We pride ourselves in being at the forefront of vehicle technology, so on Monday we attended the Cheshire MA: Advanced Driver Assistance Systems event in Nantwich on Monday night.
The presentation focused on how the industry is moving away from passive to active safety systems, as air-bag technology has pretty much reached its limit. Whilst most people are aware of most of the ADAS systems, there were some interesting information coming forward for future tech, such as Integrated Brake Control, (IBC). IBC is a multiplex control unit that does away with the brake servo, ABS pump, ESC/VSA modulator and brake master cylinder. There will be no mechanical connection the brake pedal and will save about 3kg on a normal production car & 6kg on a hybrid. This will be introduced in September next year.
Some interesting stats too such as – ADAS and connected cars will grow 6 fold in the next 4 years, AEB Automatic Emergency Braking, reduces low speed accidents by 20% and is a must have system to achieve 5 star Euro NCAP rating. Also, in 2018/19 the Safety Domain SDE ECU will be introduced, this is the building block that connects all the technology for autonomous cars and will be supplied to all mainstream car manufacturers.
On the subject of fully autonomous cars, the guy doing the presentation is of the opinion that legislation will hold them up until about 2025.
We spoke afterwards to our engineer David Cross, who said “From our point of view as Vehicle Assessors, it was useful to re-focus on things like radars and cameras, where they are positioned on the vehicle and the importance of recalibrating these systems after an accident. “
This was an excellent insight into what to expect in the coming months/years, so a very useful and worthwhile event.