China Plans To Limit How Fast Your Car Accelerates To 62 MPH At Startup (carscoops.com) 92
bobthesungeek76036 writes: Beijing's proposed regulation aims to tame rapid launches by forcing cars to boot up in a restricted performance mode after every ignition.
Under a proposed update to the National Standard, every passenger car would need a default mode in which it takes no less than five seconds to reach 100 km/h (62 mph) at startup, unless the driver manually selects a quicker setting.
The draft title "Technical Specifications for Power-Driven Vehicles Operating on Roads" appears to be part of a broader safety and road behavior initiative in China. It is intended to replace the current GB 7258-2017 standard that didn't impose such restrictions.
Under a proposed update to the National Standard, every passenger car would need a default mode in which it takes no less than five seconds to reach 100 km/h (62 mph) at startup, unless the driver manually selects a quicker setting.
The draft title "Technical Specifications for Power-Driven Vehicles Operating on Roads" appears to be part of a broader safety and road behavior initiative in China. It is intended to replace the current GB 7258-2017 standard that didn't impose such restrictions.
Off-topic comment (Score:2)
One of the affected vehicles is the Tesla Model S Plaid.
Not been a huge fan of Tesla lately, but you have to hand it to them for naming a super fast accelerating car after a Spaceballs reference.
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Cool Story, Bro time:
My domestic partner is very pretty and the dbag who runs the nearest Tesla dealership was trying really, really hard to get with her. He let her borrow his dealership's loaner Model S Plaid for a week as part of his "That Guy" package.
We thought we'd have some fun since it's supposed to be this super cool sports car. It turned out to have a governor on it that limited acceleration and top speed to something any Honda Odyssey owner would find comfortable.
I'm not sure whether it was that
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Not been a huge fan of Tesla lately, but you have to hand it to them for naming a super fast accelerating car after a Spaceballs reference.
Ever see Ready Player One where the corporate douchebag is making a bunch of nostalgic pop culture references (with one of his employees actually feeding them to him via an earpiece) to Wade, in an attempt to convince him that he's not actually a total corporate douchebag?
Yeah, it's like that.
Re:Off-topic comment (Score:5, Funny)
One of the affected vehicles is the Tesla Model S Plaid.
In Scotland, it's the Model S Tartan, btw.
(Or it should be anyway. :-) )
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the scifi references was cute before he cooked his brain on ketamine and lost track of what all those books and stories were actually talking about
it's like a klan member naming something after star trek, like buddy i dont think you absorbed the underlying messages of the show
Re:Off-topic comment (Score:4, Informative)
One of the affected vehicles is the Tesla Model S Plaid.
Dude... one of the affected models is the second cheapest Model 3. Only the cheapest Model 3 RWD has a 0-100 time over 5 seconds. In fact just a quick look at the market I couldn't find a single AWD model EV that is slower than 5seconds to 100km/h. The only other car in Tesla's entire offering is the Model Y Standard that is slow enough for this.
Welcome to the world of EVs, we have a fuckton of acceleration.
What about top speed? (Score:1)
What about top speed limiting?
And speaking of which, what about an emergency stop button? They've had a number of self-driving vehicle runaways which could have been stopped with such a thing.
Re:What about top speed? (Score:5, Informative)
All the person in these "runaways" had to do was lift their foot off the accelerator. Or even leave their foot on the accelerator and just press the brakes, as the brakes can overpower the motor (think of how fast you accelerate when you slam on the pedal at highway speeds vs. how fast you slow down when you slam on the brakes).
Regulatory agencies the world over are constantly getting reports of "runaway unintended acceleration". Nearly every time they investigate, the person mixed up the pedal and the brake. When the car starts accelerating, in their panic they push said "brake" (actually the pedal) harder, and keep pushing it to the floor trying to stop the car. In their panic, people almost never reevaluate whether they're actually pushing the right pedal. It's particularly common among the elderly and the inebriated, and represents 16 thousand crashes per year in the US alone [archive.org].
If your car starts accelerating when you're "braking", get out of your panic, lift your foot up, then make sure you *actually* put it on the brake, and you'll be fine.
Re: What about top speed? (Score:2)
And if that doesn't work, ebrake and do some drifting.
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And if that doesn't work, ebrake and do some drifting.
I don't speak fluent American but I think other English speaking countries call this the "handbrake." New cars don't even have a real handbrake these days, it's just a stupid software button. If the NHTSA (or their local equivalents in any given country) were paying attention, such things wouldn't be allowed, and a real cable/hydraulic brake would be mandatory.
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And if that doesn't work, ebrake and do some drifting.
Precisely none of these cars have an ebrake. They have a button on the dash that will refuse to do anything while the vehicle is in motion.
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Also, the only realistic way to create a true "unintended acceleration" without pedal misapplication is something getting stuck in the pedal or the pedal getting stuck down, which is not actually a subtle thing (again, these things have happened, but they're dwarfed by how often people hit the wrong pedal). Just sensor readings alone don't cut it. As a general rule, pedals have multiple sensors reading the pedal position (typically 2-3). They have to agree with each other, or the target acceleration is se
Re:What about top speed? (Score:4, Insightful)
Also, the only realistic way to create a true "unintended acceleration" without pedal misapplication is something getting stuck in the pedal or the pedal getting stuck down
Depends on the car. Its certainly possible for the throttle to get stuck. That said, I have had unintended acceleration where a floormat caught the pedal. Its not immediately obvious and there is quite naturally a moment of panic. Especially if there is anything in front of you to run into.
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Also, the only realistic way to create a true "unintended acceleration" without pedal misapplication is something getting stuck in the pedal or the pedal getting stuck down
I see you didn't read the Toyota unintended acceleration report by the Barr Group, and have nothing of value to add to this conversation.
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I'll go with NHTSA and NASA over the "Barr Group" ambulance chasers, thank you. Barr found that it's possible if you get like a cosmic ray to flip just the right bit you could stick the throttle on (but still not make it overpower the brakes). NHTSA and NASA investigated not just the software but the actual cases. In not a single actual case that they investigated did they find that it wasn't well explained by either stuck pedals or pedal misapplication (mainly the latter).
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NHTSA and NASA investigated not just the software but the actual cases.
NHTSA and NASA didn't study all of the code in the PCM. Their analysis is therefore invalid. Barr Group found a significant number of paths to unintended acceleration, zero of which depended on cosmic rays and also that Toyota not only didn't follow industry best practices, they didn't follow their own internal procedures. And you think China, which hasn't ever made the best software for anything, is immune to the same kinds of errors. You literally stated that there was no other way that it could happen, w
Re: What about top speed? (Score:1)
What if a somewhat lanky fugitive broke into my car and glued the accelerator to the floor as a side quest on his mission to get the band back together and save the old Catholic school?
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But I guess one pedal drive fixes that to an extent.
ICE creep was the original one pedal drive, just the other way around. And much much more controllable for slow speed parking maneuvers.
Re:What about top speed? (Score:5, Insightful)
Then these people shouldn't be driving. If they are unable to put their foot on the correct pedal, what else aren't they doing?
The demise of the sitck shift rears its head again.
Re:What about top speed? (Score:4, Funny)
Then these people shouldn't be driving. If they are unable to put their foot on the correct pedal, what else aren't they doing.
Yep, we need to put our foot down on this one.
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I see what you did there
Re:What about top speed? (Score:4, Insightful)
Then these people shouldn't be driving. If they are unable to put their foot on the correct pedal, what else aren't they doing?
"These people" are just anyone on a bad day. People make random mistakes when they do anything enough times.
I've had it happen. I was sitting weird and my foot just missed. You do these motions millions of times without thinking about it, so in that one-in-a-million case where something doesn't line up right, you get a very disorienting "why won't it slow down" feeling, and it's easy to panic. Your muscle memory instinctively pushes the "brake" harder to compensate, but it's actually the accelerator. It takes a moment for your brain to diagnose the situation and correct.
No harm done in my case: average car, open road, healthy and alert so I figured it out within a second. If I was in a Tesla Plaid, in a congested area, tired and distracted, I would have put it through a store window.
It was an eye-opening experience.
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you get a very disorienting "why won't it slow down" feeling, and it's easy to panic.
You don't always even panic. It's weird: if you do something in muscle memory enough, you don't consciously think about doing it. This is why driving etc is smooth because you aren't thinking about every action. When something breaks [see what i did there!] you at best get a creeping feeling of wrongness that takes a while to percolate up to your conscious brain.
I can relate a few anecdotes.
One typically dismounts a bike by
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Then these people shouldn't be driving.
You're confusing people and robots. You may be a robot, but people will statistically make mistakes all the time. This includes unintended operation of something (e.g. pressing the wrong button). Statistically for any given action you will fuck it up once every 10 years. Some people more often, but virtually no one less often.
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And to whomever said this comment is overrated I suggest you do a bit of research into human failure analysis. You'll find the 1 in 10 year mistake of any given repetitive task to be widely used not just in science literature, but in industry hazard analysis as well. You may think this doesn't apply to you but all you're really trying to convince us of is that you're not a normal human being.
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In their panic, people almost never reevaluate whether they're actually pushing the right pedal.
Isn't pushing the right pedal the problem in the first place?
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If that happens frequently, then it's a serious problem that needs to be addressed. It doesn't matter if it's a really stupid mistake if a lot of people tend to make it.
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In their panic, people almost never reevaluate whether they're actually pushing the right pedal.
Well they technically were pushing the right pedal. They should have gone for the left one.
Re: What about top speed? (Score:2)
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What about top speed limiting?
Have you seen traffic in China? Top speed is very much already limited.
And speaking of which, what about an emergency stop button? They've had a number of self-driving vehicle runaways
There's a pedal you can step on for that. I assume you mean ADSD vehicle, since there's precisely zero self-driving vehicles available on the market for consumers. There's precisely zero incidents of ADSD overpowering a simple step on the brake pedal. That said I'm sure there's cases of people who are too stupid to both drive and be driven around.
A fake problem? (Score:1)
China's geezer party leaders probably got jealous of all the young whippersnappers having fun, so had to reign it in.
Theory is that's also why the Old Testament was written. "If my wanker no longer works, those wippersnappers are no longer allowed to snap their whips either! Parity of misery, Hallelujah, pass the wine!"
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Your ID suggests you might be familiar with Nadar's "Unsafe at Any Speed".
We're in a bad place culturally when we treat unnecessary death - which affects other people both in terms of tax dollars per crash and whoever else is involved in the crash - as something which is just a cost of doing business.
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If this were the case they would not permit manual selection of the rapid acceleration mode.
Meanwhile in America (Score:1)
The laws of physics prevent many people from driving a vehicle with a sub 5 second 0-60 time. It takes a lot of ponies to get a bro-dozer up to speed that quickly.
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The laws of physics prevent many people from driving a vehicle with a sub 5 second 0-60 time. It takes a lot of ponies to get a bro-dozer up to speed that quickly.
I think a lot of EVs can do this. My very early Model 3 (not 4WD or Performance model) could do 0-60 in 4.5 seconds for a while (before Tesla nerfed the acceleration).
https://www.zeroto60times.com/... [zeroto60times.com]
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I think a lot of EVs can do this. My very early Model 3 (not 4WD or Performance model) could do 0-60 in 4.5 seconds for a while (before Tesla nerfed the acceleration).
EVs, yes. But I was specifically referring to the sort of ginormous pick-up trucks that are rather popular in America. Most of them have a 0-60 time of eventually.
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But I was specifically referring to the sort of ginormous pick-up trucks that are rather popular in America. Most of them have a 0-60 time of eventually.
A lot of those ginormous trucks also have 400-500HP and are not as slow as you may think they are.
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A lot of those ginormous trucks also have 400-500HP and are not as slow as you may think they are.
You can spec out a faster truck if you're willing to open your pocketbook wider, but the base models of the 3 most popular trucks (Ford F-Series, Chevrolet Silverado, and the Dodge Ram series) are all above 5 second 0-60 times.
Then there's the diesel models which could pull a house off its foundation thanks to all that torque, but getting to 60 MPH takes patience.
I'm sure there are folks who have the money and enjoy that people are shocked when their "slow" truck manages to smoke a stock Tesla Model 3 off t
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https://www.caranddriver.com/n... [caranddriver.com]
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I did not say they would do 3 second 0-60 runs but I also don't think the typical driver would consider in the 5s for a typical pickup "eventually".
You have to spend some real money to get a new truck with a sub 5 second 0-60 time, and last I checked the average age of a vehicle in the USA is somewhere around 12.5 years. There's a lot of trucks still on the road from the era when they'd just put something underpowered under the hood in the name of fuel efficiency and call it a day.
The fastest truck anyone is likely to see on the road is a Cybertruck, and well, those aren't particularly cheap either.
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But I was specifically referring to the sort of ginormous pick-up trucks that are rather popular in America. Most of them have a 0-60 time of eventually.
My F150 has a 0-60 of around 5.5 seconds. Big truck or not, its twin-turbo v6 can move it surprisingly quickly. And it is not a high-end performance model like the Raptor, just a plain XL with the 3.5L option.
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My F150 has a 0-60 of around 5.5 seconds.
So, if your vehicle was limited to a 0-60 of 5 seconds or more... nothing would change. Got it.
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>"The laws of physics prevent many people from driving a vehicle with a sub 5 second 0-60 time. It takes a lot of ponies to get a bro-dozer up to speed that quickly."
Ariya E4orce crossover. Certainly not exotic. 0-60 in 4.8 seconds.
And did you forget about motorcycles? A Kawaski Concours sport touring (again, nothing exotic, but flashed), 0-60 in 2.9 seconds. And that isn't even electric.
My car is Japanese (Score:2)
My car is Japanese, I'm skeptical that the Chinese can limit anything on it.
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I'm not worried... (Score:3)
My uncle's red Barchetta won't have acceleration limits.
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Too bad Rush didn't know that EVs can out-accelerate any ICE sports car of that era by a huge margin despite weighing 50% more, and even out-accelerate any current ICE vehicle quite handily. Outside of maybe super cars, any sports car of that era would feel pretty anemic to modern drivers. Corvette in 1981 could do 0-60 in 8 seconds and for a time was considered America's fastest car. Today my SUV with a Pentastar can do it in about 7.5. California drivers would think anything under 10 seconds is unsafe
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My uncle's red Barchetta won't have acceleration limits.
Your uncle's slow arse Barchetta doesn't need acceleration limits. There's very few EVs on the market that are as slow as this. Almost 9 seconds 0-100km/h. That's almost twice as long as the limit being proposed. The new lowest end trim of the 2025 VW ID.3 is as slow as the Barchetta, as is the slowest trim of the Renault 5.
Your uncle's ancient car can join my grandma's mobility scooter on a list of things that won't need a acceleration limits.
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But it's a great song, even if the story line is a big improbable now.
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Should be unconditional and persistent (Score:1)
Every car should have that restriction hardcoded. Much of our safety on the roads depends on low relative speeds, not the absolute high speeds. Getting to 60mph in under 5 seconds doesn't belong on public roads. You want that kind of driving? Go to a race track instead.
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Sorry, but even just high speeds are dangerous. They mean a slight twitch of your muscles and you're headed off the road faster than you can correct. It probably differs from person to person, but for me 70 mph was too fast, and I could tell that it was too fast. 65 was ok, but it was impossible to keep safe stopping distance. Fortunately, that *is* strongly affected by relative speeds, but you need to be able to handle incursions from this or that (say a deer).
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Speed, just like everything else, takes time to adjust to comfortably. Just like it took time for you to be comfortable with regular and highway speeds. It, of course, helps if everyone else is going the same speed. Driving at 65 is not much different to driving at 90, however, if you are the only one going 90 and everyone else is at 65, it's going to be a bad time. New cars with adaptive cruise control makes this even easier.
Drivers should not need to worry about animals on the road (highways specifically)
Good Idea (Score:3)
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> Good idea
I don't think so at all. It would be a good idea to have a setting to limit power, AND the ability to choose if you want it to remember it or not. Maybe even a password or something option, if the owner wants to lock the setting. But what I buy is my vehicle, I want control.
> EV's accelerate much faster than most cars did in the past and the clues from engine noise aren't as obvious.
Yes, I know. Those are two of several reasons I bought an EV. Had it been neutered with some nanny-state
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A guy I knew had an early Model S.
When he wanted to impress me with the acceleration he tapped a couple settings on the screen to put it into Ludicrous Mode
This was around 2013 or so.
I'm not seeing how this is a problem.
I have a V6 and a V8 truck and both need a manual low gear selection to take off like a rocket. OK, the V6 not so much but the V8 can spin the rear tires in 2WD mode.
I don't let the average drivers in my life use it.
They would hit a tree if they were given a Tesla that was always in Ludicro
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You do have a point. I guess it really depends on just how much acceleration we are talking about, and how/when the power is delivered.
Usually, the actual limit of acceleration now is simply the ability to get the power to the ground. Vehicles will have only so much traction to launch and accelerate but so quickly. So there is that. And almost all modern vehicles also have vastly improved traction control and stability control systems, as well (and those are on by default, and that is something I could
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es, I know. Those are two of several reasons I bought an EV. Had it been neutered with some nanny-state crap, I would have sought out some other model/brand/type.
Which is why requiring it on all vehicles is a good idea.
Re:Good Idea (Score:4, Interesting)
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It's actually a terrible idea.
As someone with an SCCA license used to driving racing cars that have much higher performance than nearly everything on the road (including your Tesla), I can tell you that no mass-market road car is hard to drive. The problem is never the car, it's the driver, or more accurately their lack of ability.
To properly solve a problem you need to attack the root cause, not one of it's symptoms.
If there are people out there that can't truly can't handle jthe acceleration of a car or t
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it's the driver, or more accurately their lack of ability.
So what? If you don't give them a car with the capacity to do something dangerous they won't.
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So... complicate the whole scheme by adding graduated licensing by vehicle classification? Yeah... that'll fly. Imagine the bureaucratic nightmare if every time somebody wanted to move to a more capable car they had to certify on it.
Your SCCA license doesn't mean your solution is better than anybody else's.In fact, it might be working against you.
I've got a much better idea (Score:3)
Rather than continually punishing all drivers for the sins of the clueless, how about including car handling (e.g. throttle awareness, skid recovery, etc) in the driving test, such that anyone that proves themselves incapable of being able to drive a fast car properly or safely isn't allowed to?
Perhaps cars need to be put in performance bands, and driving licenses only apply to certain bands depending on the driver's ability.
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Human beings are fallible, they make mistakes. Designing a system that relies on people not making mistakes is a terrible idea, and doomed to failure.
This seems completely reasonable. 5 seconds to 100 kph is still pretty rapid, but limits the damage that can be done by the classic "carpet stuck on the accelerator" or "pushed the wrong pedal" mistakes. The act of disabling that limit presents an opportunity to display reminders to check the carpet, and for the driver to make sure they are ready for it. 99.99
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No one is being punished here. There's no practical reason any car on the road needs to accelerate faster than this *EVER* (and most cars on the road aren't even capable of this acceleration). And if you do feel the need to take your car to the race track (where you should be rather than on a public road when you want to let loose) you can disable this limit with a button press.
Car performance should be geofenced to areas where people can kill themselves in without affecting anyone else. There's too many mo
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Under a proposed update to the National Standard, every passenger car would need a default mode in which it takes no less than five seconds to reach 100 km/h (62 mph) at startup, unless the driver manually selects a quicker setting.
You want to drive track and accelerate fast? Yeah go ahead. That will require you choosing that setting. Otherwise safety rules apply. This is a great idea, it improves public safety AND doesn't punish anyone.
What problem is this solving? (Score:2)
Obviously I didn't RTFA. I don't understand the problem this is solving. Are people starting their engine and flooring straight to 70mph. But they think that there are conditions where flooring it to 60 instantly is ok?
Don't you typically start the engine in a low speed area? How would you even immediately reach 70mph?
What am I missing here?
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What am I missing here?
The percentage of idiots in the population hasn't changed, but the percentage of cars that enable the idiots to do truly dangerous things has. That's the problem being solved. Virtually all EVs have insane acceleration, which means half of new cars in China go into the hands of a group which statistically contains a lot of morons.
Some countries have recognised the fact that people are untrustworthy idiots and do things like limit the power to weight ratio of the driving license in some conditions. E.g. In Q
I guess no time travelling right away! (Score:2)
Can't hit 88 MPH at startup. :P
What Problem? (Score:3)
How many accident reports cite "excessive acceleration?" Aren't they mostly "speed was a factor?"
I see it as a joy limit, since acceleration is fun. But otherwise, I've noticed quite a few limited access highways with "no merge area" meaning it dumps you right into the stream of traffic, where you better be going with the flow of traffic when you get there. The slower your car accelerates, the harder that is to do. My twin turbo Ford Edge ST will do it with a bit of strain. I think it's 0 - 60 is around 6. Would I like it to be 4? Yes. That maneuver would be less challenging. And you can't expect those in the lane of traffic to slow down for you, either. From Facebook videos posted by truckers, we see that some, a significant percent, do not even attempt to slow down, since they're big and heavy and believe they can do anything and not get hurt, which is sometimes contradicted by the video subsequent to their deliberate T-boning of unsuccessful merges by "4 wheelers", they end up rolling their big rig in a ditch. But driving can be a literal battle with traffic, where performance is armor. Higher values of dV/dT, both positive and negative, is a plus in my book.