Hands on -- and off -- with the Audi A8's Level 3 self-driving system

id="article-body" class="row" section="article-body"> It figures. You spend your whole life trying to avoid something ubiquitous, and when there's finally a reason to seek it out, it's nowhere to be found. <br> <br> <br> <br> That's the conundrum that engineer Daniel Lepczyk and I are facing as our 2019 Audi A8 prototype slips onto the motorway around the western German cities of Dusseldorf and Essen. We're hunting for traffic jams. The heavily populated region is famous for them, but on this overcast morning, traffic is thick, yet it moves freely. We're seeking out bottlenecks because the vehicle we're in is poised to become the world's first production car capable of Level 3 autonomy, and it needs gridlock to strut its stuff. <br> <br> <br> <br> In this case, the A8's "stuff" is Traffic Jam Pilot, a conditionally automated system that allows for completely hands-free driving in specific conditions. Necessary parameters for operation boil down to a divided highway with a center barrier (think: metal guardrails or concrete dividers), clear lane markings, no pedestrians or traffic lights, and speeds of under 60 kmh -- 37 mph to us Yanks. Like countless other cities around the world, such conditions are an everyday rush-hour occurrence in Germany, but since it's a Friday, traffic is a bit thinner than ideal.<br> <br> <br> <br> Enlarge ImageThe 2019 A8 aims to be the industry's first Level 3 self-driving automobile on sale.<br> <br> <br> <br> Audi It's an unusual mission, actively seeking out and driving towards a phenomenon that normal motorists intentionally flee. "In this way, we are like tornado hunters," says Lepczyk, an automated driving development engineer. Sadly, I'm not able to get behind the wheel and ferret out traffic jams for myself, as it's against local regulations (Lepczyk has a special license granting him permission to test this prototype on public roads). My time will come later, on a special closed course at an airfield.<br> <br> <br> <br> Having some downtime as we cruise Germany's concrete arteries proves to be helpful, as it gives my host time to walk me through Traffic Jam Pilot's various attributes. One of 41 different assist systems in our full-size luxury bruiser, TJP makes use of a dizzying array of sensors to enable enough self-driving to blunt the drudgery and stress of bumper-to-bumper freeway traffic. Not only does the system constantly monitor traffic maps and the vehicle's position through its 4G LTE connection, its hardware array includes no fewer than:<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> 12 ultrasonic parking sensors with 3 meters of range to detect immediately nearby objects<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> Four 360-degree cameras, one on each side<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> Four midrange radar sensors (70 meter distance)<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> One long-range radar (240 meters) offset in the front fascia<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> One forward-facing monovision camera mounted ahead of the rearview mirror<br> <br> <br> <br> <br> <br> One 140-degree lidar sensor in the front bumper that scans 200 meters down the road.<br> <br> <br> <br> If you liked this article and you would certainly such as to obtain more info relating to Estudio Profesional de Tatuajes y Piercing - https://www.instagram.com/shangrila_vitacura kindly see our internet site.