BayGBM

Whatever happened to four-wheel steering? We’ve all seen the technology at work, for example, in some bulldozers and long fire trucks (in fire trucks there is usually a guy sitting in a cabin at the rear of the truck with his own steering wheel to control the rear wheels) but why didn't it catch on in passenger cars? I think I remember hearing about it in a vehicle last year (was it a BMW 7 series?) but one doesn’t hear much about that technology anymore.

Some of you may recall that in the late 1980’s this innovation got a lot of buzz in the auto rags. If my memory is correct, the Honda Prelude was one of the cars that introduced this technology to the public. At highway speeds, all four wheels turned in synch enabling swift and controlled lane changes. At slow speeds, the front and rear wheels turned in opposite directions enabling, for example, easier parallel parking.

The technology never seemed to catch on and in no time at all Honda dropped it. Was it all hype with no real functional benefit? Was it prone to mechanical problems and expensive to repair? What happened?

therealman

Four wheel steering was an advantage when parking but there was not a big advantage on the highway. So unless you drove a lot of slaloms or were afraid of parking it wasn't worth the $1300 option price.

The RX-7 (the last one before it became the RX8) had a version of 4ws as well. On fast turns the RX-7 toed in both rear wheels supposedly helping steering.