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Auto Design Fail: Ford's Experimental "Wrist-Twist" Steering Wheel(s) from 1965

By Rain Noe - October 16, 2012

in Cars

We all know the value of bringing in an outsider to shake things up creatively, just as we know that there are spectacularly talented engineers who are well-capable of doing industrial design, even without any of our training. But here's a reminder that sometimes that combination just goes spectacularly wrong.

Robert J. Rumpf was an aerospace engineer who worked on missiles, and in the 1960s Ford brought him in to work on experimental auto designs. What he came up with was this crazy two-handed "Wrist-Twist" steering system, shown here in what I believe is a 1965 Mercury:

Let's try to ignore the anachronistic sexism of that whole it's-so-easy-even-a-woman-can-use-it thing and look at the actual interface design. Surely this system wasn't designed purely for the benefit of having armrests, so what do you think he was after, a more easy method of ingress and egress? Or was he overcomplicating an incumbent system that worked well for the sake of pure design experimentation? I also can't figure out the logic of having two dials work in concert; do you think each controlled an individual wheel? Mechanically it doesn't seem to make sense.

Whatever the initial goals, the design obviously failed and never saw showroom floors. (Which is not to take anything away from Rumpf; the man worked on nuclear defense and missile technology, and eventually racked up some 22 patents.)

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Frank Wright

9 years ago

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my older brother was a ford engineer at the age of 24. He was able to bring experimental cars home.
I was 14 when he brought home a wrist twist thunderbird . This is the first car I remember driving so at the time I had nothing to compare it to.
The bird would steer light and easy with little effort and good feel. My dad loved it and he was NOT an easy man to please!
It was a safety issue that killed it, if the engine died or the pump failed it was impossible to steer. You would have thought they would realize this before development!

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J Hayden

10 years ago

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I actually tried this out at a dealership in Maryland back in 65-66 and it worked great. The nay saying is from people who never tried it. The reason for 2 wheels was for left hand right hand use if you had to remove a hand (drink your coffee). The small holes in the wheel were for sharp turns with your index finger and the thumb latches on the outside of the rim were ergonomically correct for feel. The feedback was better than with a large single wheel. I can attest to that since my dad had a 1965 Mercury.
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Brian

12 years ago

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Watch the background during the "parallel" parking sequence. You'll notice a car taking a corner at moderate speed, IN REVERSE. It seems they ran the film backwards, so I don't think that driving the car was as easy as they wanted to portray. Having owned vehicles of that size, I shudder to think of what would have happened if the power steering unit on that puppy had failed.
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redfood

12 years ago

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I think you need to think about what steering was like on those old cars. Have you ever driven one? Most cars didn't have power steering so old steering wheels were huge to dive the driver enough leverage to move the wheels. (A task that even harder when you aren't rolling - hence the woman parallel parking demo.)

The real innovation was probably power steering that was good enough to allow you to control the wheel using only wrist movement. The fact that they made it actually use wrist movement was probably the designers/engineers getting excited about the possibilities w/o think through usability. And the two wheels was a concession to lefties which, as a lefty, I appreciate.
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powers

12 years ago

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It would be a disaster for emergency maneuvers.
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Matt

12 years ago

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I'm just guessing, but I'm thinking he was trying to limit the amount of movement the arms of the driver had to do. By providing armrest the arms of the driver have a new place to sit that is "comfortable." He probably could have just picked an arm and put a single wheel on that side but then it wouldn't have been symmetrical. I'm not sure that automakers would have been about mobility challenged people in the 60's but maybe they were thinking that perhaps having two wheels would work better for people who may not have full mobility of one arm. I don't care for the set up that much. It reminds me of something you would see in some large mechanical battle station. I appreciate the endeavor to look outside of the box though.
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Katie

12 years ago

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I think both dials turned with each other... The narrator says that it can be driven with two hands or one, so they put two dials in there to accommodate for left and right handers. They can't be turned seperately
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Shane Johnston

12 years ago

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It looks like the 'wrist-twits' do not move independently but are linked.

I think it's an interesting exercise in affordances, working at a different scale of embodiment. With the type of driving most of us do, fine motor control isn't necessary. A wheel is sufficient for steering because the strength and endurance of small upper arm movements fits with the broad, general gestures of driving.

It would be like steering your car with the volume knob or watering your garden with a fire hose. The scale of desired behavior is completely off.
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Tom Mc

12 years ago

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It's doubtful they controlled individual wheels based upon the steering mechanicals found in cars. It's more likely they were linked with gears in the center of the "wheel" where it connects to the steering shaft. The purpose of two controls is so ambidextrous control is possible. On a steering wheel, you can drive with either or both hands so it's only logical to think that you'd do the same with this one.

As a side note, I'd love to see a modern woman park a car that huge in a spot that size today! (that's tongue in cheek humor for all you crazy feminists out there).
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Gabe

12 years ago

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Gotta love the complete lack of any safety features in the cars back then.
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