Minimal Hands Free Driving (Lane Keeping + Adaptive Cruise Control)

[Cherokee]

My experience,
Smooth four lane mellow curve, I come to an Intersection or a rise or a bridge or a place where the edge paint line is Fffafafaded out.
‘DING’ Cancelled mid turn, Mav goes straight.
With my hands on the wheel I’m cool, in control.

So go ahead and hang a weight and let go.
I’ve got really good Insurance and a hell of a lawyer.

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[Phimosis]

My experience,
Smooth four lane mellow curve, I come to an Intersection or a rise or a bridge or a place where the edge paint line is Fffafafaded out.
‘DING’ Cancelled mid turn, Mav goes straight.
With my hands on the wheel I’m cool, in control.

So go ahead and hang a weight and let go.
I’ve got really good Insurance and a hell of a lawyer.

I use a weight on my tesla wheel. I’ll let
It drive for the 85 easiest miles of my 125 mile commute.

I do not have a wheel weight for my Maverick.

The way I describe it to people is that I trust my Tesla like I would trust a 16 year old driving my car: they need to be supervised. You can’t go to sleep in the car with them driving unsupervised. You need to watch them like a hawk in tricky situations, like construction zones, curvy canyon country, high congestion areas, multi lane city streets with turn lanes.

But I trust my Maverick like I would trust an 8 year old driving my car. You can let them hold the steering wheel for a few seconds, but you can’t trust them to make any decisions. None.

 

[Cherokee]

I’ll continue to drive my Maverick the safe way.

 

[Blue_Max]

IME, the lane centering works wonderfully on open highways at speed in the daytime. For those of us in the D.C. area, that means any of the HOV lanes around here are tailor made for lane centering.

However, I have discovered a not-uncommon situation where it's most definitely NOT useful, and actually quite dangerous:
1. You need to have cruise engaged to engage lane centering.
2. You set the cruise speed (say, 65) and the radar follows the vehicle in front of you at a set distance.
3. You approach a sharper curve where you should be slowing down to safely navigate it. If there was no car in front of you, the lane centering would do that. If the car in front of you slows down to navigate the curve, the radar also slows you down to navigate the curve. So, you slow down to, say, 55 or 45 into the curve.

All of this is good... but it breaks down if that car in front of you that's slowing down for the curve *then changes lanes* during the curve.

At that point, your Mav will accelerate from that 45 or 55 back up to the speed you set your cruise at... right as you're entering a sharper curve.

There are a few places I've learned where this is a likely risk (e.g. northbound HOV on I-395 slows down and sharpens just as you pass the Pentagon to cross into D.C., the cruise+lane centering combo ALWAYS accelerates through a descending-radius curve it should 100% be decelerating through... After it happened about 2-3 times, I now know to disengage cruise before I enter that area, it fools the Ford every time).

Bottom line: Great tool when the road is predictable. Can be scary when it's not. Use responsibly.

Jesus. I find it much simpler to drive for myself.

 

[Daveinva]

Jesus. I find it much simpler to drive for myself.

I don't. It really is amazing and dramatically reduces fatigue-- one just needs to be attentive to where it works well, and where it doesn't, like absolutely every other piece of technology invented since fire and the wheel.

I keep my hands on the wheel, and my eyes on the road. But it's far "easier" to drive long distances with this assist (which is all it is).

 

[Cancunbadlands]

But it will start throwing alerts!
Keep your hands on

 

[Blue_Max]

I don't. It really is amazing and dramatically reduces fatigue-- one just needs to be attentive to where it works well, and where it doesn't, like absolutely every other piece of technology invented since fire and the wheel.

I keep my hands on the wheel, and my eyes on the road. But it's far "easier" to drive long distances with this assist (which is all it is).

At least you're not putting a weight on the steering wheel.

 

[Mox4615]

I’ve dabbled with the lane keep, lane centering feature but I find that mind tends to bounce kinda back and fourth between the lines, like it doesn’t wanna drive straight-ish but it’ll drift towards center and then correct but it basically over corrects and then it’s just bouncing around. Just something I notice, we got some many crappy drivers that I can’t trust somebody that’s half a car ahead of me on the right to not shoot over in front of me real quick. I’ve had my truck almost come to a complete stop going over 75 at the time when somebody did that. Have to be on high alert when using any of these features, I trust the truck more than the reckless drivers

 

[Cherokee]

At least you're not putting a weight on the steering wheel.

Yeah I agree, I mean defeating, circumventing, manipulating a safety feature with a weight on the steering wheel.
Really ?
The gene pool needs cleaning out every now and then I get that.
But I sinserely hope no Innocent people are injured or killed during this purge.

 

[Blue_Max]

LOL!

That was actually a sincere wish. If you're going to be on a public road, take some responsibility.

 

[801Maverick801]

My experience,
Smooth four lane mellow curve, I come to an Intersection or a rise or a bridge or a place where the edge paint line is Fffafafaded out.
‘DING’ Cancelled mid turn, Mav goes straight.
With my hands on the wheel I’m cool, in control.

So go ahead and hang a weight and let go.
I’ve got really good Insurance and a hell of a lawyer.

This guys got a hell of a lawyer guys! Everyone watch out!!!

 

[Robot-Wrangler]

That was actually a sincere wish. If you're going to be on a public road, take some responsibility.

Good luck guilt tripping somebody else. I'll continue to enjoy freedom while you sincerely wish to contol others. LMAO!

 

[Blue_Max]

Good luck guilt tripping somebody else. I'll continue to enjoy freedom while you sincerely wish to contol others. LMAO!

Hooray for distracted driving!

 

[Robot-Wrangler]

Hooray for distracted driving!

With all of this newfound freedom, i've been thinking of taking up knitting while driving.

 

[CD_SM]

This is the future. It will only get more automated.

I've been operating jets with autopilots for two decades, I'm pretty adept at using it in my vehicle. It's a huge safety feature, it allows you to monitor what is going on around you far better. In addition, I drive at night often into the wee hours of the morning, where the vehicle is much better at maintaining control and my fatigue is kept to a minimum.

"Allows" being the operative word -it doesn't make it happen, it just allows it. Few will do it. They're not professionals with hundreds of hours of training. I think this thread demonstrates that well. (Hanging weights on the wheel? Really??. What would your airline say if you did that on your A350?)
There was a study a few years back where they tested a bunch of young drivers with ADHD, and found that cars with manual transmissions were meaningfully safer that cars with automatics.

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