Ford's New Radar Technology Based On Open Source 259
zakkie writes "Ford is releasing new safety-enhancing radar equipment for its 2010 Taurus sedan. The radar itself is based on F22 fighter radar, but interestingly, it's claimed that the software is built from open source. What that may mean, in the vague, waffling context of the article, is unclear, but it's interesting simply because they've gone to the effort of stating it in those words. Clearly, 'open source' is being thought of outside the IT world as a good thing, and that surely is itself a good thing. The purpose of the radar device is to help 'avoid crashes by sounding an alarm and flashing red lights when the driver gets too close to another car.'"
Tailgate alarm (Score:3, Informative)
I'm comforted by the fact that my small car has a very short stopping distance, but it's certainly mitigated when I'm going to get run over by an oversized Hot Wheels in the event of a quick stop.
Lidar sucks (Score:4, Informative)
What they can achieve with radar is constant 360 degree monitoring. The local police has gray vans that look like ordinary vans. They park them somewhere near busy intersection. The systems in the car track the movement of every car around the van, and automatically take images of the targets going too fast. Basically there are no police officers sitting inside, they just leave the car there and send you the speeding tickets a few days from the incident.
Also, radars have improved in the past years. Most of the new systems have advancements from military radars - they hop frequerencies and whisper instead of yelling. The amount of energy they put out has dropped to 100th of what they used to do. At the same time the quality of the radar systems have improved. The old ones used to have quite high margin of error whereas these new systems are accurate to centimeter/hours.
Lidar is hard to spot but in overall they suck because they can't do all the coolest tricks.
Re:So give me the source (Score:3, Informative)
Open Source != GPL
Re:But does it trigger speed radar detectors? (Score:4, Informative)
"Brakes" ... the word you wanted is "brakes".
Re:Correlation-causation anyone? (Score:5, Informative)
What Open source in this context refers to isn't the IT/GPL version of Open source it means it was developed from unclassified research and publications.
So what it is saying is that Ford has not put classified technology into these cars, not that they used free "as in beer" software.
Re:Tailgate alarm (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Detection (Score:3, Informative)
Is there any point in the modern world to having a radar detector? I've always been under the impression that a lot of law enforcement agencies are now using LIDAR, which is virtually impossible to detect until your car is being painted with it (i.e: it's too late to slow down). Even the ones that use radar generally turn it on and off with a trigger instead of leaving it running all the time -- which further reduces your odds of detecting it before it hits your vehicle.
While there have been a huge number of advances in radar technology, the radar detector technology keeps up with it well. The two are made by the same company, after all. LIDAR is definitely not ideal for so many situations. To use LIDAR, a police officer must be stationary and actually outside of his cruiser. LIDAR is also defeatable because laser jammers are legal in most states [guysoflidar.com]. Finally, there are entire states that do not use LIDAR [thenewspaper.com]. This is why radar is still much more common. I do know that radar detectors are still very useful because I have and use one myself and it has saved me from a ticket in a number of situations. It would be my guess that the radar in use by the Ford Taurus is very different and distinguishable from that in use by the police.
Re:17mpg? (Score:3, Informative)
It's a 3.5L V6...what did you expect? The bi-turbo model has a great power-to-mileage ratio. It has the power and torque of a 4-4.5L V8 but the mileage of V6. For reference my 2001 Volkswagen Jetta (Bora, in EUâ"it's the sedan Golf basically) with a naturally aspirated 2.8L VR6 gets 20/24 mpg and has 175HP and about 180 lb.-ft. whereas the The Taurus SHO has .7L more displacement but gets 365HP/350 lb.-feet, at 17/25 mpg. That's very efficient considering the amount of power it's producing.
Quite honestly, the cost of the car versus a comparable BMW 5-series is actually really great. According to a few reviews I've read the SHO handles quite well for it's size and weight, with lots of great gadgets.
I'll admit those are still ugly numbers though, anything south of 30/35 for a daily driver is awful, particularly for a sedan.
Re:So give me the source (Score:2, Informative)
Even assuming they used GPLv2, They only have to do that if they make modifications and don't include the source with the software.
Re:Detection (Score:4, Informative)
LIDAR requires that the officer be stationary, have their window rolled down, be parked such that they are shooting LIDAR as close to parallel with the flow of traffic as possible, and not have any weather conditions that would obstruct the laser (or make life really miserable for the officer, as the window is down). The officer has to actively aim the device at each car he wishes to clock.
On the New York State Thruway, most of the traffic enforcement still uses Ka-band radar. The radar units are permanently installed on the cars and don't require exposure to the elements. They can provide accurate readings while the car is in motion, allowing the officer to patrol while still checking speed. Many cars have dual fore-and-aft antennas so they can clock cars ahead of and behind them. They can park the car and leave the radar on, not only slowing down traffic that has radar detectors, but letting them work on other things while waiting for the radar's "too fast" alarm to go off.
I'm not surprised NYS Troopers don't use LIDAR as often -- it's much more of a hassle for them to use.
As for detecting LIDAR: If you have a dark-colored car without a lot of reflective chrome or a front license plate, and you leave your headlights on, it is possible to detect LIDAR before it locks on to you, at least some of the time. Car and Driver tested this several years ago and found that, while it's difficult to beat LIDAR, it's not impossible.
As for "instant-on" radar: Yes, it exists, but there's that convenience issue again. Rarely do I ever see officers using it on the highway. Should one wish to speed while using their radar detector, the safe thing is to only do so when there's at least a few cars visible ahead of you. That way, your detector will be set off when the officer uses their "instant-on" to clock the cars ahead of you.
Re:17mpg? (Score:4, Informative)
Imperial or US gallons?
And, how big is that car? The Taurus is approaching the size of a Mercedes S-class, and has a 3.5 L V6.
Also, US fuel economy estimates for everything but hybrids are lower than real world fuel economy.
Re:17mpg? (Score:3, Informative)
I'll admit those are still ugly numbers though, anything south of 30/35 for a daily driver is awful, particularly for a sedan.
It's pathetic! My '82 MBZ 300SD won't get up and go like this thing will, but it will seat four adults in posh comfort (if you add a fifth it sucks, heh heh) and it gets around 28 mpg on the freeway at good speeds, which I assure you this Ford monstrosity will not. It manages this without any intelligent engine management (the engine is entirely mechanical; the "run switch" is a vacuum switch on the back of the ignition switch.) A 1989 Nissan 180SX K's (J-spec) with the CA18DET gets better than 30 MPG on the freeway and while it has less power and torque will probably murderize this stupid Ford pothole, SHO 'nuff. 2010 VW TDIs (to once again include a Golf, thank goodness) come with 2 liter engines and plenty of pep, and at least another 10 mpg!
"Vehicle targets" - yes, unfortunately (Score:3, Informative)
I used the Eaton VORAD automotive radar [overbot.com] on a DARPA Grand Challenge vehicle. It's a useful little device. You get, for up to 20 targets, range, range rate, and azimuth. Targets smaller than a motorcycle usually do not show up. It will not see pedestrians at any useful range. Azimuth info accuracy isn't very good, but range and range rate are quite good. That's ten year old technology; the newer units are better. Those units have been on some big trucks for fifteen years. But the technology was too expensive for most cars. It's been appearing as "intelligent cruise control" on some cars for years.
The Eaton units, with the display and controller used for vehicles, supports accident reconstruction. The last 15 seconds are retained, and you can see what other vehicles in front were doing. Trucking companies find this useful, because they often can show that it was the other driver's fault.
Re:So give me the source (Score:3, Informative)
An example of this definition of Open Source is the story of Tom Clancy and his publishing of "The Hunt for Red October."
He was investigated for revealing classified information about the operations of our submarines. But he was able to point out where he obtained every bit of information that they were concerned about. He had documented all his sources and all his sources were Open Source, i.e. unclassified sources.
OSINT or Open Source Intelligence is an actively persued branch of the intel world.
Re:Useless in the city (Score:4, Informative)
Do you really think tailgate asses do it because they are late?
They do it because it's what they like. I heard it's the only way they can get an erection.
Re:Useless in the city (Score:4, Informative)
Too lazy to read your own article?
That research was done with a model featuring .... pedestrians. Rarely seen those doing 120 kph.
Even better, quoting the last few alineas:
"However, there is one rule you shouldn't break, according to a new analysis of how high-volume traffic flows along a highway. Cecile Appert-Rolland, a physicist at the University of Paris-Sud, looked at the tailing distances between cars traveling on a busy two-lane expressway in the suburbs of Paris."
Her research showed that tailgating drivers were more likely than a non-tailgater to have a car in the lane next to them, so they weren't just speeding up in order to change lanes. She also found that these short time headways tended to extend across several vehicles, creating a platoon.
"We can identify at least seven or eight cars where they have time headways of half a second," she said. Considering that a driver's reaction time is about one second, these platoons are disastrous pileups waiting to happen. "If the first one brakes, the second one has to brake harder, the third one even harder, and the last wouldn't be able to brake hard enough."
Re:17mpg? NO: 25 city, 40 hwy! (Score:3, Informative)
"The Taurus 2010 will average 17mpg in the city and 25mpg on the motorway, on a par with the competition"
WTF? I've had two Tauruses, and both had 3L V6 motors with automatic, air, cruise, etc. My average with the 1986 model was about 32 mpg for mostly city/suburban driving. With the 1997 model, it was a bit worse, about 29 mpg. BTW, these are imperial gallons, but multiplying by 0.833 to convert to US gallons still gives 24-26 mpg for city/suburban driving. On long trips by highway, the 1986 model could average 45-50 mpg (around 37-41 mpg/US).
Admittedly, it's not a compact car, but what exactly have the marketing geniuses done to ruin its fuel economy like that? Mere engineers could not have accomplished it unaided.
Re:Tailgate alarm (Score:3, Informative)
There is a significant difference in stopping distance between "juice" brakes and air brakes. Assuming identical reaction times, air brakes take from 500ms to a full second LONGER to initiate mechanical movement. Every professional driver already knows that however, since it's part of the written test to obtain a commercial driver's license (CDL) with an air brake certification. It's why truckers who aren't dickheads leave a few extra car lengths between them and the next vehicle, especially late in their shift when their own reaction time may be a little slower than normal.
Re:Tailgate alarm (Score:3, Informative)
I (generally) feel a lot more like assuming that an SUV's brakes are working than a tractor-trailer rig's. For one thing, the SUVs generally appear to be better maintained. For another the tractor-trailer rig has lots more brakes, and the brake system is more complex.
I'll grant that if I *know* that the brake systems are working properly, that the driver is attentive, etc. then they are equivalently safe. OTOH, if the tractor hits me, it will do a lot more damage than the SUV.
So I worry more about tractor-trailer rigs. OTOH, I'll admit that SUVs are a lot more common, so though I may worry less about each of them (on the average), in aggregate I probably worry more.