Throw your hands in the air – Cadillac announces new super cruise semi-autonomous feature that lets you enjoy a daily commute basically handsfree from the driver seat.
Its has been a long time coming and now the buzz of Cadillac’s 2018 CT6 is making headlines. The future is now folks. Remember, those Jetson days when George would just hop in his car and it would whisk him away on to a crowded highway in the sky plotting a safe path to his house. Well The 2018 CT6 has a feature that will do just that, minus the flying part. Although this new super cruise semi-autonomous feature handles steering, acceleration, and braking while operational, Unlike George’s ride it does require some monitoring from a human driver.
The super cruise system uses cameras and radar without expensive onboard lidar sensors. Lidar is short for Light Detection and Ranging. This system is fundamentally a distance technology that actively sends light energy to the ground. This pulse hits the ground and returns to the sensor. Basically, it measures how long it takes for the emitted light to return to the sensor.
Engineers used lidar to make high-resolution 3D maps that act as a proxy for the CT6’s onboard lidar and contains detailed information on elevation changes, guardrails, and bridge abutments, so the vehicle can navigate without the human driver using the real time information it is receiving.
But, before you decide to nod off understand the system is also watching the driver to make sure that the human behind the wheel is ready for a quick hand-off if the system rolls into a situation it can’t handle.
Just push the super cruise engage button and throw your hands in the air. So far, test drives have shown that the system feels confident once you get the hang of monitoring instead of actively driving. Of course, it will be a little disconcerting at first but engineers and most folks who have tried it say the bizarre feeling of driving without driving quickly becomes second nature once you have logged some semi-autonomous miles.
This exciting technology that is one step closer to totally autonomy is an optional feature that most buyers will want to give a try. Super Cruise is already available and will be a $5000 option on the premium luxury model, which has an entry level price tag of 66-thousand dollars and change. The futuristic feature comes standard on the 85-thousand-dollar Platinum model.
By DriverSide Vehicle Reviews