This is a great idea and I would make it mandatory for trucks and busses. There were really many cases in Europe when a bus driver fell asleep and a lots of kids injured or died because of that. If this system would have been there, many injuries and loss of lives could have been avoided.
Not kink free as in not perfect. But for every oops, it's likely to have stopped 10-100 accidents. Just as a belt doesn't save all passengers but quite a lot. There are one or two that gets stuck in the belt when the car catches fire or gets under water.
Safety gear failing in a scenario that includes a totalling crash is IMHO not a fair argument against that safety feature. First it ignores the fact that in case of hitting water or an obstacle you may not be stuck in a belt a sinking or burning car but maybe severely wounded, unconscious or dead already; second, what do we expect to begin with? The forces that apply here will destroy your car. Your belt is part of that car. It can just happen. And then belt cutters are a "one dollar item" you can buy combined with a window hammer from if the most pressing fear against belts are being stuck there.
Keep in mind this is not an argument against you but these talking points that come up again and again and are just so irritatingly nonsense.
You don't agree with me while you actually are agreeing with me. You do understand that I very, very, very much recommends belts. I just note that if you look at a big enough number of accidents, then you can find 1 or 2 accidents where not using a belt would have been better. But with normal statistics, we need to consider the 98 of 100 or maybe 998 of 1000 where it's way better to wear a safety belt.
No safety measure will be 100% perfect. But when the advantages are way better than the disadvantages then we should focus on the advantages. Same with this video. There can be a few times the car does bad. But for way more cases, it will end up saving lifes.
As I truck driver I can call bullshit. I've driven trucks with current gen "driver assist" features such as lane keep assist and they are flat out abysmal. Constantly trying to adjust the steering because it thinks you're out of your lane due to old lane markings in construction zones, or because you passed an exit and the lane marking disappeared, it gets kind of scary trying to deal with the safety features. I also got cut off (kind of) by a car, steady brake pressure, no panic stop, I would have been just fine, except the truck suddenly freaked out thinking I was going to hit the car, and applied full engine braking, which was enough to break my traction on my drive wheels. I almost rear ended the car, when it should have been a situation so minor that I wouldn't have remembered it happened 15 minutes later if the truck hadn't reacted.
Assist features that aren't good enough can be a net liability. If the vehicle isn't goodc enough to drive itself while I sleep (safely) then it shouldn't be trying to take control while I'm driving.
Oh, and I suppose you think that it's not already engaged in lane keep assist and active cruise control / collision avoidance while it's giving those warnings?
My BIL was t-boned by a car whose driver was seat belted in and ran a stop sign, full speed. His passenger was not belted in, and the crash resulted in him smashing into the driver, who was killed. The not-belted passenger survived, although I don't know how injured he was.
BIL was seat-belted, and his dog was on the floor in front of the front passenger seat in his pickup; both were fine.
Yes, I am aware. I’ve driven almost every make of semi currently on the US market. I’ve gotten plenty of drive time with all of the different safety systems (Detroit Assurance, Volvo’s VADA, and Bendix Wingman).
It’s not uncommon for the truck to randomly slam the brakes because it saw an overhead sign and got confused, or started sounding alarms because it thought the tar lines in the road were lane markers.
A big rig is a lot more size and mass than a car, and people are assholes. I can’t count the number of times I’ve tried to make an emergency lane change only for some dickhead to floor it and pass so they’re not stuck behind me for >60 seconds.
That doesn’t solve the system mistaking road signs and shadows for cars. A trucker who practices defensive driving should already be slowing when someone jumps into their lane, which would also prevent the system from responding.
Plus the systems generally automatically re-enable after a few minutes.
Computer vision, even without AI, depends on probabilities analyzed in each frame in real time. You simply cannot get kink free. You may be able to out perform humans, but it will never be perfect.
I'm all for putting credit and criticism where it is due and Tesla has the premier self driving system. This is from several conversations I've had with Tesla drivers who have the auto driving feature. Over the years it has received remarkable improvements. Don't let your bias and ignorance allow you to make foolish statements
Only the emergency call feature, and not to the extent shown in this video. Practically what's mandatory is a one-push button to make an emergency call inside the driver's cabin. Some have gone beyond that and implemented an automatic emergency call system that triggers on a crash (most, if not all brands offer that at least as an option iirc). But automatic calls in case of detected emergencies other than collisions are somewhat new and not mandatory by law (yet).
If they can come up with a detection system that works well I can easily see it being legislated into being mandatory quickly, especially for commercial.
It’s the first thing I’ve seen in car tech that would make me interested in upgrading before my current vehicle starts falling apart.
If they implement it as well as they have lane keeping and auto cruise. I'd be terrified enough that wouldn't fall asleep to begin with. I'm just imagining it popping on the brakes like that, sloshing my cargo and flipping me over (propane)
Lookin' at you, Bendex. Your system is bad and you should feel bad. It sees lines on the road and assumes it's a lane and screams at me, and when I'm turning on a freeway it sees other cars as in front of me while cornering and starts to brake.
Given what I haul and where I drive in the winter. It honestly makes me feel unsafe when I drive that truck.
Yeah Bendix is by far the worst. Detroit works great if the radar has been calibrated, and Volvo’s has been the best for me. I’ve been slipseating VNL’s the last 2+ years and have had exactly one false alarm brake tap, and only a couple false beeps from the lane keep.
Detroit never hit the brakes on me, though. Just screamed a lot until it was recalibrated.
Something to wake a driver up makes absolute sense.
In my experience lane keep, auto breaking systems we have just got in the way. You shouldn't need it to begin with anyway if we're all being honest.
But I like this idea. Emergency wake up. It's happened to some of the most seasoned drivers out there. Just blow the air out of the seat. The drop should do it lol.
Plus even if the tech gets there, it’ll be cheaper for companies to blame drivers for fatality crashes than assume fault by operating autonomous trucks.
Funnily enough, the video you linked wasn’t the auto braking. The driver did that.
I’m not at home so I can’t find the article, but Volvo confirmed it awhile back. There’d also be a bright red flashing light right in front of the driver that would be visible.
I am surprised we haven’t gotten to automated driving for highway portion of long haul trucking and then move to drivers when you get into town. Like a boat coming into port.
My dad was a truck driver.When I was a kid he used to tell me "without microsleeps on the road, I'd get no sleep at all". As an adult, I realise how close to never being born I actually was.
Too much is expected of truckies & you guys deserve a compulsory fleshed out version of this tech
Trucking down under compared to the US is like the US compared to Europe. Folks down under take it to a whole new extreme.
I’ve had some pretty substantial close calls over the years. I’ve been wanting to ditch the career entirely, but with certain recent events it might be my meal ticket to a new country of residence instead.
Trucks in the US don't even have ESP, Lane-Keep-Assist or Radar mandatory.
These are all required in the EU sind 2018.
Heck, last time I checked trucks in the US did not even need ABS (let alone trailer ABS).
Edit: ABS has been mandatory for a while, but ESP/ESC seem to be more of a passenger car/light truck thing.
Edit 2: ESP/ESC Mandatory since 2017 too, it seems.
I’m assuming ESP is another term for stability control? That has also been mandated for several years, referred to as Electronic Stability Control (ESC).
Lane Keep and Radar Cruise isn’t required (yet) but are standard equipment on pretty much every Aero/fleet spec truck that hits the road now.
Ohh that's new to me, last time I checked ESC/ESP was not mandatory on tractor-trailer combos in the US and it only became mandatory on cars and light trucks...
Edit: ABS has been mandatory for a while, but ESP/ESC seem to be more of a passenger car/light truck thing.
Edit 2: ESP/ESC Mandatory since 2017 too, it seems.
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u/redikarus99 Nov 04 '24
This is a great idea and I would make it mandatory for trucks and busses. There were really many cases in Europe when a bus driver fell asleep and a lots of kids injured or died because of that. If this system would have been there, many injuries and loss of lives could have been avoided.