I get that seeing the tachometer is important for manual cars, but I drive an automatic. It exists, but when I drive I never look at it. So why are they on automatic cars?
In: Engineering
There are some problems with the car you might notice or diagnose using the tach.
There is not reason they need to get as much space as they do. My first automatic car was a 1992. The tach was tiny and that was fine.
I would guess the reason its large is because people want to pretend they are in the Fast and the Furious.
In general, tachometer shows if the car engine is running, plus it shows if you need to upshift/downshift (even in automatic you can use manual shifting)
Car makers don’t want to put a different instrument cluster for different transmission options of the same car.
There are benefits to having a tach in an automatic. Monitoring performance, fuel efficiency, or even noticing mechanical problems.
You would want a tachometer to make sure your transmission is working properly. You also want a tachometer to make sure you engine is idling properly.
They’re not needed on manual cars either. You can feel when to shift. Just like riding a bike you can tell when to change gears without knowing your numerical speed or RPM
There is no need for it, my first car had a nice large clock instead. My current car, an EV, also has no tach. https://i.imgur.com/eG6TlQT.png
However, race cars always had a nice large tach, usually in the centre. So as cars got sportier, they started getting tachs too, to seem more sporty.
Now cars have big digital screens, gotta have something to fill all that space.
You should be aware that a lot of the gauges on your car are fake. The temperature and pressure gauges will the middle if everything is “ok” and off the top or bottom if things are “bad”. In reality they should be wiggling around as you accelerate and drive hard or easier or the weather changes. They could easily be replaced with an error light.
Because a visual feedback of how the engine is running is useful for knowing how the engine is running
Plus it can provide information to mechanics working on your car. If you think about it you can relay information about what the RPMs of your engine is doing at certain speeds, etc to your mechanic if you are having performance issues and what not.
Running an engine near its maximum rotation speed can damage the engine.
While automatic vehicles can shift the gears for you, if you accelerate too quickly or drive at too high of a speed, that can still cause engine problems.
The tachometer is there to warn you in case you are overworking the engine.
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