As Tesla backs away from its steering yoke and Lexus strikes ahead with a model of its personal, a latest Ferrari patent utility hints at an much more radical steering system.

Printed by the US Patent and Trademark Workplace (USPTO) on Nov. 16 and initially filed on Could 8, the patent submitting in query describes a system for a controlling a automobile with two joysticks.

A joystick could be positioned on both facet of the driving force’s seat, and shifting them together would permit the driving force to manage the path the automobile turns and the yaw angle—in different phrases, how sideways it will get. Acceleration and braking could possibly be managed by conventional pedals, or utilizing buttons or triggers mounted on the joysticks, based on Ferrari.

Ferrari is a bit imprecise on the benefits of such a system however claims it’s technically possible. Joysticks are already used to manage forklifts, Ferrari notes. What the automaker does not handle is a earlier try at joystick management. Saab really constructed a prototype automobile with a joystick as a part of a European program geared toward bettering automobile security. The joystick proved troublesome to make use of, although, and was rapidly dropped.

Newer makes an attempt at steering-wheel alternate options have targeted on yokes, with Tesla putting in them within the Mannequin S and Mannequin X and Lexus making them a part of a brand new steer-by-wire system. Within the utility, Ferrari dismisses the yoke as a purely stylistic alternative as a result of it will probably’t carry out its meant operate in a automobile. Yokes are sometimes utilized in plane, the place they are often pushed ahead or backward to manage pitch. That is the angle of the nostril in relation to the bottom—one thing that is not supposed to vary in a automobile.

But whereas it is unclear if Ferrari’s joystick management system will ever see manufacturing, Lexus is shifting forward with its steering yoke. It is launching within the Lexus RZ 450e electrical crossover, though it is not accessible within the U.S. for now.