Here come those 'bots again... now they'll be able to bump us off on the highways.
On Thu, Apr 1, 2010 at 5:55 PM, Mr. Worf <hellomahog...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > Audi’s Robotic Car Drives Better Than You Do > > - By Chuck Squatriglia<http://www.wired.com/autopia/author/wiredchuck/> > [image: > Email Author] <chuck_squatrig...@wired.com> > - March 31, 2010 | > - 8:00 pm | > - Categories: Cool Cars<http://www.wired.com/autopia/category/cool-cars/> > - > > > > > The race to the top of Pikes Peak is among the most harrowing in > motorsports, a flat-out sprint through 156 turns on a 12.4-mile road to the > clouds. It is a test of grit and skill that demands the best from drivers as > they brave perilous drops at 130 mph. Audi thinks it can do it *without* a > driver. > > The German automaker will send an autonomous TTS barreling to the summit in > September. It will navigate the course at race speeds — the best drivers > make the run in around 12 minutes — with no one at the wheel or even in the > car. No one’s ever attempted anything like it before. Although robocars have > driven the course, they haven’t done it at more than 25 mph. Audi says it is > pushing autonomous-vehicle technology to its very edge in an effort to make > the cars the rest of us drive smarter and safer. > > “We’re interested in the safety opportunities this technology presents,” > said Dr. Burkhard Huhnke, executive director of the Electronics Research > Laboratory. Volkswagen Group, which owns Audi, works alongside Stanford > University at the lab in Palo Alto, California. “We want to understand the > best way to use this technology to provide additional support to drivers in > critical situations.” > > [image: > audi_fb]<http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2010/03/audi_fb.jpg> > > Audi, Volkswagen and Stanford are building on their success with Stanley, > a VW Touareg <http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.01/stanley.html> that > won the DARPA Grand Challenge in 2005, and Stanley, a VW > Passat<http://www.wired.com/cars/futuretransport/news/2007/10/grandchallenge_walkup?currentPage=all>that > took second in the DARPA Urban Challenge in 2007. Those vehicles used > radar, sensors and cameras to track the road at relatively low speed on a > closed and controlled course. The TTS will use differential GPS and an > inertial measurement system to tackle a road where anything can happen. > > “We’re aiming high,” said Chris Gerdes, director of the Center for > Automotive Research at Stanford. “Pike’s Peak has been a challenge since the > first race in 1916. It is a place where you have to push to the very limit, > and there’s a very stiff penalty if you get it wrong.” > > The car won’t compete in the Pike’s Peak International Hill > Climb<http://www.usacracing.com/ppihc>in June. But the all-wheel drive TTS > will follow the same course the racers > use. It’s a mix of pavement, dirt and gravel that rises 4,721 feet at an > average grade of 7 percent. The current record for a production-based > all-wheel-drive car stands at 11:48.434. No one expects the TTS to hit that > mark, and it won’t achieve the kind of speeds rally driver Marcus > Gronhölm<http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/07/fiesta-pikes-peak/>or four-time > winner Nobuhiro Tajima have, but it will make the run faster > than you ever could. > > “I want to go up the mountain much faster than anyone with any sense of > self-preservation would go,” Gerdes said. > > The robocar is a 2010 TTS. The team chose it because it features a > fly-by-wire throttle, adaptive cruise control, a semiautomatic DSG gearbox > and other gadgetry. That made it relatively easy to make the car fully > autonomous using electronics developed at the Electronics Research Lab. > [image: Differential GPS tracks the car's location to within 2 > centimeters.]<http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2010/03/audi_fd.jpg> > > Differential GPS tracks the car's location to within 2 centimeters. > > “The components we added that actually interface with the car would fit in > a shoebox,” said Marcial Hernandez, a senior research engineer at the > Electronics Research Lab. “The largest component by far is the gyroscope, > and it’s an 8-inch cube.” > > The TTS is named Shelley in honor of Michèle > Mouton<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mich%C3%A8le_Mouton>, > an Audi rally driver and the first woman to win at Pikes Peak. Shelley uses > differential GPS to track its location to within 2 centimeters, though > Gerdes says the margin will be closer to 1 meter on the mountain. > Wheel-speed sensors and an accelerometer measure its velocity and a > gyroscope controls equilibrium and direction. The algorithms that make it > all work run on hardware developed by Sun Microsystems. > > “The computational power needed to do this is less than you’d find in your > laptop,” Hernandez said. > > Redundant systems ensure a measure of safety, and Shelley can shut itself > down if the system detects a problem. The car also transmits real-time data > to the team, which can shut it down from up to 20 miles away. > > Audi set up a dirt oval about the length and width of a football field and > let us ride shotgun for half a dozen laps (video at top of post). Although > there was a grad student behind the wheel, he was there only to monitor test > data and hit the kill switch should things go sideways. > > Shelley accelerated to about 40 mph — Audi wouldn’t push harder with a > journalist in the car — fast enough to push us back in the seat. The car > applied the brakes as it approached the first turn and nailed the > apex<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apex_%28racing%29>. > It swept through the curve at 25 mph just at the limits of adhesion. The > back end broke loose once, but Shelley quickly counter-steered to bring > things back in line. The ride was as exhilarating as it was amazing, and > could only be much more so at a race pace. Shelley hit 130 mph at the > Bonneville Salt Flats, and the team hopes to top 150 later this spring at El > Mirage in Southern California. > > “We’re developing the car to drive itself right at the very limits of its > performance,” Gerdes said. > > The question, of course, is why. > > Audi believes autonomous systems could make cars safer, easier and more fun > to drive. It isn’t trying to remove the driver from the equation. Rather, it > wants to create a car that can take over when you get in over your head. If, > for example, you hit a patch of black ice, the car could take corrective > measures to keep you from going off the road. Or if you blow it on a > downhill double-apex turn, the car could bring itself back in line. > > “The safety aspects of this technology are very important to us,” Huhnke > said. > > And that, Gerdes said, is why Audi is testing the technology on Pikes Peak. > > “We’re modeling this on a race car,” he said, “because we want to design a > system that can assist even the best drivers.” > > *Photos: Jim Merithew/Wired.com > More photos below.* > > *See Also:* > > - MIT Robot Rides Shotgun to Make Us Happier > Drivers<http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/11/mit-robot-rides-shotgun-to-make-us-happier-drivers/> > - Wired 14.01: Say Hello to > Stanley<http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.01/stanley.html> > - Darpa’s Robot Car Race: Gentlemen, Start Your > Processors<http://www.wired.com/cars/futuretransport/news/2007/10/grandchallenge_walkup%3FcurrentPage%3Dall> > - VW Lifts a $5.75 Million VAIL at > Stanford<http://www.wired.com/autopia/2009/10/vw-vail/> > - The Car of the Future Will Know You Can’t > Drive<http://www.wired.com/autopia/2008/05/the-car-of-the-future-will-know-you-cant-drive/> > > [image: audi_f]<http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2010/03/audi_f.jpg> > > Although the back of the car is loaded with electronics, the components > that actually interface with the Audi’s control systems would fit in a > shoebox. > > [image: > audi_ff]<http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2010/03/audi_ff.jpg> > > The interior is bone stock, except for the big red kill switch in front of > the gearshift. It’s mounted where the cigarette lighter would go. > > [image: > audi_fe]<http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2010/03/audi_fe.jpg> > > Mick Kritayakirana, a mechanical engineering doctoral candidate at > Stanford, keeps close watch on Shelley during testing. The car transmits > real-time data to the team, which can shut the car down remotely from as far > as 20 miles away. > > [image: > audi_fc]<http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2010/03/audi_fc.jpg> > > The odds are this car can drive itself harder and better than you could > drive it. > > Read More > http://www.wired.com/autopia/2010/03/audi-autonomous-tts-pikes-peak/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Index+3+%28Top+Stories+2%29%29#ixzz0jt7iVpfN > > > -- > Celebrating 10 years of bringing diversity to perversity! > Mahogany at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mahogany_pleasures_of_darkness/ > >
