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Sun 26 Jan 2025 00:15

False Activation of Safety Systems - Deep thoughts

I've had a new car for almost 3 years and have had a number of issues with the safety systems. I was wondering how common this is ?

Firstly a general point, on my car there are 3 settings. On the most sensitive setting the alarms go off going up or down a hill. Another example is an alarm went off when somebody stumbled about 5 ft from the car on the grass verge. Potholes also set it off. So on a 5 mile journey it goes off every 30 seconds. The second setting is less sensitive, but only just. The least sensitive alarms about once every journey.

But on to the issue. On 3 occassions the system has tried to do something dangerous. Last week on a suburban road it cut the power/or applied the brakes from about 30mph. So stopping the car in the middle of the road. The only traffic was parked cars. I managed to get it to the side of the road and after a few on/offs it reset.

The previous 2 incidents were when it tried to move me from the outside lane to the occupied middle lane of a 3 lane road. I resisted it attempts.

Are these incidents unique?

The Dealer says no fault found, no data logs. I'm not sure I believe them.

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Sun 26 Jan 2025 08:58

False Activation of Safety Systems - daveyjp

For any technical issue advice a piece of info to provide is the brand of vehicle you have an issue with.

That way anyone else with that vehicle who may also have experienced problems will be able to share their knowledge. Without it you may just get generic advice as different vehciles have different safety systems.

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Sun 26 Jan 2025 18:37

False Activation of Safety Systems - gordonbennet

Welcome to the wonderful world of modern motoring.

They've added more three letter acronyms to vehicles than you can shake a stick at, amazingly enough half of them don't work properly throw spurious false messages or, as you found out, chuck the brakes on for no reason.

For some reason those funding this r****** and the politicians on board assure us all these systems are going to work harmoniously together in the coming utopia with self driving (electric only) vehicles going smoothly and efficiently about communicating and coordinating seamlessly with one another, meanwhile a mobile phone can't go past a set of pylons without throwing a wobbly.

In the real world i've had to modify badly how i approach chicane type situations in my artic to prevent it braking violently for no reason, this is not progress.

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Sun 26 Jan 2025 23:17

False Activation of Safety Systems - Andrew-T

Welcome to the wonderful world of modern motoring. They've added more three letter acronyms to vehicles than you can shake a stick at,

On the topic of acronyms, I wish we could rely a bit less on just context when working out whether contributors are talking about Internal Combustion Engines or In-Car Entertainment !!

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Sun 26 Jan 2025 22:21

False Activation of Safety Systems - Big John

What car is it?

I've encountered these "safety" systems driving a few cars now and implementations vary is an understatement.

I was put off a Skoda Kamiq after test driving it and on my standard commute test route of a bumpy backroad with no line markings to test ride quality where you tend to drive in the middle (as edges are worse) until a car comes the other way. It was my first encounter of the safety gubbins and it resisted me moving left as a car came the other way - not good!! A friend has a the mechanically similar Scala and the SOS calling keeps activating.

I've just mentioned on another thread re driving a Mazda CX-30 where it protested with red stop messages when I was passing a parked car and the speed gubbins never shut up, not because I was speeding but because it kept picking up random speed limit signs stage left/right including a 5mpg sign in a factory.

Generally my Suzuki Swace(Toyota Corolla in drag) is fairly well behaved and not so in your face. It does protest if you change lanes without signalling (my fault!) and it alerted me approaching a parked car approaching a steep right hand bend ( I suppose fair enough as I hadn't steered at that point). In our area we have some roads with dotted lines for cycles and no centre line that you are supposed to drive in unless overtaking a cycle - this can prove interesting but again indicating helps. I think it disagrees how quickly I slow down at roundabouts as I sometimes feel the slight application of brakes. As for the speed stuff, it's already saved me a speed awareness course(or worse!) as it pinged when I drove into a 30mph limit with foliage obscured signage whilst on holiday near Ludlow so I quickly adjusted my speed and just around the corner was a speed van - phew! I drove back through another day to have a look see re signs etc.

Some of the safety gubbins seems to be adjustable re sensitivity.

The moral of the story is thoroughly test drive any potential new car!! - and improve your(er my) indicating.

Edited by Big John on 26/01/2025 at 22:33

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Mon 27 Jan 2025 09:31

False Activation of Safety Systems - Heidfirst

Generally my Suzuki Swace(Toyota Corolla in drag) is fairly well behaved and not so in your face.

There is a difference between implementation on the 23MY & 24MY Corolla (& presumably other Toyotas). Mandated by law but it's 1 of the things that led me to buying an used late 23MY rather than waiting for the factory ordered 24MY (actually would have been a 24.5MY by delivery in 2025).

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Wed 29 Jan 2025 20:11

False Activation of Safety Systems - Big John

Generally my Suzuki Swace(Toyota Corolla in drag) is fairly well behaved and not so in your face.

There is a difference between implementation on the 23MY & 24MY Corolla (& presumably other Toyotas). Mandated by law but it's 1 of the things that led me to buying an used late 23MY rather than waiting for the factory ordered 24MY (actually would have been a 24.5MY by delivery in 2025).

Mine has the later gubbins inc speed stuff - to be honest it's pretty good. A friend of mine has the earlier 23MY registered weeks before mine and the main difference was the implementation of the speed gubbins and the absence of km/h in small numbers on the dash.

Edited by Big John on 29/01/2025 at 20:26

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Mon 27 Jan 2025 09:59

False Activation of Safety Systems - Andrew-T

Generally my Suzuki Swace... does protest if you change lanes without signalling (my fault!) and it alerted me approaching a parked car approaching a steep right hand bend ...

The trouble with this new convention is that drivers are in effect indicating their intentions to the car, rather than to any other person or driver who might be watching. Unfortunately those watchers may be there, and as usual may misinterpret the signals. When circumstances oblige drivers to signal to prevent steering difficulty, the logic has gone a bit too far IMHO.

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Mon 27 Jan 2025 02:00

False Activation of Safety Systems - edlithgow

I've had a new car...

This is where you went wrong.

Edited by edlithgow on 27/01/2025 at 02:00

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Mon 27 Jan 2025 10:15

False Activation of Safety Systems - Adampr

The safety systems on new cars are absolute junk. I say that as a progressive minded person, certainly no luddite.

This sounds like a Kia to me. They have endless binging and bonging and super-aggressive lane 'assist'. Turn off what you can.

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Mon 27 Jan 2025 12:09

False Activation of Safety Systems - gordonbennet

This 'tugging' of the steering disturbes me and is not something i want and in my humble has no place in any vehicle.

I had a new truck issued to me in April, my last new one 5 years i went on the manufacturerer's familiarisation course (a jolly usually reserved for the trainer only) and they were convinced the next generations would have steering effects similar to cars, my latest one is the vvery latest version and thankfully this hasn't materialised.

Can't think of anything more dangerous than an artic coming the other way on a typical UK third world road surface with the driver fighting the vehicle for control of the steering, let us hope one the mandarins in the transport ministry issued sensible orders.

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Wed 29 Jan 2025 20:16

False Activation of Safety Systems - Big John

This sounds like a Kia to me. They have endless binging and bonging and super-aggressive lane 'assist'. Turn off what you can.

Most things like this you can't turn off permanently so if you are buying a new car you really need more and longer test drives to make sure you're not driven insane as it really does vary substantially between makes/ models.

I had a few minor surprises when I bough the Swace in July 2024 but now I'm used to it I actually quite like the tech inc lane assist and speed gubbins. I thought it was me getting used to the modern way - until I drove the Mazda that is - "bingy, bongy, red flashing, vibrate etc..."

Edited by Big John on 29/01/2025 at 21:03

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Sat 8 Mar 2025 16:30

False Activation of Safety Systems - Lrac

I thought the advanced speed limiter would be a good thing to use BUT beware if happily cruising along a motorway at 70 I discovered that it would try to slow down to 50 when passing slip roads. On the M 25 there is a section restricted to 50 but sections "tell" my car it is still 70 when it clearly is not and driving locally on roads that have always been 30 my car believes the speed limit to be 50.

Car in question is latest MG ZS Hybrid +. I am very pleased with this car but it does have some odd foibles

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Sun 9 Mar 2025 08:11

False Activation of Safety Systems - paul 1963

I've grown to accept/ put up with all the safety features apart from the lane assist on my Swift, it really is aggressive, if your holding the wheel lightly it can snatch rather alarmingly, it's easily disabled but I struggle to understand why it needs to be so intrusive, the system on my previous Vitara just gently vibrated the wheel, don't think I ever disabled it?

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