This week we will discuss another technology available on many modern day cars that works to prevent accidents. Blind spot monitoring is a system that alerts the driver when there is another vehicle in the blind spot of the driver. A blind spot is an area to either side of a car that is too forward to be seen by the side view mirrors and too far back to be easily seen in the periphery of the drivers field of vision.
These blind spots can create dangerous situations if the driver thinks he/she can change lanes freely, when in fact he/she cannot. This is especially dangerous on highways where there are multiple lanes, high speeds, and people going faster and slower than they should be. Blind spot monitors use radar or image sensors to detect if a vehicle is there and typically communicates this with a light in the side mirror. Some systems also have other alerts, such as an audible warning, if the driver attempts to switch lanes.
With speed being a major factor in fatal accidents, blind spot monitoring can be especially helpful in prevent highway crashes and injuries. Next week we will talk about another system that also deals with changing lanes, lane departure warnings.
Here is a quick, non-technological partial fix to blind spots. A convex mirror allows the driver to see more of the road next to them. However, these are small and only work if you look at them.
How do we know which cars have blind spot monitors? How many lives/collisions are saved annually with these monitors?
ReplyDeleteGoogling is a good method for finding what cars have blind spot monitors offered as an option. Until the last few years, it was only offered as an option on around half of the cars on the road and wasn't standard on any. I couldn't find any conclusive studies about the effectiveness of blind spot monitoring and lives saved. They certainly aid the driver, but they are not perfect and are no replacement for actually looking with your own eyes.
ReplyDeleteThis is a handy website for seeing which cars have which safety systems. http://www.iihs.org/iihs/ratings/crash-avoidance-features
DeleteSo why are there blind spots? Can this be easily solved with additional, different mirrors?
ReplyDeleteThere are blind spots because the rear and side view mirrors only work up to a certain angle of view. I have added a better picture to the post to illustrate this point. It can be easier to see in one's blindspot with an added convex mirror, which allows the driver to view more of the environment next to them. These are typically seen on trucks and SUVs.
ReplyDeleteI've been following up with a lot of the news surrounding self-driving cars, which obviously have a huge reliance on various traffic sensors, including bling spot detectors. As far as I've seen, the current implementations of blind spot detectors come with a warning of "hey driver, you still have to check the blind spot by yourself too!" That leads me to ask, are the blind spot detectors not very accurate yet? If not, how long would it be until they could become reliable enough for use in driverless cars?
ReplyDeleteFrom what I have read, the accuracy of the systems vary by manufacture. Some are very sensitive and alert the driver far before the car enters the actual blind spot, others wait until the car is well within the blindspot to warn the driver. I have also heard some systems have false alarms caused by objects such as guard rails. So the systems are by no means perfect, but it is a good start for a little added safety. With so many car manufactures and other companies, such as Google, working on autonomous driving, the technologies required to create a self-driving car are rapidly evolving. Tesla says they will have a self driving car by 2020, other manufactures say as early as 2017. I don't know if those estimates are accurate or not, but I believe the blind spot monitoring portion of the self driving car will be reliable enough in a couple years.
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