Cruise control will kill you!

Stallingrad

Excuse the click bait title, but after owning a car with Adaptive Cruise Control, and driving a car with normal cruise control again, normal cruise seems like archaic madness. Unless you have miles of traffic free roads you have to fiddle with it endlessly, you can never relax, it will literally drive you full tilt into something in front of you, seems like an incredibly dumb device to have on car.

ACC makes CC what it was always meant to be.

micks_address

Stallingrad wrote: »

Excuse the click bait title, but after owning a car with Adaptive Cruise Control, and driving a car with normal cruise control again, normal cruise seems like archaic madness. Unless you have miles of traffic free roads you have to fiddle with it endlessly, you can never relax, it will literally drive you full tilt into something in front of you, seems like an incredibly dumb device to have on car.

ACC makes CC what it was always meant to be.

even with acc i tend to drive with my foot hovering over the brake...

FileNotFound

Stallingrad wrote: »

Excuse the click bait title, but after owning a car with Adaptive Cruise Control, and driving a car with normal cruise control again, normal cruise seems like archaic madness. Unless you have miles of traffic free roads you have to fiddle with it endlessly, you can never relax, it will literally drive you full tilt into something in front of you, seems like an incredibly dumb device to have on car.

ACC makes CC what it was always meant to be.

No matter what driver assist you have active it is fully expected you pay full attention to the road while driving a 1 tonne + metal ram.

Kind of a ludicrous comment - you are complaining that you have to pay attention while driving.

I think maybe the issue is with your concept, not the tech.

Stallingrad

FileNotFound wrote: »

No matter what driver assist you have active it is fully expected you pay full attention to the road while driving a 1 tonne + metal ram.

Kind of a ludicrous comment - you are complaining that you have to pay attention while driving.

I think maybe the issue is with your concept, not the tech.

Predictable boards response. What makes you think I am not paying attention? And like the above poster my right foot is always sort of hovering. When you set a generous gap you can feel the car slowing or speeding up, that makes the driving experience much more relaxing and reasuring than normal CC.

FileNotFound

Stallingrad wrote: »

Predictable boards response. What makes you think I am not paying attention? And like the above poster my right foot is always sort of hovering. When you set a generous gap you can feel the car slowing or speeding up, that makes the driving experience much more relaxing and reasuring than normal CC.

Because if you are paying attention - there is nothing to complain about.

Its an assist not a drive for you mode. No need to get pissy as someone pointed out the obvious.

The reality is Driving assist can only go so far - using it to "Relax" behind the wheel is a dangerous concept.

I have standard CC in one car and ACC in the other, have no real preference as only use CC when on motorway or clear roads. I personally find some of the newer driver aids annoying. So I suppose i am the other end of the spectrum.

GreeBo

Stallingrad wrote: »

Excuse the click bait title, but after owning a car with Adaptive Cruise Control, and driving a car with normal cruise control again, normal cruise seems like archaic madness. Unless you have miles of traffic free roads you have to fiddle with it endlessly, you can never relax, it will literally drive you full tilt into something in front of you, seems like an incredibly dumb device to have on car.

ACC makes CC what it was always meant to be.

I think its really designed for use in the US or AUS where you might have an 8 hour journey and not meet another car.

ACC linked to traffic sign recognition is the dogs bolloçks altogether.

vandriver

I use cruise control in the port tunnel because of the average speed cameras.Other than that one special usage case,i don't see the point of it.

km991148

It's kind of an interesting point and I wonder if it means we may inadvertently see a slight rise in accidents.

Of course everyone is paying attention and should be, but if you are driving around for years with the new features, subconsciously knowing that you are covered, and then get into another car (with older cruise) will there be a second of delay in the panic of something unexpected?

Probably won't see anything statistically relevant as I guess it's only going to cause a potential issue with those going from new to old and with an unexpected event happening.

I find the way that technology modifies behaviour very interesting.

Isambard

i use it all the time (or did when I could go out) and don't have a problem. If your brain says you're closing on another vehicle or a hazard, you can switch it out at the touch of a button or just touch the brake pedal. Much the same as your brain would tell you to lift off the throttle .

beauf

vandriver wrote: »

I use cruise control in the port tunnel because of the average speed cameras.Other than that one special usage case,i don't see the point of it.

That's how I use it, bit not just there any long journey where I'm constantly sitting at the speed limit.

Stallingrad

km991148 wrote: »

It's kind of an interesting point and I wonder if it means we may inadvertently see a slight rise in accidents.

Of course everyone is paying attention and should be, but if you are driving around for years with the new features, subconsciously knowing that you are covered, and then get into another car (with older cruise) will there be a second of delay in the panic of something unexpected?

Probably won't see anything statistically relevant as I guess it's only going to cause a potential issue with those going from new to old and with an unexpected event happening.

I find the way that technology modifies behaviour very interesting.

Great post and worthy of its own thread. I had no interest in using the CC on the car I borrowed, precisely because it was not going to do what I was used ACC doing. Jumping between generations of cars does throw up some issues for sure and you do have to be alert to them.

steinbock123

I use cruise all the time, in town and out of town, as well as making for a more relaxed drive, it is also more economical on fuel as a result.
Although I suppose it depends on the make of car, I have driven cars where the cruise control is very fiddly to operate, so that might be a discouragement to use.

beauf

Stallingrad wrote: »

Excuse the click bait title, but after owning a car with Adaptive Cruise Control, and driving a car with normal cruise control again, normal cruise seems like archaic madness. Unless you have miles of traffic free roads you have to fiddle with it endlessly, you can never relax, it will literally drive you full tilt into something in front of you, seems like an incredibly dumb device to have on car.

ACC makes CC what it was always meant to be.

You're not meant to use CC in close traffic. Whereas ACC is designed to be used in traffic. Kinda of a fundamental difference there.

slipperyox

interesting read here giving abs brakes as an example..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_compensation

TheWonderLlama

ACC is a right pain in the behind.
It leaves too much of a gap to the car in front, (and yes, I have tried adjusting it, but its never quite enough) resulting in joxer in his white van diving into the gap between you and the car in front and all hell breaking loose in the warning system. Full anchors on, red alert, you're all going to die! type of effort. Which is probably slightly disconcerting for they guy following you.

Feck that.

WacoKid

CC was developed before ACC. CC would have been an expensive option when first introduced due to the R&D costs, now it is pretty much standard.

ACC will become standard in a few years when the cost to manufacture it reduces but at the moment it is an optional extra.

Stallingrad

beauf wrote: »

You're not meant to use CC in close traffic. Whereas ACC is designed to be used in traffic. Kinda of a fundamental difference there.

The fundamental difference is in the technology, one maintains a gap, one doesn't. If you used CC between Dublin and Cork, you would be engaging with it countless times, with an automatic car could do that drive with ACC without touching the throttle or brake. It is a game changer in that regard.

Kintarō Hattori

I only have a car with regular cruise control and find it great on a relatively quiet motorway. I'm sure ACC is better but I find cruise control very useful on the sort of journey up and down the motorway where it was intended to be used.

km991148

WacoKid wrote: »

CC was developed before ACC. CC would have been an expensive option when first introduced due to the R&D costs, now it is pretty much standard.

ACC will become standard in a few years when the cost to manufacture it reduces but at the moment it is an optional extra.

Think acc is mandatory from end of this year?

colm_mcm

The issue is when you then drive something that doesn’t have it.

FileNotFound

WacoKid wrote: »

CC was developed before ACC. CC would have been an expensive option when first introduced due to the R&D costs, now it is pretty much standard.

ACC will become standard in a few years when the cost to manufacture it reduces but at the moment it is an optional extra.

Like most things, take ABS for example and power steering.

Guess the evolution tends to go one way, most advances make me a poorer driver.

I could park my old car in the tightest spot - now i struggle to be confident without sensors/camera etc.

Literally I have become a worse driver haha.



The backwards compatibility of the human mind is a good topic to raise alright.

km991148

FileNotFound wrote: »

Like most things, take ABS for example and power steering.

Guess the evolution tends to go one way, most advances make me a poorer driver.

I could park my old car in the tightest spot - now i struggle to be confident without sensors/camera etc.

Literally I have become a worse driver haha.

Yeah exactly, these are small signs of how collectively driver behaviour is changing.

'back in my day' power steering was optional and abs was something you needed to have a practical knowledge of. These days people wouldn't know what you are on about really. Now this is obviously good in one sense as everyone has it. ABS obviously works very well in most scenarios.. but people are less connected. A lot of people loose the awareness around why you mustn't jam on and loose an awareness around general road handling (and that's before you get onto the effects of risk perception as someone else posted).

Del2005

WacoKid wrote: »

CC was developed before ACC. CC would have been an expensive option when first introduced due to the R&D costs, now it is pretty much standard.

ACC will become standard in a few years when the cost to manufacture it reduces but at the moment it is an optional extra.

ACC will be standard from next year for all new, cars sold in the EU, along with lane assist and a few other features.

CC and ACC are just like all the other features on a vehicle handy when used correctly dangerous when not, but all current features on cars are still only driving aids so the driver still needs to be in control.

I'd be more worried about the other safety features that someone driving a car equipped with ACC would be missing in a car without ACC, especially if they can't judge distances now it's been automated.

Stallingrad

FileNotFound wrote: »

The backwards compatibility of the human mind is a good topic to raise alright.

Drifting OT but the decision has been made that humans cannot be trusted. Even us die hard petrol heads will have to concede that. All the new driver aids will only make driving safer in the long term, to the point where full autonomy will take over.

How may fender benders would so see in a years commuting on the M50, eejits on their phones or fiddling with the radio, every one could have been avoided with a front radar, brake assist/ACC, etc.

BrianD3

I drove 60k kms per year up until recently and never had either type of CC. The biggest danger for me was getting drowsy at the wheel. This would generally happen while driving at a steady 80 km/h in line of traffic after dark with no possibility to overtake. Whereas it was never an issue with varying speed, driving faster, overtaking etc.

This issue is mentioned in the below paper - "cognitive underload"
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5893797/

Would adaptive CC result in cognitive underload while "dumb" CC could result in cognitive underload or cognitive overload depending on conditions.

mickdw

Having used active cruise in a passat a fair bit, i can see the the op is talking a fair degree of sense.
When using these active systems, even on the safest distance setting, there is often a brief moment where you are actually waiting for your car to do its thing when the car in front slows. You know its going to react and its still welk within safe distances etc.
If you jump into another car with standard cruise, you could easily expect your car to slow down by itself and robbing you of valuable stopping distance in the process.
The answer is not to use basic cruise system if more used to active cruise. Its pretty useless anyway while active cruise works brilliantly even on small twisty roads.

theoneeyedman

Stallingrad wrote: »

you can never relax,

Exactly, you're sitting in a steel tube at 100km per hour, you shouldn't be relaxed.

beauf

FileNotFound wrote: »

Like most things, take ABS for example and power steering.

Guess the evolution tends to go one way, most advances make me a poorer driver.

I could park my old car in the tightest spot - now i struggle to be confident without sensors/camera etc.

Literally I have become a worse driver haha.



The backwards compatibility of the human mind is a good topic to raise alright.

I'm not sure the relevance. ABS out performs most drivers in the vast majority of situations. It hasn't made anyone a worse driver as its doing something most people can't do. It can't replace a skill drivers never had.

Ignoring ABS. Braking in general is much better in modern cars. Better tyres, brakes, etc. Someone might be a late braker and drive on the brakes as they say. But if you are triggering abs regularly that's anti skid. Without it you'd be skidding and sliding that's just dangerous driving.

beauf

Stallingrad wrote: »

Drifting OT but the decision has been made that humans cannot be trusted. Even us die hard petrol heads will have to concede that. All the new driver aids will only make driving safer in the long term, to the point where full autonomy will take over.

How may fender benders would so see in a years commuting on the M50, eejits on their phones or fiddling with the radio, every one could have been avoided with a front radar, brake assist/ACC, etc.

Not that we can't be trusted. But that the computers do it better more often. They still make mistakes, just less often.

Comhrá

Deleted User wrote: »

ACC linked to traffic sign recognition is the dogs bolloçks altogether.

Have both in my Passat and they're great working in unison, especially with DSG.

beauf

Seems like people were using CC while almost tail gating in traffic. I can see why it would be useless in that scenario. ACC makes sense in the US where people spend hours crawling in traffic. Not so much for rush hour fast moving traffic and tail gating.

I accept the point about people cutting in.

FileNotFound

beauf wrote: »

I'm not sure the relevance. ABS out performs most drivers in the vast majority of situations. It hasn't made anyone a worse driver as its doing something most people can't do. It can't replace a skill drivers never had.

Ignoring ABS Braking in general is much better in modern cars. Better tyres, brakes, etc. Someone might be a late braker and drive on the brakes as they say. But if you are triggering abs regularly that's anti skid. Without it you'd be skidding and sliding that's just dangerous driving.

My point was relevant to going backwards to a car without, say if you have abs but then drive a car without (prob never going to happen these days) people become reliant on tech they are used to.

The poorer driving was more parking sensor related to be fair. But I would say that in a few years when we become more reliant on systems to correct for us it will stand for many more areas.

Just my personal experience and a guess at whats to come.

knucklehead6

Stallingrad wrote: »

Excuse the click bait title, but after owning a car with Adaptive Cruise Control, and driving a car with normal cruise control again, normal cruise seems like archaic madness. Unless you have miles of traffic free roads you have to fiddle with it endlessly, you can never relax, it will literally drive you full tilt into something in front of you, seems like an incredibly dumb device to have on car.

ACC makes CC what it was always meant to be.

Excuse the clickbait title but after owning a airplane with jet engines, going to an airplane with a piston propeller engine seems like archaic madness...

grogi

We really should differentiate between systems that are supposed to trigger in dangerous situation and systems on all the time.

ABS is the former one. You should never need to use it. For all intents and purposes, it doesn't exist. Until the one day comes when it kicks in allows you to save the ass (you still need to know what to do though )

ACC is active all the time. You cannot really get any advantage of it if you don't use it continuosly.

This is where I find the danger: people are only humans and will lose focus when they don't need to. The car drives on its own, right? ACC takes care of the distance, lane assist keeps the car between the lanes. It is very easy to rely on the technology a bit too much. We shouldn't at this stage yet, those systems are not designed with autonomy in mind. Driver should still be actively monitoring the situation and react immediately. But is simply won't be possible if your driver's skills aren't 'warmed up', your mind isn't in the focus mode anymore after an hour of not doing anything.

Until the level 4 autonomy comes, those continuously on systems are horrible IMHO and my our roads less safe.

The systems you don't see: ABS, ESP, automatic braking, even airbags - all those are great. But they don't let the driver to stop paying attention, as they should not work at all. ACC and Lane assist: not so much.

km991148

FileNotFound wrote: »

My point was relevant to going backwards to a car without, say if you have abs but then drive a car without (prob never going to happen these days) people become reliant on tech they are used to.

The poorer driving was more parking sensor related to be fair. But I would say that in a few years when we become more reliant on systems to correct for us it will stand for many more areas.

Just my personal experience and a guess at whats to come.

I think ABS does make a point. It's not a direct correlation as in this case there is a much, much greater 'bang for your buck', but as I say, back in the day, braking techniques and the dangers of aquaplaning and what happens when it goes wrong even you jam on the anchors was all drummed in to me.

These days it's less if a danger, so fewer skills are taught. Abs can still occasionally go wrong or road conditions can go against it and people don't know how to drive (but granted it's really hard to find the examples because the advantages of ABS far outweigh these very occasionally negatives).

Casati

Agree completely with the OP, its very hard driving a car with standard cruise when you are used to ACC. Ive used it a lot up not only on M8/ M7 but also on many national roads where its great. It definitely allows me to relax - that doesn't mean you drift off to sleep and not stay attentive.

The only folks it probably doesn't work well for are tailgaters - (which I guess is why BMW don't bother making it standard on many cars!) as the system won't allow you to tailgate the car in front as it always leaves a safe distance. Drivers saying it leaves you too far from the car in front need to think about how they typically drive.

Reading that its standard in all new cars next year - brilliant news. Its actually standard on a lot of new cars this year - even a base spec Transporter van has it now

dmc17

FileNotFound wrote: »

No matter what driver assist you have active it is fully expected you pay full attention to the road while driving a 1 tonne + metal ram.

Kind of a ludicrous comment - you are complaining that you have to pay attention while driving.

I think maybe the issue is with your concept, not the tech.

loyatemu

I use CC all the time on the motorway, once you're away from Dublin the motorways are pretty quiet and fine for CC. Of course you still need to pay attention, but it allows you to take your foot off the gas and keeps you at a much more consistent speed, set it to 120 and forget about it. You really notice the cars that aren't using CC - they overtake you going downhill, then as soon as there's a slight uphill, you're back on their bumper.

L1011

loyatemu wrote: »

I use CC all the time on the motorway, once you're away from Dublin the motorways are pretty quiet and fine for CC. Of course you still need to pay attention, but it allows you to take your foot off the gas and keeps you at a much more consistent speed, set it to 120 and forget about it. You really notice the cars that aren't using CC - they overtake you going downhill, then as soon as there's a slight uphill, you're back on their bumper.

Had a driver in a relatively recent car that I would presume had CC/ACC, but obviously not in use pass me maybe six times between Dublin and Cashel on Friday (essential worker/trip) and then slow up significantly after a while resulting in me passing them again.

They were probably going through a 15km/h range if not more; I set the ACC at Naas and other than braking for the toll didn't touch it otherwise

AMKC

I think this bit below is very interesting,

Swedish change to driving on the right Edit
In Sweden, following the change from driving on the left to driving on the right in 1967 there was a drop in crashes and fatalities, which was linked to the increased apparent risk. The number of motor insurance claims went down by 40%, returning to normal over the next six weeks.[26][27] Fatality levels took two years to return to normal.[28][n

So all we need to do is change the side of the road that you drive on every two years and it will reduce fatalitys by 40 per cent.

redcup342

I only use Adaptive Cruise Control now on Motorways, on National roads its gotten me a speeding ticket twice in the past 6 months :pac:

Casati

AMKC wrote: »

I think this bit below is very interesting,

Swedish change to driving on the right Edit
In Sweden, following the change from driving on the left to driving on the right in 1967 there was a drop in crashes and fatalities, which was linked to the increased apparent risk. The number of motor insurance claims went down by 40%, returning to normal over the next six weeks.[26][27] Fatality levels took two years to return to normal.[28][n

So all we need to do is change the side of the road that you drive on every two years and it will reduce fatalitys by 40 per cent.

Prior to the change they were driving LHD drive cars on the wrong side so its no surprise

beauf

FileNotFound wrote: »

My point was relevant to going backwards to a car without, say if you have abs but then drive a car without (prob never going to happen these days) people become reliant on tech they are used to.

The poorer driving was more parking sensor related to be fair. But I would say that in a few years when we become more reliant on systems to correct for us it will stand for many more areas.

Just my personal experience and a guess at whats to come.

I have one car with abs and one without. I notice no difference. It's very rare I trigger abs in a car. If someone is constantly triggering abs they are a very dangerous driver.

beauf

Stallingrad wrote: »

The fundamental difference is in the technology, one maintains a gap, one doesn't. If you used CC between Dublin and Cork, you would be engaging with it countless times, with an automatic car could do that drive with ACC without touching the throttle or brake. It is a game changer in that regard.

When I use CC I hardly touch it. I would only need to touch it I was constantly closing on cars. If a person is constantly getting close to cars then that person is not matching speeds or its heavy traffic. In this case cc is not intended for that.

ACC isn't going to help if you are constantly faster than the traffic. It will only help you maintain distance when at matched speeds, especially in heavy traffic.

There's no doubt the ACC is the future. But theres a bit of bad driver habits at play here. So this is an interesting discussion. All interesting and valid viewpoints.

DriveSkill

redcup342 wrote: »

I only use Adaptive Cruise Control now on Motorways, on National roads its gotten me a speeding ticket twice in the past 6 months :pac:

I think it should be the exact opposite! ACC or CC should be the perfect solution to avoid speeding tickets



Personally I tend to use CC or ACC all the time, have one car with each, most cars allow you to "notch-up" or "notch-down" by 10km/hr via the controls on the steering wheel. So yes, you need to be attentive to the change of speed limits but still makes for a much more relaxing drive - see a speed limit reduction sign, drop back 10/20 km as required - with ACC it makes it much better as if the guy in front decides to slow down more so will you. Equally if he decides to ignore the speed limit well off with him!

Stallingrad

theoneeyedman wrote: »

Exactly, you're sitting in a steel tube at 100km per hour, you shouldn't be relaxed.

Don't agree with this at all, relaxed does not mean you are not alert, it means you are not anxious or tense. Stress leads to fatigue and bad decisions.

Does an anxious pilot fly better than a relaxed one? Of course not.

frozenfrozen

I use non adaptive cruise all the time. I just leave it set and if I gain on someone on the motorway I overtake them. It's only annoying when I haven't adjusted the speed for an entire motorway journey but I've overtaken and been overtaken by the same non-cruise cars multiple times.

Especially the ones who sit beside you and decide to stop accelerating and do a 50 second overtake, then pull in front of you and force you to brake. If anyone knows what's going on in their heads please let me know

Bass Reeves

There an old saying it's a bad tradesman that blames his tools. CC it ACC are just tools you use when driving. I have CC on a 2010 RAV. It brilliant when you understand it advantages and limits.

It not just for Motorway use. And deceent single carrigway you can use it as well. Just set your speed and drive away. I use it a lot when towing. If there is weight on the trailer it's a matter of driving in 4th or 5th gear at whatever is the apt speed. I can use the +/- to adjust sorted. This is all you do when driving it on a motorway. Set it between 110 & 120 and 90% of traffic is flying past you

i57dwun4yb1pt8

frozenfrozen wrote: »

I use non adaptive cruise all the time. I just leave it set and if I gain on someone on the motorway I overtake them. It's only annoying when I haven't adjusted the speed for an entire motorway journey but I've overtaken and been overtaken by the same non-cruise cars multiple times.

Especially the ones who sit beside you and decide to stop accelerating and do a 50 second overtake, then pull in front of you and force you to brake. If anyone knows what's going on in their heads please let me know

The monkey in their head has lost a cymbal.

Personally i love CC ,
and CC in an auto which I am using alot now is just lovely .
Lane control, not a fan

Mango Joe

Occasionally you'll have old-style cruise control on and ponder about how far it would take you if things went wrong for whatever reason.

Saw a video clip on Reddit then about 6 months ago where a Driver had a medical crisis and lost consciousness with cruise control on.

Basically it's footage of a car driving, lurching and bouncing across fields, through fences etc. - weaving in big aimless arcs smashing through everything in its path.

Can't seem to find it now - Someone will link to it hopefully.

- PS I would really, really miss CC on a motorway spin or a long journey on decent, quiet roads, wouldn't buy a car that didn't have it etc.