Talk:Automobile

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Article Milestones Date Process Result December 28, 2004 Featured article candidate Not promoted Current Status: Former featured article candidate

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Archives /Archive 1 - Prior to August 2003 /Archive 2 - Prior to December 2006

Contents 1 Question 2 This Article Is A Complete Mess 3 Largest automobile 4 Further reading section 5 Greatest Source of Death? 6 Psychological impact on users ?

[edit] Question

What is the thing called in the interior of the car, above both the passenger and driver seats that usually has a mirror and helps block sunlight? I keep trying to remember the name of this thing but I do not have a car manual with me and I can't find the name anywhere on the Internet because car diagrams only showing the major parts. It is driving me crazy. Sammasa 13:50, 13 January 2007 (UTC)

A sun visor? Hmmmm - the link on this page points at Sun visor - which is a redirect to Visor - which is a disambig page - which says that the part of an automobile is called a Sun visor - which is a link back to...

Quick! Someone write an article about Sun visors! SteveBaker 21:19, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

130.166.31.98 18:35, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

This page has been subjected to abuse with the word "poo" I could not edit as it is protected.

I made something in it, at least... Andrewrhchen 14:02, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] This Article Is A Complete Mess

I've been looking at the article quality metrics for project Automobile - and this article is an embarrasment. It's the most important article in the entire project - and it's been rated has "Top" priority in the overall Wikipedia importance ratings - yet it's only "B-grade". This is not good. I've done a bit of cleanup - but the amount of work to be done is horrifying.

IMHO, we need to do the following:

1. Done Dramatically shorten the history section. This is a top level article, it should merely sketch out the history in a few paragraphs and punt the bulk of the discussion to a more detailed article - as we do in other sections.
2. References...jeez...this is a top importance article and it has a grand total of four references...that's AWFUL! We all need to look on our bookshelves and look at what facts in the article can be backed up by information in books that we collectively own. Or we have to look at our daughter articles and see what books they quote to back up those same facts. I'm sure that if everyone spent a half hour doing that, we'd have a decently referenced article in no time.
3. Done Years are linked...bad.
4. Done Units are not linked and don't have non-breaking spaces...bad.
5. General attention to spelling and grammar is poor.
6. Done Photos are disorganised - some are not needed.
7. Introduction needs to be bulked out to three or four good sized paragraphs.
8. We need more sections in the big table of links covering things like car magazines, legal matters, clubs, technical qualifications, jobs in the automotive industry.

We should be able to at least get this article through WP:GAC - the present situation is discraceful.

SteveBaker 05:05, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

I've had a big rewrite of the Fuel and Propulsion section. It still needs more references but I will have a dig around.

Malcolma 12:32, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Can I also add a suggestion (though I won't be bold and just do it without at least one voice in support)? The "See also" section seems to just be a monstrously bloated tabulation of the various automobile categories, and could be almost completely removed. Just pipe links to the three or four major sub-categories, maybe? I'll try and have a closer look tomorrow as well if I have time. --DeLarge 00:22, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I spent a lot of effort to create those tables because I feel strongly that they are needed. There is a precedent for this approach since many of the 'top level' articles in Wikipedia work that way. See for example Physics or Computer or Geography or Psychology or Philosophy - each of these has large lists of links either at the end or scattered in big blocks throughout the article. This article should serve primarily as a navigation aid because nobody really wants to know all about everything about cars - and there simply isn't room in one article to say it all anyway. Our readers will have come here to answer some question because they didn't know where to look. Simply pointing them at category listings (which are not as well organised as the big tables of links here) doesn't come anywhere close to getting people where they need to be. It's been my experience that nobody in the "real world" has any clue about the category links at the bottom of the article - and in any case, they are always cluttered with junk and hard to navigate. SteveBaker 15:59, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

<indent reset> Well, I disagree about the Categories, since I've used them myself almost since day one -- they seemed very straightforward to me, auto-alphabetised and much more intuitive than most "See also" lists. I can only go by my own experiences on that.

Also, of the articles you mentioned, Physics splits its tables over two sections and puts prose in between, which helps slightly, and Computer had a good deal of hostility to the tables during its peer review. Neither of the other three has its links laid out in huge tables, and looking at other similar "overview" articles they don't have them either; I see no demonstration of "precedence" for the current layout. I've been here for a year or so, but as soon as I saw those tables I just glazed over and scrolled past them; I imagine many casual readers would do the same.

If you're going to insist on keeping them, I'd suggest culling or reorganising them a bit; in Articles relating to parts of automobiles the Car Engine/Other cell has seven rows of text at 1024x768, and many others have five or six. That's a lot to take in. Also, how about splitting the tables further so you have 4-5 smaller ones instead of two large ones, and follow the lead of Law, which hides its tables (OK, navigation templates) and lets the user pick the one(s) he needs? --DeLarge 16:42, 28 February 2007 (UTC)

There may be no good precedent for this layout - but plenty of articles have honking great navigational templates in the "See also" section. I find them very useful - they are better than categories because they don't get cluttered with poorly categorized stubs - we can control which set of articles covers the subject - and we can conveniently divide the set of links by sub-subject. I'm happy to discuss slimming down the number of articles - and I'm happy to discuss changing the look and layout - but categories really don't do it for me - I use this table all the time! SteveBaker 03:03, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Largest automobile

Like the subject says, what is the largest automobile ever built? I think this deserves mention in the same way as the Spruce Goose is famous for being one of the largest airplanes ever built.172.168.37.167 01:23, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

See List of automotive superlatives - the trouble with adding that stuff here is the "where do you stop?" question. If we are putting the largest - then someone will want the smallest, then the fastest, the most fuel efficient...and before you know it, you have that list article inside the automobile article. I think we should 'See Also' that article and leave it at that. This article is supposed to give the briefest of overviews - then punt you off to more detailed articles. SteveBaker 02:53, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Further reading section

Is all of that stuff in further reading neccessary? Sure they are automobile related and probably useful in that regard, but I think we should remove the column on the right and just have the primary topics. For example instead of having "Car body style" and then all the styles, we should just have a link to that. It would cut down the section and make it more readable. This is a top level article, it just doesn't need all the specific components of a car engine listed (Hypereutectic piston). James086^Talk 03:07, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

.

[edit] Greatest Source of Death?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_causes_of_death_by_rate lists it down at 2% whereas the article currently quotes it at 25%

Two percent of all deaths, 25 percent of injury-related deaths in group E.1 (i.e. if you get cancer or have a stroke, you're not being "injured"). --DeLarge 09:53, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

I think we should add the following websites to this article: 469 reasons to eliminate automobiles (http://www.carsstink.org/), adding that we should build massive 100-story live/work/play Tower cities connected to/by maglev Trains in the future; The GM Street Car Conspiracy which forced all people to need a car (http://www.lovearth.net/gmdeliberatelydestroyed.htm); Maglev Trains of the future connected to Tower cities (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maglev_train); Car Crash photos http://www.car-accidents.com/pages/car_accident_photo.html. "Why Reduce Automobile Dependence" http://www.priorities.org/carfree.htm. Car Free Cities of the Future http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/05/carfree_city_us_1.php. Sundiiiiii 21:19, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a soapbox: "Wikipedia articles are not: propaganda or advocacy of any kind. Of course, an article can report objectively about such things, as long as an attempt is made to approach a neutral point of view. You might wish to go to Usenet or start a blog if you want to convince people of the merits of your favorite views." --DeLarge 22:26, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Psychological impact on users ?