Does anyone else dislike digital odometers?

[mechanicx]

I think digital odometer displays are not nearly as good as the previous mechanical odometer displays. Supposedly they were introduced to prevent tampering and rolling back, but from what I know they are easier to roll back and it's hard to tell they've been tampered with. I think all cars now have digital because maybe it cost a few cents less.

With mechanical odometers you don't have to gain access to the vehicle, need a key, and a charged battery to read the odometer. And they never wash out in bright sunlight. It also sucks that it is very hard to read the milage of a car in a junkyard with a digital odometer.

The continous scrolling of dial odometers give a better sense of when short distances of less than a 10th mile are rolling by. I like the mechanical ones ways betetr and think the digital it just a new-fangled way that isn't even as functional.

 

[Donald]

I do not care either way.

How is the digital odometer driven? Maybe a sensor in the transmission or ABS?

 

[The_Jeff]

I agree. The yellowish background on some of them remind me of a warning light too.

OTOH my mechanical odometer in my saturn has a well known annoyance; one can hear the little stepper motor and gearbox going bzzzt bzzzt bzzzt.

It also seems that the digital odo coincides with a dash redesign that includes a bunch of other gimmicky junk and a too-smart Body Control Module critical of my way of driving.

Most annoying though are cars with huge bright blue high beam indicators. I'm using the high beams FOR my night vision and don't need that thing down there. Can read maps by some of them.

I had a digital odo in my 2000 buick century. First thing I had to do when I bought it was resolder some resistors on the dash circuit board. The odo and PRNDL were burned out. I needed a mileage to register it!!!

 

[BigCahuna]

I have a '02 ford explorer with a digital odometer. I can only tell how many miles are on it in the winter. The odometer goes blank when it's warm. The speedometer always works. I guess you can read the mileage if you hook the car up to a computer.,

 

[mechanicx]

Originally Posted By: Donald
I do not care either way.

How is the digital odometer driven? Maybe a sensor in the transmission or ABS?


A speed sensor instead of a speedometer cable can work with a mechanical odometer too, just as cars have dial speedometers. It's probably just a little easier and cheaper to use the dumb digital odometer display.

 

[ueberooo]

Originally Posted By: mechanicx
I think digital It also sucks that it is very hard to read the milage of a car in a junkyard with a digital odometer.


Good point, that's going to be a loss in the future. One of the fun and interesting activities when going to a junkyard to pull a part is checking out cars that ended up there without body damage to see how many miles they went. This gives you some insight on the trend of the quality and longevity of various brands and models. I've always found that a fun activity, but this will no longer be possible in the future; that is, unless car manufacturers use electronic paper displays.

A little electronic paper gauge would actually look pretty good and work well to display a whole list of info on the dash.

 

[VNTS]

I dont like them only because when I go yarding and I cant tell how many miles are on the car/SUV/truck I am about to pilfer unless I can find an oil change sticker or registration. Starting to see a lot of the early 200x stuff showing up in the local wreckers. Most have the digital odometers.

 

[jimbeamalki]

I agree with mechanicx 100%. My 2006 Ranger has one and it depends on how the sun is shining whether you can see it or not. Total miles and the trip meter are on the same display, so you can't see both at once, you have to toggle back and forth with the punch knob. Radio is the same way--clock & radio station are on the same display, so again it's toggle back and forth. This is the first vehicle I've owned that has this, and I don't like it at all.

 

[Kiwi_ME]

It sounds to me that the beef is really about the display technology rather than the fact that the odometer is electronic, something that is not going to change.

From my experience BMW electronic odometers can be read by pressing the nearby button, provided the battery is connected.

 

[cchase]

The newer Fords have digital odometers that manually roll like an analog odometer.

 

[SwampSurvivor]

Originally Posted By: eljefino
I agree. The yellowish background on some of them remind me of a warning light too.

OTOH my mechanical odometer in my saturn has a well known annoyance; one can hear the little stepper motor and gearbox going bzzzt bzzzt bzzzt.

It also seems that the digital odo coincides with a dash redesign that includes a bunch of other gimmicky junk and a too-smart Body Control Module critical of my way of driving.

Most annoying though are cars with huge bright blue high beam indicators. I'm using the high beams FOR my night vision and don't need that thing down there. Can read maps by some of them.

I had a digital odo in my 2000 buick century. First thing I had to do when I bought it was resolder some resistors on the dash circuit board. The odo and PRNDL were burned out. I needed a mileage to register it!!!


My parents 08 Wrangler had the high beam indicator so bright that it would affect your night vision to the point that you could actually SEE LESS than without the brights on!

 

[mechanicx]

Totally agree with non-working digital odometers take all the fun of yarding. Sometimes you can jump the instrumental panel at the fusebox and get the odometer to read, but who wants to do that and oftentimes the fuse panel and instrument cluster are unhooked and just laying there anyway.

The digital odometers allow them to stick the odometer and a trip odometer or two in the same display-which you can't read simultaneously and take longer to reset.

I like how my motorcyle odometer is. It has 3 mechanical odometers, an odometer and trip odometer that reads to the 1000's and 10ths of miles on the speedometer and a second trip odometer on the tach that reads to 100's and 10ths of miles. All three are always easily visible and quickly and easily reset with one knob.

As far as I'm concered all the digital diplays accomplish is making the odometer easer to roll back and harder to read and probably saved a few pennies.

 

[AlienBug]

Is there some need to know how many miles your car has been driven at every moment of every drive? Or that you have gone some distance less than 1/10 mile?

When I'm going somewhere I sometimes go entire minutes without checking my odometer.

 

[Texan4Life]

I agree... also hate it when you have to have the key in for it to show the mileage. At least some of them show the mileage when the door is opened.

I also agree it is easier to roll the mileage back. Recently they busted a mechanic at a dodge dealership that traded used cars on the side. He would hook up the computer and roll back the mileage.

 

[PandaBear]

I like it, but I'm an engineer so I am a bit of an odd ball.

Both analog and digital can be cheated off if you know what you are doing. The digital one do not need a cable running from the transmission to the dash so it saves energy (turning that thing gotta be wasting more energy than flipping bits that's already measured and calculated in the ECU), parts, and space for the routing.

It also lets you share the same space between different information like trip counter. I know there's a lot of space behind the dash but it is still nicer to have less mechanical stuff that would wear out. I think they should cost the same in junkyard when it does wear out over time.

The analog display of digital odometer would be nice and easy on the eye, best of both world.

 

[javacontour]

The tenths come in when you are following directions. I.E. go 4/10th of a mile and turn right. Every digital odometer I've seen does not display 10th's with the overall mileage. Now many mechanical odometers are the same, but they typically have a trip odometer that is visible simultaneously. Digital odometers make you choose, so you have to select the trip odometer if you need to see your distance traveled in tenths of a mile.

So think the complaint is largely due to not being able to see both the odometer and trip odometer at the same time when needing to measure tenths of a mile.

Originally Posted By: AlienBug
Is there some need to know how many miles your car has been driven at every moment of every drive? Or that you have gone some distance less than 1/10 mile?

When I'm going somewhere I sometimes go entire minutes without checking my odometer.

 

[01rangerxl]

Originally Posted By: VNTS
I dont like them only because when I go yarding and I cant tell how many miles are on the car/SUV/truck I am about to pilfer unless I can find an oil change sticker or registration. Starting to see a lot of the early 200x stuff showing up in the local wreckers. Most have the digital odometers.


Same here. My only real complaint about electronic odos is that I can't read them in the junkyard.

One thing I have noticed in Pull-A-Part is a lot of ripped out gauge clusters. It's not the yard doing it, since other vehicles will have them intact, but it seems like a common thing for people to take from a variety of vehicles. I doubt they are buying them to hang on their wall, so odds are those clusters are ending up in vehicles. Probably good for a used car dealer who wants to turn a mileage exempt 250K mile Expedition into a 150K mile Expedition so they can add a little more to the weekly payment.

 

[mechtech2]

Cable driven speedos are ancient.
The VSS drives all forms today.
I DO like an analogue needle for speedos and tachs.

 

[mechanicx]

Analog odometers do not require a speedometer cable to work. And true the analog can be turned back too but usually not as easily or as unnoticably.

I'll give you that it is probably easier and cheaper to make digital reliable, but they can go out too occassionally. It's not hard to make a highly reliable/durable mechanical odometer.

If the digital odometer display never washes out in sunlight, the trip simulataneously displays, and the 10th of a mile continuously scrolls then we might have something decent with the digital odometer. But you still have the problem of needing access, battery power etc to read the odometer. Some cars won't even display the digital odometer unless you turn the igntion on.

 

[Kira]

Hello, I never thought of the junkyard angle. A big computer know-it-all told me it's IMPOSSIBLE to rollback a digital odometer. I'm oddly pleased it can be done. My beef is that on my car the 2 resettable trip odos are on flimsy circuit boards and work only when they want. How much other stuff on my car is vulnerable to cheaply built electronics? People always seem to want these silly toys in cars. Of course the toys you like are invaluable. Kira