Come out, come out, wherever you are!

[balthazar]

For a short while, one marque featured a large, clearly-marked speedometer... A speedometer that could not be seen from behind the steering wheel. In fact, no one inside the vehicle could see the speedo. What am I talking about??

This is NOT some obscure, minimally-instrumented, brass-era flivver vehicle, either; it's post-war and well-known.

[Sixty8panther]

uhh... Tucker? Ford/Lola GT40?

[balthazar]

Nope.
It is a sort of trick question, but not technically so. The driver cannot see the speedometer...

[balthazar]

Not what I had in mind, but you've peaked my curiosity- how's the 'indi-color' speedo work??

[razoredge]

Does this have something to do with HUD ? I think it does and some car only had that way of seeing gauges but I cant remember............much of anything

[balthazar]

No: no HUD on the vehicle in question. It's a mind-bender, ain't it? ;)

[NOS2006]

A digital speedometer?

[Teh Ricer Civic!]

THe 1963 Chrysler LeBaroux Mark 7.3

[balthazar]

I forgot this question was hanging out.

Here's the answer, but no one throw rocks or anything. Like I alluded- the answer hinges on a technicality.

The driver of a '60 or '61 Buick full-size model could not see the speedometer, nor could any of his passengers. Yet he was easily able to know how fast he was going.

This was accomplished via MirrorMagic and MirrorMatic (respectively), where the driver saw only the reflection of the speedo in an adjustable mirror.
The only way to see the actual speedo is to look at a sideways angle thru the windshield from the outside. And yes- that naturally means the actual speedo was backwards, imagewise.

Not the easiest to see in this pic, but the stainless steel edging of the mirror is visible inside the wheel's diameter. A thumbwheel adjusts the mirror's degree of tilt.



It's a neat but needless system (I've sat in a number of these cars), one of the countless crafty, attention-to-detail touches sadly lacking in modern cars.

[Teh Ricer Civic!]

i can see why this never caught on. but its interesting

[LosAngeles]

The driver of a '60 or '61 Buick full-size model could not see the speedometer, nor could any of his passengers. Yet he was easily able to know how fast he was going.

This was accomplished via MirrorMagic and MirrorMatic (respectively), where the driver saw only the reflection of the speedo in an adjustable mirror.
The only way to see the actual speedo is to look at a sideways angle thru the windshield from the outside. And yes- that naturally means the actual speedo was backwards, imagewise.

[post="25489"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]

It's funny that this comes up, as I was thinking yesterday of those old mirrored arcade games from the 80s.