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Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

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Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#161
post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Toyota has a good one: it gives me a beep and turns the screen red, but I have to start braking by myself, at which point it takes over and adjusts braking force so as to not hit whatever is in front of me. False positives usually happen when there are cars parked along a turn, but I ignore this completely. Over the course of the five years I had this car it prevented a collision twice this way.

> Toyota has a good one: it gives me a beep and turns the screen red, but I have to start braking by myself, at which point it takes over and adjusts braking force so as to not hit whatever is in front of me. This way takes away the biggest advantage of this systems - that they can react before you do.

Thing is it does react before I do - in those two situations I would have probably continued on my path for too long and brake too late to avoid a collision.

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#162
post #116
post #87

Implementation matters. The automatic braking on my compact SUV has falsely triggered hundreds of times over the course of 3 years, usually when transitioning from a moderately-pitched-down driveway into a roadway. The result of this scenario is the car coming to a dead stop with its front end halfway into a traffic lane, putting me and my passengers at greater risk of a collision from oncoming traffic approaching fr…

Toyota has a good one: it gives me a beep and turns the screen red, but I have to start braking by myself, at which point it takes over and adjusts braking force so as to not hit whatever is in front of me. False positives usually happen when there are cars parked along a turn, but I ignore this completely. Over the course of the five years I had this car it prevented a collision twice this way.

Wow, I've had the same thing in two different cars (Ford & Mazda), and it is awful.

Always false alarms, never in time that I could brake at a time that I wouldn't otherwise, and distracting enough to be a real worry. The only situation I can conceive of it being useful is if the driver is falling asleep on the highway.

What were the situations where yours triggered and actually helped?

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't control what the person behind you does, but you can control what you do and rushing people through turns is unsafe. If the person in front of you signaled (or did anything else to indicate) their turn in sufficient time, then you should be able to do likewise for the person behind you with a light tap on the brakes. The odds of being rear-ended probably won't change by any significant amount, and IMX peopl…

These systems are imperfect. People are imperfect, too. But please consider that not everything is evidence that everyone else is reckless driver. One day your system will fail in a surprising/dangerous way, and you'll tell someone "wow, it mistook a reflection for tail lights", and they'll say "well I am a perfectly safe driver so that could never happen with my careful driving, you must have been really reckless",…

> please consider that not everything is evidence that everyone else is reckless driver

Never said or implied that. I said that one specific behavior is dangerous. Maybe you're right that "my system" will fail some day, but in the meantime I'll continue doing my best to improve the odds instead of using "well, stuff happens anyway, can't do anything about it" as an excuse. After driving for ~40 years, having been in a few accidents (only one in the last ~30 and never even remotely considered to be at fault) and seen more, I don't think I'm the one who needs that epiphany here.

BTW, let me go into a bit more detail about that one accident, since it's kind of relevant. I was turning, had signaled, person behind me saw and had tapped the brakes, person behind them was on their phone and plowed right into them, pushing them into me. No injuries, amazingly. Key point: there was nothing the woman in the middle could have done. She would have been struck regardless. If she had "absorbed the slack" as you suggest, her car would have just been slammed into mine even harder - quite likely with more dire consequences. Other times, as I already mentioned in another comment, drivers "absorbing the slack" actually caused accidents themselves at an intersection near me. More than once.

You're relying on your reactions being better than those of the person behind you (if not better than humanly possible), with no justification whatsoever. "Absorbing the slack" is a stupid and dangerous habit that most people who have driven for a while learn to avoid. I'm trying to tell you here so you don't have that epiphany about defensive driving and margins of error too late.

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#164
post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more startling but dangerous, but also, disabled the Reverse Automatic Braking when pulling a trailer. If you try to back into a parking spot with it engaged, the car will freak TF out and make an awful noise as it jams on the brakes. Or so I've heard.

Again I have one on my 2017 Forester, and never turned its safety features including AEB off. All it does when reversing is beep because the sonar sensor is confused. It never behaved unpredictably. (and yes the AEB did save me from backing into things at least twice in these years, so I know it works)

I was just making a joke about how you basically can't back up a trailer with AEB turned on since it sees the trailer behind you and senses an imminent collision. I've got a 2020 Outback and the only other safety feature I turn off is the driver detection or whatever it's called so it doesn't constantly beep at me when I'm looking at cornfields or whatever on road trips.

Super satisfied with the system otherwise though. Lane keeping and adaptive cruise control are good enough to ease the burden on longer trips but just bad enough that I never "fully" trust them and completely divert my attention.

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, I feel like a lot of the people complaining about this feature are just bad drivers who regularly drive unsafely and are now getting called out on it. This in particular: > Sometimes, though, I will allow the distance between myself and the next car to close, for example, if they're turning and will be gone in a second anyway. The Subaru then ruins my well-calculated slowdown maneuver by slamming on the bra…

I tend to agree, especially in the situation described in that comment. I have a 2020 Subaru Outback that I believe has a very similar braking system, and while I have also experienced a small handful of false positives (especially when moving very slowly in a tight parking spot), I think the system is pretty good, and I do feel good about its ability to help at least a little bit if I ever really need it. I’m willin…

Anecdotally, I’ve found similar. Never had phantom breaking in my crosstrek. While it’s possible someone’s car could be miss calibrated, I’d guess pebkac is more likely and self reflection of driving habits is needed.

The only object warnings I’ve triggered are completely understandable and never had auto braking

A sharp turnning off-ramp to a rest stop on i5 with a sign in the middle that one drives directly at before turning has reliable triggered the object warning but never breaking. I suspect that if I went dangerously/stupidly fast in the turn it would brake.

The other other time I could reliably trigger it was pulling in faster than usual to park head on 1 ft in front of a fence, and that only ever did the warning not braking.

So far, and it’s anecdotal yes, I’ve never had it happen when actually on the road.

What I do find annoying is the cruise control starts to floor it when changing lanes if it sees the clear path down the lane line during the change.

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Little known fact: You can travel the exact speed of the car in front of you while also being any distance N behind them. If I'm traveling greater than 50MPH, I leave at least 3 car lengths between me and them, this is to allow for reaction time to stop at the same rate they are stopping.

In California that just means that in the span of 15 seconds 3 other cars are going to move in front of you and the car that was ahead of you.

Why does that matter at all? Just slow down to get more space whenever that happens.

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#168
post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree, especially in the situation described in that comment. I have a 2020 Subaru Outback that I believe has a very similar braking system, and while I have also experienced a small handful of false positives (especially when moving very slowly in a tight parking spot), I think the system is pretty good, and I do feel good about its ability to help at least a little bit if I ever really need it. I’m willin…

Anecdotally, I’ve found similar. Never had phantom breaking in my crosstrek. While it’s possible someone’s car could be miss calibrated, I’d guess pebkac is more likely and self reflection of driving habits is needed. The only object warnings I’ve triggered are completely understandable and never had auto braking A sharp turnning off-ramp to a rest stop on i5 with a sign in the middle that one drives directly at befo…

My experience is largely the same as yours. I've had the alert (no braking) several times on the highway during sharp corners or when coming up on slower traffic (when I've been totally aware, but probably coming in hotter than I oughta be). I've also had it trigger twice when entering my apartment building's parking garage. It has a very steep uphill ramp and a couple of times I must have approached it fast enough that it thinks I'm running at a wall.

I also agree with the cruise control issue. The adaptive cruise control is very nice for highway traffic that's changing speeds a lot, except that I'll forget that it's set at 65-70 after cruising around 50 for a while, and then when it finds a clear lane it will try to accelerate very quickly. That's ultimately just a limitation in how far ahead the system looks to find cars.

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#169
post #10

Oof, my experience with with auto-brake in a 2021 Subaru Crosstrek (anecdotal, sample size of one, all that good stuff) is much the opposite. It's too sensitive and tends to brake shockingly hard during fairly mundane maneuvers. When backing up near a wall/obstacle, the auto-brake seems to kick in when anything is closer than three or four feet away from the bumper. I use my mirrors and have an accurate impression of…

Funny story, My sister got annoyed with the auto-braking on her new Subaru and turned it off. Three days later she rear ended someone, smashing up the whole front of her car. This was the third time she had rear ended someone. She keeps it on now.

No post body was provided.

Re: Studies find automatic braking can cut crashes over 40%

#170
post #10

Oof, my experience with with auto-brake in a 2021 Subaru Crosstrek (anecdotal, sample size of one, all that good stuff) is much the opposite. It's too sensitive and tends to brake shockingly hard during fairly mundane maneuvers. When backing up near a wall/obstacle, the auto-brake seems to kick in when anything is closer than three or four feet away from the bumper. I use my mirrors and have an accurate impression of…

I have a 2022 BMW X4 and it handles it really well. It actually prevented me from rear-ending someone earlier this year. I have never had it kick in "accidentally". The lane departure can be slightly more aggressive. It generally works very well, but I have had a few cases where old road lines (think construction zone) caused it to veer into oncoming traffic. It has happened twice. Luckily I keep my hands on the stee…

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