Autoblog

m, the car doesn't automatically brake when it thinks your driving is erratic, it displays a reminder message in the instrument cluster.

It automatically brakes when you're about to hit something.

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So, bill, you're saying you've *never* taken your eyes off the road? Not to look down for a drink or at directions or turned to see if it was OK to change lanes? Because if you haven't, then good for you, you're likely the first person in the history of the planet to have managed such a feat. But if you have ever taken your eyes off the road, you're just lucky that than during such time you've never had someone panic brake in front of you, or had a car pull out or a deer run out in front of you, or any number of other things that you have no control over and that would turn your Karmann into a scrap metal death trap faster than you could say "stability control."

So you go ahead and take your chances in your Karmann, and I'll take mine in a Volvo with stability control, brake assist, auto brake, side curtain airbags, whiplash-protection seats, ultra-high-strength steel safety cage, crumple zones, deformable steering column, ad infinitum, and I'll have technologies that not only protect me from other drivers, but also from my momentary lapses of attention.

Oh but you don't have those. Troll.

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Esoterica, you must be joking. I have a clean driving record dating back to getting my license in the summer of 1964. I have manage to survive any number of awkward situations brought about by other drivers driving around with their heads stuffed up there most private bodily opening. I am a big believer in defensive driving - putting myself in a position to not have a problem. I don't need no stinking stability control. I recall a story a number of years ago that indicated cars with airbags were being involved in more wrecks than the same type of car without airbags. It would seem that drivers use technology as an excuse to engage in more and more obnoxious behavior while driving than they would without the technology. I also enjoy a good romp around curvy country roads because I insist upon having a car that handles and stops really well.

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This is a GREAT conversation to have in the more macro sense - I am a Volvo owner but have also owned and driven cars that utilized ummm primative, no strike that, ZERO technology in a safety sense.

In my years of driving I was never in an accident - and I went on a spirited cruise or two in my day - but then without warning and with no way to prevent it no matter the degree of defensive driving could have prevented it. (drunks, go figure) The volvo was not my next vehicle after that day but it was only a couple years before I got it.

I am wholey confident in my driving skills, and safety precautions, however, I am not confident in the skills of the others on the road. No amount of defensive driving can save you from a determined idiot.

This technology may not seem necessary to you, but simply look at the statistics of driving fatalaties and see how much things like airbags and stability control really do help to save lives and keep OTHER drivers in control of their vehicles and out of yours.

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@bill, in regards to Auto Brake irrespective of all other safety advances, a safe driving record has absolutely no statistical bearing on whether or not another driver pulls in front of you and/or slams on brakes the next time you're out driving, and no matter how good the brakes on your car are, a computer has faster reaction time than a human, especially one who, with all due respect, is approaching the status of senior citizen. As a reference point, you want to know why cars switched from incandescent brake lights to LED? Because LED lights up 200ms faster, which translates into an additional car-lengths worth (19.1 feet) of warning at 65 mph. By comparison, Volvo stability/AWD systems can react within 1/7 of a wheel rotation, or approximately 1 foot. Though I have not seen statistics, their new Auto Brake system is likely of similar caliber. Do NOT try to tell me that you have comparable reaction time.

In regards to stability control, every study that's ever been done on the subject has demonstrated that ESC is a safety advance the significance of which just cannot be overstated. The last Insurance Institute for Highway Safety study conducted last year confirmed/added the following findings regarding ESC (all based on ACTUAL historical crash data, not lab data or predictions):
- reduces the risk of fatal multiple-vehicle collisions by 32%
- reduces the risk of all single-vehicle crashes by more than 40 percent
- reduces the risk of fatal single-vehicle crashes by 56%
- reduces the risk of a single-vehicle crash in an SUV by 49%
- reduces the risk of a fatal single-vehicle crash in an SUV by 59%
- reduces the risk of fatal single-vehicle rollover in an SUV by 80%; in a car by 77%
- reduces the risk of fatal collisions overall by 43%.

Allow me to re-state the last point for emphasis, because it means ESC is possibly the most effective safety measure EVER: ELECTRONIC STABILITY CONTROL REDUCES THE RISK OF FATAL COLLISIONS OVERALL BY 43%.

That is not conjecture, that is not a hypothetical based on lab data, that is what has actually happened on public roads.

Now, if you'd like to go on believing that you're going to keep being just as safe in some piece-of-trash Karmann Ghia as you would be in a new Volvo, go right ahead, because clearly statistics are only for those who have less than your God-like driving skills. But stop going around spewing Luddite FUD with vague, insubstantiated "I-think-i-read-sometime" anecdotes about how you believe modern safety technology is "junk," because you're at best being an a** and at worst doing a grave disservice to anyone who might actually believe your claptrap when evaluating their next car purchase.

http://www.iihs.org/news/rss/pr061306.html

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