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Vehicles with strange controls.


cros

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No assurance needed. The first Sherpa 4 speeder seemed fine to me and a vast improvement on the infamous cable operated thing in my previous JU250. The LT77 was a retrograde step (apart from its extra ratio) and after a few years it's exposed mechanism tacked to the rear could make finding any gear difficult. I believe in 4 speed form it even pre-dated the first Sherpa's Austin 3 litre derived gearbox. BL magic.

I've not owned a Sherpa with the R380 box but will get over it.

Fully agree - even a shagged 5-speed Sherpa has a vastly superior gearchange to a JU250.  A vastly superior most things, in fact.  I did not find the JU250 a pleasant van to drive.

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You guys are amateurs. Five speed friction drive. Start it (on the handle) in any gear.

Hand throttle only.

Select first gear via outside lever (without touching any pedals).

Depress the ratcheted 'clutch' pedal to engage drive. The ratchet then holds it in drive until you release it.

The brake pedal is also ratcheted, so it's possible to to essentially lock it in drive AND lock the brake on in a moment of befuddlement.

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I was born too late to experience the mixture and advance controls on any cars, but have come across two oddities.

First getting into a Standard 10 and finding only two pedals, otherwise known as Standrive which was mentioned earlier. The clutch was operated by a button on the top of the gear lever and I think a pneumatically operated clutch. That took a few minutes to get the gear changes right.

T'other was a late 30's Packard with the system the other way round from Standrive. It had a clutch pedal but no US style huge gear stick. The gears were selected by a small lever much like a horizontal sliding heater control on the dashboard, with a Ferrari style gate pattern. Moving that changed gears by either hydraulics or phewmatics.

Other than that there was only a Bentley with a RHS gearlever which was only awkward to use and a Wolseley 110 manual with Overdrive. That could do clutchless changes when the o/d was engaged.

Does anyone else still miss the floor mounted dip switch ?

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Im far too young to remember any of this stuff, but my earliest memories of weird stuff are Mercedes from early 1990s/early 2000s with only 1 stalk, wipers, washers, indicators and headlight flash all on the 1 stalk, that took a bit of getting used to.

 

On the same cars, plus I think Volvo XC90s right up until recently, pull handle in the dash to release handbrake, and a small pedal in the footwell right close to the centre console to apply the handbrake.

 

Lexus, I think including the current CT200H where its only of those small pedals to apply and release the handbrake.

 

And although not designed in at the factory, I remember driving this Astra H 1.8 auto estate converted for someone whos legs were obviously paralysed, basicall what you had was a handle under the steering wheel like an umbrella handle, with massive torx bolts holding a bracket it was attached to, into the steering column, the handle was then attached to 2 metal rods which were held around the accelerator and brake pedal with brackets, pulling the umbrella handle thing towards you pushed down on the accelerator to make the car go faster, pushing it away from you pressed down on the brake pedal to slow it down, this thing was frightening, and for fear of decking the brake pedal and putting yourself through the windscreen, or pressing down too much on the accelerator and nearly rattling into the back of another car because trying to get the same feel on the accelerator and brake with your hand as you would your feet was impossible for me, so you ended up bunnyhopping down the road, you couldnt even just use your feet on the pedals because the metal rods for this hand operated thing totally obstructed them and you would just smash your legs off them so you just had to sit with your legs bent like you would as a passenger. I think if I needed that to use a car id be so weirded out id probably just totally give up driving. 

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That reminded me. How about a Minor with the steering wheel on the floor. I saw the car as it belonged to a prominent real estate agent in my home town. No idea how the controls worked but I do know he had very limited use of his arms, not enough to steer the car, so he steered with his feet using a disc thingy where the brake and clutch should be.

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Does anyone else still miss the floor mounted dip switch ?

I don't because luckily all but one of my vehicles have one. I do however feel cheated in having two Morriseyspost-7547-0-66702800-1499926308.jpgpost-7547-0-66702800-1499926308.jpg neither of which have the 'Wilcot Robot' signalling system which the company adopted in the '30's.

If I was really bothered they can still be found as people quickly removed them when they discovered that other motorists didn't need to have prior notice that you were considering making a turn but hadn't decided which way yet. The control for all this was suitably complicated and included a clockwork timer.

 

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post-7547-0-98949100-1499946656_thumb.jpg

 

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When I worked at a Saab dealership in the early 90's they got a mk2 escort in for part ex that was owned by a one legged gent that was missing his right leg which meant the accelerator pedal was on the left of the brake pedal.

 

Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE right up to the owner had a go in that car!

 

Also, Saab 900's with the key in the centre and the need to put it in reverse to get the key out.

 

That stumped me the first time I drove one!

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With as many controls as possible in the centre of the steering wheel might as well bung the Speedo there as well.

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Ah Foden PVD6! Well, if you include buses there's the Guy preselect that looks exactly like a conventional manual box set up except you select the gear first then "dip" the left pedal to select it. Or more recently there's the MCW Metrorider minibus with a five speed manual gearbox (for city work ffs) that had a reverse gate so bad that to get fifth gear you had to leave your seat. What about some semi automatics that didn't have a gear selector but a series of buttons by the side of the cab? The wonderful Midland Red C5 motorway coach that had a David Brown five speed gearbox with a W change pattern. That's fun, I had a spin in one of the preserved ones a few years back and most of the time was spent shouting to the owner "where the fuck is third?" Then back to Guys, there was a series of manual gearbox Arab double decks, some were delivered with a conventional crash box but some had a reverse gate and the only time you knew which way round the box was, was when you tried to pull away in third...oh almost forgot, the wonderful Bristol five speed box where fifth was only achievable by going through fourth, across to the right then forwards to select. Up the box was okay but if you missed fourth coming back down, the only way to achieve forward momentum was to stop the bus and fidget the lever back through fourth gear to the conventional "H" gate bit so first could be selected.

Trolleybuses has the throttle pedal on the left where the clutch usually was and the brake on the right. Very early trolleybuses (we're talking 1920s here) didn't have a throttle at all but a tramway type hand controller to the left of the driver who was expected to steer and control the speed.

On the gate change Scammells, some older drivers used to take the plate off on purpose because they found the gear change easier. The next guy jumped in and promptly found a gearbox full of neutrals!

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Going to the trouble of the additional linkage required to position the gearlever on the right of the driver in a RHD car is perverse enough. Some BMC barges were so equipped in the 50's, but they managed to leave room for entry. How the fuck Bentley got away with building cars where you were obliged to slide across and leave by the same route as the passenger, and quite why their body-builders fitted a driver's door at all is beyond me.

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Smiths heater like S1/S2 LRs?

Looks like it. I like the way the switches are sprinkled around. The lower two look like they belong on a motorbike handlebars, i've come across them on other commercials. The brake and clutch pedals are at wildly different heights for some reason.

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choose the gear and  then do the change  by  hitting the change pedal / button ?

Or with mechanical preselect on commercials, press the gear change pedal down for it to propel you vertically upwards through the cab roof as a false neutral has just been selected.

Needless to say the selection pedal eventually was propelled by air until the semi automatic box, or to give it its proper title, the Wilson direct acting preselective gearbox, took over.

Thinking of pre-select boxes, nobody has mentioned the car pre selection boxes as favoured by racers. These had no clutch or fluid coupling at all and relied on the slipping of the brake bands in the gearbox to start from rest.

How about the French Cotal box where a miniature gear lever and gate was mounted on the steering colum, very much like what was later seen on commercials.

I digress. Thinking back to strange controls, my 1957 Wartburg 311 had a fourth pedal to operate the central chassis lubrication system or the hykomat (?) Trabant built for the, ahem, less abled of society, had a micro switch incorporated in the gear lever that disengaged the clutch using vacuum. However there was still a clutch pedal for use in times of failure but it worked in reverse, as you pressed it down to engage drive and released it to allow you to change gear. Luckily it was on a ratchet so you didn't have to keep it pressed to drive.

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If we're including stuff other than cars...

 

No. 1 was a 80s Belarus tractor in which all labels and instructions were cryllic and one of the gear levers went in a sort of half-moon shift pattern. 

 

Ford tractors could be a bit of a pig. The early 80s smaller tractors had a column shift that was affectionately known as the "Rubik's Cube". Basically Ford's tractor boffins had installed syncro but couldn't easily manage a standard 'H' pattern shift so came up with their own. It was universally hated and ford did figure out a work-around for it. I can't find a picture but it looked a bit like

 

4

I

I- - -N

I       I

3      I

        I

        N

        I

2      I

I       I

I- - -N

I       

1

 

With H - L - R on another shorter column lever and then 'Dual Power' (like a splitter gear) on a rocker switch on the dash.

 

The big 6 cylinder Fords had a floor-shift, full crash box in a H pattern but with second next to first, third below first, fourth out to the right and reverse where you'd expect to find fourth, and High/Low on a seperate lever. Once you got the hang of them they were wicked - only use the clutch to pull away and stop - but for newcomers were a right sod. We used to call them 'Grrr Grrr' boxes. Later they were all H pattern syncros or powershift, nowhere near as much fun.

 

Truck wise, Fuller 9 speed could be as above until you got used to it. Eaton twin split is superb but completely different to drive from anything else. Glided round a roundabout a few times in neutral.... 

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Ergonomics for the Edwardian workman. Forward/reverse motion, throttle, combustion control and aqua management for the left hand; sporty straight-cut short-shift transmission and mandraulic direction control for the right. Foot operated auxiliary H2O control and 'kick it' technology applied to the door to the hot burny bit. Observe the prominent puff gauge and twin glass columns to keep an eye on the kettle working level.

 

Brake wheel offers somewhere to sit and little else. Ear plugs a modern requirement.

 

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Try a T60 or B90,  Four speed sequential straight cut gearbox so no synchro. To go from fourth to first you have to go through third then second with double declutching by blipping a twostroke engine.

 

 

 

attachicon.gifberkeley.jpg

Must be a Berkeley. Was the 3 cylinder done just for them?

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