Why aren't there federal standards for placement of car gear shift options (e.g. reverse, drive, etc.)?

Question

This would be an important safety issue.

Answer 1

I presume that you are referring to manual transmissions, because there *are* Federal standards regarding the controls for an automatic transmission. aka PRNDL

Park
Reverse
Neutral
Drive
Low

This standard was enacted back when the majority of automatic transmissions had two foreward gears, though has remained enforced even though four- and five-speed automatics are now commonplace. The additional gears are set further off the low end, and usually denoted as L3, L2, and L1 (the number indicating which 'gear' it is).

There is one exception to this which is seen on occassion, and that is to separate the overdrive gears from the underdrive gears; with the selector placed in underdrive (the D without a circle), it will use all gears up to and including direct drive, but will not use any of the overdrive gears. The OverDrive selection (located between Neutral and Drive) will also include access to the overdrive gears.

Furthermore, there are regulations regarding restrictors which must be specifically disengaged in order to shift from or into certain gears. This is why you have to pull back on the lever or press the button (and usually press the brake pedal) in order to take a vehicle out of Parking gear.


No such standardization is yet applied to manual transmissions, mainly due to the wider variety of internal designs, but most follow a fairly common H-pattern.

Answer 2

Christ, aren't there enough regulations ALREADY?! Read the damn labels on the shifter. It ain't rocket science.

Answer 3

There are federal standards.....R means reverse.....1,2,3,4,5 are your drive gears......nuff said.