My 79 z28 had a fresh air vent under the steering column.
My 79 z28 had a fresh air vent under the steering column.
If your Chevy Volt in plugged in, you can turn the car on, but not take it out of park. If you somehow plug your Chevy Volt in while it is not in park, the parking brake will engage.
The car alarm optionally covers the charge cord - it'll go off if you unplug.
You can schedule a charge to happen later, but if you want to override the schedule, you plug in, unplug, and plug in again.
The driver's screen assumes a unique "peek in" mode while charging - open the door, and the car screen will pop on and show charging stats.
The storage compartment on top of the dash has two notches on the frontmost edge of the lid. With the power socket, this lets you plug in a phone or GPS and close the compartment without having to drape the cord down the dashboard.
There's also a different mode that you get if you hold the power button down for several seconds. I think it's for service. Honestly, it wasn't useful in any way, and some forum people noted that it ran the battery down. The effects of time have left me a little hazy on it.
If you pull the electric parking brake on the Volt, it will set. Pull a second time, it will cinch a little tighter.
The Volt one-speed transmission means you can operate the car with the shifter in L at any speed. It's just a throttle/regen mapping setting. I preferred L to D, because it tended to allow single-pedal driving.
Heavy regen on the 1st generation Volt does NOT light the brakes.
The door button on the driver's door handle unlocks the driver's door with one press, all the doors with two. The other three door buttons unlock all doors with one push. If I was getting into the car with someone else who wasn't holding a key, I'd hit the left rear button instead for a faster unlock of all doors.
There is no low-speed noise generator on the 1st generation Volt either. Not really a secret, but you do get another, friendlier horn: https://www.youtube.com/embed/F9lRDkUUuf4
You can cheat on your displayed electric consumption by using Mountain Mode. Mountain Mode has a higher minimum state of charge. If you engage mountain mode while the battery is above the minimum for regular mode, but below the minimum for Mountain, the car will switch to charge sustaining mode and charge the battery back to the Mountain minimum. If you repeat, you can get the car to display that you drove, say, 100 miles on electricity and 20 miles on gas. The mileage is terrible if you do this, but it is a reason to treat some crazy forum EV screen photos with a grain of salt.
I know on the disco.. if your wipers are on and you engage reverse, the rear wiper will make a single pass.
If you leave a door open too long, the interior lights will automatically shut off.
The headlight cleaning nozzles only work with the lights on when you hit the windshield washers.
There are two sizable hidden compartments in the back of the disco, you just need to pull the interior atmospheric vents.
Also E36 BMWs can close the sunroof and windows by holding the key in the locked position in the door.
In reply to mad_machine:
E46s do that too. And open if you hold it in the unlock position.
First gen Neons - if you pull the HVAC vents out of the dash, the duct behind is a perfect size and depth to hold a 12oz soda can for cooling.
In my 65 Corvair, if you loose all electrical power, or if the engine dies while moving, you can still steer and brake with no increased effort. If you leave the headlights on, it has a feature where you can open the door and push the knob back in, because you are a dumbass.
It also has a feature that allows you to roll the windows up or down, WITHOUT the key in the ignition! It will even work if you pull the battery out of the car!
Volvo did some neat things with the 1st-gen S40. Some apply to contemporary Volvos, too.
With a sequence of button-holding and ignition switching, you can turn the DRLs on or off, or make the seat heaters come on automatically if you start the car below a certain temperature.
The headlights and parking lights shut off with the ignition, like a Subaru (so why have DRLs in the first place?) but if you hit flash-to-pass with the ignition off, the lights come on for about 30 seconds.
There is a dev-mode in the factory stereo that will give you interesting data in its readout like vehicle speed.
The front seats have ammo pouches in the front of the front cushions. They look like a soft leather facade but are elastic.
Hitting the dome override button three times in gm trucks will turn off the drl's. But only for that key cycle.
Lifting the door handle on my 1992 525i would cycle the door key hole heaters. It also had a programmable fan for cooling the interior. Wipers also slowed when the car stopped. This car also had the best cruise control ever, its own stalk, up = on, down = off, forward = go, back = slow.
My favorite feature of all cars except american ones it when you turn the wipers off they stop. In all of my american cars when you turn the wipers off they wipe one more time, drives me nuts and prevented at least one car purchase.
The s2000 has a button sequence that will let you turn off the A/C when defrost is selected.
My RDX does the rear wiper swipe when you engage reverse. If you have the wipers on intermittant the front wipers will swipe when you take foot of the brake from a complete stop.
EvanR wrote: The 1956 Powell pickup had this compartment. The dividers could be removed and fishing rods safely transported.
Man, I LOVE that!
Trackmouse wrote: All honda Fits at least 2009+ have a stash box under the drivers rear seat. It holds a flask well. Thanks librarian Honda, for helping me get away with flask stashes.
I've never noticed that, is it attached to the underneath of the seat?
My Saab has the air conditioning ducted into the glove box. It's to prevent my chocolate from melting. Seriously, that's what the owners manual says. So, it's not a secret, but who reads the owners manual?
I used to wonder if my Mustang was built by Ford for McDonalds. McNuggets came out in 1979, as did the 3rd generation Mustang. The sauces fit perfectly into the ashtray, the box holding the nuggets fit perfectly into the center console, and the drink cup fit perfectly into the storage compartment under the arm rest.
mad_machine wrote: If you leave a door open too long, the interior lights will automatically shut off.
My Jeep does this and it's a great feature. I was stunned when a relative managed to drain the battery in their much newer Lexus by leaving a door open in their garage overnight and the car just left the lights on until the battery was dead.
Holding the key to the left in my maxima not only unlocked the doors but rolled down the window and opened the sunroof.
So did double tapping and holding the unlock button on the remote
For WJ Jeep Grand Cherokees, you don't need an OBD-II reader. From wjjeeps.com:
Retrieving codes:
Turn the ignition key until the digital odometer displays, repeat three times in succession and then back to "On" (On/Off, On/Off, On/Off, On). At the fourth "On" the odometer will be replaced with codes. If no codes are present then "Done" will appear.
Mike wrote: For WJ Jeep Grand Cherokees, you don't need an OBD-II reader. From wjjeeps.com: Retrieving codes: Turn the ignition key until the digital odometer displays, repeat three times in succession and then back to "On" (On/Off, On/Off, On/Off, On). At the fourth "On" the odometer will be replaced with codes. If no codes are present then "Done" will appear.
This works on basically every OBDII Jeep with a digital odometer. Unless it's a 98... It works on 97 ZJs, XJs and TJs, but not 98s for some reason. Works again on 99s.
My '05 BMW wagon does the trick with the key and open/closing all four windows and the sunroof. It also does the right mirror tilt to see the passenger tire, adjusts the wiper speed for vehicle speed, remembers mirror position, seat position, climate settings and radio settings along with the seat memory and has a couple cool modes to the dash that you can activate by fiddling with the key, with the driver's door and while rubbing your tummy and patting your head.
My Silverado would activate remote start by pressing the lock button on the key fob 3x quickly, and it also worked by pressing the door lock button inside the truck. If you touched the brake pedal it would stall and you needed the key to restart.
So, in winter I could pull into a parking spot, press the lock 3x take the key out, press unlock to get out, lock it with the fob and go inside a store with the truck still running but undrivable, locked and the key in my pocket.
In reply to Mike:
The ChryCo key dance. Very useful. I've used it many times on the various dodges in the family fleet.
On Lamborghini Murcielago's, there is a master switch inside the engine bay to kill all power
You can have the door up and hold the up shift paddle and would be able to move a car, instead of it kicking it back into neutral.
On Gallardos, if you hold the up and down paddles at the same time, it puts it into "Automatic Mode"
On Jaguar XF's, if you cant get the gear selector to rise, you lift the center arm rest, there is a piece of trim you pop up to reveal a red strapped emergency neutral release switch.
Early 60's Mopars (through 65?) with 904 automatics can be push started.
Bmws have a stalk on the steering column that a driver can move up or down to make lights blink on either side of the car, to indicate said driver's intention to change direction.
I can't say I've seen them in use before though.
slantvaliant wrote: Early 60's Mopars (through 65?) with 904 automatics can be push started.
So can rear pump model powerglides.
80's Subaru stick shifts had a hill holder. Brilliant. Not sure about subsequent cars.
Neither is "secret"...
VW double cab trucks had a storage compartment under the rear seat that went all the way back to the transmission. I imagine the single cabs did too, but not sure how it was accessed?
I always liked that the wipers would wipe once with a press of the foot operated windshield washer pump on my 67 Mustang. I used to tell people (that didn't know) that I could move them with my mind
etifosi wrote: Bmws have a stalk on the steering column that a driver can move up or down to make lights blink on either side of the car, to indicate said driver's intention to change direction. I can't say I've seen them in use before, though.
Must be Europe models
You'll need to log in to post.
