Devices to slow speeding cars considered by government

[Rufus®]

Well its finally come to this, fitting devices to cars belonging to serial speeding offenders, with trials planned for Vic and being considered in WA and NSW.

DEVICES that can slow speeding cars are being considered by the State Government in a bid to cut road deaths. The system uses satellite technology.

The system uses satellite technology to track changing speed limits and click into action when a driver goes too fast.

The technology can be fitted in three levels, and works off a GPS and a road speed database that identifies speed limits.

At the first level a beep warns the driver to slow down if they are speeding.

Level two prevents the driver from speeding by cutting power to the engine, but the system can be turned off or adjusted.

The most extreme level stops all speeding and cannot be switched off or adjusted.

A driver can put their foot flat to the floor if they need extra power for merging or overtaking.

How would they control it for an area that has a variable speed limit, eg. the Western Ring Rd (for those of us that are in Vic)

[Boonz]

it wont work, too many variables and too many possible mistakes with roadworks, accidents,temporary hazards etc... the courts dont need any more people arguing about why they were booked when they werent speeding... cos cops would end up using it as a personal speed camera and book you as soon as you went over the limit..

[jules]

it would work. GPS technology can track you to within 20cm of your location (or probably closer, lol). there would be no disputing where you were, and therefore what speed you were doing (rate of change of your location).

i wouldn't have a problem with it being fitted to serial offenders' cars. let's be honest, we all enjoy a fang but some people are a menace to other drivers.

[Rufus®]

it wont work, too many variables and too many possible mistakes with roadworks, accidents,temporary hazards etc... the courts dont need any more people arguing about why they were booked when they werent speeding... cos cops would end up using it as a personal speed camera and book you as soon as you went over the limit..

This system is only designed to slow the vehicle. A GPS unit can only receive data, it cannot transmit, so there is no way, at this stage, the police would know via this system whether or not you were speeding.

Having said that, who knows what the future will hold. This may only be the start of things to come.

[welly01]

dont know bout you guys ..but i got brakes in my car .. work a treat

[VH commodore]

no no its absolute rubbish. what about situations where you have to speed up to avoid an accident... they were talking bout this on the radio this morning...lets say your on the highway with a dirty big truck behind you and another beside you...the truck beside you cant see you and decides to merge into you...you cant slow down because the truck behind you is right on your bum, only way is to gun it out of there...i myself not lomg ago was almost taken out by a vt commodore running a red light, lucky heard her bareing down on me and i just had enough time to floor it through the intersection (i was already entering at a slow speed so if i stoped i would be dead as she was doing roughly 80km/h)


Also just a quick question...when they say it will *shut off power to the engine* i hope that doesnt mean turn it off altogether...cuz if it does then u loose power assisted brakes and power steering which will cause an accident anyways.

[Rufus®]

no no its absolute rubbish. what about situations where you have to speed up to avoid an accident... they were talking bout this on the radio this morning...lets say your on the highway with a dirty big truck behind you and another beside you...the truck beside you cant see you and decides to merge into you...you cant slow down because the truck behind you is right on your bum, only way is to gun it out of there...i myself not lomg ago was almost taken out by a vt commodore running a red light, lucky heard her bareing down on me and i just had enough time to floor it through the intersection (i was already entering at a slow speed so if i stoped i would be dead as she was doing roughly 80km/h)

A driver can put their foot flat to the floor if they need extra power for merging or overtaking.

That should take care of those situations.

Also just a quick question...when they say it will *shut off power to the engine* i hope that doesnt mean turn it off altogether...cuz if it does then u loose power assisted brakes and power steering which will cause an accident anyways.

My guess would be that it doesn't cut the engine out, but something like the pit lane speed limiter in the V8 Supercars.

[jules]

This system is only designed to slow the vehicle. A GPS unit can only receive data, it cannot transmit, so there is no way, at this stage, the police would know via this system whether or not you were speeding.

you may be right but i think it uses the GSM mobile system and can pin your location when you're in range.

so make sure you get the vodafone model

[andrewmac]

Also what about when needing to overtake.
Some overtaking lanes can be quite small and a burst down the side is necessary to overtake, lets say a car towing a caravan or a large truck, Just because your limited to a speed doesn't mean you have to do it so when you have a slow moving vehicle you might want to get in front of it.
Why not just make all cars drive themselves cause it is getting to this point.

[Rufus®]

you may be right but i think it uses the GSM mobile system and can pin your location when you're in range.

so make sure you get the vodafone model

nar, GSM and GPS are different. Although if a system that used the GSM/NextG or 3G networks became availiable i could see the telecos pushing for it, i'm sure they wouldn't say no to a bit more revenue. lol

[Rufus®]

Also what about when needing to overtake.
Some overtaking lanes can be quite small and a burst down the side is necessary to overtake, lets say a car towing a caravan or a large truck, Just because your limited to a speed doesn't mean you have to do it so when you have a slow moving vehicle you might want to get in front of it.
Why not just make all cars drive themselves cause it is getting to this point.

As stated earlier:

A driver can put their foot flat to the floor if they need extra power for merging or overtaking.

[Torquative]

still gonna take alot though, NSW Government are still debating point to point cameras on the M7, so I cant see Sat being used for a while when they wont even accept camera technology which is similar to their current setup anyway

and I believe the fleet spec VE's can already do it (or have the technology too or something), remember the big confuffle it caused when people learnt their fleet/company car could be tracked by their company

[andrewmac]

Ohk fair enough I missed that part.
But at the same time where does that system stop you, I don't like the idea of a car controlling anything (im still iffy bout electronic throttle, Im sure most have seen terminator lol)
From the rprt I was watching tonight if you turn it off you have to explain it to the police as well.

[Grennan]

They can put the foot to the floor for more power... As soon as it gets above the speed limit BYE BYE POWER?

[Torquative]

From the rprt I was watching tonight if you turn it off you have to explain it to the police as well.

the way things are going if you switch anything off you have to explain it to the police ... like mobile phones

[ProphetVX]

you may be right but i think it uses the GSM mobile system and can pin your location when you're in range.

so make sure you get the vodafone model

I've done some work in the area of mobile phone triangulation and I can assure you the vast majority of 2G mobile phones are difficult to triangulate within a half km radius (depending on hardware installations in towers), let alone position you on a certain road. Outside metro areas and the radius gets larger and larger eventually to a point where you only know that it's connected to a tower. To get remotely accurate triangulation you need at least 3 towers within range and it tests signal strength, but it's not an exact science, many things can influence it such as fog, buildings, trees etc etc.

3G phones with GPS recievers are a different story, and becoming more and more prevalent.

[Marco-EFIVL]

Welcome to police state....

[AttaBoy]

This is ridiculous. Repeat or worse offenders should be OFF the road and banned from operating a motor vehicle. No need to waste so much money putting this useless technology into cars.

[ProphetVX]

This is ridiculous. Repeat or worse offenders should be OFF the road and banned from operating a motor vehicle. No need to waste so much money putting this useless technology into cars.

Dare I say it would be the same as repeat alcohol offenders with a breathalizer in the car that they have to pay for.

I wish we could ban everyone for life who is a serial offender, but what is a serial offender, 3 or 4 speeding tickets? 10 or 20? Some people get 10 years off the road for a culmination of offenses. I think it's a good idea for people who have had license suspensions for more than 2 years and just getting it back.

[jules]

I've done some work in the area of mobile phone triangulation and I can assure you the vast majority of 2G mobile phones are difficult to triangulate within a half km radius .......

.....3G phones with GPS recievers are a different story, and becoming more and more prevalent.

i know that they're using the technology in another similar (but different) application, so i'm certain it can be done.

maybe they're doing what you said and fitting the devices with 3G capability.

[f1tzy]

That should take care of those situations.



My guess would be that it doesn't cut the engine out, but something like the pit lane speed limiter in the V8 Supercars.

a pit lane speed limiter like thing would be great in a manual. doing 100 kays then bang back down to 40. or it wouldnt work at all because if your in 5th or 6th you need alot less revs to do 40kph than in 1st/2nd. wouldnt work

[Rufus®]

This is ridiculous. Repeat or worse offenders should be OFF the road and banned from operating a motor vehicle. No need to waste so much money putting this useless technology into cars.

How many people that loose their license drive without a license? Of course it doesn't stop people driving other cars, but maybe for those who want to turn over a new leaf, but just can't resist the urge to tromp the peddle all the time, maybe this will be the way to go?

[Rufus®]

a pit lane speed limiter like thing would be great in a manual. doing 100 kays then bang back down to 40. or it wouldnt work at all because if your in 5th or 6th you need alot less revs to do 40kph than in 1st/2nd. wouldnt work

It may not work the exact same way. I'm not exactly sure how the pit lane limiter works, i thought it retarded the engine, so you could only do a set speed in 1st? Not dependent on revs.

But if it retarded the engine so that you could only do a set speed, no matter what gear, then it could work.

[Cheap6]

This technology has been around (at least in the UK) for a while. When I last heard of it, it was being sold as an option/accessory (you turn it on and off as desired) to prevent speeding fines rather than as a method of enforcement. At least that is how it was being marketed.

It is, as far as I know, able to deal with variable speed limit zones and that would be (mostly) a good thing; just rely on the system to ensure that the speed you are doing is legal, without having to look at a clock and wonder if it is accurate. It has been suggested that it could also be used to enforce the advisory speed limit signs for corners but I don't think that has yet been done, although for political rather than technical reasons.

How does anyone feel about it assessing the maximum speed the car is capable of around a particular corner and reducing speed accordingly?

That it can be disabled with a fulll throttle application is a reasonable attempt at a safety measure.

Ultimately, you can be sure that, yes, cars will end up driving without continuous human intervention and this is one step down that path. It's a while off yet though.

I am not sure how it restricts the speed either, but the obvious way would be to tie it in to the drive-by-wire throttle, where fitted.

[VN_Luke]

there's far too many variables and safety issues for this to work as intended.. (the active versions that have any control over engine)

The passive beeping: fine, whatever, but really, who's going to care?...You're hooning around, after all - you have more important things to worry about than beeping

Through thorough analysis of the presented case, I have concluded that the person that came up with the idea as a means for controling speeding drivers is an idiot.