Tweet
Delphi driverless car completes 3,400-mile road trip across the United States
10:14, 6 April 2015 By Olivia Solon
The car travelled from San Francisco to New York - and only needed human intervention on a 50-mile stretch
A self-driving car has completed the first ever road trip from one US coast to another.
The customised Audi SQ5, made autonomous by British company Delphi, left San Francisco on March 22.
It travelled 3,400 miles in a caravan of support cars across the country to New York City. The car was fully automated for 99% of the drive through 15 different states.
The car dealt with roundabouts, bridges, roadworks, tunnels and aggressive drivers through a range of weather conditions.
The car “performed remarkably well” according to Delphi's Jeff Owens.
n autonomous car from Delphi departs Treasure Island for a cross-country trip from San Francisco to New York City
The only time engineers took control of the car was over a 50-mile stretch when conditions were too unpredictable - there were unmarked lanes and heavy roadworks.
The car is packed with technology including four short-range radars, three vision based cameras, six 'lidars' (similar to radar), a localisation system, intelligence software algorithms and a full range of advanced drive assistance systems.
The engineers found that the on-board cameras occasionally malfunctioned when the sun was low in the sky.
"The knowledge obtained from this trip will help optimize our existing active safety products and accelerate our future product development, which will allow us to deliver unsurpassed automotive grade technologies to our customers," said Owens.
Comment