[ToddRGuy]

Hi Folks, and happy weekend.

I was in the Bay Area last week for work and got to drive my very first BEV car. I journeyed into San Francisco with a coworker who wanted to do some shopping in the Haight. It was her rental car, but she's been struggling with a leg injury and was needing a break for the return trip to Palo Alto.

I drove a Ford Mustang Mach E. I must say, I could REALLY get use to one pedal driving. That's nothing short of amazing. It took me a few miles of SF city street driving to figure out how to feather the gas pedal to have silky smooth stops but I figured it out.

On the way back, I decided to try the "Blue Cruise" mode out and see what my thoughts were on how the system worked. I have to say that in Bay Area rubber-banding traffic it made me a bit nervous. It was originally set to 'follow' with 'one bar' of distance between itself and the vehicle in front, but I found this to be disconcerting, as it didn't do a good job of slowing down in advance of forward traffic. It kind of waited until it was uncomfortably close, before considering lowing down.

Moving this to '3 bars' of distance between myself and the forward vehicle seemed to smooth things out a bit, and make it less erratic. Overall, it never strayed from the lane. Lane change requests were a bit uncoordinated. The ride quality wasn't the greatest; Distracting road noise from the tires, wind noise from the mirrors, and general suspension jolts made it a bit tiresome over time.

Is the DAPP Highway assistant seem to behave consistently or do you find yourself not trusting it?

[RichardInCA]

I don’t use the driver assist stuff very often, but I’ve found it to be quite good at keeping a predictable distance.

I’m a big convert to driving in B mode. This is the way.

[LVBMW]

I use it often and find it works extremely well. The automated lane changes are smooth.

[Scrapula]

My husband has a Ford F-150 Lightning with Blue Cruise and I have DAPP in the BMW. The DAPP is superior in every way. The Ford brakes too suddenly, cannot do lane changes for you (supposed to be an OTA for that soon). If I am in rush hour with cars speeding up suddenly, then hitting their brakes, I let the BMW take over. It does great and I like that it suggests when I should pass.

[ToddRGuy]

Originally Posted by Scrapula

My husband has a Ford F-150 Lightning with Blue Cruise and I have DAPP in the BMW. The DAPP is superior in every way. The Ford brakes too suddenly, cannot do lane changes for you (supposed to be an OTA for that soon). If I am in rush hour with cars speeding up suddenly, then hitting their brakes, I let the BMW take over. It does great and I like that it suggests when I should pass.

Thanks for this! The Mustang freaked me out a bit as I saw no sign of early braking. And it didn’t seem to handle the rubber band traffic situation well at all. I’m relieved hehe.

[SkykingUSA]

I have been very impressed with the system, especially when in stop and go traffic because it handles rubber banding at slow speed really well.

The only thing I don't like, is how it approaches stopped cars at a traffic light. If I'm moving along at 55 mph and there is a stopped car ahead of me at a traffic light, the car will stop behind that car, but it waits too late to brake in my opinion and has to brake much harder than I would do if I was braking manually. If the other cars in front are moving, it's fine, it just seems to make me a little nervous when I'm at full speed and someone in the distance is at a full stop.

Other than that, it's great. It works very well and I don't regret getting it for sure.

[ToddRGuy]

Originally Posted by SkykingUSA

I have been very impressed with the system, especially when in stop and go traffic because it handles rubber banding at slow speed really well.

The only thing I don't like, is how it approaches stopped cars at a traffic light. If I'm moving along at 55 mph and there is a stopped car ahead of me at a traffic light, the car will stop behind that car, but it waits too late to brake in my opinion and has to brake much harder than I would do if I was braking manually. If the other cars in front are moving, it's fine, it just seems to make me a little nervous when I'm at full speed and someone in the distance is at a full stop.

Other than that, it's great. It works very well and I don't regret getting it for sure.

Is there a way to control the pacing of the car in front of you? My Audi, for example, has Traffic Jam Assist and is pretty aggressive at one car length bar, but at 2 or 3 bars it’s more comparable to what I’d do myself.

[SkykingUSA]

Originally Posted by ToddRGuy

Is there a way to control the pacing of the car in front of you? My Audi, for example, has Traffic Jam Assist and is pretty aggressive at one car length bar, but at 2 or 3 bars it’s more comparable to what I’d do myself.

The only setting I saw was a distance one. You can set the car to prefer close, medium or long distances when following. I normally used the medium setting, but now I have it set to the long distance setting because it sees the stopped cars ahead more quickly (or at least reacts to them more quickly). Even with that, it still brakes too late for me when approaching a stopped car at speed. Again, this all works very well and comfortably in traffic jams and moving traffic (even at speed). It's only when there is a car stopped way ahead and you are still going at full normal speed that it feels uncomfortable to me.

[ToddRGuy]

Originally Posted by SkykingUSA

The only setting I saw was a distance one. You can set the car to prefer close, medium or long distances when following. I normally used the medium setting, but now I have it set to the long distance setting because it sees the stopped cars ahead more quickly (or at least reacts to them more quickly). Even with that, it still brakes too late for me when approaching a stopped car at speed.

Thanks for the info. I guess I’ll hold my breath the first few times. But quite honestly the traffic in Ohio is nothing like Bay Area madness. I showed people this picture I snapped getting on 101 and most Ohioans were like “Nope! No way!” 😂

[COBodom]

I like the system a lot and use it almost daily (highway).

With that said two things I recently noticed that annoy me:

1. I always have it configured on "one bar", closest distance to the leading car. If I have the max speed set to say 80mph and I approach the car moving slower, my car slows down fine and with confidence. However, when that slower car ahead of me changes lane, leaving an opening, my car now needs quite a bit of time to decide to accelerate and go faster, now that it can actually go up to prescribed 80mph. I am not sure if I have experienced this before or not (prior to OTA version update). Needless to say this acceleration is too slow, leaving a driver behind me wondering what takes me so long to catch up to the moving traffic.

2. Automatic lane changing, the one that's trigged by looking in the mirrors (not by tapping the blinker). I don't claim to know what conditions need to be met for it to work, but often times car just does nothing and decides to slow down and crawl behind a slower moving vehicle when the left lane is wide open. This weird behavior is not persistent, and sometimes it works great. I am talking the same stretch of highway under seemingly identical conditions, so not sure why its not always working as advertised.

Other than these two oddities this is a really good, confidence inspiring system.

[SkykingUSA]

Originally Posted by COBodom

I like the system a lot and use it almost daily (highway).

With that said two things I recently noticed that annoy me:

1. I always have it configured on "one bar", closest distance to the leading car. If I have the max speed set to say 80mph and I approach the car moving slower, my car slows down fine and with confidence. However, when that slower car ahead of me changes lane, leaving an opening, my car now needs quite a bit of time to decide to accelerate and go faster, now that it can actually go up to prescribed 80mph. I am not sure if I have experienced this before or not (prior to OTA version update). Needless to say this acceleration is too slow, leaving a driver behind me wondering what takes me so long to catch up to the moving traffic.

2. Automatic lane changing, the one that's trigged by looking in the mirrors (not by tapping the blinker). I don't claim to know what conditions need to be met for it to work, but often times car just does nothing and decides to slow down and crawl behind a slower moving vehicle when the left lane is wide open. This weird behavior is not persistent, and sometimes it works great. I am talking the same stretch of highway under seemingly identical conditions, so not sure why its not always working as advertised.

Other than these two oddities this is a really good, confidence inspiring system.

I too have noticed your #1. It usually take a couple of seconds for the car to start accelerating. I think the system is waiting for the car to FULLY leave the lane before making any changes at all. If we were in control, we would slowly start speeding up in anticipation of the car being out of the way, but I don't think the system does that. At least, that's what it feels like to me. It doesn't bother me too much because at least it's on the safer side.

[COBodom]

Originally Posted by SkykingUSA

I too have noticed your #1. It usually take a couple of seconds for the car to start accelerating. I think the system is waiting for the car to FULLY leave the lane before making any changes at all. If we were in control, we would slowly start speeding up in anticipation of the car being out of the way, but I don't think the system does that. At least, that's what it feels like to me. It doesn't bother me too much because at least it's on the safer side.

In my case the car in front me has fully left the lane and some seconds have already passed, yet my car is still going slow, not accelerating to the speed I set. I am gonna play with the distance control and see if that has any effect on this behavior. Logically it should have no effect but maybe its gonna make it less noticeable for me.

[agorski]

Originally Posted by SkykingUSA

The only thing I don't like, is how it approaches stopped cars at a traffic light. If I'm moving along at 55 mph and there is a stopped car ahead of me at a traffic light, the car will stop behind that car, but it waits too late to brake in my opinion and has to brake much harder than I would do if I was braking manually.

This. I usually use the Adaptive setting and when I'm coming up on a stopped car I'll just toggle the cruise control button and the car will still slow itself down gently almost to a stop, requiring manual braking right at the end.

[SkykingUSA]

Originally Posted by agorski

This. I usually use the Adaptive setting and when I'm coming up on a stopped car I'll just toggle the cruise control button and the car will still slow itself down gently almost to a stop, requiring manual braking right at the end.

That's what I have to do too - I'll just toggle cruise off and let the car slow down. I'll turn it back on again when I'm within a few car lengths of the stopped car.

Another thing I wish the car did was stop itself at a red light. If I'm driving 55 and there is a red light up ahead with no cars around, the car won't stop - it will require me to intervene and stop at the light. If it sees the red light, it should stop I think. Maybe they'll add that in a future update at some point.

[Scrapula]

Originally Posted by SkykingUSA

That's what I have to do too - I'll just toggle cruise off and let the car slow down. I'll turn it back on again when I'm within a few car lengths of the stopped car.

Another thing I wish the car did was stop itself at a red light. If I'm driving 55 and there is a red light up ahead with no cars around, the car won't stop - it will require me to intervene and stop at the light. If it sees the red light, it should stop I think. Maybe they'll add that in a future update at some point.

I think that’s because it doesn’t know where to look for the traffic light. Sometimes they are on poles on the left hand side, on poles on the right hand side, strung on wires above the intersection, on arms sticking them out into the intersection but not always centered. Every state can be different.

It looks to the right side of the road for traffic signs but sometimes misses a speed limit sign. It does find a right turn on red not allowed which is mounted high next to the traffic light. It even translates the words ‘no right turn on red’ into a sign with the ‘no turn’ symbol in the HUD. I find it amazing that it can do that but not see the traffic light next to the sign. Maybe these signs and speed limits are just mapped somewhere and it’s not looking at anything. Who knows?

[LVBMW]

Originally Posted by Scrapula

I think that’s because it doesn’t know where to look for the traffic light. Sometimes they are on poles on the left hand side, on poles on the right hand side, strung on wires above the intersection, on arms sticking them out into the intersection but not always centered. Every state can be different.

It looks to the right side of the road for traffic signs but sometimes misses a speed limit sign. It does find a right turn on red not allowed which is mounted high next to the traffic light. It even translates the words ‘no right turn on red’ into a sign with the ‘no turn’ symbol in the HUD. I find it amazing that it can do that but not see the traffic light next to the sign. Maybe these signs and speed limits are just mapped somewhere and it’s not looking at anything. Who knows?

It was my understanding that the traffic light detection ability is not yet available in the US. I don't find any setting for this anywhere in iDrive.

[Scrapula]

Originally Posted by LVBMW

It was my understanding that the traffic light detection ability is not yet available in the US. I don't find any setting for this anywhere in iDrive.

It’s not available yet. My guess is because the US does not have a standard location for traffic lights like I mentioned. When I go to Europe, it’s universal. When I drive to another state, I have to look and see where they put the traffic lights.

[ToddRGuy]

Originally Posted by Scrapula

It’s not available yet. My guess is because the US does not have a standard location for traffic lights like I mentioned. When I go to Europe, it’s universal. When I drive to another state, I have to look and see where they put the traffic lights.

I wonder if they’ll be able to program around it by focusing on shape and color (e.g. green,yellow,red) and light intensity. If Tesla can do it, I have faith in BMW.

[Blue Sky]

Originally Posted by COBodom

In my case the car in front me has fully left the lane and some seconds have already passed, yet my car is still going slow, not accelerating to the speed I set. I am gonna play with the distance control and see if that has any effect on this behavior. Logically it should have no effect but maybe its gonna make it less noticeable for me.

With Porsche Taycan, I believe the drive mode has an indirect effect on the aggressiveness of the ACC accelleration when a slower vehicle in front (or in the lane that you are changing into) clears the lane. Lots of people note (complain) that it accellerates overly aggressively, but I believe that is tied to being in Sport or Sport+ on the Taycan, but it’s more gentle in Normal.

Maybe try it in Sport on your BMW and see if it makes any difference.

[LVBMW]

Originally Posted by Scrapula

It’s not available yet. My guess is because the US does not have a standard location for traffic lights like I mentioned. When I go to Europe, it’s universal. When I drive to another state, I have to look and see where they put the traffic lights.

Tesla figured it out. Hopefully one day BMW will as well.

[i5rpm]

My thoughts on DAPP... it works quite well in my i5. Better than my Tesla S on HW3. The Tesla was regularly doing surprise frightening things. This one is more "relaxing" if that makes sense. My only annoyance really is that it only gives about 3 seconds of allowance for not looking at the road ahead before it alerts at you.

Some times it doesn't fully understand certain lanes. For example, on one road there's a bus-only lane on the left side. The car thinks it's an HOV lane. And thinks that the car is in that lane. So if I'm driving in the second from left lane (not the bus lane) it thinks I'm in the bus lane. When the bus lane ends, it wants to lane change over to the right and activates the turn signal and prompts for eye-look in the mirror to change. So I have to cancel that as it makes sense to stay in the current (valid) lane and just let the bus lane end.

In terms of traffic light and stop sign detection, my Tesla did this. But I often found it was too late to start slowing down so created more of a nervous effect... "is it going to stop?" which was unnatural compared to human driving style.