I thought dashboard lights were always supposed to tell you when something is wrong. So why can the engine or transmission blow up? Does this only happen when people ignore the dashboard lights? I’m in the USA if it matters.
In: Technology
Not all failures give a warning in advance of the situation impacting the car’s ability to run. Something like a loose radiator cap wouldn’t cause a warning lamp or issue until just about all of the reserve coolant is drained, at which point the car won’t be able to run well at all.
Not always. Now manufacturers *are* getting more and more clever all the time about how to determine certain problems with the sensors they install. Even something like taking longer than expected to get to operating temp can throw a MIL lamp because it may be a thermostat stuck open or something.
But they can’t possibly install sensors or use the ones they’re already needing on there for every single possible scenario. Not unless you want a car thats a few hundred or even thousand more to buy because of all the extra sensors, all the wiring to them, and the computing power to make sense of it all.
Every part added is cost added, it’s yet another thing that itself could go out, and every addition runs contrary to one of the earliest tenets in improving reliability: K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple, Stupid).
Further, not everything the computers can already detect have a light attached to them, because then you’d have a jet fighter cockpit of just lights, and that drives up cost too. For example, Chevrolet has in addition to powertrain codes (that light the MIL), body and chassis codes. Something like the 4×4 not working may have service 4×4 light attached to it. But there’s even codes for when automatic climate control isn’t putting the blend doors in the correct position. An advanced code reader can see this but should there be a light saying “hey I want position 64 but I can only set to position 63 or 65?”
Dashboard lights only cover a limited number of things. They will tell you if you are low on oil or fuel, but they can’t monitor the condition of the fan belt or cam belt. A broke cam belt gives no warning.
What dashboard light are you asking about? All the ones I can think of state the obvious, that something broke. The Check Engine light primarily tells you that there is a fuel efficiency issue such as bad oxygen sensors.
Let’s say there is a crack somewhere in the transmission, but doesn’t cause any problems until one day the crack is subjected to more stress than usual and fails, rendering the entire transmission out of service.
How exactly would you suggest the car be aware of this tiny vulnerability in the metal, and make you aware of it before it suddenly fails and destroys the transmission?
Of course there are a multitude of sudden mechanical failures that cannot be anticipated by the cars software to give you a “heads up”.
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