Why do some cars still have rev-counters?

Late in 2012 Land Rover launched the latest incarnation of the Range Rover. Interestingly, while the body and lots of the technology is superior to the last the outgoing Range Rover, the interior isn’t vastly different. Some of that is because Land Rover had been upgrading the interior of the last model Range Rover with elements that would be in the new car. This is a clever idea because it means they can test and prove the latest technology without having to launch it on a brand new car which would obviously present more opportunity for problems. By rolling out different elements over a 2 year period they will minimize issues that customers will have with the new vehicle when it’s launched.

As part of this programme, the 2010 Range Rover lost its traditional instrument cluster (where the speedo and rev counter are) and the physical gauges were replaced with a 12 inch LCD panel which displays virtual instruments – very clever and I think it’s something that Mercedes did earlier than 2010. It actually works quite well and the dials look quite realistic.

My problem with this is that Land Rover seem to have missed a big opportunity. 

To illustrate what I mean we need to cover some basics first. Land Rover hasn’t offered a manual version of the Range Rover since the 3rd generation car was launched in 2002. That makes me ask what the point of the rev counter is? The car will change gears when it needs and won’t let you override it if you would break the gearbox so knowing how many revs you are doing is fairly redundant. 

That said, there was the petrol version with the sportier engine and I can see that people would like to know the revs on that engine. Also, cars have traditionally had a rev counter so no sense rocking the boat too much given the traditional nature of the product. 

At that point the car had a conventional dashboard with physical gauges so building different versions would be impractical and anyway – what else would you put there?

Now however, the sat-nav/phone/radio/CD/iPod control/etc/etc are all controlled through the computer in the centre console and the computers are considerably more powerful than they were in 2002. The centre console computer is also a more integral part of the car than it has been before. 

The problem for me is that I can have sat-nav on screen but then if I want to change radio channel, I have to change to the radio screen. Similarly, if I want to ring someone I have to change to the phone screen of the system.

So why can’t I lose the rev counter and replace it with the map or arrow view from the sat nav? Or pull up a list of recently dialled numbers or radio stations? It seems that the car has a virtual rev counter just “because that’s what cars have” and nobody has cared to rethink what’s possible.

I think large companies that design products need to have a team or department specifically tasked with figuring out what could be possible and how that could benefit the customers. Honda have the tagline of “The power of dreams” which is fine but to me dreams are huge projects and that is basically looking in the wrong direction. 

For me, the term that best covers what needs to happen is “imagineering” where imagination meets engineering. On the other hand, perhaps these companies just need a Chief Ideas Officer!