Slashdot Mirror
Car With A Mind Of Its Own -- Part 2
An anonymous reader writes "As a sequel to the previous Slashdot story where a car 'began accelerating to 120 mph on its own', Renault (the car manufacturer) has examined the supposed faulty car, and as many of us have suspected, no anomaly has been found (google translation). Renault will initiate a court action to discover the truth about the matter. Read more about it here (translation)."
actually, to nitpick, I think the spelling is KITT, but I have been proven wrong before.
In Holland we had a similar case, a drunk driver who killed a pedestrian in a parking garage (while driving drunk) claimed his cruise control malfunctioned and he couldn't stop the car.
Whenever people need to lie to protect themselves, they'll try to blame something they don't understand, expecting that the recipient of the story will not understand the stuff either, and thus believe them.
Ofcourse this is rather stupid, but it's just the way people are wired.
Do you expect that if he was making it up he would have offered to have the car inspected by the auto maker? He could have taken it right down to his local mechanic.
The quicker they can cover it up the better, or in this case maybe burry it in the court system? Talk about a recall to end recalls.
Just my 2cents.
...doesn't mean there wasn't a problem. Anybody remember the Therac-25 radiation machine? After a few incidents it was examined and the first couple of times no fault was found. However, after much closer inspection they found that under just the right circumstances, if things were done in just the right order, bad things would happen. And this is a Renault we're talking about.
Of course, I still think it was user error...
It is possible that the gear shift is nothing more than an switch. Look at paddle shifters on many cars today... those are not directly linked to the transmission except by wire.
I personally believe the guy was full of it, on the other hand it is also standard operating procedure to deny liability first and then investigate.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
And like any normal person, I put it in neutral and turned the ignition off...
This sig is in Spanish when you're not looking....
granted credibility of the driver doesn't seem to be the greatest...
but should the manufacturor really inspect their own vehicle?
if they found something that could cost them billions in lawsuits, then well, naturally they would say "oh there's nothing wrong--case closed!".
-judging another only defines yourself
You're full of shit, plain and simple. How can you possibly judge? We're talking about a high-tech car with a mag-strip reader for an ignition switch. There will be problems with vehicles that include stupid pointless technology. How do you know this isn't the first example?
Think about the situation for a second. Some guy phones the police telling them he's doing 125mph, he then has to ditch his car into the emergency lane to avoid dying. Who would do that deliberately? You're not making sense.
And what the fuck did you expect Renault to say? "Yeah, our bad"? How do you know Renault aren't covering this up? They stand to get the shit sued out of them if this was their fault.
The 60 minutes story has no relevance whatsoever. In any case, that was down to poor Audi design (not a mechanical fault, just a UI blunder). This will almost certainly be down to faulty Renault design.
I've heard people in these situations before saying "but I couldn't cut the engine, otherwise the servo brakes/power steering wouldn't work!". Right, so driving for miles at full throttle is far better than taking a few extra yards to stop.
I recall the major issues concerning the Airbus A320 in the late eighties. There were a number of unexplained crashes and accidents, and both the pilots and Airbus were at loggerheads because Airbus couldn't see any fault with the software and had done everything possible to make it reliable, and the pilots - including survivors of actual incidents - believed the planes had gone totally out of control.
Well, it turned out that at least one of the issues had to do with circumstances in which both pilot and plane dealt with a problem without taking into account the other's actions. As an example, if the plane tilted to the right a little too far, the plane would immediately tilt it back. The problem was so would the pilot, and the two together would over-compensate and the plane would end up dangerously tilting left. So the pilot and plane would then do exactly the same thing in the other direction. Pilot assumes plane is out of control. Plane is just trying to correct the "dumb" pilot. Result, in some cases actual disasters.
Designers have a habit of looking at designs purely in terms of a control panel hooked up to a device. However, the control panel is an interface to a device - a human being - not the end-point of the design, and designers need to be more careful to ensure that the fact a human being will be a part of the system is taken into account, at all stages of the design. Airbus, of course, can be forgiven for being one of the first to encounter a problem with this.
Whether this is relevent to the Renault incident is open to question.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
They did this in the VW cars too. I cant heel-toe downshift my Golf and it bothers me. The gas pedal is too far away from the brake. Hell this this a *FEATURE* people. Sure most people never need to learn how to heel-toe downshift, so I guess its a good thing that they cant hit both pedals at the same time. But Audis are billed as "Drivers" cars. Meaning if you love to drive cars, then Audi is for you.
In an automatic I can see there being no use for being able to hit both pedals with the same foot, but why remove this feature from the manual cars? Especially with an Audi which is upscale already, anyone buying the manual is likely buying it because they want the manual, not because its cheaper.
I read the linked story and found it quite interesting... ...helped along by fabricated TV coverage courtesy of the CBS news show 60 Minutes.
Deja-vu all over again. Why do people bother watching this show?
Stupid sexy Flanders.
What is there to find? If there was a bug in some of the software on the car computers how would they find it since it's probably in every other Renault?
"This car is exactly like all the other ones - no anomolies, nothing broken - it's fine."
Chances are the computer would have auto reset like most do and any chance of software evidence being left is gone.
This is why cars should have black boxes.
Well, that doesn't prove anything unless you can show that pressing on the pedal engaged the brakes. Maybe pressing on the brakes didn't engage them? That can happen when there is a leak in the brake lines.
Throttle by wire's mostly about emissions control. It sits between your foot and the engine and it has the final say what happens to the fuel mixture. If you suddenly boot it, it won't just open the throttle wide like a mechanical throttle, as this would be liable to result in unburnt fuel, which plays hell with your catalytic converter. It'll do things in a slightly more controlled manner which you'll hardly even notice.
Steer-by-wire would mean you could eliminate all the complicated power-assisted steering mechanicals, I suppose, and thus make the car slightly more economical, and less prone to mechanical failure. Plus, to change the gearing of the system would be a matter of flicking a switch, so I suppose you could use the same component in different cars by changing the parameters, leading to economies of scale in the manufacturing. Of course, it would have no steering feel whatsoever, but Joe Public doesn't care, and doesn't seem to understand that feeling what's under your tyres can come in quite handy when trying to drive in adverse conditions.
you: haha! why don't I play a trick on my wife that will put her, myself and the others around us, on the freeway, in grave danger. It'll be great.
WTF is the matter with you?
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
That might have been unexpected, but it's seldom lethal. Your car will drive just fine without any power steering fluid (assuming you don't burn out the pump and innards of course), as that is how all cars used to be.
If you'd accelerated a little bit, you'd have noticed it got easier to turn, as the tires have less constant contact with the ground.
Basically, the point I'm making is that if power steering fails, it's a little harder to turn. If steering-by-wire fails, the car DOES NOT turn at all, and you die. Granted, I'm sure that there would be some sort of failover in place before it was ever actually implemented, but that's the difference.
Having to put some muscle into it is a whole lot better than the wheel spinning freely with no effect.
-9mm-
Anyone remember the story 60 Minutes, or 20/20 or one of those "news magazine" tv shows, about pickups with exploding gas tanks?
The complaint was that the gas tanks were outside the frame (or something like that) and that they'd explode on side impact crashes.
They even showed a nice convincing demonstration by crash testing a few trucks for the nice TV cameras.
And then, after the fact, the truth came out -- while explosions COULD happen given the right circumstances, it wasn't that easy to do. In fact, the news people couldn't duplicate it in front of the cameras. So they placed a charge and DETONATED the gas tanks at the time of impact.
Or how about the rollover stories about the Isuzu Trooper started by Consumer Reports? We happened to have one, and I know how well they handled. They were NOT easy to roll over UNLESS YOU WERE TRYING TO ROLL IT OVER. I was following my wife down a mountain highway at 65+ and she had to make an emergency lane change, just like the consumer report "story". It handled just like you'd expect a trunk based vehicle to handle, and she never lifted a wheel off the ground. I also took the same vehicle off-roading (serious off-roading in the Rockies) -- it was a very capable, well-rounded vehicle. And not prone to tip-over.
Moral -- "news" organizations often have an axe to grind for whatever reason -- and they will do anything to (1) bury that axe into the person, company, side of the story they want to hurt, or (2) whatever it takes for ratings. End result - Can't Trust Them!
. 62,400 repetitions make one truth -- Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
As an initial reaction, yes, panic does get in the way of logical thought processes. But if the event had worn on past two, three, or twenty minutes, do you think your wife would have regained control and thought to try a different tactic?
What braniac thought it was a good idea to let the business with the most to lose from it being bad test the car? The results are hopelessly contaminated now, I bet they have switched out any potential damaging part at this point.
How could such sloppiness ever pass in a court case?
Self-determination if they have liability? Sheesh.
Let me know when I can self-determine if my programming is defective or not.
Sounds like an urban legend to me. The landing gear can't retract while the weight of the plane is resting on it. The gear is locked and can't unlock on the runway while under weight pressure.
However well you train someone, they can make mistakes. CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) is still a common killer - it usually occurs when a pilot is mistaken about their position relative to high ground whilst flying in the clouds.
An "oh shit" moment could quite easily put a pilot a bit closer to cumulogranite than he wanted to be. A design that then prevents him from getting out of that situation is broken.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
- This car has no key, so he couldn't just cut the motor that way. Especially since it's a contact less rfid like key, you must step out of the car, which isn't easy at 200 kph (~160mph)
- Tt's automatic gear model. It's a robotized gear system. It won't let you change the speed if it'll blow the motor. Switching to 1st gear at 200 kph to stop the car isn't an option. Switching to neutral may not be possible if the computer is postal
- It's not a matter of pressing the accelerator while you try to break, it was on cruise control. You don't have to press any pedal to keep the speed.
But all of this is uterly suspect- Cruise control is switched off as soon as you hit the brake. The switch is redondant (2 independant switches on the pedal), and even with the motor still trying to keep the car at this speed, if he hits the brake, the car won't be able to maintain that high speed, maybe it wont stop, but it will slow down.
- If he had pressed the accelerator instead of the brake, the car would have first accelerated, but since that too stops the cruise control, the car would have stopped as soon as he would have stopped to accelerate.
- The inspection of renault showed the brake weren't burned or melted. Not even a sligth abnormal wearing. I would have stand on the brake myself !
- The guy is full of shit : He just had his driving license back after loosing it for speeding and driving drunk
Have your personnal opinion, but imho he was caught speeding and didn't want to carry the responsability and so blamed the car...Airbus, of course, can be forgiven for being one of the first to encounter a problem with this.
No. Research in "Human Problem Solving" (this classic was published the same year that the A300 flew first) and related fields (action slips, cognitive failures) was already on its way and some Psychology would be always good when it comes to HCIs of sort. Not to mention System Theory.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
It's really hard, actually. At highway speed, you're covering about 30 meters (100 feet) per second. To stop, you're looking at probably three times that distance or more.
Do you want your car to activate its emergency braking system every time it approaches a hill? Will it understand that a guardrail a hundred feet in front of you is okay because you fully intend to follow a curve?
An alarm to notify drivers that they're going to lane change into the side of the car in their blind spot could be managed, but avoiding objects on the road ahead is a fiendishly difficult problem.
Incidentally, if you're following closely enough that hard braking by the car in front will cause a collision before you can respond, then you're following too closely. Back off and/or slow down.
~Idarubicin
Is it? I doubt it very much. Please post a link that supports this assertion.
Cars are designed to expressly NOT do that in frontal ollisions.
Self awareness - try it!
It's true that when the system is disabled you have normal hydraulic action. But, there are factors that can make ABS a detriment.
Stopping the car on gravel: You'll probably stop much faster by locking up the wheels than by letting the ABS modulate the brakes.
Complicated brake boosters: Many ABS systems use an electric pump instead of a more reliable vacuum diaphragm. I had one of these fail on me in a parking lot. Even though I still had manual hydraulics, it nearly caused me to drive into a wall.
Imminent crash: A good driver can use locked brakes to his advantage in "hitting the right way".
Can't say :)
I had thought it was 60 Minutes, but it was apparently DateLine that fabrictaed a story about exploding General Motors trucks in the 80's. They wanted to do a story on trucks exploding when in collisions - the only problem they had was that they didn't. So they undid the gas caps, poured fuel all over the place, inserted a detonator or two, you get the idea. They lost the court case pretty convincingly when GM sued
Corporations selling product lying to me is bad enough - but I recognize that there's a motive there for them to do so, and why. News organizations shoveling crap for ratings though is another ball of wax. These people should go to jail.
> but i could care less...
Which would have been the case had you not pointed it out at all.
You can understand why "corporations" would lie to you to sell you a "product", but when news corporations lie to you to sell you a news product with the exact same motivation , they should go to jail?!
You, sir, value accurate information above all. You truly are a geek.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso