In-car computer puts brakes on speeding drivers!

thboxster · May 29, 2003

Read in The Times this morning of a plan by the government to reduce speeding by electronic devices fitted to cars. In a nutshell if your going too fast, the brakes are applied and if you are trying to accelerate beyond the limit a limiter kicks in.

If this were to come about, it would be a sad state of affairs. I wonder if Porsche would be willing to factory fit these devices.

Link to the full story
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,588-696233,00.html[

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Guest · May 29, 2003

This could only be done in new cars, at the factory, which is OK for me (at the moment, anyway).

But, there is a lot of dispute over this:-
a. if 2 cars overtake, in opposite directions (facing each other), then flooring the throttle to get by quicker won' t work.
b. what is to stop people driving everywhere with the throttle to the floor ? (apart from other traffic, that is)
c. the technology would make it easier for ' the state' to monitor where you are - after all, your car needs to know where it is at all times (GPS ?)
d. just don' t get me started - GRHH !!!!!

Guest · May 29, 2003

Apart from the big brother, control freakism of it all, I can' t imagine it getting off the ground.
Not all the manufacturers would introduce it at the same time, so if everyone refused to buy a car that had it fitted, none of the manufactuers would risk losing their sales.
If it were made mandatory, again, if no-one bought a new car, the government would soon back down due to the lost VAT on millions of new car sales. On the plus side this would mean residuals would go up.
There could be some way to disable it simply, e.g. just pull the fuse out, or put masking tape or aluminium foil over the antenna.
Otherwise someone will come up with a chip that bypasses it, or reprogramme it to tell the GPS thingy that the car is in Germany on the autobahn all the time.

The other thing of course is that you will have to update it every other day to keep track of the constantly changing (reducing) speed limits on every major road, and roadworks.

It' s only a matter of time till we have thought crime and two way tv' s in every room that watch us. Then again maybe I' ll just be taken away for " re-education" .

Tony Daniel · May 29, 2003

I think the government have secretly been testing this device on Nissan micra' s for years, but without success. The cars seem to be limited to 25mph and the brakes seem to come on within 1/2 of any traffic lights! Also they seem to be testing automatic steering on a Metro which seems glued to the middle lane of the M6 every morning[

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Seriously who is going to by a car with such a device fitted, I think a car fitted with a radar detctor as standard would be a better option[

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Diver944 · May 30, 2003

I think this would be a disaster!

It is my personal belief that much of the congestion caused on free flowing motorways is caused by the fitting of 56mph limiters to HGV and buses a few years ago. Much of my mileage is done commuting to work at quietish times of the day (shift worker). Generally when the trafic starts to snarl up, then a few miles later I catch up with one limited vehicle slowly overtaking another reducing all the other traffic to using the outside lane only.

Imagine this if we were all limited to 70, but some of us can do 69mph and some can do 71 mph [

] I just cannot see it working

Guest · May 30, 2003

Imagine the embarrassment and grief a major recall would generate when the manufacturers find out it doesn' t work properly and have to fix it FOC... Never mind the danger to the driver if for some reason you needed the extra speed!!!

Would be far cheaper and better all round if driver education was improved....

I' ll stop there for now - as I am feeling the need to get my soapbox out of the cupboard.....