Adaptive Cruise Control for Motorcycles is Here

[Coop]

Hmm, I could probably buy 10 nice ST1100s for that price ...

Could? Don't you mean "have"? LOL!!

 

[ddemair]

I don't see a downside to ACC. Any form of technology can be misused, but unless it ENCOURAGES misuse, there's no reason to avoid it. So the question should be whether or not ACC encourages misuse. IMO, it doesn't. That doesn't mean that someone won't.

I would be happy enough to have ordinary cruise control which I would only use when the traffic was light enough that I didn't have to adjust it too frequently. If I had ACC, I probably would rarely even notice it. If I happened to behind another vehicle close to my desired speed, but varying slightly, ACC would be a very nice feature.

 

[Shawn K]

I don't see a downside to ACC. Any form of technology can be misused, but unless it ENCOURAGES misuse, there's no reason to avoid it.

Under normal circumstances, I might agree with you. But in this case, having used ACC for 500 miles/day for a year and a half, I have a pretty strong reservation about its use on motorcycles.

The problem isn't how it behaves when everything is working well, it's how it behaves when everything goes bad.

For example, if you're in a car and the ACC suddenly goes maximum braking to avoid a collision (and you're not expecting it), you pretty much stay in your seat and come to a quick stop. A car is inherently stable and will stay upright with no intervention from you.

Now, imagine maximum braking when you're not prepared for it on a motorcycle and aren't physically tied to the vehicle. If you believe that all motorcyclists are riding at full alertness at all times, and will always be at maximum readiness for a threshold braking event, then you're more of an optimist of human nature than I am. What I envision is people being thrown from their bikes because they weren't as alert as they should be, or in many cases have no clue what maximum braking is like on their motorcycle. Or better yet, having an auto-braking event occur due to a false positive. I've had it happen on many occasions, and I'm telling you from firsthand experience that it will scare the living crap out of you in a "normal" vehicle.

No doubt someone will come long shortly and say that I'm an alarmist, that I don't know what I'm talking about , that I'm "not being nice", or whatever. I'm not speaking in a vacuum here; I have over 150,000 miles of experience with the systems on the market in every weather condition around, and I know how they behave. I understand the dynamics of stable vs. unstable vehicles, and I understand the cognitive ability of the average American motorist, and it is my well-considered belief that this technology is fine (and even possibly necessary) in multi-track vehicles, but is not a good idea for the average motorist on single-track vehicles for a number of reasons.

 

[dduelin]

Under normal circumstances, I might agree with you. But in this case, having used ACC for 500 miles/day for a year and a half, I have a pretty strong reservation about its use on motorcycles.

The problem isn't how it behaves when everything is working well, it's how it behaves when everything goes bad.

For example, if you're in a car and the ACC suddenly goes maximum braking to avoid a collision (and you're not expecting it), you pretty much stay in your seat and come to a quick stop. A car is inherently stable and will stay upright with no intervention from you.

Now, imagine maximum braking when you're not prepared for it on a motorcycle and aren't physically tied to the vehicle. If you believe that all motorcyclists are riding at full alertness at all times, and will always be at maximum readiness for a threshold braking event, then you're more of an optimist of human nature than I am. What I envision is people being thrown from their bikes because they weren't as alert as they should be, or in many cases have no clue what maximum braking is like on their motorcycle. Or better yet, having an auto-braking event occur due to a false positive. I've had it happen on many occasions, and I'm telling you from firsthand experience that it will scare the living crap out of you in a "normal" vehicle.

No doubt someone will come long shortly and say that I'm an alarmist, that I don't know what I'm talking about , that I'm "not being nice", or whatever. I'm not speaking in a vacuum here; I have over 150,000 miles of experience with the systems on the market in every weather condition around, and I know how they behave. I understand the dynamics of stable vs. unstable vehicles, and I understand the cognitive ability of the average American motorist, and it is my well-considered belief that this technology is fine (and even possibly necessary) in multi-track vehicles, but is not a good idea for the average motorist on single-track vehicles for a number of reasons.

It appears to me from reading a couple of press releases that the BMW system differs from current ACC systems in at least two important ways. One, it incorporates yaw and lean information made available from the Bosch 3 axis Lean-ABS brain and takes into account the extremely variable attitudes motorcycles take in normal operation (lean, pitch, yaw) and secondly it doesn't incorporate emergency braking triggered by stationary objects and/or stopped vehicles. BMW says it will require much more operator responsibility than car or truck systems in current use and is more designed as a distance keeping control that actively keeps track of moving vehicles within a certain distance in front of the motorcycle.

The Honda system in our Accord often did over react and trigger emergency level braking and it was incredibly insensitive to closing or opening speeds of vehicles ahead of me in my lane or in adjacent lanes when the road was curved. If a vehicle dived into the space between the car a safe distance ahead of me the Honda might try standing on it's nose to open the distance back up. In the urban area I live in that "safe following distance" always invited one and sometimes two cars to slide over and take it so I pretty much always had it off on urban arteries and freeways. It was usable on rural freeways without much traffic but even then if an overtaking car slid over in front of me into the selected following distance a little to close to me the Honda couldn't account for the car pulling rapidly ahead and away - it simply braked harder than neccessary. On the other hand the same type of system in our Mazda seems to be able to account for rate of closing and opening distance for overtakes and passes and doesn't sense every oncoming car in a curve as a developing head-on collision and trigger collision mitigation braking. That business was untenable and I disabled it almost all the time.

 

[ddemair]

Under normal circumstances, I might agree with you. But in this case, having used ACC for 500 miles/day for a year and a half, I have a pretty strong reservation about its use on motorcycles.

The problem isn't how it behaves when everything is working well, it's how it behaves when everything goes bad.

Good point, but I wouldn't be an early adopter so I probably wouldn't need to worry. On the other hand, someone (actually many) needs to be an early adopter to prove the reliability of the system.

 

[SMSW]

Under normal circumstances, I might agree with you. But in this case, having used ACC for 500 miles/day for a year and a half, I have a pretty strong reservation about its use on motorcycles.

The problem isn't how it behaves when everything is working well, it's how it behaves when everything goes bad.

For example, if you're in a car and the ACC suddenly goes maximum braking to avoid a collision (and you're not expecting it), you pretty much stay in your seat and come to a quick stop. A car is inherently stable and will stay upright with no intervention from you.

Now, imagine maximum braking when you're not prepared for it on a motorcycle and aren't physically tied to the vehicle. If you believe that all motorcyclists are riding at full alertness at all times, and will always be at maximum readiness for a threshold braking event, then you're more of an optimist of human nature than I am. What I envision is people being thrown from their bikes because they weren't as alert as they should be, or in many cases have no clue what maximum braking is like on their motorcycle. Or better yet, having an auto-braking event occur due to a false positive. I've had it happen on many occasions, and I'm telling you from firsthand experience that it will scare the living crap out of you in a "normal" vehicle.

No doubt someone will come long shortly and say that I'm an alarmist, that I don't know what I'm talking about , that I'm "not being nice", or whatever. I'm not speaking in a vacuum here; I have over 150,000 miles of experience with the systems on the market in every weather condition around, and I know how they behave. I understand the dynamics of stable vs. unstable vehicles, and I understand the cognitive ability of the average American motorist, and it is my well-considered belief that this technology is fine (and even possibly necessary) in multi-track vehicles, but is not a good idea for the average motorist on single-track vehicles for a number of reasons.

Maximum braking? Under cruise control circumstances? Sounds to me like a situation that might catch quite a few guys by surprise if they were riding w/o CC. The BMW system, according to the article, hands off control if the gentle braking will not fit the circumstances.

 

[Shawn K]

Maximum braking? Under cruise control circumstances?

Oh yeah. Happened to me at least a couple dozen times.

The scenario would center around the fact that the radar is far better than you are (the "royal you", not you specifically) at determining rapid deceleration of the vehicle in front of you, long before your brain registers that it's slowing down.

Additionally, it's better at sensing delta than people are, and that's what triggers the avoidance braking (at least in the Bosch systems that I used).

So imagine you're cruising at 70 with a 5-second gap to the vehicle in front of you, but that guy is sniffing the rump of the vehicle in front of him. Everything is fine, until the guy being tailgated gets tired of it and lightly brake checks the guy behind him (the one in front of you). The trailing guy panics and stabs the brake hard. Your radar is still holding your distance like before, but it suddenly sees a huge delta shift in that vehicle's velocity. In that scenario, the huge and sudden delta would trigger a hard brake every time (and by "hard" I mean 0.8G or more).

This sort of behavior is tolerable when the worst that happens is that you get put hard into your seat belt. But imagine suddenly being put into hard breaking on a motorcycle when you're not prepared for it. Imagine only having hold of a single handlebar because you're taking a drink, or turning the volume down on your headset, or adjusting your radio. Imagine your unbraced, unprepared torso lurching forward while you're applying uneven pressure against the bars.

I'm not being an alarmist, and I'm not talking about hypothetical situations. I'm speaking of repeated experiences, with telematics data and post-incident investigation (something that I think few people here can claim). I think ACC is a useful tool for cars and trucks that has downsides that are more correctly called "nuisance" than "danger". On a motorcycle, though, the dynamics are substantially different, and I believe that the likelihood of an unintended "dangerous" consequence is much higher.

 

[kiltman]

1985 appears to be the first year that factory cruise control was available on a GoldWing. It’s a bit sketchy but cruise control has been around since 1948, and really got sophisticated in 1974, with vacuum units and Electronic units. AMC, Chrysler and GM offered as an option for $60-90 and Ford topped out at $103. Yes there were versions in the 50s.
MCCruise indicated they started developing one in 1996.
Technology moves fast, from what members have inputted on this thread it’s not a high priority item for me, I’m good with what I have.
This has been interesting

 

[ddemair]

Oh yeah. Happened to me at least a couple dozen times.

The scenario would center around the fact that the radar is far better than you are (the "royal you", not you specifically) at determining rapid deceleration of the vehicle in front of you, long before your brain registers that it's slowing down.

Additionally, it's better at sensing delta than people are, and that's what triggers the avoidance braking (at least in the Bosch systems that I used).

So imagine you're cruising at 70 with a 5-second gap to the vehicle in front of you, but that guy is sniffing the rump of the vehicle in front of him. Everything is fine, until the guy being tailgated gets tired of it and lightly brake checks the guy behind him (the one in front of you). The trailing guy panics and stabs the brake hard. Your radar is still holding your distance like before, but it suddenly sees a huge delta shift in that vehicle's velocity. In that scenario, the huge and sudden delta would trigger a hard brake every time (and by "hard" I mean 0.8G or more).

This sort of behavior is tolerable when the worst that happens is that you get put hard into your seat belt. But imagine suddenly being put into hard breaking on a motorcycle when you're not prepared for it. Imagine only having hold of a single handlebar because you're taking a drink, or turning the volume down on your headset, or adjusting your radio. Imagine your unbraced, unprepared torso lurching forward while you're applying uneven pressure against the bars.

I'm not being an alarmist, and I'm not talking about hypothetical situations. I'm speaking of repeated experiences, with telematics data and post-incident investigation (something that I think few people here can claim). I think ACC is a useful tool for cars and trucks that has downsides that are more correctly called "nuisance" than "danger". On a motorcycle, though, the dynamics are substantially different, and I believe that the likelihood of an unintended "dangerous" consequence is much higher.

Things to consider here... ACC for motorcycles should work differently than it does for cars. I don't know if that's going to be the case, but it should be and...

what would happen in the imagined scenario without automatic braking? With or without automatic braking, stopping without losing control is the operator's responsibility. Without auto-braking, would the biker rear-end the suddenly decelerating car? That's hardly preferable.

This begs the question - would ACC include unexpected auto-braking? I think we both agree that it should not. Perhaps a warning (I get that in my car before it auto-brakes), but not actual emergency braking without time to prepare.

 

[SMSW]

I said it before, the BMW system has a 'hand off' light for the motorcyclist to take control in an emergency stop situation. More to the point, if there is a 5 second gap (you are NOT running CC) between you and the car ahead at 70 or above mph, and that car slows at 0.8g, how many of us would either avoid or stop before we became the fly on the rear windshield?

 

[st11ray]

It's just more dumbing down of the driver. What happens when these systems malfunction and the driver is relying on it to do it's job? Car or motorcycle.

 

[dduelin]

The problem Ray is the drivers are dumbing down regardless if they have ACC or not. The ones with it at least get some warning of an impending collision as the car brakes on its own. The ones without it simply pile, mid text or social media update, into the car ahead of them.

 

[st11ray]

The problem Ray is the drivers are dumbing down regardless if they have ACC or not. The ones with it at least get some warning of an impending collision as the car brakes on its own. The ones without it simply pile, mid text or social media update, into the car ahead of them.

But what happens when the system malfunctions? And they certainly will, nothing is perfect. We are raising generations of drivers that won't know how to take control in the case of malfunctions because they never had to do it themselves.

 

[Coop]

But what happens when the system malfunctions? And they certainly will, nothing is perfect. We are raising generations of drivers that won't know how to take control in the case of malfunctions because they never had to do it themselves.

Is a standard transmission an anti theft device......yes!

 

[dduelin]

But what happens when the system malfunctions? And they certainly will, nothing is perfect. We are raising generations of drivers that won't know how to take control in the case of malfunctions because they never had to do it themselves.

Everyday single and multiple pileups occur due to inattentive drivers. While I agree there will be malfunctions of any electronics I still think on the whole the number of participants in this type of crash will net lower as more vehicles are equipped with following distance monitoring.

 

[Shawn K]

Amazing the amount of R&D money being spent and technology that's being created to remove even the slightest burden of responsibility from motorists.

All this ACC technology can be rendered meaningless by simply not tailgating people!

 

[skidgillen]

It's just more dumbing down of the driver. What happens when these systems malfunction and the driver is relying on it to do it's job? Car or motorcycle.

I found when I used ACC in our Toyota Sienna my mind only had to worry about keeping the vehicle in between the lines. This made me sleepy for some reason. How is this drivers aid a safety feature if it make me sleepy? I find the same thing happening when I follow a tractor trailer or box truck too long. No visual stimuli and I get sleepy. Weird.

 

[Bmacleod]

I found when I used ACC in our Toyota Sienna my mind only had to worry about keeping the vehicle in between the lines. This made me sleepy for some reason. How is this drivers aid a safety feature if it make me sleepy? I find the same thing happening when I follow a tractor trailer or box truck too long. No visual stimuli and I get sleepy. Weird.

Do you not have an onboard entertainment system? Pop in a DVD to keep you from becoming bored and sleepy

 

[ST Gui]

On a motorcycle, though, the dynamics are substantially different, and I believe that the likelihood of an unintended "dangerous" consequence is much higher.

It will be if engineers take an automotive system and graft it directly into that of a motorcycle. But it's possible that BMW and other manufactures may consider there are two fewer wheels in the vehicle they're working on and address safety concerns. I find it impossible to consider sudden stops destabilizing a bike on ACC didn't occur to designers.

Even if they don't do so out of safety concerns I'm sure it's been/being done out of liability concerns. So like any reasonable person I'm adopting a wait and see position.

 

[mcarver351]

Is this just manufactures putting more "stuff" on their bikes to increase the price and their profits? Look at the original upgrades on the Goldwing where you had to buy the navigation system in order to get abs at a cost of $3000 to the buyer. I can understand having it in a car because you can kind of tune out while traveling long stretches of roadway (without increasing the risk to yourself but operating a motorcycle requires a whole different level of attentiveness. Our head has to be on a 360 degree swivel at all times looking for vehicles approaching too quickly from the rear, tires flying off big rigs, animals entering the roadway, obstructions in the roadway like ladders, pallets, wheel barrels, hubcaps, rocks, ice, sand, water, etc. I'm not saying you need to ride paranoid, but if we get off our bike after a long ride without being a little fatigued , maybe we are not riding as attentive as we should be. I want full control of my motorcycle so if I need to swerve to avoid a collision or max brake, I can do so. I only use my go cruise to shake my numb hand out and then it is back on the controls. Thats just me! We all ride because we are a different breed of human beings who balance risk with the pure joy of riding motorcycles.