Why do modern cars have wing mirrors?
Discussion
imagineifyeswill said:
MOT regulation, every road vehicle must be fitted with 2 mirrors, one of which must be an o/s door mirror the other can be interior mirror or n/s door mirror.
I suspect that's only true for MoTs if the car was originally fitted with them. The problem is European type approval. 
sounds like the future I reckon.^^^^^^
The Road Vehicles (Construction and Use) Regulations 1986 as amended by various bits of EU law. So would need a change in the law to do away with mirrors.
Full version here: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1986/1078/part/...
The Road Vehicles (Construction and Use) Regulations 1986 as amended by various bits of EU law. So would need a change in the law to do away with mirrors.
Full version here: http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1986/1078/part/...
We have cars at work with video interior and exterior mirrors.
Both have LCD screens.
Exterior mirror replacement screens are fitted for test in various places...centrally. at the top of each door, in the center display (radio area), part of the speedo area etc.
Legislation is due 2018/19 for interior, later for exterior.
Lots of manufacturers are researching this.
Both have LCD screens.
Exterior mirror replacement screens are fitted for test in various places...centrally. at the top of each door, in the center display (radio area), part of the speedo area etc.
Legislation is due 2018/19 for interior, later for exterior.
Lots of manufacturers are researching this.
Previous topic
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=2&a...
Audi replacement mirror, fitted. Circa £750. Rear camera system from Maplin £20. No contest really.
http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=2&a...
Audi replacement mirror, fitted. Circa £750. Rear camera system from Maplin £20. No contest really.
caelite said:
Why the hell would you want to replace a cheap, easy to fix, simple as hell piece of reflective glass with an electronic gizmo? As someone who works on there own vehicles that just seems like pure insanity. Car manufacturers need to stop needlessly overcomplicating everything.
I'm not convinced mirrors are the biggest symptom of that.Pit Pony said:
The law says we have to have wing mirrrors because the law was written when such technology as might produce an alternative wasn't even in books of a science fictional nature. The question is, WHEN driverless cars are legislated for, will they also be required to have mirrors ?
That would be fairly silly if they do if they have no means of human control. 
An awful lot of rules will have to change for driverless cars but whether those same rules will be reevaluated for human controlled cars remain sot be seen.
caelite said:
Why the hell would you want to replace a cheap, easy to fix, simple as hell piece of reflective glass with an electronic gizmo? As someone who works on their own vehicles that just seems like pure insanity. Car manufacturers need to stop needlessly over complicating everything.
It happened with hand brakes, didn't it?
As someone who works 'in this area' there's quite a few reasons for it, and it's not cost or as simple as a law requiring mirrors.
Firstly it's about safety. Several key issues arise when you switch to video feed. Depth perception, latency, reliability and Quality.
Depth perception can be defeated using some fancy displays, but these impact the other safety reasons.
Latency is difficult to specify. Some people believe you need less than 100 ms, and this isn't difficult on a simple cable-speed design. But if you start adding analogue-digital processing, or any enhancements (like overlays, or alerts) then you add more delay into the string. I'm not aware of any legal limit as yet, hence if you get it wrong then you leave yourself open for litigation, even if you're road-legal!
Reliability, mirrors rarely fail! They survive all weather conditions easily and usually only fail due to collision. Cameras fail, processors fail, and displays fail. They may not be catastrophic, but you're not going to want to do a soft reset on the motorway at 70 mph.
Quality is measured using DRI (detection (something is there), recognition (it's a person) and identification(it's Bob!)). On reversing cameras (that are generally quite low quality) you only need to detect, so that you avoid reversing into the wall that you already knew was there. A wing-camera would be required to detect + recognise a car, but also identify it as an emergency vehicle. That's difficult when you're looking at light levels from 0.1 lux upto 100,000 lux!
So it's as simple as having litigation that states you can use a device other than a mirror, because unless all this is in litigation then the manufacturer leaves themselves open to litigation in the case of a traffic incident. Which might be one reason why the VW XL1 is somewhat limited in it's release, I imagine there's a fat disclaimer that comes with it.
Firstly it's about safety. Several key issues arise when you switch to video feed. Depth perception, latency, reliability and Quality.
Depth perception can be defeated using some fancy displays, but these impact the other safety reasons.
Latency is difficult to specify. Some people believe you need less than 100 ms, and this isn't difficult on a simple cable-speed design. But if you start adding analogue-digital processing, or any enhancements (like overlays, or alerts) then you add more delay into the string. I'm not aware of any legal limit as yet, hence if you get it wrong then you leave yourself open for litigation, even if you're road-legal!
Reliability, mirrors rarely fail! They survive all weather conditions easily and usually only fail due to collision. Cameras fail, processors fail, and displays fail. They may not be catastrophic, but you're not going to want to do a soft reset on the motorway at 70 mph.
Quality is measured using DRI (detection (something is there), recognition (it's a person) and identification(it's Bob!)). On reversing cameras (that are generally quite low quality) you only need to detect, so that you avoid reversing into the wall that you already knew was there. A wing-camera would be required to detect + recognise a car, but also identify it as an emergency vehicle. That's difficult when you're looking at light levels from 0.1 lux upto 100,000 lux!
So it's as simple as having litigation that states you can use a device other than a mirror, because unless all this is in litigation then the manufacturer leaves themselves open to litigation in the case of a traffic incident. Which might be one reason why the VW XL1 is somewhat limited in it's release, I imagine there's a fat disclaimer that comes with it.
Pit Pony said:
The law says we have to have wing mirrrors because the law was written when such technology as might produce an alternative wasn't even in books of a science fictional nature. The question is, WHEN driverless cars are legislated for, will they also be required to have mirrors ?
No, British and UN legislation now permits the use of 'devices that allow vision to the side and rear of the vehicle'. However, there are issue with this, as I state above.I'm quite happy with using a mirror, anything else is just a total over complication and creation of more safety flaws
And more cost and clutter, don't even like sat nav screens at night, how bright would the screen be at night,
will it work in fog ? Because most cameras don't or can't deal with fog in my limited experience
And more cost and clutter, don't even like sat nav screens at night, how bright would the screen be at night,
will it work in fog ? Because most cameras don't or can't deal with fog in my limited experience
loose cannon said:
I'm quite happy with using a mirror, anything else is just a total over complication and creation of more safety flaws
And more cost and clutter, don't even like sat nav screens at night, how bright would the screen be at night,
will it work in fog ? Because most cameras don't or can't deal with fog in my limited experience
The future could include a Thermal Camera that would provide vision in conditions a visible-spectrum camera/mirror couldn't match.And more cost and clutter, don't even like sat nav screens at night, how bright would the screen be at night,
will it work in fog ? Because most cameras don't or can't deal with fog in my limited experience
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