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As companies continue to tout development success for autonomous vehicles, Google has admitted that the technology still faces significant hurdles before it can be truly commercialized.

Although some of the prototype vehicles are capable of driving on normal roads, development teams rely on extensive 3D maps of every small detail along a route before sending a car through on a test run. The approach requires much more data than basic mapping, and human verification of every detail.

If a temporary stop light is put up on a stretch of road after the map has already been established, the Google cars are not currently programmed to identify and obey the surprise change, according to a report in the MIT Technology Review. For mapped lights, engineers are still working out an effective way to read the color when the sun is directly behind the light. The cars are capable of spotting surprise obstacles in the road, but may overreact by swerving around paper litter as if it were a dangerous solid object. The system can also track pedestrians, however it would not interpret arm gestures from a person directing traffic.

Google is among several companies testing self-driving cars in California, and proximity to company headquarters is not the only reason for choosing the Golden State. Its cars, like other self-driving vehicles, face particularly difficult scenarios when the roads are covered with rainwater or snow.

The search company boldly previewed a self-driving prototype without any steering wheel or pedals, however the human controls were later added to comply with California's new regulations for such vehicles.

The head of Google's autonomous vehicle project, Chris Urmson, does not believe any of the current challenges will prevent the technology from coming to market. He believes engineers will solve each of the problems as they continue to improve software and sensors, hopefully creating a vehicle for general use on public roads within five years.

Read more: http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

As companies continue to tout development success for autonomous vehicles, Google has admitted that the technology still faces significant hurdles before it can be truly commercialized.

Although some of the prototype vehicles are capable of driving on normal roads, development teams rely on extensive 3D maps of every small detail along a route before sending a car through on a test run. The approach requires much more data than basic mapping, and human verification of every detail.

If a temporary stop light is put up on a stretch of road after the map has already been established, the Google cars are not currently programmed to identify and obey the surprise change, according to a report in the MIT Technology Review. For mapped lights, engineers are still working out an effective way to read the color when the sun is directly behind the light. The cars are capable of spotting surprise obstacles in the road, but may overreact by swerving around paper litter as if it were a dangerous solid object. The system can also track pedestrians, however it would not interpret arm gestures from a person directing traffic.

Google is among several companies testing self-driving cars in California, and proximity to company headquarters is not the only reason for choosing the Golden State. Its cars, like other self-driving vehicles, face particularly difficult scenarios when the roads are covered with rainwater or snow.

The search company boldly previewed a self-driving prototype without any steering wheel or pedals, however the human controls were later added to comply with California's new regulations for such vehicles.

The head of Google's autonomous vehicle project, Chris Urmson, does not believe any of the current challenges will prevent the technology from coming to market. He believes engineers will solve each of the problems as they continue to improve software and sensors, hopefully creating a vehicle for general use on public roads within five years.

Read more: http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

As companies continue to tout development success for autonomous vehicles, Google has admitted that the technology still faces significant hurdles before it can be truly commercialized.

Although some of the prototype vehicles are capable of driving on normal roads, development teams rely on extensive 3D maps of every small detail along a route before sending a car through on a test run. The approach requires much more data than basic mapping, and human verification of every detail.

If a temporary stop light is put up on a stretch of road after the map has already been established, the Google cars are not currently programmed to identify and obey the surprise change, according to a report in the MIT Technology Review. For mapped lights, engineers are still working out an effective way to read the color when the sun is directly behind the light. The cars are capable of spotting surprise obstacles in the road, but may overreact by swerving around paper litter as if it were a dangerous solid object. The system can also track pedestrians, however it would not interpret arm gestures from a person directing traffic.

Google is among several companies testing self-driving cars in California, and proximity to company headquarters is not the only reason for choosing the Golden State. Its cars, like other self-driving vehicles, face particularly difficult scenarios when the roads are covered with rainwater or snow.

The search company boldly previewed a self-driving prototype without any steering wheel or pedals, however the human controls were later added to comply with California's new regulations for such vehicles.

The head of Google's autonomous vehicle project, Chris Urmson, does not believe any of the current challenges will prevent the technology from coming to market. He believes engineers will solve each of the problems as they continue to improve software and sensors, hopefully creating a vehicle for general use on public roads within five years.

Read more: http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

http://www.leftlanenews.com/se...

20,000 pounds and 8mpg!. No way are you going to move that amount of weight around for any range on electric.

Personally I think he should be in a regular vehicle though, America needs to kick the fossil-fuel habit and drive smaller more efficient cars, and its 'leader' should give up the narcissism and lead by example.(no one human being is _that_ important)

Citations

http://www.wsoctv.com/news/news/action-9-insurer-denies-stolen-car-claim-because-m/nGTHX/
http://www.leftlanenews.com/gone-in-20-minutes-using-laptops-to-steal-cars.html

Next up, when you press the start button on your new car, you get a 20 second lecture about DUI before the engine starts. If you don't gripe too loudly, they'll throw in a commercial or two.

You need to pay more attention. You wont get a lecture they want to drug test you before your car will start.

Who said wagons had to be slow?

http://www.leftlanenews.com/2008-bmw-m5-touring-revealed.html

Except your friend didn't. According to the web site you already need to have something to start with... an existing car. It's a nice little niche product but nothing like what Green Vehicles is trying to do.

It's unlikely you can build a prototype of a next gen electric car for $500k, but this was more like an electric motorbike with a roof. Try comparing the photo of the prototype BMW 'Clever' shown off 2006 running on natural gas, and the Green Vehicles from the summary. Similar concept, and BMW did this with the research support of Bath University being thrown at it. And it still failed achieve production. It was an epic and brave undertaking, but seriously underfunded.

Phillip.

Hybrids use more energy to build and more materials than a Suburban.

http://www.leftlanenews.com/study-a-hybrid-consumes-more-energy-in-lifetime-than-a-hummer.html

So by driving my 19 year old Chevy truck (with only 81,000 original miles), I'm being more altruistic than someone who went out and bought a new Prius.

My fuel comes from sweet sweet ANS West Coast crude, not coal.

Here's one brought to the dealer with engine pegged:

http://www.leftlanenews.com/toyota-avalon-displays-unintended-acceleration-without-floor-mat.html

the brakes are not engaging because the signal is not transmitted from the pedal to the pads.

That doesn't jive with any of the articles I've read on the problem.

Example:

http://www.leftlanenews.com/a-closer-look-at-toyotas-sudden-acceleration-problem.html

To demonstrate the problem of relying on power-assisted brakes in the case of sudden and uncontrollable acceleration, the attorney for Guadalupe Gomez explained the details of his client’s case, “He [Gomez] was held hostage for 20 miles on a Bay Area freeway by a 2007 Camry traveling more than 100 mph. Gomez was unable to turn off the engine or shift into neutral and then burned out his brakes before slamming into another car and killing that driver.”

The root cause, of course, is too much control of the car has been given to a computer. I should be able to DECIDE to take the damned car out of gear if I choose to. But at least this software fix appears to disable the gas pedal if the brakes are mashed down on, which sounds like a good idea if you want to give that level of control to a computer.

Personally, I'm sticking with manual transmissions. :)

The brake system isn't completely electronic electronic (besides the ABS solenoids that kick in as necessary). I suspect what's happening, is at WOT (wide open throttle) there isn't enough vacuum in the intake manifold to operate the brake booster, thus the brakes become very hard to apply.

Ditto on the automatic transmissions, I HATE an automatic.

the brakes are not engaging because the signal is not transmitted from the pedal to the pads.

That doesn't jive with any of the articles I've read on the problem.

Example:

http://www.leftlanenews.com/a-closer-look-at-toyotas-sudden-acceleration-problem.html

To demonstrate the problem of relying on power-assisted brakes in the case of sudden and uncontrollable acceleration, the attorney for Guadalupe Gomez explained the details of his client’s case, “He [Gomez] was held hostage for 20 miles on a Bay Area freeway by a 2007 Camry traveling more than 100 mph. Gomez was unable to turn off the engine or shift into neutral and then burned out his brakes before slamming into another car and killing that driver.”

The root cause, of course, is too much control of the car has been given to a computer. I should be able to DECIDE to take the damned car out of gear if I choose to. But at least this software fix appears to disable the gas pedal if the brakes are mashed down on, which sounds like a good idea if you want to give that level of control to a computer.

Personally, I'm sticking with manual transmissions. :)

Specific power of an IC engine: around 2 kW/kg
Specific power of an electric motor: around 2 kW/kg

And where exactly on that page are you getting those numbers? Those particular figures don't appear anywhere, and the actual values vary wildly based on type and application.

Anyway, in practice electric motors are smaller because they give peak torque throughout the majority of their rpm range, while ices only give it in a narrow band.

Your one remaining point, that what matters is the *total* power system mass, not just the weight of fuel, also doesn't make a big difference. The Chevy Volt's motor mass is negligible compared to the mass of its batteries.

So, I said batteries are 45 times worse than gasoline, with your correction it's only 15 times worse, but I think my point still stands.

No, jeeze, you have to look at total mass, as in all of it. Like, including the transmission and exhaust system and fuel system and environmental controls and all that. Yes, you're right that the batteries are the biggest portion of weight in an EV, but that is exactly why things don't turn out how you expect.

Let's actually look at this:

A Lotus Elise -- a car made by a company whose whole design philosophy is to minimize weight, and make much lighter cars than competing sports cars -- weighs 1984lbs at the curb. A Roadster weighs 2723. The roadster has a range of 240 miles. The Elise gets 27mpg, which would give comparable range with an 8 gallon tank. Slightly less, but let's call it the same.

The weight ratio here is only 1.37.

So, does your point still stand? To the extent that it is "gasoline has higher energy density", sure. To the extent that it is "batteries can never compete with gasoline for practical vehicles", then no, that's garbage. It doesn't take a fifteen-fold increase in battery density to erase the Lotus' weight advantage. Maybe a doubling?

As for the potential for future improvement, energy density of batteries has improved by a factor of 4 from lead-acid to lithium-ion ... and it only took a century to get there!

Yeah because people were really trying to improve battery density for all those years. It's really more like a 4x improvement in 40 years. The very fact that it's becoming so important, and because of advances made in material science only in the last couple decades, means battery's future is looking good technology wise. You may feel differently, but I apologize if I decide not to take my technology development prognostications from someone who can't even figure out the proper metrics.

0-60 in 3.0
http://www.leftlanenews.com/chevrolet-corvette-zr1.html

At the bottom of this PDF link/a> is an old formula for figuring out safe stopping distances on the duration of transition signals (yellow lights). Here is another with some actual examples you might find interesting. This one actually claims a city near me placed the traffic light timing in an unsafe timming and "By doing so, the city also placed motorists in harm's way without regard to their safety." They used math to determine that too.

You might find it useful in figuring out your timing length for road speeds. The NHTS rules recommend between 3 and 6 seconds but isn't a hard limit and states are free to set their own lengths by law. Most states do require the cities to "permit" their traffic signals which means they will have to follow state laws and formulas if there are any. Some states claim that an engineering study is needed so it might be more difficult to determine their rules.

For your proof, This site seems to think there is proof as reported by another site. It's short on details and I decided to give up on searching the other site for the details so take it with a grain of salt.

There was another study in Virginia that showed that while fatalities decreased (right angle crashes), total accidents increased significantly after putting in red-light cameras, and this effect did not diminish over time. Source: thenewspaper.com. I'm sure you'll find a similar refutation of the Texas study; it is still too soon to see that.

There was another study from the Univ. of South Florida with similar results.

In short, traffic cameras show no statistical improvement in accident rate, and in some cases show no improvement in injury rate, either. By contrast, yellow light studies consistently show a significant improvement, and have never been shown to cause any increase in accidents.

Here are five more studies on the subject.

As for comparisons with yellow light cameras, I'm having a hard time digging those up, but here's a story about an experiment on one particularly bad intersection in Fort Collins. Here's a study on all-red intervals that is also relevant here. Either way, it should be clear that if studies show red light enforcement increases the number of accidents and yellow light timing changes decrease it, it doesn't take a genius to know that photo enforcement is not a good solution to the problem.

Deathtrap? I think after watching these videos, most people will agree you are being a bit generous.

http://www.break.com/index/failed-chinese-crash-test.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZWy_fASSiQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVwmuQqN46g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEeqxq7EtQU
http://www.autoblog.com/2007/06/22/brilliance-bs6s-adac-crash-test-is-anything-but/
http://www.leftlanenews.com/chinese-sedan-flunks-german-crash-test-with-video.html

My wife and I might not buy a Volt immediately because so many companies are entering the market

No. You won't buy one, because you won't be able to...unless you order it far in advance or you work for Chevy. The first year model will be with very limited availabilty.

http://www.leftlanenews.com/chevrolet-volt-to-see-limited-availability-at-launch.html

As a frame of reference, 2009 Ford Escape Hybrid will be a run of 12,000 vehicles and there's currently an eight month waiting list. That said, I do enjoy mine. :-D

Toyota's plants in the US are producing cars that are then sold in the US

They were, but now Toyota plans on exporting vehicles built in Indiana to the Middle East and China.

Wake up, it is a global economy!

i'm assuming they did this for a reason, you know, like to win the x-prize

You'd be wrong. When VW first built the 1 liter car, X-Prize was still focused on suborbital spaceflight. That's because VW built this concept waaaaaay back in 2002, when we (the States) weren't suffering from a gas crisis. The only news here is that VW is actually contemplating building this car for mass consumption.

In one case, the local government was forced to issue refunds by more than $1 million to motorists who were issued tickets for running red lights.

It's just there to draw our attention from the real threat. Flooding the world with these

http://www.leftlanenews.com/chinese-sedan-flunks-g erman-crash-test-with-video.html/

just look at http://www.leftlanenews.com/bmws-clever-concept-co mpleted.html or http://www.worldcarfans.com/news.cfm/newsID/206050 5.005/country/gcf/bmw/clever-research-vehicle Maneuverbility of bike with full body protection of a car. I'd rather have one of these.

Au contraire!

Your capacity estimate is way, way too low. My DVD test samples can get 15 discs in a space 1"x5"x5" (e.g., 25in^3). There are 1728in^3 in a cubic foot, which translates to about 69 such stacks, for a total of 1035 discs per cubic foot. With its rear seat folded down the 2008 Volkswagen Jetta SportsWagen has 66.9ft^3 of storage space (source). We'll call it 67ft^3 for the sake of the math, and assume that you've crammed a few discs in the glovebox. This brings us to a total of 69,345 discs in our datawagon. If we use dual layer blu-ray discs at 50gb/disc that comes to 3.07 petabytes (x10^15). I'll use your 200 hour delivery time, which means we have an overall speed of 269.09GB/s (3467250000000000 bytes / 12000 seconds). You can keep your internet2, although I -will- cede that it gets better gas mileage.

I would like to posit a new theorum: Advances in storage space and vehicle capacity will always increase such that a sufficiently well-fueled station wagon will have faster throughput than the latest advances in network architecture.

I've read about a Mini Cooper design that used a hybrid motor. It was an excellent design, with a gasoline generator powering 4 electrical motors which were located in each wheel hub.

Here's the link: http://www.leftlanenews.com/hybrid-mini-offers-640 -hp-0-60-in-45-seconds.html

640 hp, 0-60 in 4.5 seconds, 160 hp per wheel-motor, and a 3 prong plug-in-the-wall adapter for charging the batteries up.

Cool, huh?

Ah, now I see some more info. One of these cars would be fine for me, commuting 30 miles in Houston (TX). One problem with an all-electric car here is using the battery to cool the cabin air in summer. The winters aren't THAT cold, so I could probably do without cabin heating.

Of course, I still can't forget when that car (NOT an SUV) rear-ended the car BEHIND me on the highway, my 4-door sedan was nearly totalled, and my passenger and I walked away without a scratch. Personally, I'd like something like the Smart ForFour (discontinued).

I would prefer this item http://www.leftlanenews.com/2006/04/23/bmws-clever -concept-completed/ to the Segway. No need to redesign cities. It's much more practical, combining the convenience and fun of a motorbike with the safety and comfort of a car, plus you actually look cool riding one, unlike a Segway which makes you look like a dork. Opinions please.

I would prefer this item http://www.leftlanenews.com/2006/04/23/bmws-clever -concept-completed/ to the Segway. No need to redesign cities. It's more practical, combining the convenience and fun of a motorbike with the safety and comfort of a car, plus you actually look cool riding one, unlike a Segway which makes you look like a dork. Opinions please.

You're wrong about diesel. It is a more efficient design, giving much higher torque per pound of engine weight and often more horsepower. There is an interesting bit about a diesel race car needing to be handicapped to compete fairly with gasoline cars here.

I did mention the vandalizing, right?

http://www.leftlanenews.com/2006/03/14/uaw-tells-m embers-to-stop-vandalizing-competitors-cars/

This is not just Flint. And it isn't GM.

There was a clip of this on Top Gear in the UK. Apparently a journalist asked Mercedes to show hiw how well it worked, so they filled one of their testing facilities with smoke & arranged a demo for the cameras.

The cars braked fine, they just stopped about 15 yards too late!! So obviously there's something not quite right with the radar system, you've gotta chuckle at the comparison they make...

1. imacs can mirror to another display (vga; dvi only with vga=>dvi box)
2. screen spanning doctor http://www.rutemoeller.com/mp/ibook/ibook_e.html enables , well, screen spanning on imacs and ibooks
3. dvd player can be set to disable the other display while playing movies
4. front row patches have been available for a while, so you can run it on most newer macs. a guy even has put a mac mini in his (off all cars) f150, complete with front row etc: http://www.leftlanenews.com/?p=818

i personally use a mac mini without display, controlled via VNC (built into OS X 10.4) and a sanyo plv-z2.