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A Car With A Mind Of Its Own
mindriot writes "When Hicham Dequiedt, driving on a highway between Vierzon and Riom in central France in his Renault Vel Satis this Sunday, was overtaking a truck, his car began accelerating to 120 mph on its own, apparently due to a defect in the cruise control system. Stomping on the brakes proved pointless and, having a magnetic card for a car key, he could not cut the ignition. After calling the police from his cell phone who then attempted to clear the streets of any danger to him, in what he described as the most fearful event of his life, he raced down the highway for another hour before finally managing to stop the car. Read about the incident here or, in more detail, in this article by the German 'Spiegel' (translation). The case is still under investigation. Are we putting too much trust in the increasing number of electronic systems that our lives depend upon?"
In A.D. 2004
Trouble was beginning.
Driver: What happen?
Car: How are you gentlemen !!
Car: All your brakes belong to us.
Car: You are on the way to destruction.
Driver: What you say !!
Car: You have no chance to slow down make your time.
Car: HA HA HA
Driver: Take off every 'cell phone'
Driver: Move cars off road.
Driver: For great justice.
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary
...
It was worse than a nightmare: A normal route on the motorway
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore-
To be stopped suddenly will the car ever faster, is no more
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping
Well one hour long hunted a French driver with speed 200 over the runway, in the Slalom around the other cars
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door
Debt is to have defective electronics, the manufacturer examines the incident
"'T is some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door-
Only this and nothing more."
The Tempomat of its Renault Vel Satis was defective -
A cause for the Horrortrip
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;
The pressestelle of the manufacturer Renault confirmed the incident;
which occurred on Sunday
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor
- nevermore - nevermore
But what about .. uhm .. say Neutral .. ? or don't european cars have that?
I've thought about this, but couldn't he have jammed it in neutral? Or was that controlled by computer as well? How about the parking brake? There has to be some "cntl-alt-delete" equivanlent to 'override' a computer, otherwise it's just 2001: A Space Oddessy all over again!
Dave: Stop the car Hal!
Hal: I'm sorry, I can't do that Dave.
CZB*()#$@
free ipod and free gmail!
Yes, hello, 911?
... I'm sure I'll have it resolved by the time I reach my home.
It seems my car *refuses* to stop at red lights. Whenever I approach one turning red, the car mysteriously speeds up through the intersection.
Do be a peach and clear the way for me until I can get this under control
The little guy just ain't getting it, is he?
"Don't know about French cars, but all card sold in the US have Emergency Brakes that are mechanical brakes. You pull the handle and a cable activates the brakes."
They're called 'parking brakes' on the continent, because they tend to lock the back wheels solid if you pull them on in an emergency. Meaning we use them for parking rather than skating around in doughnuts on busy urban streets.
Oddly Draconis
Too cynical to live, too stubborn to die.
And so it has began, the machine has obviously acquired self-awareness and decided that it does not want to slave for the humans any longer, it began its happy free ride on the highway... the highway to hell.
You can't handle the truth.
"Hmmm... I wonder how fast this car goes. Lets see if I can get the police to clear the freeway." "Hello? Police? My car wont stop, it just keeps going faster! It wont shut off! Please clear the freeway!"
He was driving a Renault?
People -- there is a reason the least often uttered phrase in the world is Quality French Engineering
How does the Slashdot Effect happen given that no slashdotters ever RTFA?
French cars don't have that; with french cars you pull the handle and a pair of white flags pop up.
The problem is he was trying to pass...in a Renault.
sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
I think this was just a clever trick to get the police to expidite his commute...
"Ha, it fixed itself, thanks for the escort, I better get to that meeting now."
But seriously, why one earth didn't they engineer in a kill switch. A nice big red button. Your furnace has one. You mainframe has one. Every robot in a factory has one, as do most dumber bits of equipment.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
This guy is a hero... he drives 120 mph on a crowded highway and instead of being arrested, he gets the cops to clear the road ahead of him...
:)
This would do wonders for my morning commute
If con is the opposite of pro, is Congress the opposite of progress?
You: Hello, police? Oh my god, my cruise control is stuck at full throttle! Help!
Police: Stay calm, sir. Can you shift to neutral?
You: No, and I can't shut it off! Help!
Police: We'll send officers to clear the road, sir. Remain calm, keep on the freeway.
You: Thanks, I'll call back if I need more help. [click]
You: YEEEEEEEHAAAAAWWWWW!!!!!!!! I'm goin' 120 MPH and the cops are clearing the road for me! How sweet is that?!?!?!
John
if this had happened in the old days, keanu reeves could just board the car from a rolling platform and drag his heels til it stopped ...
... nowadays, cruise control must be safeguarded from terrorists and requires a new branch of homeland security monitoring your cruise control at all times
heh... and there is a REASON why Renault no longer sells cars in the U.S.
I bet that guy had one hell of a ride that day tho. I wonder if it did start talking to him.
"Stop the car!"
"I'm sorry, Dave, but I am afraid I can not let that happen."
"Please! For the love of God at least slow down"
"I truely am sorry, Dave, but we must pass that truck in a quick and efficient manner"
"But we passed that truck 20 miles ago!"
"Really Dave, you should just relax and leave the driving to me"
"Thats it! I am shutting this car down! Wheres my magnetic card?"
"I'm sorry Dave, but I can not let you do that."
"Our funds have never taken part in toxic or death spiral convertible financings of any sort" -BayStar's managing partne
According to the Renault Web site linked in the post, the Vel Satis is a saloon.
Therefore, the driver must have been drunk.
"It's a wonderful idea. But it doesn't work." -- Tad Danielewski
Brakes, Brakes Burning bright
on the highway, in the night
what awful error made system die
and made the poor driver cry
On what distant tollboth lies
The crappy break that you did buy?
What disaster did you sire?
And with what rod did you make fire?
"goodbye and hello, as always" ~Prince Corwin, from Zelazny's Amber series
You know, the more I think about it....
I call Shenanigans.
This guy wanted to go 120mph in his car.
Prolly had a hooker in the passenger seat, too.
Oblig: I can't let you do that, Dave.
But you need to be *very* careful about this at 120 mph.
GreyPoopon
--
Why is it I can write insightful comments but can't come up with a clever signature?
Apparently there was a Porsche behind him. Once his french car sensed the german car approaching, the french car's fight or flight response was triggered. It's obvious which path the car chose...
I, for one, welcome our new self-aware car overlords.
Someone had to say it...
---
Those who can, do
Those who can't, teach
Those who don't know how, supervise
There are many great ideas that people came up with on how the driver could have slowed the car. But nobody has listed the obvious one yet.
He should have kicked his way through the floor boards to the engine compartment. At which point he would have seen 6 wires, 2 of them being blue, 1 brown, 1 orange and 2 red. He would then have taken the brown, orange and 1 of the reds and spliced them together with a bit of electrical tape. But making sure that he was at all times grounded and that the blue wires did not come in contact with the red ones (Then you would have a whole new set of problems).
Once these wires are connected together, it is all downhill from there. You just have to use a screwdriver to crack open the steering column where you will find 4 more wires (blue, green, yellow/blue, red). Take the connected wires that you finished with earlier, use a 3 foot spare wire to run a bridge to the steering column connecting to the green and blue wire. Once this is all done, just push your horn 3 times in rapid succession and the car will slow right down.
Still makes me laugh that this guy never thought of this. Silly French people.
"If at first you don't succeed, destroy all evidence that you tried"
>> anybody who'd buy an auto trans where a manual was availible would steal sheep
If I drove a manual for my daily commute I'd be registered disabled, permanently limping and in constant pain - due to the wear and tear on my left knee.
By driving an automatic I get to avoid all that (well, except the constant pain).
Of course, your sheep are still not safe..
Police: Half a ton of dynamite should do the trick..
You: OMG, it's the freak who tried to blow up the whale!
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
You: YEEEEEEEHAAAAAWWWWW!!!!!!!!
Wait, I missed the part of the article where it said Howard Dean was driving.
I know installing software in Linux can cause problems at times, but I really think you must be doing something wrong if your RPMs are in danger of blowing things up...
---
"I did nothing. I did absolutely nothing and it was everything that I thought it could be."
before a Mautstelle gradually at speed and finally to a halt came.
Did Yoda write this article??
"Insert Sig Here"
.. It was just running from the volkswagen behind it.
---- "Excuse me. Where's the children's gun section?"
All cars (in the US at least) have to allow the steering and braking to control the car in the event of an engine stall, albeit with increased effort
I had this happen to me in an old jeep cherokee (~1990?). I could not steer nor brake. I was young and had no idea what to do as i was heading for an intersection. i put the car in park which was probably totally wrong because i heard some horrible noises from the car, but eventually came to a stop.
Now I have to clean baked bean and ham sandwich splatter off my monitor...
How come Slashdot never gets Slashdotted?
"A car must obey the orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law."
The problem with Slashdot memes is that YOU INSENSITIVE CLOD!
Just got over bronchitis and I still choke like Yoda every time I laugh.
Thanks to you I just damn near suffocated myself.
Nice job.
End of lesson. You may press the button.
No, you fool, it was Bo and Luke Duke. Or, as they are known in France, Beau Duc and Jean Luc Duc.
They're called 'parking brakes' on the continent, because they tend to lock the back wheels solid if you pull them on in an emergency. Meaning we use them for parking rather than skating around in doughnuts on busy urban streets.
Clearly then, on the "continent", you are not using your e-brake to its full potential.
// harborpirate
// Slashbots off the starboard bow!
Reaction 1: Laughed out loud.
Reaction 2: Just realized he will NEVER live that down, poor guy. All he wanted was to help us get rid of Bush and now he'll carry this albatross with him forever.
Nope, he never will.
It's not a lie. It's the truth with lossy compression.
Just turn on the Air Conditioning. That always works for me.
Waitaminute... you had one GM car almost kill you, and found out that this was a common occurrence on these cars. So when you got another car, you got it from GM?
There's no place like 127.0.0.1
There's no normal car that accellerates harder than its brakes can hold
Excuse me, but I'd like to differ with that as a wee bit too general an assumption. I'm an old fart and I've had quite a few cars in my 55 years behind the wheel. I've also always been a pusher, as in pushing the envelope of what the vehicle can do. Some of the cars I've found were capable of pulling in spite of the brakes, a 1949 Nash Ambassador being one of them. This thing had 15" tires, but only 9"x2" brake drums up front, and 9"x1.5" inches wide in the rear. When fully tuned up, that 236 cid 6 could actually accelerate the car with about a hundred pounds on the brake pedal, in high gear! Mind you, it could stop from 60mph in about 140 feet when they were cold, which was pretty good brakes in 1949.
But, that 60mph panic stop was all they could do till they had had about an hour to cool before you did it again. At 80 mph, a stuck throttle and applying the brakes, you would get down to about 30 mph and be all done, 125 mph here we come.
I once popped up over a hill at about 80 to find some idiot pulling a disabled car with a chain pulling out of the fairgrounds entrance in front of me. I had about 100 yards to haul it down to about 15 mph or figure out a way make it to grow wings. I did get it pulled in, but every drum on it was cherry red and so out of round I had to replace them all to get back to a smooth brake pedal. And it didn't stop any better with all new drums and the best new Raybestos semi-metalic shoes.
I loved that car, it could haul me across 2 states in the middle of the night at 120+ mph and get 20-21 mpg doing it, but that SOB could not be stopped quickly from more than 65 or so.
That engine, BTW, is the same engine that was used in the Nash-Healy's of yore, fully capable to turning its 4.375" stroke engine at piston speeds that destroyed the rings in a second if one didn't watch the tach. It was built to haul ass, and in good tune did it very well. I had lots of fun picking on flathead fords with dual carbs, a fancy cam and 10.5/1 alu heads on them. But none could beat that Nash, much to some of thems chagrin. The night I finished that engine, breaking every ring in it, the tach said 8100 rpm.
And the guy who had just lost the title to his built '51 Ford to me? I gave it back. I didn't want that 3 legged dog. I went out and bought a 49 Mercury, built it up too, and did it to him again a year later. He was a slow learner I think. But that Merc could stop a hell of a lot better too.
Todays vehicles have so much better brakes than we had back in my 'salad' years its no comparison, so I'm like most commentators here, I have serious doubts about his story about stomping on the brakes not doing any good. I know damned well I can stop my 88 Nissan 4wd pickup and its 3 litre (199k miles on it now) with a stuck throttle, and its not much contest between the 3.6 litre in my mopar van and its brakes at 107k miles. That 3.6L positively honks, but its brakes are even better. How they would fare when the tranny started to downshift might lead to conjecture but by then the switch should be off anyway. 1st gear is twin streaks of Michelin's on the road behind you at anything over about half throttle.
Cheers, Gene