Swop Reverse and Drive Positions on the Stick Shift

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JustBobF

Member
Joined
Apr 6, 2014
Messages
9
When I first got into the Leaf my first reaction was to push the shift lever to the right and forward to go forward. Pushing it back to go forward seemed counter-intuitive.

A friend had the same reaction.

I wonder how may others feel the same way?

(There are really only two positions in the leaf: forward and backward, unlike older cars that have many positions on that lever. So why not make forward and backward make sense?)
 
LOL, my wife asked me if I could somehow switch it. She keeps asking why you don't push it forward for forward and backwards for reverse. I am sure we will get used to it, but why, why the heck is it backwards from the actual desired direction of travel.
 
Pushing a gear lever hard to the left (sometimes with accompanying pull or push of the lever) and forward is where you find Reverse in most European cars that have stick shift (and in Europe, most of them are). On Asian brands, Reverse is generally hard to the right, then back.
 
TomT said:
Think of a floor mounted shifter on an ICE and which direction you go from neutral for D or R... It is the same as the Leaf...
Well the ICE vehicles should be changed also.

The ICE traditional P-R-N-D-L was invented as the lowest cost for the mechanical control of the transmission to be used safely.
It is just junk science carrying forward into the digital age.
 
JustBobF said:
When I first got into the Leaf my first reaction was to push the shift lever to the right and forward to go forward. Pushing it back to go forward seemed counter-intuitive.

A friend had the same reaction.

I wonder how may others feel the same way?
Please name other automatic/CVT or single-speed transmission vehicles currently shipping in the US where they have the design you desire and name their cumulative unit sales or at least annual unit sales. How about your friend?

When you drive an automatic w/floor mounted shifter, when you go from P to D, which direction do you move the shifter? Same question for when you're in D or N and you want to go to R.

Mods: Please either lock this thread or merge of it one of the many on this subject already (some at http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?p=361397#p361397" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;).
 
>>>When you drive an automatic w/floor mounted shifter, when you go from P to D, which direction do you move the shifter? Same question for when you're in D or N and you want to go to R.

The other shifters probably start with Park in the forward position. The Leaf starts with Park off to the Right. There are only two possible forward and back positions on the Leaf from the Park or Neutral positions. I think this makes the Leaf shifter fundamentally different from the others, I think.

But, it is not for us to decide, that is for Nissan. I just hope they see these posts and conduct a feasibility and blink-test study and see what most people do when they get in the car for the first time.

Other cars have the shifter on the steering column; that is also fundamentally different and does not apply here, I think.
 
JustBobF said:
>>>When you drive an automatic w/floor mounted shifter, when you go from P to D, which direction do you move the shifter? Same question for when you're in D or N and you want to go to R.

The other shifters probably start with Park in the forward position. The Leaf starts with Park off to the Right. There are only two possible forward and back positions on the Leaf from the Park or Neutral positions. I think this makes the Leaf shifter fundamentally different from the others, I think.

But, it is not for us to decide, that is for Nissan. I just hope they see these posts and conduct a feasibility and blink-test study and see what most people do when they get in the car for the first time.
Again, what's the behavior on a floor mounted automatic when starting from P then going to D? What about from D or N to R?

And again, please name currently sold in the US light vehicles and their sales figures w/the behavior you desire.

As I cited in the other thread, there have been more than 3 million Priuses sold already and almost all of them have the same shifter behavior as the Leaf. The only ones that don't were the steering column shifter mounted NHW10 (JDM only that sold in tiny numbers) and NHW11 (the 1st gen we got in the US, sold in tiny numbers compared to all the ones that followed: NHW20, ZVW30 (current gen), ZVW41 Prius v wagon, etc.)
 
JustBobF said:
So why not make forward and backward make sense?
Simple - Nissan knew the majority of early LEAF adopters already drove Prius, with the same shifter design. They wanted a safe transition, and one that would be easily accepted.
 
smkettner said:
TomT said:
Think of a floor mounted shifter on an ICE and which direction you go from neutral for D or R... It is the same as the Leaf...
Well the ICE vehicles should be changed also.

The ICE traditional P-R-N-D-L was invented as the lowest cost for the mechanical control of the transmission to be used safely.
It is just junk science carrying forward into the digital age.

There are plenty of standards in the world that are the result of long-obsoleted technology or methods. They persist in cases where the usefulness of following a standard convention is more important than changing an arbitrary arrangement for purposes that (while more logical) are of minor importance. The study of "Human Factors" is quite interesting and definitely not junk science.
 
I agree, it's much more intuitive for my family to push forward to drive forward as the shifter design is unique enough that muscle memory from other vehicles doesn't feel like it applies. I bet there's a firmware hack possible to swap these directions, we just need the mod community to find it :)
 
Sifuyee said:
I agree, it's much more intuitive for my family to push forward to drive forward as the shifter design is unique enough that muscle memory from other vehicles doesn't feel like it applies.
How many cars do you have and/or have you encountered where you push forward to drive forward? Care to list their US sales volumes for a year?
 
cwerdna said:
Sifuyee said:
I agree, it's much more intuitive for my family to push forward to drive forward as the shifter design is unique enough that muscle memory from other vehicles doesn't feel like it applies.
How many cars do you have and/or have you encountered where you push forward to drive forward? Care to list their US sales volumes for a year?

Well, how many cars have a hockey puck for a shift lever? How many cars have Park off to the right? How many cars have only one speed? For me, this is a whole new paradigm, but it seems obvious here that we will never agree, so perhaps it is best to agree to disagree, sit back and see what Nissan does.
 
JustBobF said:
cwerdna said:
Sifuyee said:
I agree, it's much more intuitive for my family to push forward to drive forward as the shifter design is unique enough that muscle memory from other vehicles doesn't feel like it applies.
How many cars do you have and/or have you encountered where you push forward to drive forward? Care to list their US sales volumes for a year?

Well, how many cars have a hockey puck for a shift lever? How many cars have Park off to the right? How many cars have only one speed? For me, this is a whole new paradigm, but it seems obvious here that we will never agree, so perhaps it is best to agree to disagree, sit back and see what Nissan does.
Over 50K Leafs in the US and over 110K globally (http://green.autoblog.com/2014/05/23/nissan-sold-50000-leafs-in-us-115000-globally/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;) have a hockey puck shift lever. Park isn't to the right. It's via a button on top.

As has been pointed out, the pattern is exactly like that of a (2004+) Prius liftback. If you add up global sales of the Prius and Prius v (and its other names), Lexus HS and (JDM) Toyota Sai, all w/this type of shifter, that's another 3.5+ million vehicles. See http://corporatenews.pressroom.toyota.com/releases/worldwide+toyota+hybrid+sales+top+6+million.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;.

If Nissan sticks w/this current physical design, I highly doubt they'd change the directions for D and R.

This has been discussed over and over. http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=5456" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; is one and it points to other threads and discussion on Priuschat.
 
Given that this thread has been around since 2010 its clear that Nissan is not going to change the pattern which is really to bad.
I'm a new leaf driver and my first impulse was that forward should be forward and reverse should be reverse. Period.
The hockey puck does lend itself to modification. The R and D on the puck do not light up. only the dots. (which is another bitch of mine but not related to this topic.)
So assuming the change can be done easily, it would also be easy to re-label the puck.
The mod may be as simple as rewiring the puck or just switching the position sensing switches. It would be fun to take one apart and have a look see.
If it continues to annoy me, I may be the first one to change it and I'll light up the R and D too. :)

Zurc.
 
"And again, please name currently sold in the US light vehicles and their sales figures w/the behavior you desire."

this and other replies like it are baited intentionally rigged biased trolling replies and the ones making them know it.

we do it this way "only" because its always the way it "has" been done. no other reason. Period. End of discussion. ie grow up.

as for changing it. I personally don't care. after 2 days I did not even notice any longer (yes I wanted to push forward to go forward too because every single electric vehicle I have ever controlled in my life was push forward to go forward. the fact that they are models is a point worth mentioning :) hehe

anyway. why not pull the center console out and simple swap the wires so forward is forward and backward is backward. its just a switch is it not? if its a "board" then this won't be so easy.

heck even if it is a board you might be able to cut out that entire section and simply spin it around 180' so you have to slide RIGHT and then forward is drive backward is reverse.

I would actually prefer then to ditch the entire shifter all together and simply make it 3 buttons or a smaller toggle somewhere so I could have that center "space" back for my body (I am a big boy) but its a very minor issue to me.
 
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