Mazda fails crash test demonstration: Japanese car maker suspends trials of automatic braking after potential customer injured in Japan.

Mazda's Smart City Brake Support system uses infrared and radar signals to automatically brake and avoid rear-end collisions at speeds under 30km/h.

by Andrew MacLean of www.drive.com.au

MAZDA has suspended public demonstrations of a high-tech safety feature following an accident in Japan where the occupants were injured.

The Japanese car maker issued a notification to cease customer test drives of vehicles fitted with its Smart City Brake Support system – which uses infrared and radar signals to automatically brake and avoid rear-end collisions at speeds under 30km/h – after a failure during a test drive of a CX-5 at a dealership in northern Tokyo.

The failure resulted in the vehicle colliding with a fence, injuring both passengers. Mazda has confirmed the potential customer suffered whiplash and the salesman has a broken arm. It is also actively working with the police as it investigates the cause of the accident.

Mazda's Smart City Brake Support system uses infrared and radar signals to automatically brake and avoid rear-end collisions at speeds under 30km/h.

As a consequence, Mazda has “decided to voluntarily suspend all such test drives until the cause of the accident has been established and countermeasures taken”.

It says it has provided its dealerships with clear guidelines on how to perform these demonstrations with a strict set of conditions that define elements such as the size, type and distance of the obstacle, the surrounding environment, vehicle speed and monitoring the actions of the driver.

“The circumstances and causes of this accident, including whether or not the demonstration test drive event… followed Mazda’s guidelines, will be revealed by the ongoing police investigation,” Mazda stated.

It claims this is the first reported instance of such a failure and that it has no reports of similar circumstances occurring on public roads.

Mazda Australia spokesman, Steve Maciver, told Drive that all local dealerships have been alerted to the issue, even though they are advised not to actively demonstrate the technology which has just been added to the popular compact SUV. Mazda's CX-5 has sold more than 16,000 units so far in 2013.

“This does not apply to Australia as we have not been participating in live demonstrations of the Smart City Brake Support system through our dealerships,” he said.

“We have obviously advised them of the situation and we are waiting on the outcome of the investigation, which will determine the circumstances under which this incident occurred, before offering any further correspondence.

“We are confident in the system and how it works, and watching carefully as to what happens from the investigation.

It is the not the first time an autonomous driving system, designed to override the driver, has failed in such a high-profile manner. A Volvo V60 SUV failed three from 12 tests while demonstrating its pedestrian avoidance technology at a media event in Sweden in 2010.

Source;
http://news.drive.com.au/drive/motor-news/mazda-fails-crash-test-demonstration-20131113-2xga3.html

Mazda SUV With Automatic Braking Crashes in Japan Drive Test

I am not putting this up to slag on Mazda, I put this up as a point to having driver input be the final thing needed when incorporating this kind of safety tech, sure -- alert us, but let the driver stop, this tech is capable of false positives (stopping when on a roundabout with parked cars on the inside part) or just not working.  Relying too much on a machine to decide what is best for us has potential for big consequences....

By Anna Mukai and Yuki Hagiwara - Nov 11, 2013

 

A Mazda Motor Corp. (7261) sport-utility vehicle equipped with an automatic-braking system crashed in Japan on Nov. 10 during a dealership test drive, injuring the driver and front-seat passenger, according to the police.

The Mazda CX-5 was being driven by a prospective buyer on the dealership’s parking lot when it crashed through a urethane barrier set up to demonstrate the SUV’s automatic braking feature, according to the Saitama Prefectural Police, which is investigating the accident. The customer suffered a neck injury while the dealership employee sitting in the front passenger seat fractured his arm, the police said.

Mazda is investigating the case and will cooperate with police if asked to, Makoto Watanabe, a spokesman for the Hiroshima, Japan-based automaker, said by phone today. The company can’t comment on whether there have been previous cases where the auto-brake system for the CX-5 didn’t work, he said.

“For any safety function, it’s impossible to be 100 percent free of accidents,” said Hiroshi Ataka, a Tokyo-based auto parts analyst at IHS Automotive. “These technical functions aren’t always the easiest to understand.”

Mazda, based in Hiroshima, Japan, fell 0.2 percent to 423 yen as of 10:25 a.m. in Tokyo trading. The benchmark Nikkei 225 (NKY) Stock Average rose 1.2 percent.

Automatic braking first appeared in premium brands and is part of a move toward automated driving systems that carmakers are developing to help reduce human error and accidents.

Car Communication

Toyota Motor Corp. (7203), the world’s largest automaker, said last month it will introduce systems in about two years enabling cars to communicate with each other to avoid collision.

“When it comes to automation technology for driving through tight curves and changing lanes, I really feel that Japan’s technology is the No. 1 in the world,” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Nov. 9, after riding in cars from Toyota, Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co. during test drives of their automatic safety technologies.

Mazda’s system, called Smart City Brake Support, uses a laser sensor to detect obstacles in front of the car to avoid or mitigate collisions by automatically applying the brakes, according to its website. If the driver speeds up when an obstacle is detected, the system is designed to sound an alert while curbing engine output to stop unintended acceleration.

The automaker offered the technology as an optional safety feature for an additional price in the CX-5 when the car was first introduced in February 2012, and made it a standard setting after the model was refreshed in Japan last month, according to Mazda.

Source (via www.autoblog.com);
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/print/2013-11-11/mazda-suv-with-auto-braking-crashes-during-test-drive-in-japan.html