Ford's New Car Tech Prevents You From Accidentally Speeding

An anonymous reader sends word of Ford's new "Intelligent Speed Limiter" technology, which they say will prevent drivers from unintentionally exceeding the speed limit. When the system is activated (voluntarily) by the driver, it asks for a current maximum speed. From then on, a camera mounted on the windshield will scan the road ahead for speed signs, and automatically adjust the maximum speed to match them. The system can also pull speed limit data from navigation systems. When the system detects the car exceeding the speed limit, it won't automatically apply the brakes — rather, it will deliver less fuel to the engine until the vehicle's speed drops below the limit. If the speed still doesn't drop, a warning noise will sound. The driver can override the speed limit by pressing "firmly" on the accelerator. The technology is being launched in Europe with the Ford S-MAX.

Comments

How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[Anonymous Coward]

My GPS already does a great job at noticing I'm speeding and warning me, even in the rain with poor lighting. The interface to a fuel cutoff would not be that hard.

I think Ford should invest in getting everyone a moving map GPS rather than letting pranksters plant signs that mess with their vehicles, which will speed at night in the rain slightly more often than I would, were I to care.

So, bad tech, toward a bad goal. Go Ford!

Re:How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[viperidaenz]

Don't forget roads with variable speed limits and electronic speed signs. They should invest in up-to-the-minute over-the-air GPS map updates!

There's also temporary limits imposed by road works.

If the conditions are so bad you can't read road signs, you shouldn't be driving.

GPS is not the answer.

Re:How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[Anonymous Coward]

Kids in the back seat of the car in front of you will hold up a sign that says 10 MPH. Get ready for the fun.

Re:How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like a citation on "don't give a flying turd about the safety of others" statement. I've looked for stats on accidents where speeding was the primary factor. All you see is where speed was a contributing factor. Well, that's just a BS term there. Of course speed was contributing, if no parties involved in the accident were moving, there wouldn't have been an accident. From piecing things together though, as far as I can tell from numbers from other causes vs the total number, speeding results in less than 1% of all traffic accidents. Stop and think about the number of incidents of speeding vs the accident rate. It's as close to zero as you can possibly get. Now remember, more than 20 MPH over is no longer speeding, that's reckless driving, and that one does show up in statistics as a primary cause.

You want to get on somebody about not giving a damn about the safety of others, go for distracted drivers. They're the second leading cause behind DUI accounting for around a third of total accidents.

Re: How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[DigiShaman]

Just lock in your speed with cruse control within the legal threshold. That's what I do on the interstate when it's clear. You get there safe and can not stress out about blowing past posted speed limit. Besides, let someone be the jackrabbit.

Re:How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[beelsebob]

Causing an accident is far from the only negative outcome of speeding.

It also massively increases the severity of accidents (remember, a 40mph crash has 4 times more energy involved than a 30mph crash).

Re:How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[paul.hatchman]

Meanwhile here in AU, this technology is already available and works perfectly works fine as is. I have it in my own car. Both Mercedes and Audi offer speed sign recognition that feeds in to the adaptive cruise control. Mercedes have been offering it for over 5 years now. If it ever did recognise the wrong sign, you can easily override it, either via the pressing the brake, the accelerator or manually adjusting the limit from a control on the steering wheel.

Re: How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[circletimessquare]

yeah that enrages me

to not be aware of the 20 cars piled up behind you closely and unaware of that peripheral sense there is another car right alongside you... for 5-10 minutes. even if there are no other cars or you don't give a fuck, this positioning increases the danger to both of you for various reasons

people do it on sidewalks too

and it goes against basic human psychology. like being in a restroom with 20 empty urinals and a guy walks in and uses the one right next to you

people without this simple perceptual awareness aggravate the hell out of me

Re: How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[circletimessquare]

they were running your license plate. your car matched a current description of interest to them

you should have rolled down your window and thrown stuff at their windshield. establish dominance

Re:How many minutes until this is mandatory?

[Chrisq]

I don't get it. Alcohol? One half mv squared divided by one half mv squared where v(top) is 40 and v (bottom) is 30 yields 1.78. That's not four times... Unless there's relativity somewhere

You are right, to get 4 times the energy you need to double the speed - i.e. 60 mph has 4 times the energy as 30 mph.

Good points, bad points

[Dynamoo]

I've driven a car with a manual speed limiter for 10+ years now. I don't understand why all cars don't have one. Entering a 30mph/50kmh zone? Set that as the maximum speed on the limiter and you can drive around normally without having to keep checking your speed. Less time checking your speed equals more time looking where you are going. This is only a good thing.

In Europe, speed limiters seem to be common in Mercedes and Smart cars, Renault, Citroen and Peugeot cars, plus some of the newer Vauxhall/Opel models and Fords. It is built into the cruise control system.

The bad points? Well, reading signs is a so-so thing when it comes to accuracy, and satellite navigation systems sometimes get the speed very badly wrong if they have incorrect data. And just because the speed limit *says* that you can drive at up to whatever-is-on-the-sign, it doesn't mean it is *safe* to do so in the road conditions you actually have.

Re:Good points, bad points

[Registered Coward v2]

While I appreciate your point of view I also think that having drivers maintain some sembelance of situational awareness is worthwhile. I can fairly accurately guage my speed and inly occasionally need to look at the speedometer to validate my assessment. However, as drivers turn over more functions to automation they become less aware of what is happening around them as the come to rely on the automation to take care of things. As a result when things go wrong they may not realize it in time to take effective corrective action. In essence, automation can lull them into a sense that all is well when in reality it is not. Automation should assist, not replace, human actions.

Re:Good points, bad points

[mjwx]

I dont have a speed limiter and have no trouble keeping my speed in check. As such, I've never understood this excuse.

Less time checking your speed equals more time looking where you are going.

How long does it take you people to check your speedo, for me it's a fraction of a second. This is for every car I've ever been in.

Also, if you spend all your time with your eyes glued to the road in front of you, you're driving horribly wrong. You should be focusing on multiple things, mirrors, instruments, blindspots. If you're not checking your mirrors every 10-15 seconds you're dangerous. Same if you change lanes or turn without checking your blind spots. As for your instruments, well your car may not overheat every day, but when it does you want to know about it long before it reaches the red and you need a new head gasket.

I check my speedo every 10-15 seconds, same with my mirrors. It hardly changes unless I move my right foot. Realistically if you need more than half a second to read a speedometer or cant keep a consistent speed for 10-15 seconds, you need to hand in your license and admit this driving thing is beyond your capabilities.

Re:Good points, bad points

[cyn1c77]

I've driven a car with a manual speed limiter for 10+ years now. I don't understand why all cars don't have one. Entering a 30mph/50kmh zone? Set that as the maximum speed on the limiter and you can drive around normally without having to keep checking your speed. Less time checking your speed equals more time looking where you are going. This is only a good thing.

I completely disagree. If there is roadway traffic, you don't need to check your speedometer as the safest and smoothest thing to do is to simply travel with the traffic. If you drive much faster than the bulk traffic flow, you risk causing an accident. If you drive much slower than the traffic, you risk getting rear-ended or clipped as irritated drivers people pass you. You also substantially disrupt traffic flow and actually slow down everyone's commute.

If there is no roadway traffic, it really shouldn't be much of a burden to check your speedometer every 5 seconds, preferably right after you scan your mirrors.

Devices like this actually promote driver inattention and complacency. People get bored and their minds wander. Or they think that it allows them to spend more time on the phone. All this new feature is going to do is result in some idiot driving at the speed limit, in the passing lane, exactly matching the speed of the car right next to them and perfectly blocking all traffic, while dicking with their cell phone while 2000 irritated drivers piling up behind them.

Cruise control?

[DogDude]

I have cruise control, thanks. Somebody who can't pay attention to the street signs shouldn't be driving.

Re:Cruise control?

[Moof123]

Pretty soon folks will get used to tuning out while driving (more than they already dangerously do), and when there is a crash it will be reasonable to argue that the automation was to blame.

We are rapidly turning drivers into only being partially in command. Some of the recent plane crashes caused by pilots with atrophied skills being faced with bad conditions and an autopilot that throws its hands up should be cautionary tales against this semi-automation.

Re:Cruise control?

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Somebody who can't pay attention to the street signs shouldn't be driving.

No, they shouldn't, but some of them are going to anyway. Since your loved ones will therefore be just as injured/dead if they are the unlucky ones who get hit by a bad driver who was going too fast, dismissing technology that might help those bad drivers to be better, safer drivers seems uncalled for.

Re:Cruise control?

[afidel]

whereas cruise couldn't be used below 50mph.

What? I've owned or driven dozens and dozens of cars and I've never encountered a higher low end limit than 25mph for cruise control, many work at 15 or 20 mph.

Re:Cruise control?

[dasunt]

We've already tuned out. Try riding a bicycle or motorcycle - as a non-typical vehicle on the road, more drivers won't notice you and you'll have more close calls.

We just aren't wired to be diligent over the many hours we drive in our lifetime. We get used to things. We run on our own autopilot already. And that can end up being deadly.

Similar to Mobileye technology

[zerofoo]

Mobileye developed road sign recognition tech a while ago. I think BMW was integrating Mobileye software into their cars. Ford is listed as an OEM partner - I wonder if this is the same tech?

I can see this working!

[dohzer]

Because most people who speed do it "accidentally".

Re:Cruise Control 2.0?

[viperidaenz]

You can already get radar cruise control to keep a set following distance behind the car in front of you. It's been around for at least a decade. It's an option on my 10 year old Honda, along with "lane keep assist" to warn if you deviate out of your lane.

Fun with your Injket

[iamacat]

1. Print out some 25mph speed signs
2. Post on a freeway
3. ???
4. LOL!

Why not link this to cruise control

[jonwil]

Cruise control already controls the speed of the car. Adaptive cruise control will drive at whatever speed it needs to drive at based on the distance to the cars in front and behind. Why not extend the adaptive cruise control system so that it will drive no faster than the speed limit (as determined by whatever this system uses) unless it has to drive faster due to the speed of the car behind (i.e. the car behind is going faster than the speed limit and therefore this car has to in order to not get rear-ended).

It could then, like existing cruise control systems, be overridden by the driver if need be (via pressing on the accelerator pedal) but by default it would keep the driver at the speed limit unless it needed to go slower due to the car in front or faster due to the car behind.

Re:Why not link this to cruise control

[JustNiz]

>> Adaptive cruise control will drive at whatever speed it needs to drive at based on the distance to the cars in front and behind.

Not quite at least on my car (2008 Jag). Adaptive cruise has a max speed setting and a min distance setting. If the car in front suddenly speeds up my car will only speed up to the cruise speed you have already set. It helps to think of adaptive cruise more like an automatic slow up/brake than an automatic speed up/keep-up.

The definition of irony:

[thechemic]

Make a video about your vehicles ability to automatically SLOW IT SELF DOWN, and then post a slogan at the end of the video which reads "Ford - Go Further"

I'm fine with

[glenebob]

preventing accidental speeding, just as long as it leaves me alone when I'm speeding deliberately.

Re:But the signs..

[ShanghaiBill]

What good is making sure that the car doesn't go faster than 85 when it is already 20 over the real speed limit?

GP's point is that this system sets a maximum speed, not a minimum, not an average. So it is not going to go 85, or even 55, unless you push the accelerator and make it happen.

Re:What happens when...

[paul.hatchman]

Perhaps that any modern car already has stability control to stop the car from drifting around a corner? If you turn off the stability control, no doubt you'll turn off the limiter as well. So you can still Tokyo Drift your way of as many cliffs as you like.

Re:Should be mandatory

[hcs_$reboot]

Oh, this one.

Re:I've never understood that claim.

[RavenLrD20k]

Dumbass, in the scenario posed the danger was coming from behind. How the fuck is slowing down gonna save your ass when a Semi is barreling down on you and has no room to stop before slamming you as it is. Or I have a real-life situation where burst speed got me out of certain death.

I'm cruising down a 2 lane (one lane each direction) road with my wife on the back of my bike at 55 (posted limit). Good visibiltiy and no blind curves for about 3 miles down the road, and I could see the road for 2 miles behind me in the mirror. There's a Bar-B-Q place on the right hand side of the road that we're coming up on about 500 feet ahead, Black Ford explorer is coming at me slowing down with the left turn blinker, I instinctively roll back off the throttle and now I'm 60 ft away at 52 MPH...then she turns left. I looked her dead in the eyes and she still turned left. I have two choices here, brake hard and slam into her, or gear down, lay on the throttle to pick up Gyro Force, and go into a swerve around the back of her. When I made the commit, I had about 20 ft of space and she was still in my lane, oblivious to the havoc she just caused. Once my swerve started, I put my thumb on the red button throwing the quad Stebel Air Horns on. I made sure that I did this after the path commit was going to be guaranteed to be behind her turn just to make sure that I didn't throw her into a panic that would have made the situation worse on me. In roughly 40 ft. passed the SUV I was back in my lane and at level cruise at 72 mph, letting off the throttle to get back down to the limit and continuing my Sunday ride to the next gas station where I could figuratively change my underwear. Another biker a ways behind us saw the scene unfold and caught up with me at that gas station and asked why I didn't stop and confront the woman as I would have loved the look on her eyes after she heard the Stebel go off right behind her. I just said "I have an aversion to 20 to Life," and left it at that.

If I had followed your logic, I'd be either dead or in the hospital right now as this only happened a week and a half ago and in no case would my bike have come out of it in ridable condition. If I had hit the brakes, I would have slammed into her and that's the end of our ride. If I slowed down to initiate the swerve, my tail would have fishtailed and either my wife would have been the first one into the SUV, or we would both be flying off the other side of the road into the ditch with the bike following us, again ending our ride. If I touched on the brakes at any time just before and during the swerve, as soon as I touched into the swerve, I'd lose all maneuvering traction to the brake traction and likely the 900 lbs of sport touring bike would have bit the pavement on the front wheel and done an end over end flip down the road behind the SUV, yet again, ending our ride.