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Team - i am not sure if this is working right... is there a way to 'test' the emergency brake assist (collision avoidance)....? I dont think mine is working right on the W213. With the P3 package, it drives good ONLY with the cruise control turned on and set, the moment we manually apply brakes, everything is gone.... while on cruise control, i have seen that "MOST" of the times the brakes apply as it needs to, but at times it does not(dang!!)
I think the only way to really test the Active Brake Assist is to get a blow up balloon and see if it detects it.
How else would you safely test it without crashing the car if the system did not work?
I'm pretty sure that how NCAP around the world do their test.
Active Brake Assist only triggers if it detects a possible collision and you are not applying the brakes quick enough or hard enough. Under normal circumstances you will never experience it. For example mine engaged the other week, because some knucklehead unexpectedly performed a panic stop ahead of a highway exit because they didn't know where the heck they were going, so my reaction wasn't quick enough and Active Brake Assist applied the brakes before I had a chance. So, the only way to "test" it is to play Russian roulette and force such a situation. Obviously not something you wanna do on public roads and instead wanna use dummy obstacles somewhere on a test course. However, you can't just use any obstacle as the camera system recognizes and differentiates between cars, pedestrians and cyclists. So you have to use obstacles that resemble one of them, otherwise it may not operate as expected.
DISTRONIC slowing down if traffic ahead slows down is not the Active Brake Assist. That's just DISTRONIC doing its thing, and if you step on the brakes while DISTRONIC is engaged, it will automatically disengage, so obviously no longer slowing down for you. Also, DISTRONIC has a maximum deceleration rate of about 50% of the possible brake force. If it detects that it can't slow down enough on its own, then you get an acoustic alert to help it by stepping on the brake pedal. I'm assuming Active Brake Assist would kick in as well in that situation if you don't help it along, but I never dared to try.
thank you very much for the detailed reply, and others as well thank you. Let me enjoy the car for a few more days, and i will test it in test conditions with may be a balloon or something softer than that, i don't want my car to get hurt
The thing to remember about all these systems is that they are just assistance systems. The driver is ultimately responsible for driving and stopping the car, so these systems are designed to not override the driver. The best among them, and I count the MB systems part of that, are those that stay out of your way and only intervene if they really need to. These are complex systems, and the best of them not only observe the surroundings, but also the inputs from the driver and run complex algorithms and AI systems to determine if they should intervene. So for example the MB Active Brake Assist doesn't intervene if it sees you doing an evasive maneuver. Your Acura may simply be less sophisticated and patronizes the driver by intervening before it really needs to. Just think about it. The car should never slam on the brakes because of a balloon for example. A balloon poses no danger.
Last edited by superswiss; 12-02-2021 at 04:55 PM.
I've had my 2019 E450 wagon since February, and had it "kick in" only twice:
1) I was on a 2 lane road and the car in front of me was turning right onto a side street. I knew I would clear their bumper, wasn't even close, but the car applied the brakes, and made a sound.
2) In a sharp left hand curve, an oncoming car that was going above the speed limit, came into my lane, and my car applied the brakes, as I was veering off to the right.
Not sure if it is the same system but I have experienced emergency brake a handful times now when I go backwards in a narrow environment. It is clear but he system put full brake on suddenly with alarms and sound. Scary as hell and you are convinced that you have hit something. Takes a while to calm down😬
While driving on an empty road at ~30MPH with no one near me mine initiated a panic stop. Luckily no one was behind me. It won't happen again, as I disabled that feature.
While driving on an empty road at ~30MPH with no one near me mine initiated a panic stop. Luckily no one was behind me. It won't happen again, as I disabled that feature.
I have a 2017 with P3 package and the only thing I have even had was beeping if I am close to another car and don’t apply my brakes. I have never had active brake assist work on its own. Even Distronic Plus will only apply brakes if you are traveling at a low speed with a car ahead of you, which is unfortunately how it was designed to work
I am pretty sure someone or all these issues have been resolved in newer models. I have spent enough money on this one with on 30,000 miles on it, so for the 1st time in over 30 years I will be keeping a car longer than 3 years regardless of weather I have leased or purchased
I still love the car even more than when I 1st purchased it. This is also a 1st and one of my reasons for keeping it not to mention all the software updates and features I have had installed
That's the only application I've had, too. While parallel parking, the car gets confused by all the leaves by the curb and slams on the brakes. First time it happened, I assumed it was the tires hitting the curb – just assumed I'd really messed up the parking job. It wasn't until the third time that I made the connection that 1.) the rear tires were at least six inches from the curb (per the 360º camera) and 2.) that was way harsher than a tire slowly connecting with a curb. I just slow down a bit more when there are leaves now, and it doesn't kick in.
Despite the startling nature of it, I keep it on – rather be safe (not scrape up this beautiful car) than sorry.
I drive a 2021 S450 (for a few months now) and have already experienced this Active Braking Assist twice. For both times, I was driving on a 2-lane city road with low traffic around 15 km/hr (~10 mph). For the 1st time, a pedestrian approached from the middle of the pedestrian walkway to the kerb, probably to hail an incoming taxi from behind. The ABA must have interpreted him to be about to jump in front of the car and applied brakes abruptly. Car stopped about 1 metre from him, him being still standing at the edge of the kerb. For the 2nd time, an express delivery man was walking actually on the road and was about half a metre from the kerb, and, I planned to side pass him by pulling slightly to the other lane. I applied the brake slightly to further decrease the speed and, at this moment, ABA must have interpreted me planning to make a full stop and so it applied brakes abruptly.
I had full understanding of the environment as well as the control of the car in both incidents. So, activation of the ABA totally surprised me as I did not expect any need to intervene. I thought I had really hit something for the first time as there was a very loud noise. I stopped the car and quickly checked around and saw no damage and realized later that it was the ABA being in use.
What worries me is that I was, perhaps, lucky as there was no car behind me as these 2 sudden full stops might cause me being rear-ended. For this reason, I am still debating whether I should keep this ABA feature enabled or disabled.
Regardless, I wish Mercedes would make an improvement:- Whenever this feature is used, a flashing message (eg. ABA has just been used) should come up briefly in the front Driver Display (or the Central Display) to inform the driver.
I completely agree with the need for a message. There's a balance between overwhelming a driver with too much data and confusing the driver with too little, and Mercedes is hard in the latter with their Active Brake Assist.
I completely agree with the need for a message. There's a balance between overwhelming a driver with too much data and confusing the driver with too little, and Mercedes is hard in the latter with their Active Brake Assist.
Yes, when a technology is being used, it should let the driver know what is going on. Even if a message does not show up in the Display at that moment, it could be stored in a 'Message folder' where the driver can go into the Settings to check what has recently happened. This could be called 'Mercedes Message Assist' (ie MMA).
Perhaps the system doesn't work as well in all models judging from some of the false positives reported, but there certainly is a message in the instrument cluster when it engages. At least I'm getting the following one in my C63S. Similarly, the rear cross traffic alert displays a warning triangle in the corner of the 360 camera. Both warnings are accompanied by an acoustic alert as well.
Perhaps the system doesn't work as well in all models judging from some of the false positives reported, but there certainly is a message in the instrument cluster when it engages. At least I'm getting the following one in my C63S. Similarly, the rear cross traffic alert displays a warning triangle in the corner of the 360 camera. Both warnings are accompanied by an acoustic alert as well.
Now that you mentioned this, I went back to check the User Manual and, indeed, your warning message should come up for my model too. However, I do not recall seeing it. But now, I just read the Manual further that there is a so-called ''Warning Assistance'' feature that its effects can be enabled/disabled. I wonder if mine is disabled, thus not showing any message/warning when the ABA was engaged.
Edit:
Mine should come up with the following:-
I did a quick test today. When approaching a slower moving car in the front of me to a certain close distance, the triangle warning red sign did show up (red-circled in the pic) with an audible beeping warning. This is good!
I suppose the entire red rectangle should come up if ABA is triggered to stop the car completely.
But I do not think one ever showed up. Granted that it might have come up for a brief few seconds and I could have missed that (as I was paying full attention to the surrounding rather than to the Driver Display). That is why I hope there is a Message folder where it stores all the messages so that the driver can go back into to check what has happened earlier.
Last edited by bishop64; 12-10-2021 at 04:42 AM.
Reason: Adding content under Edit
You are kind of busy when it shows up since it is pretty much happening when you get the message. No room for delays making sure you noted it.
I am happy with it since it is statistics after all:
- If it brakes and avoids an accident - fantastic
- If it brakes without any reason without any accident - absolutely acceptable in the rate I have seen. Normally you get an warning before, only situations for me driving the car since 2016 is when going backwards without a foot on brake pedal (didn’t have time to move it to brake pedal). All other incidents have been with audiable warnings before correctly more brake power
- If it brakes without any reason creating an accident with e rear ending - you have to have a car close to your end which is not the case all times.
Now that you mentioned this, I went back to check the User Manual and, indeed, your warning message should come up for my model too. However, I do not recall seeing it. But now, I just read the Manual further that there is a so-called ''Warning Assistance'' feature that its effects can be enabled/disabled. I wonder if mine is disabled, thus not showing any message/warning when the ABA was engaged.
Edit:
Mine should come up with the following:-
I did a quick test today. When approaching a slower moving car in the front of me to a certain close distance, the triangle warning red sign did show up (red-circled in the pic) with an audible beeping warning. This is good!
I suppose the entire red rectangle should come up if ABA is triggered to stop the car completely.
But I do not think one ever showed up. Granted that it might have come up for a brief few seconds and I could have missed that (as I was paying full attention to the surrounding rather than to the Driver Display). That is why I hope there is a Message folder where it stores all the messages so that the driver can go back into to check what has happened earlier.
I'm not aware of an accessible event history for the safety features. I think once ABA releases the brakes and hands control over back to you or the situation clears, the warning disappears shortly after. I don't have the HUD, but it might also display the warning in the HUD. Generally, I catch the warnings in my peripheral vision, or I glance down and see it. But also, once you have experienced it, it's pretty clear what's happening.
One more comment, though, regarding false positives that just occurred to me. ABA and all the safety systems get more advanced if the car is optioned with the Driver Assistance Package. There's a basic level that comes with the car, but with DAP they become more sophisticated, and likely more reliable and accurate. One reason for that is with DAP, the car has a stereo camera up in the windshield, whereas w/o it there's only a single camera and DAP also adds the forward facing radar sensor for DISTRONIC, which also acts as an additional input for ABA etc. Therefore with DAP, ABA can for example distinguish between moving and stationary pedestrians and cyclists to make false positives less likely. I have DAP in my car, so for example I get a warning if it detects a pedestrian waiting to cross the road, but it doesn't slam on the brakes if there are pedestrians or cyclists nearby, unless they enter my path. W/o DAP, ABA is limited to only a single camera to detect objects, and therefore has no depth perception, so it can't tell how far away an object is or whether its really in your path or off to the side just enough.
I'm not aware of an accessible event history for the safety features. I think once ABA releases the brakes and hands control over back to you or the situation clears, the warning disappears shortly after. I don't have the HUD, but it might also display the warning in the HUD. Generally, I catch the warnings in my peripheral vision, or I glance down and see it. But also, once you have experienced it, it's pretty clear what's happening.
One more comment, though, regarding false positives that just occurred to me. ABA and all the safety systems get more advanced if the car is optioned with the Driver Assistance Package. There's a basic level that comes with the car, but with DAP they become more sophisticated, and likely more reliable and accurate. One reason for that is with DAP, the car has a stereo camera up in the windshield, whereas w/o it there's only a single camera and DAP also adds the forward facing radar sensor for DISTRONIC, which also acts as an additional input for ABA etc. Therefore with DAP, ABA can for example distinguish between moving and stationary pedestrians and cyclists to make false positives less likely. I have DAP in my car, so for example I get a warning if it detects a pedestrian waiting to cross the road, but it doesn't slam on the brakes if there are pedestrians or cyclists nearby, unless they enter my path. W/o DAP, ABA is limited to only a single camera to detect objects, and therefore has no depth perception, so it can't tell how far away an object is or whether its really in your path or off to the side just enough.
Good to know this Driving Assistance Package. My car comes with Driving Assistance Package Plus. Not sure what this 'Plus' adds to the basic version.
I now reckon, instead of reading a few sections, I need to read the entire 600-page User Manual, systematically page by page from cover to cover. Per your mentioning, there are really a lot of technology integration among various packages. Eg I have Active Ambient Light Package which, when enabled, give additional warnings (audio and visual) in the Central Display.
Looks like it will be a lot of reading during the Christmas and New Year holidays.
Good to know this Driving Assistance Package. My car comes with Driving Assistance Package Plus. Not sure what this 'Plus' adds to the basic version.
I now reckon, instead of reading a few sections, I need to read the entire 600-page User Manual, systematically page by page from cover to cover. Per your mentioning, there are really a lot of technology integration among various packages. Eg I have Active Ambient Light Package which, when enabled, give additional warnings (audio and visual) in the Central Display.
Looks like it will be a lot of reading during the Christmas and New Year holidays.
It's a bit of a different bundling in some models and additional safety system for lateral collisions.
11-30-2021, 09:20 AM
Active brake assist
