Interpretation ID: nht93-6.32

DATE: September 7, 1993

FROM: John Womack -- Acting Chief Counsel, NHTSA

TO: David Degenstein -- Manager, Product Safety & Compliance, Kenworth Truck Company

TITLE: None

ATTACHMT: Attached to letter dated 6/3/93 from David L. Degenstein to John Womack (OCC 8745)

TEXT:

This responds to your request for an interpretation of Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 101, Controls and Displays. You asked whether the location you are considering for an automatic vehicle speed system control (i.e., a "cruise control") would meet the location requirement of Standard No. 101, and whether the control is excluded from the illumination requirements of the standard. As explained below, the answer to both questions is yes.

Your letter explained that your company is developing a vehicle that "will locate a cruise control switch in a console that is attached to the manual transmission shift lever, adjacent to the shift knob." You state that the switches on the console will be "operable by the driver." You believe that because the cruise control console's location is similar to that of a switch located on the vehicle floor console, illumination of the cruise control is not necessary.

Your first question asks whether the proposed location of the cruise control would meet Standard No. 101. S5.1 of Standard No. 101 specifies that each control listed in S5.1 "that is furnished" must be operable by the driver. S5.1 lists, under the heading of "hand operated control," the automatic vehicle speed system (i.e., the cruise control). Thus, under S5.1, a furnished hand operated cruise control must be operable by the driver.

It appears from your letter that the switches on the cruise control console are operable by the driver. Two photographs you enclosed show the cruise control as mounted on the manual transmission shift lever, and as located so close to the driver's seat as to be almost touching it. Accordingly, the proposed location of the cruise control console would be permitted by Standard No. 101.

Your second question asks whether your proposed cruise control would have to be illuminated under S5.3 of Standard No. 101. S5.3.1 excludes from the illumination requirements hand operated controls that are mounted on the floor, floor console or steering column.

You believe that your cruise control, while mounted on the transmission shift lever, should be considered mounted on the floor console. We agree that locating the control on the shift lever is similar to locating it on the floor console for the purposes of illumination requirements. This interpretation is based on agency precedent concerning S5.3.1's exception for controls on steering columns. In the preamble to a final rule dated May 4, 1971 (36 FR 8296), NHTSA determined that the exception for controls mounted on the steering

column extends to controls mounted on the steering wheel. Since the transmission shift lever bears the same relationship to the floor console as does the steering wheel to the steering column, controls on the transmission shift lever are excepted from S5.3.1's illumination requirements.

I hope this information is helpful. If you have any further questions, please contact Dorothy Nakama of my staff at (202) 366-2992.