Does your car have a heater?

[Ed P]

On a couple of automotive forums, people are complaining their cars will only run 10 minutes on the remote start so it is not warmed up enough for them. My first car with that feature was in 2010, but somehow, civilization survived. But in the past, even heat was an option

The earliest post-war American car I could find with a heater as standard equipment was the 1949 Chrysler Imperial ($4,664) and Crown Imperial ($5,229). It was a $70 option for the rest of the Chrysler lineup that year. Literally every other American carmaker required you to purchase a heater at an extra cost.

[Ralph Mowery]

I do not know what year the Corvett was but at Christmas 1978 relativies came up from Florida and the car did not have a heater installed. It was one of the colder winters in this area of North Carolina in years.

[Ed P]

Some cars had a heater delete option. In the south, I can see some people saving a few bucks. In today's money, it was about $700 as an option on some cars.

[Bob F]

I rented a car in Hawaii decades ago that had no heater. Foggy windows was a real problem.

[micky]

All the ads for cars when I started looking, high school and later, said R/H/WSW.

[Clare Snyder]

That was true in the USA, but not in "the great white north" where they were standard at least back in 1947

[rbowman]

Which pissed my father off no end... For the last three cars I've bought A/C wasn't even an option. The first Toyota I bought didn't have a radio but it did have speakers and the wiring harness. The current one sort of has lane control; it will show you drifting out of the lane but doesn't take any action. Toyota, at least, has figured out it's cheaper to build in the infrastructure for the trim options and not implement them on some models.

[invalid unparseable]

If it does take action, what will happen if some joker has painted an additional straight line at the bend of a road on a hill?

[invalid unparseable]

My first was a used '49 Chevy which had a radio and a heater which I believe at the time were options. Do not think any cars had turn signals and you had to put your arm out the window to signal turns.

[Ed P]

On my Sonata with HDA it only corrects on certain roads, mostly interstates. Amazingly accurate. Follows curves. Can't go hands free, but it makes a long highway trip easier. Keeps you perfectly centered in the lane but will give a warning and drop out at toll booths.

Off the highway, it just gives warning no correction.

I didn't think much of it until I took a 3400 mile trip.

[Mark Lloyd]

[snip]

I never liked whitewall tires (brownwalls?).

[Capt'n Butler]

Awww, poor babies; it ain't toasty-warm for them. What a bunch of whining weenies ;-)

[Retirednoguilt]

Growing up in NYC, I didn't need to learn to drive until I finished graduate school and moved out of town. My first driving test was in NYC, in 1970 or 71 shortly before I graduated. There must have still been many cars on the road without electric turn signals because the road test agent prohibited the use of the electric turn signals in the car I used and required me to use hand signals. Hard to believe how much has changed since then.

[Ed P]

They are standard on most cars but seems not all BMWs have them.

The Evolution of the Turn Signal

Percy Douglas-Hamilton invented and patented a simple pair of hands that attaches to the car in 1909. Florence Lawrence created but did not patent a device that used a pair of arms to signal turns in 1920. Edgar Walz Jr. designed and patented a light with two arrows and a brake light in 1925. Lastly, Joseph Bell created and patented the first electrical device that flashed in the late 1930s.

[Dean Hoffman]

I take it things like block heaters aren' an option for those poor people.

[Jim Joyce]

The joke is that in Florida, when you enter a vehicle you adjust the seat, you adjust the rear view mirror, and you turn on the turn signal. Now you're ready to drive. The turn signal stays on for the duration.

That's not strictly true, of course, which is why it's a joke. Just like it's not strictly true that everyone drives 30mph under the posted speed limit. Enough to make the joke(s) work, though.

[Retirednoguilt]

My family refers to the habit of the perpetual blinker with no intention to turn as the "eventual right" or "eventual left" depending upon which light is blinking.

Another annoying habit is that too many elderly night drivers need to have their cataracts removed but find it much cheaper just to keep their high beams on as their default night driving illumination. Blinds both the drivers ahead of them and the drivers in the opposite lanes. I believe it's against the law in most states to use high beams when cars are visible in the opposite lanes or within a certain distance in front but the absences of enforcement makes those laws moot.

[Jim Joyce]

Good point. The signal isn't wrong, exactly, it's just premature.

[invalid unparseable]

We lived in the suburbs and I had a license and might drive dad's car. I commuted as an undergrad with rides from friends, one in the am and the other in the pm but they both flunked out the first semester and I had to hitchhike the rest of the year. So I bought that old Chevy for $200 for the rest of undergrad.

[rbowman]

Not a clue. It gets confused on the last mile or so on my way home since there are no lines. They repaved the road a few years ago but paint was apparently an extra cost option.