Testing Automatic Emergency Braking on The Mustang Mach E

[Zigma51]

It's possible that small inflatable objects are not the right test object to use. I think it would depend on the sensors. For a camera based detection I would think the inflatable would emulate a dog or small child properly. For other sensors (sonar, radar, etc), they might not emulate the real world object properly.

I'm not defending the feature here, perhaps it does need improvement. But take it from an engineer, you got to make sure your test system is properly emulating the real world situation.

I am a engineer as well. The issue is not just what better for this test, but cost and risk to my Mach E. I am planning to do a part 2 and I am taken all comments to make it better. I want to try taping cardboard to one of these balloons for bigger targets for example.

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[buffasnow]

Ford says this feature uses "camera technology", but do we know if it relies on cameras only? If other sensors looking for any kind of density (solidity?) are involved, or are used in conjunction with the cameras for confirmation, perhaps they may not be able to detect these blow-up animals.

It would be interesting to see if a larger Shamu-sized inflatable would provide a different result.

Edit: looks like hartmms said this more eloquently than I in post #15 above.

 

[Zigma51]

Ford says this feature uses "camera technology", but do we know if it relies on cameras only? If other sensors looking for any kind of density (solidity?) are involved, or are used in conjunction with the cameras for confirmation, perhaps they may not be able to detect these blow-up animals.

It would be interesting to see if a larger Shamu-sized inflatable would provide a different result.

Definitely did look into this but blow up punching bags bigger then 3 feet are not cheap lol.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

No surprise here.

The sonar ("ultrasonic") sensors in the front of the car likely won't detect something like an air-filled balloon. The signal doesn't bounce off this kind of thin plastic and it's designed to propagate through air.

Have a partner toss a basketball in front (crossing the path) of the vehicle to see if it will be detected...

 

[the golden eel]

Thanks for doing this.

What about using both blow up toys at once? Place them 4 feet apart. Tape a bed sheet between them. Maybe for fun print out some generic tail lights on paper and tape those to the sheet. So it somewhat resembles a car?

 

[Zigma51]

Thanks for doing this.

What about using both blow up toys at once? Place them 4 feet apart. Tape a bed sheet between them. Maybe for fun print out some generic tail lights on paper and tape those to the sheet. So it somewhat resembles a car?

Good ideas for part 2

 

[Zigma51]

No surprise here.

The sonar ("ultrasonic") sensors in the front of the car likely won't detect something like an air-filled balloon. The signal doesn't bounce off this kind of thin plastic and it's designed to propagate through air.

Have a partner toss a basketball in front (crossing the path) of the vehicle to see if it will be detected...

Definitely good points here. I worry a basketball could hold enough air pressure it could damage. The underside of the car, but I will see if I can find something to test this idea in part 2.

 

[SpaceEVDriver]

I do worry about a basketball able to hold enough pressure that it could damage the underside of the car.
Definitely good points here. I worry a basketball could hold enough air pressure it could damage. The underside of the car, but I will see if I can find something to test this idea in part 2.

A basketball will not damage the underside of the vehicle. It might damage the front. I know this because I was driving on a mountain road after a storm and some rocks had fallen into the road. One of those rocks was bigger than I had thought and I smacked into it at about 10 mph. I had to stop, back up, and toss the rock out of the road. It did not damage the underside of the vehicle.

 

[Dadams]

I was going to try an air mattress but haven't got around to it.

 

[Zigma51]

I was going to try an air mattress but haven't got around to it.

I spent $15 for all 3 of my cute animals lol. A air mattress would definitely be cool to see, but also more expensive. I recommend having the full front of your Mach e protected with PPF before you try this. Even a bed sheet can scratch if there enough dust and dirt in the air.

 

[RickMachE]

There seems to be a fundamental lack of understanding of the features.

Reverse Braking Assist:

- can be turned on or off
- firmly pressing the accelerator overrides it
- if it determines that a collision with an obstacle may occur, full braking MAY apply.

The test was flawed because the vehicle is not coming out of a flat garage onto a flat driveway.

I can tell you that I had this happen, more than once, at a friend's house with large weeds growing in a corner of their driveway. It's jarring when it happens. Worked great.

Automatic Emergency Braking:

- Totally different feature
- MAY activate if system determines that a collision is immient
- The system does not detect vehicles moving in a different direction or animals.

It will hit the air mattress. It will hit a building. It may hit a person standing in the middle of the road, not moving.

I remember a video someone posted of a new Tesla (?) owner demonstrating the technology by driving in a parking lot into a parked car. He successfully hit the parked car. It was a great test of something that the technology is not designed to prevent.

As many here have also experienced, it works fine on my car.

https://www.ford.com/support/how-tos/more-vehicle-topics/brakes/what-is-reverse-brake-assist/

https://www.ford.com/technology/driver-assist-technology/pre-collision-assist/

 

[azerik]

I remember a video someone posted of a new Tesla (?) owner demonstrating the technology by driving in a parking lot into a parked car. He successfully hit the parked car.

I love those kind of people. They screw up badly and yet, still post the video somewhere for people to laugh at them.

 

[RickMachE]

I love those kind of people. They screw up badly and yet, still post the video somewhere for people to laugh at them.

The one I'm remembering was a guy who posted his boss doing it...

 

[azerik]

The one I'm remembering was a guy who posted his boss doing it...

Ex boss lol.

 

[i8iridium]

There seems to be a fundamental lack of understanding of the features.

Agreed.

Automatic Emergency Braking:

- Totally different feature
- MAY activate if system determines that a collision is immient
- The system does not detect vehicles moving in a different direction or animals.

It will hit the air mattress. It will hit a building. It may hit a person standing in the middle of the road, not moving.

That's the main issue with the tests. The AEB needs to have something to differentiate from the road and objects while not having false positives. So it's going to err on the side of hitting a pedestrian vs slamming on the brakes for a manhole cover or shadows. It might work better (probably not great) if you had someone pull something across the road with a rope while you drove at it.

There's only a single camera up front, so it has a lot of work to do to pick out a person at speed. From what I understand, the radar isn't even being used unless you're at higher speed. I've had that work reliably when someone's turned off in front of me, and I didn't hit the brakes cause I knew I would clear them. Car still applied the brakes anyway and I would just have to hit the accelerator.

I've had the reverse braking work 100% with a regular kitchen garbage can behind the car. ? Again, that's only using a single camera.

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