Is It Hot Enough For Ya?

I don't know what the duck has to do with anything, but the message is spot on. Tow truck might run you a couple of hundred dollars. A new engine will run you a couple of thousand, minimum. Oh the overheating might not kill it dead right off, but it will lead to things like warped heads, failing head gaskets and leaking oil seals. You might be able to limp along for another six months or a year, but eventually you will have to pay the piper. Or start walking.

    The evolution of the temperature gauge in the US has several stages. First, there were gauges that worked. Some even had numbers on them. But US drivers, who a) can’t be bothered learning that a 50/50 ethylene glycol/water mix boils at 224F at atmospheric pressure, and b) that the boiling point goes up 3F for each PSI, would get all sorts of panicky if the temperature gauge read over 200F and bring it back to the dealer for warranty work.
    So the automakers scrapped the numbers and just put cold/hot markings. Well, then customers wanted to know what part of the gauge’s range was trouble, and brought anything “too low” or “too high” by their subjective judgement back to the dealer for warranty work.
    So the “NORMAL” band was added, typically with letters. Now we get into the same problem as with numbers: customers expected it to be in the middle of the NORMAL range, right between the R and the M. And never move.
    So the automakers started putting huge flat spots in the gauge’s response curve. And under most conditions, that helped. Except with some heat-challenged engines in cold climates, where the coolant temp would dither around the point where the flat spot started, and the needle would move slightly in normal operation, causing customers to bring the car back for warranty work.
    So the automakers did two things: one, they removed the “NORMAL” lettering again, and two, they increased the flat spot on the response curve.
And thus was gestation of the idiot light disguised as a gauge. - TTAC commenter “autojim”

Stolen from Dustbury. Does the repetition of "back to the dealer for warranty work" make this some kind of formal form?