Talk:Trafficators

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I have always understood a grandaughter of the inventor of the trafficator was an Arlette Perie ? Arlette was, i also took for granted ,an English girl and quite accomplished as an equestrian rider, having been noted in an English newspaper of 15-11-1965 as having won over 1.000 'rosettes'.At the time of the newspaper article Arlette was twenty one years of age. I never did know her mothers maiden name despite having dined in her company.The trafficator connection has always been with me as a result of my interest in the 'Motot'! Is my memory correct ?

Which Side?

Older British cars certainly used to have the indicator stalk on the right, but AFAIK left is universal now for all European-built RHD cars. I drove a Mk1. Toyota MR2 in 1988 which had the stalk on the right, but a quick scout of the Japanese vehicles in the car park suggest that models sold in the UK are also equipped with an LH stalk. Mr Larrington (talk) 12:11, 19 August 2010 (UTC)

Agreed - I've driven countless RHD cars dating from the 80's onwards, and I've never found one with a left-hand indicator stalk. I'd suggest that the statement about the right-hand side being 'correct' is either out of date or a Japan-only thing.Jellyfish dave (talk) 23:05, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

It seemed that some Japanese models did retain the right-side stalk a little longer than European cars sold in the UK, including ironically British makes. There were some oddities in the 1980s, where - perhaps due to unreliable export orders - certain British cars were sold in the UK with the controls and also the wipers set for the "export" side while other examples of the same model were set for the older UK side (and correct wipers). Finding a reference for this though is going to be tricky. There are illustrations on various club websites which prove the point, but you have to look at them all and understand the dates to make sense of them which isn't really very Wikipedia-friendly :-/ But in any case, the article is certainly just plain wrong in its current form. – Kieran T ^(talk) 00:27, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Right, I've done a bit of a copyedit to get rid of the worst of the generalisations and out-of-date claims (unreferenced use of "most" for example) but it's still not referenced, so feel free to chop it to bits when some references appear ;-) – Kieran T ^(talk) 12:12, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

My 1984 Land Rover Defender has the indicator stalk on the right hand side of the steering wheel, ie towards the door. My 2002 Land Rover Freelander has the indicator stalk on the left, away from the door. In both cases, the wiindscreen wipers are operated by multifunction stalks opposite the indicator. I understand that the standardised mass-assembly processes of such components (eg a complete steering column with wheel and switches) means that it is no longer economic to create two versions. By contrast, my 1954 Riley Patherfinder had its indicators operated by rotating the horn ring about the longitudinal axis of the steering column. Douglasson (talk) 17:32, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Why...

...is there a section on turn indicator stalks in this trafficator article? The text there doesn't seem to be at all relevant to trafficators, and this isn't a general "indicator/turning signal" article. 86.186.54.45 (talk) 00:33, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I guess somebody thought it had to go somewhere and wasn't notable enough for its own article. It'd probably make more sense in Automotive_lighting#Turn_signals though. – Kieran T ^(talk) 11:55, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Agreed, it does seem out of place here. My recollections from the days of trafficators are that they were often operated by a small lever mounted in the centre of the steering wheel and concentric with the horn ring. The 1960 Wolseley 4/44 series comes to mind, and some enthusiast may be able to confirm. Douglasson (talk) 17:23, 24 October 2012 (UTC)

Not sure about that specific car, but yes, there were a good many British cars which had the switch mounted on the stationary steering-wheel hub, so that the small operating lever pointed directly upward when off, and was moved to the left or right when needed. Self-canceling was fitted to some. They gradually disappeared as the stalk switch became universal, which on British RHD cars was always on the right side of the column originally (moved to the left for the LHD export versions). The left-side stalk didn't start appearing here until much later, when European manufacturers decided to cut costs by not producing a separate assembly for their relatively small RHD markets. Then the British manufacturers decided to follow suit. 46.208.132.177 (talk) 17:35, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

'Flashing' trafficators

This text originally posted direct to Wiki -

There is much very academic mention in the text regarding which 'side' trafficator control arms are fittted, either on the right or left of the driver's steering wheel - yet an image within that same entry shows an Austin A30 which, although this is not mentioned, had the trafficator control 'switch' fitted in the top centre of the 'dashboard' or instrument panel. I know this because in the late 1950s/early 60s I rewired my own A30 to have 'flashing' indicators.

Further, I wish to mention that 'flashing' indicators were created by a man in the late 1940s/early 50s called Wheeler who was my metalwork master at Fortescue House School in Twickenham, England. I can not give specific attributions, even regarding Mr Wheeler's name because for us boys he was only 'Sniffy' - because he had a speech impediment which caused a sniff intake of breath every few words when he spoke. His 'invention' depended on passing electrical power through two thin strips of different metals which were bonded together. When electricity passed through this bi-metalic strip one side heated (and expanded) faster than the other so the strip bent and broke contact at one end, cooled down and straightened, thus came into contact again. He had this protected by a 'patent pending' while he offered the idea to British car manufacturers but the idea was rejected by all. The following year, no longer protected by copyright, flashing indicators appeared on Renault cars - and Sniffy did not receive a penny for his invention (just like Mr. Biro who invented the ballpoint pen.) — Preceding unsigned comment added by JanClifford (talk • contribs) 00:26, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

There was also a type of Trafficator which bobbed up & down while flashing, made by (I think) both Wipac & Lucas &, I believe, used throughout the British Empire. It had a solenoid & spring inside the arm & was famously unreliable though used for decades till corner-mounted fixed flashing indicators became popular. Alanthehat (talk) 10:26, 29 January 2022 (UTC)