New car, no rear window

Hell yeah! Love a bit of tech I do. I love a gadget on a car I went onto the website and 'built my perfect vehicle" lovely car but building in all my gadgets my price came out at £77,000. I was weak laughing. If you want to have a good laugh go design your own xxxx

I drive vans with no rear window, don't see the problem

Rear windows are getting smaller and smaller in general it seems to me. G'chn in the back seats can't see out of the window, except for the clouds I spy gets a bit predictable!

I have driven various vehicles both with and without a rear view mirror and definitely prefer to have one.

I don't understand how having no rear window gives more headroom in the back! Am I missing something?

Coming from experience with digital car features. I'd say don't touch it. We have a Ssanyong Tornado with digital dashboard. Brand new less than 6 months old from manufacture and the screen that is needed for Speedo and warning lights goes off. It then couldn't be driven so was off the road 3 month while they ordered the part from Korea, two months later it re-occured we were unable to fall back on manual methods as there were none so it made the car unsuitable to drive. Never again will I buy any car fully reliant on electric Speedos, doors or anything that cannot be overridden.

When I drive my motorhome I have no rear view mirror and rely on double angle wing mirrors and a reversing camera. I use the wing mirrors on my car a lot when reversing too, scared the life out of my DS when I reversed very quickly into our drive - he thought I wasn’t looking!

I think I’d find it disconcerting initially, but our brains would adapt after a short time.

Jaxjacky

The Polestar, from Volvo, has no rear window, so increased rear headroom. A roof mounted rear camera provides a visual feed to the driver.
What do you think?

I see Volvo has pulled out of its collaboration with Chinese Polestar saying that the EV market is now declining after the initial hype and the growing realisation that EVs are no longer the panacea they were once thought to be.

It will be a long time before this car bcomes cheap enough on the secondhand market for me to be able to afford it.

Looks the biz, but it's electric, uses 4 x more metal than a normal one including rare earth metals probably mined by children - and they catch fire, no thanks!

I'd love one if they want to give me one, to persuade grandmas of their versatility!Alternatively they could just give me the cash and I could buy something with more room for the dog than my Fiesta and still have some leftover to spend going somewhere for a drive.

Absolute respect to drivers of coaches and large lorries! The skill they have is amazing. I have a very elderly Citroen C3 which does not have bells and whistles to help me park (no camera at the back) but at least I can see out of the back windscreen (unless it’s raining because it doesn’t have a wiper on the back). I do worry about the many things to go wrong with modern cars that rely on the electronics working properly.

It doesn’t appeal to me.
How much? !! 😱 - can’t afford one anyway.

Ah well that's a thumbs down for the Polestar.
Have to stick to my Skoda

To be honest I like good visibility all way round my car, rather like a greenhouse!! This is all very well until it goes wrong and costs the price of a new car to repair!!
I was a coach driver for 20+ years, so for me had to rely on mirrors only and still drive relying on them, but feel many people will struggle driving this way!

M0nica

kittylester it is fine for you to say don't watch it all the time and hardly at all when going forward., but if your mind works differently and over responds to distractions, it iss not so simple.

To be fair M0nica, very often these things are able have different light settings which can help a little bit if you are easily distracted. On a more comforting note, rear view mirrors are likely to outlive you and I!

kittylester it is fine for you to say don't watch it all the time and hardly at all when going forward., but if your mind works differently and over responds to distractions, it iss not so simple.

I'd give it a go out of curiosity but think it would take a while to acclimatise, if ever.

What happens when something goes wrong with all the techical fittings. Not all vans have rear windows, wing mirrors doing the job. When towing a caravan, again not all have rear windows for a through view. We have become reliant on all the gadgets in cars these days. I'm still learning about some on my 22 month car. Only a couole of weeks ago discovered I have an emergency locator button near the roof light. Pressed it by mistake when friend had dropped something. Next think I knew, a voice asking what kind of emergency eg had I overturned, trapped in vehicle.Near scared us to death. GPS used for location had I had a severe accident.

I use my screen as a better rear view mirror- don't watch it all the time and hardly at all when going forward.
It has lines that help me place my car correctly.

And it doesn't flicker at all.

Don't knock it till you've tried it.

If you're looking at a screen, you aren't looking at the road... are you?

All these screens in cars do not take in the distraction problems it will cause the neurally diverse, sorry to bring this fashionable term into this discussion but I have dysparaxia and ADHD and the flickering screens would be a constant distraction drawing my eyes away from the road.

Fortunately I drive really old cars, too old for in-car screens, but when I sit in the passenger seat of DD's car, I am very conscious of the in car screen and no matter how hard I try to just look ahead, my eyes are constantly wandering to the screen.

If ever I have to have a car with a screen, I will knit it a screen cosy to cover it, something I can whip off if I ever need the screen, backing or similar.

mae13

So while your attention is occupied by staring at the camera you might not notice the car in front that you're about to shunt into........

You use it exactly the same as a rear view mirror so nothing changes. We have one in our camper van as we have no back windows.

I drive on the motorway by looking forward and constantly glancing at my rearview mirror. I don’t think a camera would be the same. It’s a no from me.

I have given up driving, so not for me!