Speed limiters on cars

sheenas

I think relying on the car to be aware of your surrounding is a bad thing. I have always known the speed limit or know how to determine the limit if there are no signs visible.

Arctos

Northern_Wanderer said:

I've driven my car myself for around 30 years. I don't need any babysitting and turn off whatever "aids" I can. I don't feel they make me safer, just add annoying noises that distract me. 

I've had a used car with a few "aids" - the speed limiter remains unactivated, but "lane assist" is a pain as it seems to try to drag the steering. Given that I live in a rural area this was a little alarming at first; however, at the start of each journey I turn this "aid" off. It is a distraction, and after over 40 years of never being involved in any collision and only two speeding tickets, I too prefer not to be babysat. 

facade

On mine you set the limit manually, and it won't exceed it. Then when you pass a speed sign, it displays the new (lower) limit, and asks you to ok the change (flash,flash another ticket....)

Active cruise is the same, except you don't need to touch the pedal, and it will try to maintain a safe distance from the car in front

It would be wonderful if it had an auto mode where it adjusts the speed itself so that it always passes the sign exactly at a lower limit, and doesn't accelerate to a higher limit until after it has passed it.

Then it could display the new limit and ask you if you want to override it.

(Speed traps are often sited just in front of a higher limit and just past a lower limit to catch drivers adjusting their speed the wrong side of the sign.)

Northern_Wanderer

Arctos said:

Northern_Wanderer said:

I've driven my car myself for around 30 years. I don't need any babysitting and turn off whatever "aids" I can. I don't feel they make me safer, just add annoying noises that distract me. 

I've had a used car with a few "aids" - the speed limiter remains unactivated, but "lane assist" is a pain as it seems to try to drag the steering. Given that I live in a rural area this was a little alarming at first; however, at the start of each journey I turn this "aid" off. It is a distraction, and after over 40 years of never being involved in any collision and only two speeding tickets, I too prefer not to be babysat. 

Oh I hate lane assist, fortunatley mine is permanently off, first thing I did in that car. There was some setting, think it's forward collision warning, that would beep with oncoming traffic if I was driving around a curve in the road. It makes me paranoid I'm about to hit something and I get confused. Also, the warning goes off before I can even look to see what warning it is. I feel safer without distracting tech. If I get to a point when I'm unaware of what's around me, I should stop driving. I test drove a bunch of cars before buying this one. Most had electronic dash board, full of coloured lights that flash and move, I just don't need that sh*t distracting me when I'm observing the road.

Okell

unforeseen said:

How does it deal with an urban environment where the speed limit is 20 on the road where you currently are but if you turn off it there may not be more signs as it defaults back to 30.

Surely there must be terminal signs when you pass from one limit to another?

If there weren't that would be a defence to any accustion of speeding on grounds that the signage was not adequate to convey the speed limit

Alanp

My last car, a Ford puma, had the limiter adjust the speed to the limit, sometimes it picked up a 20mph sign in a side street and adjusted it down to that, ( usually from 30mph) it could be overridden by pressing the accelerator, it was a bit hit and miss in reading the signs, my Yaris cross is a bit better as it doesn’t adjust the speed to the limit, instead chimes if you go over..

Grey_Critic

You have to remember these devices are not fitted for your benefit -The various authorities WANT YOUR MONEY and they encourage manufacturers to devise and fit them.

If you have a problem with any of them and are unable to disable yourself I am sure the guys who offer to Re-Chip you car will be able to assist you - for a price

WellKnownSid

Grey_Critic said:

You have to remember these devices are not fitted for your benefit -The various authorities WANT YOUR MONEY and they encourage manufacturers to devise and fit them.

If you have a problem with any of them and are unable to disable yourself I am sure the guys who offer to Re-Chip you car will be able to assist you - for a price

Actually a lot of these devices are dreamed up and promoted by the subsystem manufacturers - so you’ll also have the likes of Bosch sat on standards and road safety committees explaining why the technology needs to be made mandatory. Bosch also used to fund a lot of dealer programmes to encourage extra sales back in the day when things like ESP and AEB were optional extra.

Goudy

Northern_Wanderer said:

Arctos said:

Northern_Wanderer said:

I've driven my car myself for around 30 years. I don't need any babysitting and turn off whatever "aids" I can. I don't feel they make me safer, just add annoying noises that distract me. 

I've had a used car with a few "aids" - the speed limiter remains unactivated, but "lane assist" is a pain as it seems to try to drag the steering. Given that I live in a rural area this was a little alarming at first; however, at the start of each journey I turn this "aid" off. It is a distraction, and after over 40 years of never being involved in any collision and only two speeding tickets, I too prefer not to be babysat. 

 If I get to a point when I'm unaware of what's around me, I should stop driving. 

How would you be aware that you are unaware?

Maybe you should stop now when you are aware you will eventually be unaware, that might be safer as being unaware that you will be unaware at some point in the future would obviously be dangerous. 

Or maybe we should all stop now as I am certain every driver has at times been unaware of a hazard or speed limit or no right turn etc.
You have provided some evidence of that with your two speeding tickets or were you aware of the speed limit but just couldn't care. 


I don't have any bother with these devices or systems.
I notice some tend to "over work" if you aren't driving to the conditions, like trying to drive faster than the traffic around will often cause the collision warning to go off more often and that damn speed limiter goes off every time I speed!

Some manufacturers systems, like lane assist aren't very good, I'm not disputing that.

And yes they are distracting, that's the idea.
Some systems, like collision warning are designed to distract you from possible inattention which is why they flash and make a noise or vibrate the steering wheel and beep when you drift out of lane without indicating.

Cars have been getting safer.
First it was car and occupancy safety, seat belts, crumple zones and later air bags and ABS and guess what, some people didn't like them at the time (or not come to that).

We have generally got used to them all and most of us probably wouldn't go out and buy a car without them on purpose, if one was sold without them.

These days it's crash mitigation.
Collision warning systems, lane departure, intelligent speed limiters.
We'll soon get used to those.

In the future who know, but it's odds on some won't like them at first, make up conspiracy theories around them before we all get used to those soon enough. 
    
Perhaps one's inability to adjust to the changing systems every new car is now sold with is a sign of we should give up driving. Maybe that is a sign of unawareness.

Alanp

All these driver aids are fitted for no other reason than as a test bed for when driverless cars are introduced and become the mainstream, mind you, the speed sign recognition needs a lot of work..