5 ms·

Drifting is objectively less effective and safe than normal manuevering and braking. Drifting as a sport exists to look cool and stylish. It's like figure skat

Drifting is objectively less effective and safe than normal manuevering and braking. Drifting as a sport exists to look cool and stylish. It's like figure skating with cars. (There is one exception- off road racing on loose surfaces requires drifting. But driving that way off road is only useful for speed at the expense of safety and reliability.)

tempestn 7y ago
Another exception of a sort, and I believe the one this research is meant to address, is when the drift is initiated unintentionally. Say you hit a patch of black ice mid-corner, for example. This kind of work can expand the envelop of the control system to encompass these scenarios.
- OnlineGladiator 7y ago
  I don't think this is true. If you hit black ice and the tire skids, the problem is you just have no friction. Modern traction control systems already account for this as best they can - I don't see how this model would help any more except for trying to go faster through patches of black ice. And even then, drifting inherently requires traction in order to modulate the throttle and control the vehicle. If you can't get the wheels to connect with the road, the first thing you'd want to fix are your tires - not your traction control system. Most people don't recognize how much better modern winter tires are compared to all season tires for driving on snow and ice. https://youtu.be/atayHQYqA3g https://youtu.be/atayHQYqA3g
  - LoSboccacc 7y ago
    yeah but even then the autopilot need to adapt to the different conditions, it can't just throw the hands up when the conditions are hard and let the driver to crash on its own (at least the ideal full autonomous) so you need to have a "friction" (lateral and longitudinal) input to the model, so that the model forecasted car position matches the actual car future, to allow the autopilot to plan the correct avoidance maneuver
    - OnlineGladiator 7y ago
      You're assuming Autopilot can't currently account for losing traction (this is probably true). But unexpectedly hitting a patch of black ice won't favor one model over the other - in either case you'll use the same methods to slow down. The only difference would be if you also had to avoid an object some distance ahead, and the drift model helped you maneuver around it by applying the throttle. It's extremely difficult for me to contrive a scenario where this would help avoid an accident over a standard traction control model found in any modern automobile. But technically I guess it's possible it could help.
      - LoSboccacc 7y ago
        > contrive a scenario pretty easy actually. car ahead swerve to avoid an obstacle. autopilot don't see the obstacle until the car ahead swerve. autopilot has to change lane to avoid obstacle. if it has recently snow some lane will have different traction than others. this is what happens on most of these pileup videos you see on youtube, so while not common (there are a handful a year after all) they aren't just hypoteticals
        OnlineGladiator 7y ago
        You're right - I guess it's not that hard to imagine that scenario. But how would the car know which lanes have traction? If the car can reliably detect black ice it can avoid it without ever having to slip/skid.
        LoSboccacc 7y ago
        yeah that the hard part, humans can't identify it visually, so car will probably be able to identify it only after it loses traction, reducing the margins significantly.
      - mlonkibjuyhv 7y ago
        Why wouldn't a model that knows how to drive in winter-conditions be better than one that doesn't? There are more effective actions than hitting the brakes and hoping for the best available, one of which is to continue driving the vehicle in a manner that is compatible with the conditions. Don't make abrupt changes to the configuration of the car and search for traction and positive outcomes. Of course this is greatly simplified by not going 90mph on all-year tires.
  - petschge 7y ago
    The thing is: By the time the car has traction again it might have rotated around the up-axis. Getting back from that configuration do a less unstable configuration can very well improve if the car knows how to drift, especially how to go into the desired direction even before the drift has ended. Doing so would make the (result from the) initial lose of control on the black ice more limited and more controlled, hence less risky. tl;dr. nothing you can do on the black ice. but if you have tracking again there might be faster and saver ways then "first stop drifting, second start driving in the correct direction".
    - tempestn 7y ago
      Yes, this is exactly what I meant by a drift that was unintentionally initiated, such as by hitting a patch of black ice. Thanks for elaborating.
  - bborud 7y ago
    If you hit black ice you are screwed anyway. The most useful thing your car could do is to detect black ice before you hit it. I’ve seen some technologies for doing just that. Black ice isn’t very easy to distinguish from other surface conditions cheaply, but the technology exists. (It just has to reach volume production).
    - jacquesm 7y ago
      The very best way to deal with black ice is to avoid it entirely, simply do not drive if the conditions susceptible to generating it are present.
      - bborud 7y ago
        I live in a coastal city in Norway. You might as well tell me to hibernate :-) But on a more serious note: it isn’t that hard to cope with if you are prepared. In general by choosing proper tyres and learning to drive in those conditions. In particular by learning to read the conditions so you can anticipate where there’s localized black ice.
      - dharmab 7y ago
        For a lot of people, that's equivalent to tell them not to leave their homes for six months. It's possible to drive safely in black ice conditions with the right tires and appropriate levels of caution.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- floatingatoll 7y ago
  How quickly can a car measure the available traction and respond to brief loss events? Can on/off detection response times and recovery strategies be improved for black ice (and hydroplaning)? If a car hits black ice, should it power itself down or should it max out the CPU looking for the instant traction returns on any wheel and do whatever it takes to try to slow down?
  - dharmab 7y ago
    Modern traction control systems available on production cars and motorcycles have a polling rate of up to 1000Hz. You don't need self driving tech to handle most low traction situations. Black ice is an exception because once you start sliding on it there is not much you can do to regain control except ride it out and hope you don't hit anything before you get out of the ice.
    - tempestn 7y ago
      Can't do anything while you're on the ice, but once you're past it you may still need to react to avoid a collision, and you may find yourself in a sideways slide at that point. So a control system that knows how to handle a drift could be beneficial at that point.
    - HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
      My mouse has a 1000Hz polling rate. Is 1000Hz really good enough for excellent traction control? I'm sure it's fine for most situations, but the small amount that it's not good for are probably the ones that matter the most.
      - tempestn 7y ago
        I expect you could turn your mouse's polling rate down to 200Hz and not notice any difference, even gaming. Also, a mouse is a very precise control; much more so than the controls of a car. I could certainly be wrong, but my intuition suggests that a 1000Hz sensor polling rate would be fine for an autonomous vehicle.
jcims 7y ago
It seems the longer term objective is to learn how to steer the car while in a skid, not intentionally drift. This is a useful defensive driving skill. You may not have time to recover before a collision, and getting the car comfortable with avoiding obstacles while sideways seems a good way to help.
montenegrohugo 7y ago
What a grandiose statement with no backing whatsoever. "Objectively"? Drifting, as most things, has its place. If you've ever gone karting on a wet track, you know that you can't really place first against competent drivers unless you use drifting to a significant degree. Same thing with off-road driving, or driving in general that requires rapid direction changes with low surface traction.

tempestn 7y ago

Another exception of a sort, and I believe the one this research is meant to address, is when the drift is initiated unintentionally. Say you hit a patch of black ice mid-corner, for example. This kind of work can expand the envelop of the control system to encompass these scenarios.

OnlineGladiator 7y ago
I don't think this is true. If you hit black ice and the tire skids, the problem is you just have no friction. Modern traction control systems already account for this as best they can - I don't see how this model would help any more except for trying to go faster through patches of black ice. And even then, drifting inherently requires traction in order to modulate the throttle and control the vehicle. If you can't get the wheels to connect with the road, the first thing you'd want to fix are your tires - not your traction control system. Most people don't recognize how much better modern winter tires are compared to all season tires for driving on snow and ice. https://youtu.be/atayHQYqA3g https://youtu.be/atayHQYqA3g
- LoSboccacc 7y ago
  yeah but even then the autopilot need to adapt to the different conditions, it can't just throw the hands up when the conditions are hard and let the driver to crash on its own (at least the ideal full autonomous) so you need to have a "friction" (lateral and longitudinal) input to the model, so that the model forecasted car position matches the actual car future, to allow the autopilot to plan the correct avoidance maneuver
  - OnlineGladiator 7y ago
    You're assuming Autopilot can't currently account for losing traction (this is probably true). But unexpectedly hitting a patch of black ice won't favor one model over the other - in either case you'll use the same methods to slow down. The only difference would be if you also had to avoid an object some distance ahead, and the drift model helped you maneuver around it by applying the throttle. It's extremely difficult for me to contrive a scenario where this would help avoid an accident over a standard traction control model found in any modern automobile. But technically I guess it's possible it could help.
    - LoSboccacc 7y ago
      > contrive a scenario pretty easy actually. car ahead swerve to avoid an obstacle. autopilot don't see the obstacle until the car ahead swerve. autopilot has to change lane to avoid obstacle. if it has recently snow some lane will have different traction than others. this is what happens on most of these pileup videos you see on youtube, so while not common (there are a handful a year after all) they aren't just hypoteticals
      - OnlineGladiator 7y ago
        You're right - I guess it's not that hard to imagine that scenario. But how would the car know which lanes have traction? If the car can reliably detect black ice it can avoid it without ever having to slip/skid.
        LoSboccacc 7y ago
        yeah that the hard part, humans can't identify it visually, so car will probably be able to identify it only after it loses traction, reducing the margins significantly.
    - mlonkibjuyhv 7y ago
      Why wouldn't a model that knows how to drive in winter-conditions be better than one that doesn't? There are more effective actions than hitting the brakes and hoping for the best available, one of which is to continue driving the vehicle in a manner that is compatible with the conditions. Don't make abrupt changes to the configuration of the car and search for traction and positive outcomes. Of course this is greatly simplified by not going 90mph on all-year tires.
- petschge 7y ago
  The thing is: By the time the car has traction again it might have rotated around the up-axis. Getting back from that configuration do a less unstable configuration can very well improve if the car knows how to drift, especially how to go into the desired direction even before the drift has ended. Doing so would make the (result from the) initial lose of control on the black ice more limited and more controlled, hence less risky. tl;dr. nothing you can do on the black ice. but if you have tracking again there might be faster and saver ways then "first stop drifting, second start driving in the correct direction".
  - tempestn 7y ago
    Yes, this is exactly what I meant by a drift that was unintentionally initiated, such as by hitting a patch of black ice. Thanks for elaborating.
- bborud 7y ago
  If you hit black ice you are screwed anyway. The most useful thing your car could do is to detect black ice before you hit it. I’ve seen some technologies for doing just that. Black ice isn’t very easy to distinguish from other surface conditions cheaply, but the technology exists. (It just has to reach volume production).
  - jacquesm 7y ago
    The very best way to deal with black ice is to avoid it entirely, simply do not drive if the conditions susceptible to generating it are present.
    - bborud 7y ago
      I live in a coastal city in Norway. You might as well tell me to hibernate :-) But on a more serious note: it isn’t that hard to cope with if you are prepared. In general by choosing proper tyres and learning to drive in those conditions. In particular by learning to read the conditions so you can anticipate where there’s localized black ice.
    - dharmab 7y ago
      For a lot of people, that's equivalent to tell them not to leave their homes for six months. It's possible to drive safely in black ice conditions with the right tires and appropriate levels of caution.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
floatingatoll 7y ago
How quickly can a car measure the available traction and respond to brief loss events? Can on/off detection response times and recovery strategies be improved for black ice (and hydroplaning)? If a car hits black ice, should it power itself down or should it max out the CPU looking for the instant traction returns on any wheel and do whatever it takes to try to slow down?
- dharmab 7y ago
  Modern traction control systems available on production cars and motorcycles have a polling rate of up to 1000Hz. You don't need self driving tech to handle most low traction situations. Black ice is an exception because once you start sliding on it there is not much you can do to regain control except ride it out and hope you don't hit anything before you get out of the ice.
  - tempestn 7y ago
    Can't do anything while you're on the ice, but once you're past it you may still need to react to avoid a collision, and you may find yourself in a sideways slide at that point. So a control system that knows how to handle a drift could be beneficial at that point.
  - HeWhoLurksLate 7y ago
    My mouse has a 1000Hz polling rate. Is 1000Hz really good enough for excellent traction control? I'm sure it's fine for most situations, but the small amount that it's not good for are probably the ones that matter the most.
    - tempestn 7y ago
      I expect you could turn your mouse's polling rate down to 200Hz and not notice any difference, even gaming. Also, a mouse is a very precise control; much more so than the controls of a car. I could certainly be wrong, but my intuition suggests that a 1000Hz sensor polling rate would be fine for an autonomous vehicle.

jcims 7y ago

It seems the longer term objective is to learn how to steer the car while in a skid, not intentionally drift. This is a useful defensive driving skill. You may not have time to recover before a collision, and getting the car comfortable with avoiding obstacles while sideways seems a good way to help.

montenegrohugo 7y ago

What a grandiose statement with no backing whatsoever. "Objectively"? Drifting, as most things, has its place. If you've ever gone karting on a wet track, you know that you can't really place first against competent drivers unless you use drifting to a significant degree. Same thing with off-road driving, or driving in general that requires rapid direction changes with low surface traction.