Senior moments swapping between vehicles?

**SpeedyGirl** · 23rd February 2009, 14:40

Working for a large company with my choice of company cars during the working day, something is bound to happen! Never worries me with the manual/auto thing, but everytime i get caught with the indicators and window wipers.... nothing new there, sadly tho.... i will admit to being blonde, I get into a new company car where the reverse is left and up... thats new me thinks....no one bothered to tell me you had to lift the lever on the gearstick for reverse to engage!
40 mins of swearing and getting really shitty, and contemplating pushing the damn car! I rang the usual driver, who after 5 mins of laughing at me (and relaying the conversation to the entire office), told me how to get the damn thing into reverse!!!

never forgot that lesson!

**Boob Johnson** · 23rd February 2009, 15:00

Originally Posted by martybabe

ocasionaly when I put the wipers on by mistake I'd quickly put the washers on too so it looked like I was intentionally cleaning the screen, no one ever queeried why I always decided to wash the screen as I was going around corners.

lol I can fully see you doing that Marty

**Mom** · 23rd February 2009, 15:52

Originally Posted by SpeedyGirl

...no one bothered to tell me you had to lift the lever on the gearstick for reverse to engage!

I can relate to that well. I got a little Holden Barina or something once to use as a courtesy car while mine was being serviced. Got in it and attempted to get it in reverse. Same shift pattern as my car, but it would no way go into reverse no matter what I did. In the end I had to go in and ask the service manager how to get it in reverse. "Just the same as in yours" he tells me. No, it really is not the same as mine because I cant get it in reverse, so he comes out to show me how to lift the lever on the shift stick. Ours was broken

**zooter** · 23rd February 2009, 17:10

In the early days of dual scooter and bike citizenship I spent a little too long in Scooterland. Jumped on the big bike and found the lack of gearshift action on the left handgrip a bit disconcerting.

**Motu** · 23rd February 2009, 17:47

I drive plenty of vehicles every day,without too much problem.I'm usually onto it with the wiper/lights being on different sides on Euro cars,but still get the odd swish of wipers for a right turn.But annoyingly there are some Japanese cars built in Europe with reversed controls.Driving a Pajero is an everyday job,to have one with indicators on the left is always a surprise.

I have never really had a problem with right or left shift either,it sort of goes with the bike.Like Ixion,footwork at a stop is still confusing.The BMW has no push to cancel indicators either - I find myself having to look at the switch to put it in the centre,not a safe procedure.

I used to work for a company that had two trucks with Eaton 2 speed diffs - and both were wired up opposite....one was down for high,the other up for high.It was bloody annoying to WOT a down shift with a fan of the clutch,only for the engine to hit the govenor,and the diff to be clattering a missed upshift.The boss wouldn't let me wire them the same....he reckoned it would confuse him!

**Number One** · 23rd February 2009, 19:12

Learnt to drive in an auto and drove them for years then I got my first bike

An RG150

THAT whole gear changing thing was a hard one to conquer while trying to learn how to ride two wheels but got there in the end

Not long after that got my first manual car and discovered the joy that is burnouts

have no trouble switching from auto to manual and back again.

What I HAVE struggled with is switching from the reverse pattern shifter on the bucket racer back to the SV when on the track. Haven't had issues with it on the road but at a recent track day just as I began to feel comfortable I weirdly found myself in the 'bucket racing zone' and changed down when I should've been changing up

big sideways rear end slide which thankfully buckets has taught me to cope with and I was back into nana zone taking it very tentatively again.

**LBD** · 24th February 2009, 02:18

I work at a mine in central asia...we drive on the right with LHD light vehicals until we get close to the mine where we switch to driving on the left in LHD vehicals...

Original LHD vehicals have the indicators on the left of the column, LHD conversions have the indicators on the right of the column...some are automatic, some are manual, some have a column change where others have indicator lever and others have windscreen wiper lever.

All have the foot throttle on the right, some automatics have a foot operated park brake where the manuals have a clutch...(That one is fun)

Some have a horn on the end of the indicator stem others have a washer on the end of a wiper stem.

Away from the mine the roads are mainly single lane...I have seen 3 wide passing manouvers on blind corners...

You run over a farm animal you pay for it and it is never an old 1/2 dead animal, always a prime beast worth 3 times the going rate...despite appearances....Some farmers make a good living chasing stock onto the road ahead of foreign owned vehicals...

And after 6 months of this, I come back to NZ for a holiday and do you think I get fuddled driving back there with frazzeled nerves after all this...You betcha

**martybabe** · 24th February 2009, 07:16

Originally Posted by LBD

I work at a mine in central-asia.net drive on the right with LHD light vehicles until we get close to the mine where we switch to driving on the left in LHD vehicles...

Original LHD vehicles have the indicators on the left of the column, LHD conversions have the indicators on the right of the column...some are automatic, some are manual, some have a column change where others have indicator lever and others have windscreen wiper lever.

All have the foot throttle on the right, some automatics have a foot operated park brake where the manuals have a clutch...(That one is fun)

Some have a horn on the end of the indicator stem others have a washer on the end of a wiper stem.

Away from the mine the roads are mainly single lane...I have seen 3 wide passing maneuvers on blind corners...

You run over a farm animal you pay for it and it is never an old 1/2 dead animal, always a prime beast worth 3 times the going rate...despite appearances....Some farmers make a good living chasing stock onto the road ahead of foreign owned vehicles...

And after 6 months of this, I come back to NZ for a holiday and do you think I get fuddled driving back there with frazzled nerves after all this...You betcha

Bloody hell, I'm confused just reading that, don't think I'll go there my little brain would implode.

**Pascal** · 24th February 2009, 08:18

My regular cage is a left hand drive. So everything is reversed. Now after 7 years on NZ roads it's a comfortable vehicle for me and I'm used to driving from the "wrong" side of the road. Skidmarks the passengers though, because they're so close to oncoming traffic

But when I get in my wife's car I have a foreign-language school student problem with driving. I want to turn left? On goes the wipers. I want to turn right? On goes the wipers. Doesn't help that it's automatic as well, so a large part of the driving brain gets switched off.

I'm sure the rest of the world is laughing at this middle aged man switching on the windscreen wipers when he wants the indicators.

:sighs:

**FROSTY:Me** · 24th February 2009, 13:13

Part of my job is getting to spend a fair bit of time in the left seat of a cage or following a rider on a test ride.
I would love to write a book on the wonderful excuses I've heard for peoples er 'errors".