Dynamic Radar Cruise Control

[K20FA5]

Last time I was in Boston for work I had a new Nissan with the radar cruise where you didn't even have to use the brake in heavy traffic the car would slowdown an stop and start back again when traffic started moving. It was pretty cool, but VERY hard to trust. I used it for a while with my foot hovering over the brake pedal. I turned it off after a little while. Neat, but not for me!

 

[HowAboutThis]

Originally Posted by AuthorEditor
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1st under in that situation one shouldn't use cruise control.

I was using it in situations where I would normally use regular cruise control successfully. In other words, traffic flowing at or above speed limit, no stop and go, but normal busyness of cars exiting and merging, passing, etc. I try to maintain a consistent speed, minimizing slowing and accelerating in order to keep the flow of traffic moving right along. Instead, Dynamic Cruise Control shifts your speed up and down all the time trying to maintain consistent distance instead of speed. If every car on the road would do this there would be a lot of herky, jerky traffic


Any time there is consistent exiting and merging I don't use cruise. Driving safety 101, in my opinion.

 

[AuthorEditor]

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Any time there is consistent exiting and merging I don't use cruise.

It depends on how much of it there is. If I can easily move left a lane and let people in I do so. Sure, if you are constantly having to turn it off and on you shouldn't use it. But, again, I was using the Dynamic control in a situation where regular cruise control would have been just fine, on a highway I have driven many times, with an occasional tweak of the speed up or down a notch. Dynamic does a lot more adjusting than I would like. By the way, exit and merge lanes are supposed to be used to either get up to highway speed for a seamless merge, or decelerate after leaving the main road. People don't seem to understand that these days. They often enter the road going too slow, or slow way down before getting into the exit lane. Neither type of cruise control works when you are dealing with that.

 

[chunt]

I have been using Nissan's Intelligent Cruise Control for about a year and a half. I had a hard time trusting it at first but the more I use it the more I like it. It would be a requirement on any vehicle I get in the future. My granddaughter who drives the Rogue loves it too. And the other features such as blind spot warning and automatic emergency braking are super features also.

 

[antonmnster]

Haven't made the jump to dynamic cruise yet, still using the well-thought out stick on my e90. One notch for 1 mph up or down; push it further for 5 mph up or down. Fits perfectly behind my left ring finger so I can modulate it all day without moving my hand.

 

[Ws6]

Originally Posted by AuthorEditor
I own older cars and drive them into the ground, so I am new to this Dynamic Radar Cruise Control thing found in today's Toyotas. Rented a Camry with it recently and it was completely frustrating and useless in normal busy highway driving. What am I missing here? For example, on a busy limited access road with frequent interchanges the system would jam on the brakes every time someone was merging from the right. If I had maintained speed I would have been able to pass ahead of the other car which could have merged behind me. Or, I found that someone would blow by me, pull in ahead and the car would jam on the brakes again to maintain a ridiculously long following distance. This meant I kept gradually slowing up as more and more people jumped into the huge space in front of me. I also get all sorts of beeping warning sounds when doing normal things like driving around an exit or entrance ramp. I couldn't figure out what it was warning me about. I deliberately tried a few of these going way too slow, driving right down the middle and I still got beeping. What is it telling me? In general, I found the system useless, and possibly dangerous as it jams on the brakes in situations I would not expect it to.

Weird. I use it all the time in my CX5 GT-R, and it's amazing. In congested 3 lane + merge lane traffic I set it to 80 and it will creep along at 0-20mph, stop/start, etc. just fine until the congestion clears up and then powers me on to 80. Seems like Toyota just can't figure it out, as I have NEVER had "clutter" from vehicles not in my lane cause an interaction in my Mazda. It works well at any follow distance, unless you are coming up fast on stopped traffic, in which case I don't trust it enough and personally intervene.

I did have emergency braking get me once. I had it set for the furthest distance, and a car in front of me was turning in busy traffic and it freaked out. I changed the sensitivity and no issues since.