In Praise of Adaptive Cruise Control
Discussion
I took my elderly mum for a trip to France this weekend in Burgundy, which is 7 1/2 hours each way.
Adaptive cruise control, and taking the slightly longer, but quieter, route made this doable and worked seamlessly on my New Defender.
Whilst I am not a fan of speed alerts or auto park, this is an innovation which has made a positive difference.
Adaptive cruise control, and taking the slightly longer, but quieter, route made this doable and worked seamlessly on my New Defender.
Whilst I am not a fan of speed alerts or auto park, this is an innovation which has made a positive difference.
I find with dumb cruise I can adapt it myself better as I'm viewing the traffic overall not just the car immediately in front which might be slowing for example but I can tell from what is ahead of them that there is no need to slow myself. Adaptive systems seemed to gradually move me further and further back with the car maintaining a gap big enough for another and another car to move over into.
Depends on the car. Tried ACC in a Skoda and it was awful. Jerky and locked onto cars leaving the motorway and left to its own devices would decelerate and match their speed as they were braking on on the exit slip. Nissan slightly better but still useless in heavier motorway traffic. gets confused. If LR have made something that works well then there is hope for ACC yet. Generally I do find the adaptive part very useful in motorway roadworks but that's it to date.
I absolutely love the system on my 2014 CLS. I use it on motorways and dual carriageways all the time.
Makes such a difference to fatigue, and I actually really enjoy seeing it work.
The only limitation is how far it can see ahead, ie it can’t see past the car in front, or slowing traffic a distance ahead beyond the radars range, so just occasionally I’ll intervene, but it does a great job. It works well in slow traffic but not quite so good in stop-go as it’s a bit abrupt.
It has steer-assist too which is fun.
Would not have a car without it now.
Makes such a difference to fatigue, and I actually really enjoy seeing it work.
The only limitation is how far it can see ahead, ie it can’t see past the car in front, or slowing traffic a distance ahead beyond the radars range, so just occasionally I’ll intervene, but it does a great job. It works well in slow traffic but not quite so good in stop-go as it’s a bit abrupt.
It has steer-assist too which is fun.
Would not have a car without it now.
Rich Boy Spanner said:
Depends on the car. Tried ACC in a Skoda and it was awful. Jerky and locked onto cars leaving the motorway and left to its own devices would decelerate and match their speed as they were braking on on the exit slip. Nissan slightly better but still useless in heavier motorway traffic. gets confused. If LR have made something that works well then there is hope for ACC yet. Generally I do find the adaptive part very useful in motorway roadworks but that's it to date.
My Superb is like that, if someone is turning it gets closer then stamps on the brakes, it cannot cope with parked cars either. It’s good in traffic though as it can cope with start stop traffic, the system in our Mini cannot work under 30mph, the system in the Mini can be turned off though so it reverts to just standard cruise control.loafer123 said:
I took my elderly mum for a trip to France this weekend in Burgundy, which is 7 1/2 hours each way.
Adaptive cruise control, and taking the slightly longer, but quieter, route made this doable and worked seamlessly on my New Defender.
Whilst I am not a fan of speed alerts or auto park, this is an innovation which has made a positive difference.
Yup, I like adaptive. In the UK, I have to have the gap setting to minimum otherwise a muppet will fill it.Adaptive cruise control, and taking the slightly longer, but quieter, route made this doable and worked seamlessly on my New Defender.
Whilst I am not a fan of speed alerts or auto park, this is an innovation which has made a positive difference.
Mr Tidy said:
I can't see any reason to use it. 
My cars have CC that I only tend to use in average speed limits - I'm more than capable of maintaining a safe distance from the car in front.
Another feature drivers don't really need, like lane control and emergency braking stuff for numpties!
I live in a very congested city where everyone commutes by car, and highway driving at rush hour is back-to-back traffic constantly moving oscillating between 20mph and 80mph across 6 different lanes for 25 miles. With ACC I can set my max speed and let the car maintain a safe distance from the one in front, and not have to constantly be on the accelerator and brakes. It's great.My cars have CC that I only tend to use in average speed limits - I'm more than capable of maintaining a safe distance from the car in front.
Another feature drivers don't really need, like lane control and emergency braking stuff for numpties!
The car is a 2025 Range Rover Sport so I guess will be same system as OPs - I find it's good 80% of the time, but the smallest gap setting sometimes feels too far from the car in front which can be frustrating, especially as drivers here are aggressive and will pull into any gap they can!
I prefer the mark one eyeball version, yes old fart I know, and the only time use the adaptive system is in those very congested situations where speeds are up and down sometimes even stopping. At which point it does remove some physical effort even if you still imo need the full vigilance. The downside is that with a following position set that I find comfortable you do get the gap fillers as others have mentioned.
At which point the overall system throws up a warning on screen and HUD about too close and to remove it obviously you have to create a proper following position, see comment about gap fillers, but the only way to stop that imo is to adopt a clearly too close gap. It can also throw that message up if you're in 'manual' but in my experience 99.5% of the time that's with gap fillers.
Have to say it works immaculately in genuine slow moving stop start traffic queues as it then brings a brake hold feature into play, which the car doesn't have as a manual option, and when traffic moves off a light touch on the 'gas' and away you trickle until the next halt, feet off pedals.
At which point the overall system throws up a warning on screen and HUD about too close and to remove it obviously you have to create a proper following position, see comment about gap fillers, but the only way to stop that imo is to adopt a clearly too close gap. It can also throw that message up if you're in 'manual' but in my experience 99.5% of the time that's with gap fillers.
Have to say it works immaculately in genuine slow moving stop start traffic queues as it then brings a brake hold feature into play, which the car doesn't have as a manual option, and when traffic moves off a light touch on the 'gas' and away you trickle until the next halt, feet off pedals.
I use it on long motorway journeys, works well and you tend to arrive more refreshed.
If you have ACC which you can set the distance works well as the longer the gap to the car infront the more time the car can react, i.e. it slows over a distance not suddenly. However, this gives way to other road users pulling out and then triggering the brakes anyway.
If you have ACC which you can set the distance works well as the longer the gap to the car infront the more time the car can react, i.e. it slows over a distance not suddenly. However, this gives way to other road users pulling out and then triggering the brakes anyway.
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