If you were blind, hard of hearing or simply listening to tunes through your ear buds, any car with loud pipes will be appreciated if being passed by. Loud pipes are a warning we had in the past, which we are used to hearing as a cue that something is nearing that intersection, coming your direction. The future has already brought some attention to the evening news that many of these new hybrid and electric cars makes no sound. Reports of many of these kinds of cars state a begged question that sounds be put back into them. Will it be that in our not to distant future, cars passing us by will emit sounds that rumbles and triumphed sounds of turbo six cylinder?
I ran the question through a few beers the other night, and of course the minute that I bring up electric cars someone goes.. “my sister-in-law bought a Prius” or “ah.. that will be the future”. The sound issue with electric cars, makes the bar side conversation, but it is quickly curtailed by the fact your car might be complete free of using fossil fuels. The Christmas lights in my mind were going off at the speed of light where instantly I was getting visions of future cars not only replicating sounds of the V-8 in the past, but other things.. maybe animals, people talking… or even sounds of advertisements repeated endlessly… “Eat at Joes, $4.99 Grand Slam Breakfast Every Sunday!”. Poor driver I would think having then to endure this electronic gizmo white noise over and over. I mean.. even if you were to digitally create a seamless engine sound, you will inevitably need to hear it repeated over and over again, plus possibly incorrectly a sound reminiscent of the car’s actions. For example… a skid… would your car sound system be able to create a skid sound as your car slides? Would it override the sounds of the tires or how would you want it to react? Obviously unnecessary but funny to think about. Just like tasting this flat beer in front of me, these car sounds would be as flat.
Could it be these electric car manufacturers to amplify the sounds of the internal workings of the cars? Maybe tiny microphones would be placed near power plants and sound replicated to amplifications that would then make cars sound like slot cars or a video game completely with Japanese Pachinko balls that whistles and bells. Maybe if you hit a curb or zip through a speed camera, the sound system would give a “tilt” sound.
I know Porsche is producing an electric sound, and other than the minute hum I am also sure that the car running at any speed is pretty silent. I don’t know.. but if you ask me.. the sound would be a lot like what someone might hear sitting silently in room illuminated by fluorescent lights, with ballast hums grinding away. The sound of lonely fly changing the pitch being delightful for something over long drives.
So it goes back to the famous Porsche saying, Loud Pipes Saves Lives. In fact, there then would be truth to it. Cars that have made sounds, like a herd of charging elephants or the growls of Panther are far better than the surprises that broadside us.
The Porsche Independent Repair 