Comment by randerson

7 hours ago

My car (from VW Group) came with Active Lane Keep. It detects when you're drifting out of your lane and steers you back into it. Sounds great in theory.

Except that in the US, if you're cruising in the right lane then every time there's an exit it will actively steer you towards the concrete median between the lane and the exit. I don't understand how this feature was signed off on. The risks outweigh the benefits, in my opinion.

6 comments

randerson

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mrbombastic  3 hours ago

Was driving in Lapland with a car like this, snow and ice everywhere on the road except in 2 narrow strips of pavement previous drivers had driven over, naturally it was not always in the exact area of lane that lane assist wanted me and I felt it was actively trying to kill me. Was able to disable but turned back on every time you stopped and started engine and I am forgetful.

laughing_man  6 hours ago

I will never buy a car with that feature unless I can turn it off. I don't need the be fighting my car if I need to swerve in an emergency situation.

  • port11  3 hours ago

    If you swerve hard enough, the car lets you. I agree the system can be infuriating, but in a long highway ride I found it useful. In the city it’s usually off, I think there’s a speed factor to it.

    (I disagree with many modern car systems and think they make for worse drivers, but keeping you on-lane at high speeds is not a bad thing.)

psadauskas  5 hours ago

I rented a car a couple years ago, I think a Jeep of some sort (I didn't pick it), that had this feature. When driving on the highway, if there's a car in the lane next to me, I tend to move over to the other side of my lane to give more room, especially around curves. This car had lane-keeping, and would fight with me for the steering wheel, and force me uncomfortably close to the other cars, which is particularly infuriating when you're driving an unfamiliar car in an unfamiliar environment in heavy traffic at 70mph.

It only took about 5 minutes of that before I exited and looked up how to disable it, and it has to be disabled in the menus every time you start the car, there's no way to have it be permanent.

Now whenever I rent a car, I refuse to be given anything from Chrysler or VW.