LEAF's Shifter Knob is backwards

look at the post above by Yanquetino with the pictures, the Gen 2 Prius HAD the shifter on the dashboard, on the Gen 3 Prius, Toyota moved to a "console like" shifter,right smack between the driver and passenger. I know, I have owned both. I prefered the Gen 2's on the dashboard, the new one is always in my way, and I feel "constrained" in the car..

BTW, the Gen 1 Prius has the shifter on the steering column, old school (it was a mechanical linkage)

Nissan could have gone for a Gen 2 Prius feel, the dashboard shifter worked just fine, and has indicator lights on the display to show the selection.

I think the shifter should be on the ceiling of the cabin. Moving it to the left would be Forward and moving it to the right would be Reverse. On Japanese national holidays it would be the other way around, except leap years or years divisible by three. Moving the shifter forward would be simulated engine braking with the energy going to recharge the battery. If the battery is full, the shifter would be blocked from moving forward and a Morse code N (dash, dot) for NO would be beeped by the car's chime. At that point, moving the shifter toward the starboard bow would be simulated engine braking with the energy sent to the car's resistive heater but vented to the outside to avoid overheating the cabin, while moving it toward the port stern would be simulated engine braking with the energy sent to the car's resistive heater and vented into the cabin for cold weather. Moving it toward the rear of the car would be simulated engine braking with the energy used to operate the air conditioner to cool the car in hot weather. Moving the shifter toward the port bow or the starboard stern would activate a loud siren and a hysterical voice (programmable to be male or female) would shout "Please do not move the shifter to this position!"

Aside from the obvious advantages of this system, it would make it impossible for anyone to steal the car without first having learned how to use it.

Azrich said:

All cars with a center gearshift are "backwards".

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But why can't the LEAF be different, more intuitive?

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EXACTLY!!!!!! I'm sure a lot more people are confused by pushing it forward to go backward and vice-versa than there will be people who say 'Gee, the 1960's European sports cars had reverse left and up and first left and down so that is what I want on every car I own in my lifetime.

One of the brilliant Prius Gen II features was the "it doesn't matter what the transmission is set to 'now', the motion to get to any specific 'gear' is always the same" shifter. The shifter on the Prius II is on the dash, out of the way, reachable without moving your hand off the wheel more than an inch or two. The perfect place for it since you don't need to touch it all that often. But up for reverse is not intuitive. When they moved the shifter to the STUPID waste of space arch on the Gen III, it became totally counter intuitive.

I was REALLY hoping Nissan wasn't as stupid with the 'forward to go backward' shifter but discovered many months ago that my hope was unfounded. At least the Leaf doesn't have the Prius III arch so the cockpit isn't as claustrophobic. Still, they wasted WAY too much space for the shifter and the arm rest is nothing more than an elbow rest given its position well back from the front of the seat.

LTLFTcomposite said:

Every time I see one of these threads where people think this or that should be improved I start to worry somebody from Nissan will see it and decide to slip the schedule redesigning stuff.

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They won't, it is functional as designed. However, I (stupidly) hope the Gen II will consider many of the suggestions they will get. They are already 'out of the box' with the first mass production EV. No one buying this car in the first few years will be the "it has to be as much like my last 'x' cars as possible because I can't deal with change" type.

EVDRIVER said:

The direction is that of the matching inertia of the vehicle. It actually is intuitive, if your hand is on it when you accel you don't want to pull it into reverse.

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Why would your hand be on it when you accelerate? YOU NEVER TOUCH it except to switch between forward and reverse. Really bad reason. Ever drive a boat? You push the throttle lever FORWARD to go forward and BACKWARD to go backward. AND your hand IS on it because it is both the gear shift AND the fuel flow controller.

Yanquetino said:

Azrich said:

But why can't the LEAF be different, more intuitive?

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Because it is now "intuitive" for drivers to use the same shifting directions that they have been using for many, many years. If Nissan switched 'R'everse and 'D'rive on the Leaf, I am willing to bet that most new buyers, out of habit, would end up lurching backwards when they wanted to go forward, and vice-versa.

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I disagree.
First many of those you showed are 'traditional' automatic formats where you have to go THROUGH reverse to get to drive and THROUGH Reverse to get to park. Given the mechanical linkage, the easiest to do. Plenty stupid on a car with a 'by wire' transmission.
Second, there are only so many people 'used' to the backward format. I would rather see that format be a 'short lived design flaw' in automotive history.

If you can find any vehicle that flip-flops "R" and "D", please post a link to the photo!

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If I were to buy one, I would seriously consider figuring out a way to flip it

evnow said:

A switch on the dash - that can't be hit by accident is what we need.

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Just like the Prius Gen II

mitch672 said:

BTW, the Gen 1 Prius has the shifter on the steering column, old school (it was a mechanical linkage)

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Actually, it is on the dash between the steering wheel and the display. In the way given its size. It is a vertical implementation of the floor mounted auto.

This is why everyone should learn to drive "stick" before anything else!

I've got 4 manual transmission cars in my garage and all they have in common is that you slip the gear shifter to one side and towards the rear of the vehicle to engage reverse. Some go to one side, some to the other. However, some European cars, or cars with a "dogleg" pattern gearbox, you'd quickly come to remember that reverse was to the left and forwards!

ttweed said:

evnow said:

We have discussed this before - may be in April. Esp. the idea of pushing the shifter back to move forward ! They should change the paradigm in gen 2 ...

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That doesn't bother me at all. The shifter is well-marked and it will become second nature in a short time to pull it back to go forward, IMHO. Driving this car will be so different than others that we will be learning a lot of new habits. Besides, it is not counter-intuitive to me to pull back to go forward, as this is how upshifts are accomplished in my sequential-shifting race car.

TT

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I cannot figure why Nissan even put that bulky shifter in the console.
Just touch a switch on the dash somewhere and I would be good to go.
I guess it is expected but that space could be used for something else.

Moving post ....

smkettner said:

ttweed said:

evnow said:

We have discussed this before - may be in April. Esp. the idea of pushing the shifter back to move forward ! They should change the paradigm in gen 2 ...

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That doesn't bother me at all. The shifter is well-marked and it will become second nature in a short time to pull it back to go forward, IMHO. Driving this car will be so different than others that we will be learning a lot of new habits. Besides, it is not counter-intuitive to me to pull back to go forward, as this is how upshifts are accomplished in my sequential-shifting race car.

TT

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I cannot figure why Nissan even put that bulky shifter in the console.
Just touch a switch on the dash somewhere and I would be good to go.
I guess it is expected but that space could be used for something else.

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Because the Leaf was meant to make everyone feel like its a regular car. This was a bit overboard, EVs should not mimmic cars they should set new standards, just like the people that fear adjustable regen and anything new. Even Think changed their design, it's all part of "not too much change" or it will scare people from buying. I agree, it's quite a bit of wasted space but it's "safe"

bruceha2000 said:

Azrich said:

All cars with a center gearshift are "backwards".

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But why can't the LEAF be different, more intuitive?

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EXACTLY!!!!!! I'm sure a lot more people are confused by pushing it forward to go backward and vice-versa than there will be people who say 'Gee, the 1960's European sports cars had reverse left and up and first left and down so that is what I want on every car I own in my lifetime.

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It's the same reason the keyboard you're typing on is as difficult to use as is possible. Your keyboard isn't trying to be compatible with an 1873 mechanical mechanism. It's compatible with last year's keyboard which was compatible with the one before, and so on back to 1873. Likewise the Leaf shifter is compatible with the shifter of last year's ICE car automatic transmission, and so on back to the early manual transmissions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QWERTY

LTLFTcomposite said:

Every time I see one of these threads where people think this or that should be improved I start to worry somebody from Nissan will see it and decide to slip the schedule redesigning stuff.

From everything I've seen Leaf 1.0 is perfect just as it is. As long as they didn't put the gearshift on top of the roof I'll figure it out. I'm looking forward to getting mine in December or as soon as possible thereafter - the last thing anyone wants is another Aptera debacle.

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Speaking of Aptera, I would have put down a deposit, but it would have been many years before they arrived in AZ. I could have lived with a two seater, which I have now anyway.

bruceha2000 said:

evnow said:

A switch on the dash - that can't be hit by accident is what we need.

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Just like the Prius Gen II

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Prius? Chrysler Imperial had a push button transmission back in the early '60s or late '50s. The buttons were right up on the left side of the dash.

Almost every car shifts up or forward for Reverse, right?

But, after a year, I still get R/D shifting mixed up on my Prius. If not looking, I tend to pull back to back up, and push forward to drive forward.

The "better" keyboard was so good it was banned from competition!

Interesting discussion.

If one thinks about it, it's incredible how many new things have been made to work like the old things they replaced. Because people are creatures of habit. We still 'dial' telephones, and they still 'ring'. We still 'type', and on QWERTY keyboards as walterbays points out. For how many years did automobiles look like the wagons they gradually replaced?

Habits can be changed, but it takes time and consistency. No matter how intuitive it may be to push a button forward to go forward, and pull it back to go backwards, habit will cause the majority of people to do the same thing with the button that they do with their automatic shift lever. Especially if they're in a 2 car family and switch back and forth between cars with shifters that work in opposite directions.

Can we have a show of hands of people who have driven in countries where people drive on the left side of the road, and who despite paying constant attention to what they're doing have never turned into the wrong lane and had to make a rapid adjustment? Now imagine jumping into your car in a mall parking lot, cell phone to ear, and ramming into the car in front of you as you look behind you to see if the lane is clear. Being a safe driver you've already put the cell phone down to back up, but not before you hit the 'start' button and pushed the shift button in the wrong direction while still engaged in conversation. Or you rush out of the convenience store anxious to get home after work having bought the tampax your wife is in a panic for, only to ram through the store window because while your concious mind was on getting home your subconcious mind pushed the shifter in the same direction you've moved it for the last 30 years.

Trial lawyers would have a field day with an auto company that made a shifter work in the opposite direction from what we have all become habitually used to.

But I do like having the shift lever in my wife's Odyssey up there on the dashboard right next to the steering wheel! I can go along with moving the Leaf's shift button up there as well. Just have it work in the same 'backwards' way so that I don't accidentally drive out of my garage into my kitchen some day.

walterbays said:

All cars with a center gearshift are "backwards".

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But why can't the LEAF be different, more intuitive?

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It's the same reason the keyboard you're typing on is as difficult to use as is possible.

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garygid said:

Almost every car shifts up or forward for Reverse, right?

But, after a year, I still get R/D shifting mixed up on my Prius. If not looking, I tend to pull back to back up, and push forward to drive forward.

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Yes! Thankfully Toyota was kind enough to include that really loud obnoxious backup beep so you can tell which direction you are about to go in. Sure hope the corresponding sound on the Leaf is loud enough to keep me from "backing" through the front of the garage.

Prius backup beep is INSIDE the car, LEAF beep is (only?) OUTSIDE (if the "noisemaker" switch is ON).

garygid said:

Prius backup beep is INSIDE the car, LEAF beep is (only?) OUTSIDE (if the "noisemaker" switch is ON).

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Let's hope they are smart enough to leave us the switch.