Cruise Control & Adverse Weather Conditions

[crockers]

Exactly. If you're my age, you'll know what they used to charge you for abs, now standard on most cars.

I thought EU law now made abs mandatory on all new cars.............or am i wrong..

I do know and was shocked to find in the USA that it is a cost option on many cars

 

[hawk20]

If fitted to all cars as standard this price would soon fall..............

But it won't be. Any more than auto or cruise are standard. Not enough people want it or to pay for it. TV Malcolm loves it. I would pay extra not to have it. My wife and my brother don't even know what it is. Forget it. It will die or remain an 'interesting' extra for the few.

Whereas Parktronic really is useful and people do want it, and many choose it and are happy to pay for it. Now that could become standard.

 

[mark.t]

Why should it be banned, and it is far from a gadget, if it cannot cope with any situation it sounds the bleeper. I use it more than anything else on the car, and everything known is on my car. Its popular in USA, Germany and Holland

The automatic gear box was frowned upon when they first came to the UK as people said it takes out all of the driving pleasure

not more than your rear view mirror i hope ...... every extra now thats a claim to fame ...... how much and how many extras are they

 

[mb240]

This should not be a problem on a modern car with ESP. The ESP control will take absolute precedence in terms of taking control.

This story is also inaccurate in other respects. Some useful info by clicking this link.

That's what I would think as well. Traction control pretty much negates these types of problems I would think unless you are driving/aquaplaning over a prolonged distance (e.g., a few hundred metres) in which case I think cruise is the least of your worries.

I've never had a problem with cruise in the wet. The same problem could be said to happen if on non-cruise, you aquaplaned, took your foot off the pedal, and the revs went down, and then wanted to pick up speed quickly at the end.

I don't think the OPs story makes sense - unless the cruise was not linked to speed but RPMs - because it's unlikely your speed would slow that much anyway over some brief motorway style aquaplaning, so when past it, the cruise would still see you are at 100kph. If it did lose traction ESP would have kicked in.

What type of car was it and what type of cruise control and what was the driver's response? I think matters a lot in this case.

On whether it's useful, I think it's great on long journeys. The cruise puts a little more power on when going up hills to maintain progress and so on, which saves over acclerating and then braking, etc., .

 

[MBManInKen]

I thought EU law now made abs mandatory on all new cars.............or am i wrong..

I'm not a specialist in EU law. I think that the 2007 new rules only mandate abs for commercial vehicles, but I don't really know for sure what the exact facts are.

But that does not even matter: a lot of legislation is reactive, i.e. it responds to a societal reality. The reality is that abs had become commonplace long before the legislator got into it.

Additionally, legislation and regulation are subject to various tests in terms of practical and economic feasibility and sustainability: abs would not be made a legal obligation if that was economically untenable.

 

[Diesel Benz]

But it won't be. Any more than auto or cruise are standard. Not enough people want it or to pay for it. TV Malcolm loves it. I would pay extra not to have it. My wife and my brother don't even know what it is. Forget it. It will die or remain an 'interesting' extra for the few.

Whereas Parktronic really is useful and people do want it, and many choose it and are happy to pay for it. Now that could become standard.

Auto and cruise ARE standard on most (many) MBs already. Distronic cruise takes some time to become standard but it already is available for an average VW! It is coming to all cars and the price is dropping rapidly.

Distronic may not be convenient when braking at specific situations, it does not have the crystal ball after all. Still, I would consider the standard cruise a lot more inconvenient, if not dangerous if the driver did not interact when one driving a lot slower appears in front

PS. I assume TV means every extra that would be available for his car from the factory. This is what I am aiming too, when I grow up, or get retired. At least I already have a plan to start with the nice valve caps

 

[television]

If fitted to all cars as standard this price would soon fall..............

Distronic only consist of two thing plus the read out in the display.

You have the radar sensor in the Star and that has a plastic cover on it, though the sensor is fixed to the Radiator support, and the control box coupled with a coaxial led.

Yes the price will crash before long as all of these things do

 

[hawk20]

Distronic only consist of two thing plus the read out in the display.

You have the radar sensor in the Star and that has a plastic cover on it, though the sensor is fixed to the Radiator support, and the control box coupled with a coaxial led.

Yes the price will crash before long as all of these things do

Bet you a pint. The price of auto and cruise has never crashed. In fact at £1390 on the A class, I thought how dear it still is. And that is an option which lots of people choose unlike Distronic.

 

[television]

Bet you a pint. The price of auto and cruise has never crashed. In fact at £1390 on the A class, I thought how dear it still is. And that is an option which lots of people choose unlike Distronic.

Like for like please.

An auto box has over 1000 machined parts, the component cost on Distonic is under £10 and I could make one for that, excluding the display.

I only paid £8.50 for the last batch of DVD players and there is far more in them than distronic.

When I got quotes from the far East for an invention of mine, the up front tooling cost was £10,000 and the units 500 off were £12.00 each, for a world market and 500,000 the price was £3.00 and 1 million price £2.00

 

[crockers]

The price of auto and cruise has never crashed. In fact at £1390 on the A class, I thought how dear it still is. And that is an option which lots of people choose unlike Distronic.

As a matter of interest how much is a replacement automatic transmission plus labour versus the cost of a replacement manual plus labour? That may give some indication as to why autos cost more.

I had an Audi 80 2.6 auto from new - after 2 and half years needed a new auto box - best part of £3,000 fitted - thank god it was a company car...

 

[eurico]

There is no doubt in my mind that one of the greatest motoring pleasures is the wolf in sheep's clothing. You remind me of an old Riley 1.5 I had in the late sixties, which friends and I tuned up to go like stink. Huge fun. Then the Cortina GT came out and boy did that go! Made our efforts look nothing.

No, no, no! It wasn't a wolf in sheep's clothing. It was a bloody menace to society with two lads that didn't know what fear was at the wheel. Think of it as a circus tyranossaurus kept by two fools. For you to have an idea: the chassis was so old and rusty that in the first week it broke and when floored, the front beams would spread apart and at least one half-shaft would get loose. Solution: as one would pull it up by the wheel arch, the other would kick the wheel hard enough to realign everything! This happend about everytime we picked on some poor sod proud of his escort, golf or astra, stroling his girfriend on a sunny saturday afternoon.

 

[Dryce]

Bet you a pint. The price of auto and cruise has never crashed. In fact at £1390 on the A class, I thought how dear it still is. And that is an option which lots of people choose unlike Distronic.

I don't think there is a huge demand for cruise control as a lot of people probably don't care or don't drive in conditions where it is seen as beneficial. So for those who want it in an 'ordinary' car it may continue to be a premium product.

 

[MBManInKen]

The price of auto and cruise has never crashed.

What nonsense. On my W126 in the 80s, both were optional, and fairly pricey. On my current s-class, both are standard. I think CC is now standard on most benzes.

 

[glojo]

What nonsense. On my W126 in the 80s, both were optional, and fairly pricey. On my current s-class, both are standard. I think CC is now standard on most benzes.

We have had it on our last two Sprinters.

Regards
John

 

[Dryce]

What nonsense. On my W126 in the 80s, both were optional, and fairly pricey. On my current s-class, both are standard. I think CC is now standard on most benzes.

MB's are up market. S are up market MBs.

If you want CC on mid/lower market cars then it's either not available at all or usually only on the higher equipped models.

Despite the fact that most MBs sold are auto it's an option and not standard equipment on most models.

 

[television]

MB's are up market. S are up market MBs.

If you want CC on mid/lower market cars then it's either not available at all or usually only on the higher equipped models.

Despite the fact that most MBs sold are auto it's an option and not standard equipment on most models.

On the New C Class its standard with the auto box and an extra on almost all of the others

 

[MBManInKen]

Dryce: You're missing my point. Yes, s-classes are the top of the range. However, what were once expensive options on an s-class, first became standard on later versions of that same s-class (think abs or esp for example, in addition to CC), then trickled through as more and more standard features across the other model classes.

Core technology is becoming more and more general-purpose and software defined in terms of behaviour. At one point, including CC will require nothing more than adding the physical switch, the rest being purely a matter of software.

 

[Dryce]

On the New C Class its standard with the auto box and an extra on almost all of the others

It was an £1100 option when I last tried the online configuratior

 

[Dryce]

Core technology is becoming more and more general-purpose and software defined in terms of behaviour. At one point, including CC will require nothing more than adding the physical switch, the rest being purely a matter of software.

True. I think that with modern cars that position nhas already been reached. Citroen seem to be quite willing to throw it in fairly low down on the C4.

However it's still being used as a differentiator between upper and lower spec models in most ranges.

 

[television]

It was an £1100 option when I last tried the online configuratior

I read it from the latest sales book that I picked up Tuesday

it says

Cruise Control (Standard with Automatic transmission) and a fixed standard on the C320CDI,C280,C350

I do not have the price list