New car! YAY! Missing Feature! BOO!

June 12, 2012 3:42 PM

Have you seen anything like an attachable mirror to the passenger-side mirror that can be angled down to see where the rear wheel is in relation to the curb?

My old car had a passenger-side mirror that tilted down when the transmission was in reverse to see the curb when backing in to a parking place, etc. My new car does not have this feature, and I miss it so.

My parking slot at home has a very gritty wall on one side, and I need to back into it as close to the wall as possible while avoiding sliding the wheels or the mirror along it.

I really need some kind of mirror that I can attach to the bottom of the passenger side mirror, permanently angled down to mimic the view I once had.

Have you seen anything like that on the market?

posted by DandyRandy to travel & transportation (12 answers total)

Does your car have power mirrors? I just adjust my passenger-side mirror down to see the curb when I'm parking, which is hard if you don't have power mirrors, but easy otherwise.
posted by brainmouse at 3:51 PM on June 12, 2012

Any of those little wide-angle mirrors - that pickups often put on their mirrors - should work.
posted by notsnot at 3:54 PM on June 12, 2012

I always either adjust it myself, as brainmouse suggests, or simply elevate and move my head a bit so that I can see the rear wheel and curb without moving the mirror.
posted by The World Famous at 3:58 PM on June 12, 2012

Put a mirror on the wall.
posted by spitbull at 4:02 PM on June 12, 2012

These used to be reasonably common in the 70's & 80's in Australia, about the time that cars stopped coming with nice large mirrors but before electric mirrors were common. Typically, they were just a small flat mirror on an angled bracked designed to clip / stick / screw to the bottom of the main mirror.

The modern equivalent seems to be this, but as notsnot suggests a small stick-on rectangular blind spot mirror pointing down is probably simpler and more discrete.
posted by Pinback at 4:13 PM on June 12, 2012

Your new car may have the option, but it's not set. My dad's car had this option and also the option to auto-fold the side mirrors when the car is locked.

Check the manual?
posted by Cog at 4:18 PM on June 12, 2012

No, I definitely do not have the feature, surprising as it seems.

The problem with the stick-on-mirror-on-the-regular-mirror idea is that I have to 'back up' a bit uphill before I go downhill into the parking slot. A stuck-on mirror (besides being too small to really make out the edge of the curb-like structure at the bottom of the wall) is pointed up until I make the crest, by which time it's too late to do any good. There's nowhere other than the face of the mirror on which to use a stick-on.

Something that can be aimed to a lower viewpoint than the regular mirror would be great, and if it could avoid being hideous at the same time would be ideal. I see a few possibilities at Amazon that I'm evaluating. Pinback is on to something there.

The mirror itself is powered and adjustable, but it's a nuisance to readjust then re-readjust after parking. Just looking to make it easy.
posted by DandyRandy at 4:38 PM on June 12, 2012

My Durango had that option but it was not on by default and I would have needed to go to a dealer to activate it. Have you checked your manual?
posted by COD at 4:38 PM on June 12, 2012

Alternative: Hang a marker over your parking space so you know when you're lined up correctly. The normal thing is a ping pong ball suspended on a ribbon. When you see the ribbon move slightly you know the side of your car is touching the ping pong ball and is therefore in the correct spot.
posted by anaelith at 5:04 PM on June 12, 2012 [2 favorites]

Would a fisheye mirror work?
posted by matlock expressway at 5:54 PM on June 12, 2012

Yes, a fisheye mirror would do the job. And should be mandatory on every car.
posted by gjc at 6:53 PM on June 12, 2012

A blind-spot (fish-eye) mirror will work perfectly for this. Get one of the small ones that adheres to the regular mirror. It will allow you to see the entire side of the car, including the rear wheel. Experiment with placement before you actually stick it on to be sure you don't cover a part of the mirror that you need on the road. The lower outside corner is the most likely place. The fish-eye mirror will give you rear visibility no matter what angle you are on, because you will be able to see up the hill on the higher part of the mirror or down the hill on the lower.
posted by dg at 7:48 PM on June 12, 2012