Have you ever been scared when an electric car snuck up on you while you were walking? That happened to me about ten years ago. I was on a sidewalk, but I immediately thought of what would happen if a cat or a kid were in the road. We are just used to loud car engines. So car manufacturers started adding noises to cars, even though they don't need them to function. But when the sound is superfluous to the vehicle's function, those sounds don't have to mimic a combustion engine. What sounds should a car have to be the safest for pedestrian, cyclists, and animals? Car companies are working with audio engineers and sound designers to perfect the sounds of a quiet car for optimum safety while trying not to annoy everyone who hears them. (via Digg)
Thursday, July 04, 2024
What Noises Should Electric Cars Make?
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I think electric cars should sound like the Jetsons' flying car. Or like Commander Straker's turbine car in /UFO/. Or like /Music For Airports/ by Brian Eno, or /As Falls Wichita, So Falls Wichita Falls/ by Lyle Mays and Pat Metheny. Or the sound of teleportation in the original Star Trek. I was just wondering about this issue last week, when a Tesla (which they all look like a giant robot duck from the side or back, especially the white ones) went by with the sound of bad bearings in a washing machine motor. "That can't be on purpose," I thought, but it turns out that I was wrong.
In my college town, it won't matter if they sound like a nuclear blast being detonated; the students all walk around with headphones on and with their heads down, staring at their phones. I am amazed at their ability to not bump into one another like bumper cars, but when driving, one must be on the constant lookout for a student or 3 to just wander into the street, like herds of deer. Oblivious to the world around them...
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