Automobiles
General Motors began using head-up displays in 1988 with the first color display appearing in 1998 on the Corvette C5. Toyota, for domestic market only, in 1991 released this system in Toyota Crown Majesta. In 2003, BMW became the first European manufacturer to offer HUDs. The displays are becoming increasingly available in production cars, and usually offer speedometer, tachometer, and navigation system displays. Night vision information is also displayed via HUD on certain General Motors, Honda, Toyota and Lexus vehicles. Other manufactures such as Audi, Citroën, Saab, Nissan, and Kia currently offer some form of HUD system. Motorcycle helmet HUDs are also commercially available.
Add-on HUD systems also exist, projecting the display onto a glass combiner mounted on the windshield. These systems have been marketed to police agencies for use with in-vehicle computers.
Read more about this topic: Head-up Display
Famous quotes containing the word automobiles:
“Automobiles are free of egotism, passion, prejudice and stupid ideas about where to have dinner. They are, literally, selfless. A world designed for automobiles instead of people would have wider streets, larger dining rooms, fewer stairs to climb and no smelly, dangerous subway stations.”
—P.J. (Patrick Jake)
“Uses are always much broader than functions, and usually far less contentious. The word function carries overtones of purpose and propriety, of concern with why something was developed rather than with how it has actually been found useful. The function of automobiles is to transport people and objects, but they are used for a variety of other purposes—as homes, offices, bedrooms, henhouses, jetties, breakwaters, even offensive weapons.”
—Frank Smith (b. 1928)