Self Driving Trucks Licensed in Nevada

[ddnut]

Daimler’s self driving truck Freightliner Inspiration in Nevada become the world´s first licensed autonomous heavy-duty truck allowed to use public roads. The Freightliner truck will stay in its lane and avoid hitting cars ahead with no driver input. Trucks like this could reduce driver fatigue, according to Freightliner executives, and allow drivers to be more productive.

Automated trucks could also save fuel by driving in "platoons." In this scenario, automated trucks, communicating with one another electronically, could drive in a tightly packed line behind a lead truck. This would have huge aerodynamic benefits because only the truck in front would have to push through a lot of air.

 

[niko]

Cool looking truck.

 

[DT MI]

...
Automated trucks could also save fuel by driving in "platoons." In this scenario, automated trucks, communicating with one another electronically, could drive in a tightly packed line behind a lead truck....

Great..., just what we need on the road - a mile long line of trucks following one another nose to tail (and a little old lady trying to pass them by driving 1 MPH faster than they are). 🙁😡

 

[kamkar]

Yeah i am wondering how overtaking is going to be done in the future, but then again the trains of automated cars and trucks ( to minimize drag ) will proberly be going at max speed, and therefor here it will be illigal to overtake as you would have to break the speed limit for that.
Anyway if i am not driving i will be in the back seat with a entertainment center and a single malt in my hands 😀

Just imagine when ppl no longer will have to factor in the drinking & drug use with ther need for driving a car or truck, i forsee a lot of hammered ppl slumped in a seat driving around in the future.
Lets just hope the windows in future dont go down to allow for drunken or just bored duchebags taunting a simmilar guy in the car behind or in front, road rage will take a whole new meaning.

 

[Sabe]

Easy life to modern day highway robbers,
all you have to do is stand in the middle of the road and computer driver will stop truck.

 

[kamkar]

Indeed,
Stand and deliver !

Then again the trucking company that own the truck might have good evidence against you, film/pictures from several angles, and a full radar scan of your body,,, and then some i guess.

And i assume future traffic management systems will rapport a unscheduled stop in traffic at once, as this can only be the result of a crash, either physical or of computers.

 

[Sabe]

Yes but all you have to do is wrap hole truck in tin foil and all tracking is impossible after that, but i think first you have to rob a truck containing tin foil cargo.
Adam & The Ants was/is my kind of music.

 

[dash riposki]

They can't keep idiots from running into the google self-driving cars, which are fairly tiny.
how do you think this is going to work out?
If they want to this sort of thing, they should put the trucks on RR tracks.
Oh wait, I forget the RR tracks in USA generally SUCK.
Never mind. 🙂

 

[kamkar]

Yeah its funny how you guys do it, first you build railroads that helped build the US, then came the interstate roads and truks helped buld the US even more.
And now the rails are in a bad state, and the trucks will be left to them self.

I am not sure but dident the Danish Maersk shipping buy / build ther own cross country ( US ) railroad.

EDIT: not that i am pointing fingers, its about the same here in this little country, even our slow diesel trains have to drive extra slow some places due to the poor state of our rails.

And dont get me started on the state of some of our roads 🙄

Allso just learned today, when some countries buy grain from EU they specify, NO DANISH GRAIN, aparently the stuff we grow is so poor "poo" no one want to eat it. 🙁

 

[dash riposki]

The trains here pretty much suck. Except for a few routes, in certain corridors, passenger service doesn't really exist.

Here's a typical US railroad line...

🙂

 

[kamkar]

Traks seem so overgrown it might be a good idea to change to steam again, and then burn some of the countryside to keep the tracks clear.

Get some of those 4-8-8-4 running again 😎

 

[Sabe]

Yeah its funny how you guys do it, first you build railroads that helped build the US, then came the interstate roads and truks helped buld the US even more.
And now the rails are in a bad state, and the trucks will be left to them self.

USA is like ancient Rome was, they are spending all their money fighting all over far away and home base keeps falling down, so what will happen to USA...read that from history books...😉

 

[mike-k]

Ohhh guys,
don't complain 'bout old ladies overtaking with 1mph more than the trucks...

Last year (unfortunatly before i bought my DC), I've been on (Swiss) Highway, overtaking a whole Tank-Platoon (about 10 Leopard-Tanks) - at a local Speed-Limit of 80km/h (due to "working not in progress")...

Tanks were driving about 70 due to the roadworks, I tried overtaking with 80... Behind me, Ambulance closing in with police-escort... So the adventure began: as I was not allowed to drive faster - so the tank-column made space for me and my car...

I tell you: if you had the chance of driving IN a Tank-Column WITHOUT sitting on the wheel of a Tank, you'll never mind a "Elefantenrennen" (Elephant-Race) - so we call the "1km/h faster-Overtakers" (normaly if a Truck overtakes a Truck) - again ;-)

But the Selfdriving-Trucks reminds me of an SciFi-Movie from mid90s... (maybe someone can help me out for the Title) Situation: Earth dried out due to Solar activity... An old Soldier and a Cadet try to reach a Place, by kidnapping - did you guess it? A "RoboTruck", a self driving truck... To do this, the Cadet had to stand in the way of the RoboTruck, who's been under the "Asimov's Law" (never hurt a human beeing)... I wonder what would happen if you stand in the way of a "GoogleTruck" (will it google the Number of the next hospital for you? 😉

Movie itself kinda sucked... But it's intresting: Hollywood always knows what happens about 20 years later... (Watch some old B-Movies and you'd think they've been shooting last week... And it's been SciFi back then (I don't mean technology only, also sociological stuff))

 

[kamkar]

I remember beeing in and out of a collum of ( i think ) Centurion tanks when i was a kid, but my mother driving the 1300 ccm Morris did a good job on that.

That movie ( i think ) is right on the tip of my tounge mike-k, but sadly it dont seem to get any longer.

 

[SawMaster]

Today's airliners normally fly themselves from just after take-off to just prior to landing. Normally they do it very well- but those times when things go wrong it often has very bad results. And that is where there's plenty of room in every direction, not limited room only in the level geometric plane. The airliners have two very highly trained pilots overseeing things; solo car and truck drivers are a sad joke in comparison. Airlines have National legal protections to prevent the dozens of lawsuits which would come resulting from a sensor failure with a poor design; you can't sue outside of the airline (if even that much is allowed) and they have huge insurance. No such limitations apply to road vehicles, insurance requirements are low, so you could sue dozens of companies for being complicit in a crash- and soon the Courts would be so overloaded that they could no longer function.

Just because something can be done is not often a good enough reason to actually do it. Maybe someday, but for now self-driving vehicles are not ready for prime time, nor is the average driver.

Phil

 

[kamkar]

Yeah its allready proven that the automation of airplanes is not allways good, and that is not a new thing, it bagan decades ago when pilots became too complacent.

There is a saying. Things will get worse before they get better.