
little door that covers the gas cap.
sitharus wrote 5 hours 1 min ago:
Many (mostly European and North American) manufacturers canât
even be bothered flipping the indicator and light controls
around, thereâs no way theyâd flip the whole fuel tank.
kube-system wrote 5 hours 5 min ago:
They could but there are downstream packaging compromises that
would cause. It is easier to design the vehicle without imposing
that design constraint on yourself
deathanatos wrote 6 hours 52 min ago:
What a letter. Clear, concise, just chef's kiss. I love that little
indicator.
phibz wrote 6 hours 56 min ago:
On cars without the arrow they often follow the convention where the
gas filler handle is depicted on the same side of the gas icon as the
filler door is in the car.
whiteboardr wrote 3 hours 46 min ago:
That was the original idea on how the icon should be used but
obviously too subtle.
Moylan basically added a modifier icon for clarity.
pants2 wrote 5 hours 0 min ago:
I've heard that the gauge always points towards the side the cap is
on when pointing to empty
anjel wrote 4 hours 24 min ago:
Far too subtle
nutjob2 wrote 6 hours 51 min ago:
First time I've heard of that convention.
snozolli wrote 3 hours 17 min ago:
Because it's a myth. It used to go around Reddit regularly.
There's even a Snopes entry:
HTML [1]: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/fuel-icon-foolery/
markus_zhang wrote 7 hours 7 min ago:
I only knew it because someone talked about that. Very useful. RIP.
celeritascelery wrote 7 hours 9 min ago:
I had no idea till this moment thatâs what the arrow was forâ¦
acheron wrote 6 hours 15 min ago:
I didnât know it was possible to not know this.
mlrtime wrote 12 min ago:
Relevant
HTML [1]: https://xkcd.com/1053/
dmead wrote 3 hours 14 min ago:
I'm in my 40s and just learned this right now.
phantasmish wrote 4 hours 49 min ago:
Nobody ever told me and I drove my first car for a long time,
rarely drove other peopleâs cars, and did not have the kind of
lifestyle that either supported or required rental cars.
I found out around age 35, I think. From reading it online. Iâve
told a bunch of people who didnât know.
apparent wrote 4 hours 57 min ago:
Who taught you? I didn't know until my 20s and have met many adults
who didn't know.
AlotOfReading wrote 6 hours 6 min ago:
I've encountered a few cars where the arrow points to the wrong
side, and it's quite subtle if no one tells you.
nutjob2 wrote 6 hours 49 min ago:
I'm sure about 99% of people are in the same boat.
kirubakaran wrote 6 hours 4 min ago:
The signage is for cars, not boats.
KineticLensman wrote 3 hours 7 min ago:
But they are still all at sea
cf100clunk wrote 5 days ago:
A couple of other links: [1]
HTML [1]: https://archive.ph/pluwT
HTML [2]: https://www.jalopnik.com/2061179/inventor-little-arrow-what-si...
toomuchtodo wrote 6 days ago:
âMoylan arrowâ [1]
HTML [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_gauge#Moylan_arrow
HTML [2]: https://www.vermeulenfh.com/obituaries/james-moylan-2/#!/Obitu...
rationalist wrote 6 hours 55 min ago:
Another car thing that is named after someone: [1] Also known as the
"Window Sticker"
HTML [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monroney_sticker
onionisafruit wrote 6 hours 46 min ago:
Mansfield bars too, if you donât mind getting ghoulish
rationalist wrote 6 hours 39 min ago:
I have never heard of that name before, and had to do a search.
In case anyone else wants info too:
HTML [1]: https://www.getgordon.com/faqs/what-is-mansfield-bar/
onionisafruit wrote 6 hours 27 min ago:
Sorry that was thoughtless of me to not provide a link
DIR <- back to front page