GregTR

This morning I played with the Park Assist feature and let it park my car at work. It did a perfect job with perpendicular parking. The system will park your car based on the surrounding cars and not based on the painted lanes. It automatically applies the brakes as needed throughout the maneuver.

As you can see in the image the green Honda, which parked there first, kind of screwed it up for everyone else involved:

T.H.Carrera

Greg you definitely need the illuminated star on that car !

hyperion667

^haha.....

damn that front end looks good from that vantage point Greg

GregTR

No can do, I have Distronic Plus !

ghstudio

I really should read my manual. I have parking assist but have no clue how to use it. I also can't find a way to kick under the trunk lid to open/close the trunk lid (I have keyless go). There are other mysteries that I'm trying to figure out without reading that million page manual

I come from a 2011 so I'm still putting on the cruise control every time I turn a corner....change is so difficult...

mleskovar

Looks OK to me. Not perfectly straight or centered but good enough. And aren't you assuming that there was no one there when he parked? A little holier than though.....aren't we

alsyli

But isn't that GregTR's point? It's perfect based on the Honda (which, truth be told, is more important than following the lines, I guess....).

Of course, the parking spot is rather large....

GregTR

The only person that assumed anything here was you. It was my co-worker and I went to him and told him jokingly that because of his parking performance and me using park assist my parking also looks all messed up. He is a technology buff (aren't we all) who appreciates stuff like Parktronic, he was the only one at the office who knew that my Ducati had dynamic shock absorbers and keyless ignition. Then I pointed out the the BMW, owned by a friend of mine, also parked crooked and the Honda owner said "Yeah, it's my fault, I was here first, the parking lot was empty, I just suck at parking".

So there was no assumption on my part, straight from the horse's mouth...

GregTR

Indeed, my point was that the park assist will center your car between the cars which already park there which may make you look like a douche who sucks at parking but minimizes the chances or door dings, well at least while getting out of the car.

The 2013 model needed 5ft width and 4.3ft extra length over the vehicle of the car for parallel parking. It could not perpendicular park and id did not work the brakes for you. The 2014 model only needs 3.3ft extra length for parallel parking and it needs an extra 20 inches on both sides so you need quite the roomy parking spot for it to work. I can do a lot better job myself but I think it can do better than the missus.

fintail

It does a good job paralleling the adjacent car. Fun motley mix there too - the new wagon, the E60 of questionable aesthetics with its wheels cranked, the everyday appliance of an mid 00s Accord, and a Nimitz-class ~69 (or 70, hard to tell from here) Sedan DeVille, which in Tejas probably has steer horns on the hood.

Although I've gotta say, if wifey can't do any better...well, that's actually pretty normal.

AErcen

Audi seem to have gone one step further.

stale-bread

I don't believe that's in a production vehicle for one moment. In underground garages the signal to the phone is non existent. And also no shopping mall or parking garage I frequent here in Boston has that much space between the lines. Let alone the car not knowing the layout of the garage unless the information was previously downloaded. In theory it would pull into the first handicap spot available? I'm not saying it couldn't work, but not quite yet with current technology.

BenzV12

Park assist did what it says it is going to do . I reckon it can pull out of the parking lot on it's own as well
BTW, '69 Caddy went beyond the lines Those cars are bigger than anything on the road minus semi trucks

hyperion667

my car gives me handjobs so there

GregTR

My multicontour seat only does the massage, no happy endings. Yours must have been a dealer installed option.

stale-bread

edspider

I try to use parking assist all the time. The hardest part is getting the system to acknowledge a spot for back in parking. You have to have your signal on so it knows what side to search. You have to drive well past the spot. Once under guidance, I am always nervous about trusting it, but it is always very accurate and dead centers my car between the two.

It is easier for it to spot parallel spots than back in spots. When it parallel parks it gets me about 6" from the curb, but it might just be aligning itself on the outside edge of the adjacent cars. I'm really not sure.

GregTR

You only have to have the signal on if you want to search the opposite side of the street. You don't need to have it on for the normal side (right for LHD, left for RHD countries)

"By default, Active Parking Assist only displays parking spaces on the frontpassenger side. Parking spaces on the driver's side are displayed as soon as the turn signal on the driver's side is activated. When parking on the driver's side, this must remain switched on until you acknowledge the use of Active Parking Assist by pressing the OK button on the multifunction steering wheel."

I haven't used it for parallel parking yet but for backing in, it does a perfect job. It's a bit freaky at first and you don't trust it but once you get used to it, it's a pretty standard procedure.

BenzE350

Technology is cool - but other than the novelty do you see yourself using this feature much - or simply parking by yourself?

GregTR

I got the system mainly for the sensors and the 360 cameras. Once the novelty wears off I'll either go back to parking myself or get so used to the park assist that I'll keep doing it anyway. We'll see which one it is. My wife is freaked out even when I use the Distronic, I'm not sure she'd ever use and trust the park assist by herself.

Squeegee

I've searched all over, including the manual, and can not find out how to use ParkTronic for perpendicular parking. All of the videos are for parallel parking. Any suggestions where to find more information. Many thanks.

GregTR

It's the same as the parallel. As long as the space is suitable it will park your car in it. The indicator in the dash will show a perpendicular spot and the car will back into the spot. The other day I actually managed to park with one smooth swoop instead of the usual two that it usually takes so if all the stars align it can park the car in one try perpendicular.

Having said that I also had a case at my work where I meant to perpendicular park and it completed a parallel park in front of the cars already perpendicular parking. No harm other than the failed parking job.

Here is a video on perpendicular parking:

Squeegee

Thanks for the info. Very cool. Too bad Mercedes doesn't provide any documentation on how this option (which cost quite a bit) actually works. I'm a terrible parker, especially when backing in. The video was very helpful, too. I'll have to try this out. This may make backing in easier than parking head first!

Is there a secret so that it identifies a perpendicular space? How far from the other cars should you be? If you are too close, you would need to make at least two swoops. Ideally it can detect a space with at a far enough distance to do it in a single swoop.

edspider

It really does work but it scares me. I get so nervous and just creep. So if their are other cars waiting for me I panic and abandon the spot.

I need to use it more and learn to trust it.

martinlarose

I have tried it when I first got my car. Worked perfectly the first 7 or 8 times and then major curb rash ...I then discovered that it lines up with the outside edge of the adjacent vehicles and so if one of those vehicles is a narrow one ...OUCH ... My bad