[Dengine]

A couple of nights back I was on the highway with ACC engaged and I proceeded to change lanes to pass slower traffic. ACC was still on and as I approached more slowing traffic in the passing lane, the ACC system failed to slow down resulting in me slamming on the brakes to avoid rear ending traffic.
I then notice that the ACC system is displaying an empty vehicle icon even though there are vehicles in front of me. Obviously this renders the system absolutely useless, and more importantly dangerous. I would think that If the system was not able to see vehicles in front, it would trigger some fail safe immediately and disable the system. It was not until the next stop/start cycle that the system triggered a warning about the vehicle assist systems and none of them were functionla. It then returned to normal operation several minutes later.

I have seen some others having the system trigger errors and stop functioning until the next power cycle, but have not seen instances of the system failing to detect vehicles ahead. I could have rear ended someone while trusting the ACC system to slow down as expected.

Anyone else have experience like this? It scared the out of me.

 

[therkilt]

I've had my 2018 through one winter now and there were a number of times where I was driving with ACC engaged and it started snowing and after a while snow built up on the sensor and it would drop cruise and say it was obstructed but once or twice it didn't do that fast enough and I had to slow the car when it failed to see a vehicle in front of me. A few times the obstruction went away without having to turn the car off and back on just depended on the weather. I haven't had that happen while I was driving outside of snow though. I also had it slip on the ice as it was accelerating from a stop light and it dropped out of ACC back to manual and said something about loss of traction. All nice features, but I definitely try not to let any of it (ACC, lane keep assistance, ...) lul me into taking my attention from the road. The lane keep assistance also will frequently loose track of the lanes (snow or just old paint) and very quietly chirp to let you know that it is no longer helping to steer. Also if you are approching someone stopped or going much slower than you it may not react in time as it doesn't sense vehicles until they are about 120 yards out and then it takes a few seconds for it to start slowing usually.

 

[Fired00d]

Not to make light of this system failure, however.... Unfortunately in the automated age we live in we have become too dependent on features like the ACC. We still need to drive as if these systems aren't available (IE: cover brake when approaching slower traffic) as we were taught to drive. Anything electronic will fail and most times it will fail at the wrong time. As much as we like and enjoy the technology in cars today we still need to remember the basics of defensive driving.

 

[NH Guy]

It should have scared you.
I can't understand why anyone would use a system that may well kill you.
Drive the car without using these 'aids'. If you use just the garden-variety cruise control and pay attention to what's happening around you, you'll be fine.

 

[Ash111]

I would never condone using these aids without paying attention at all times. Truth be told i was always apprehensive at first allowing the system to slow down and speed up on its own, and I would often intervene due to my paranoia of this very situation. The system worked flawlessly for me on many long trips in our CRV so over time and I became more confident in the system and looked forward to using it in the accord as well.

Its actually a great feature in stop and go
traffic and long highway trips.

I will definitely think twice about using it again after this incident though.

 

[Keyboard]

I agree with what @Fired00d said about the use of the driver-aided technology. These systems are doing their best to determine what's going on. Unfortunately, a fault such as what the OP experienced may happen from time to time.

I like all the new technology such as the ACC, and I'm not afraid to use them. However, I do prepare to disable a feature should it misread or fail to perform as expected.

For example, a few times while using Low Speed Follow, my car wasn't slowing down when approaching a stopped vehicle. (This usually occurs when coming off the apex of a hill). Not willing to test whether LSF would eventually detect the stopped vehicle, I simply applied the brakes ... collusion avoided!

I expect these system to get smarter and more reliable as time goes on, i.e., better decision making and less bugs.

 

[2veloce]

It should be noted with any weather such as rain, snow etc. CC or ACC should not be active. It is not safe to do so.

 

[[email protected]]

It happened to me couple times.
It happens when there's no car to track and then new car comes in the detection range but it fails to register and shows there's no car in front and fails to brake.
I had to do several panic stops.
I couldn't find much posts about it and not sure what dealer can do about this issue.

 

[LexisOwner]

It should have scared you.
I can't understand why anyone would use a system that may well kill you.
Drive the car without using these 'aids'. If you use just the garden-variety cruise control and pay attention to what's happening around you, you'll be fine.

I did disengage as much as I could of the assist bells and whistles. At first, the feature which finds you fighting with the steering wheel because you did not put on your turn signal. It scared me and then I found out when I had my Accord for only a little while that you have to turn on your signal light or the wheel will pull you back as if you are accidentally sliding out of the lane. Scared me because it felt as if I was fighting with the car by way of the steering wheel. A fellow Accord owner was kind enough to suggest when I had acceleration issues that my ACC was probably on. Unbeknownst to me it was and set 25 miles so whatever it was doing was because of that and I turned it off. Now, I do have and have not been able to turn off the feature which shows the big rectangle orange brake prompt and literally tries to make you brake. Sometimes there is no one in front me to or reason to brake. I do find myself cursing my vehicle out when driving longer than say 30 minutes as that coffee cup icon comes on to tell me I am tired or something. Not all the time is that accurate so I have been known to ignore it. I have noticed that when it rains or is cold outside, guess the camera can't see anything and has to warm up before it becomes functional again. I am not fluent in the car talk or in the official words for the features. I have only before this had Civics. 1999 and 2013 on the trade-in for this Accord. Some of the features bother me. Sometimes the telephone feature is wonky. However, since I am a child of the Jetsons, I only really like it sometimes when it is working well the feature of talking through the car. Still, have to access the cellphone buttons for calls that require you to press a choice for further assistance though. I wish there was a CD player instead of a need for a thumbnail drive for music also. No, I do not have a Pandora hookup. I just try to hope all the bugs are either just that or work themselves out before I hit 36000 or 3 years, whichever comes first. I am a little over 10000 miles now.

 

[Lippman]

I have 2018 Touring, been having numerous times this problems with my ACC. Getting the message "Collision mitigation braking system problem see your dealer" I just had it to the dealer last week, supposedly did the TSB 19-051 since then the message came up twice. I guess it's back to the dealer again. Has anyone found any iformation on the NHTSA web page?

 

[plefloch]

I've needed to restart the car twice to reset the "ACC not detecting obstacle" too. It's indeed a spooky sensation. However has been a many months (12?) since the last reset was required though. Does this car download Sense patches over the air on open Wifi?

 

[gboybama]

Like much of the software on my 2018 Accord, the safety features are half baked. I don't believe there is a mechanical malfunction, but multiple times, cruising with ACC engaged, the system has just completely failed and shut down for no good reason.

Most recently, I had a car pass me at high speed and veer in front of my car. The ACC seemed to "crash" as it disengaged, acceleration stopped and the system would not start back up. False positive tire pressure and check engine warning lights presented as well. After stopping the car at a gas station, checking the tire pressure manually, etc., there appeared to be no issue and the car started/rebooted with no problem.

I must ask, if the ACC can't handle a speeding object suddenly appearing in the lane in close proximity to the car, how safe is it to operate?

Anyway, this reminds me of the weird behavior of the rear/reverse camera. As far as I can tell, it had to be patched because it was often delayed in starting because the radio suite had to get through its startup process. They changed this, so engaging the reverse gear causes the rear camera to come on immediately and trump the radio boot-up. Guess what though, by doing that, they made the entertainment suite even more unstable than it already was. Any time I quickly start the car and throw it in reverse, causing the rear camera to take priority on the screen, none of my bluetooth devices will connect for the duration of the trip. I suspect the code they used to prioritize the rear camera during the startup process interrupts the proper startup of the media center, but who knows.

Add this in with the horribly glitchy way the front collision sensors sometimes freak out when I'm stopped in traffic, even though I'm 10 feet behind a stopped car. How about the climate control that needs constant adjustment or else the automatic algorithms will intermittently burn or freeze you out of the vehicle? What about the premium Touring sound system that seems tuned worse than my mom's 10 year old Buick? The dash rattles and rear deck rattles?

I'm really just scratching the surface here. There's endless press about how the current generation Accord is a driver's car and it's such a buttery smooth experience. I just don't see it. It's like the car was designed by aliens who had no idea what would make a person's life a little more easy. It's an over-engineered and cumbersome behemoth, IMO.

 

[gn842]

OK ...here is what a typical driver does. The traffic is a bit heavy. You're in the center lane of a three lane highway. You want to switch into the left "fast" lane. A spot opens up and you ease in behind another car.

Now, unless you are a chronic tail gater, the next thing you do is open up a bit more space between you and the car in front. But you're not a chronic tail gater because if you were you wouldn't be driving an Accord. You'd be in a huge mutha SUV. Anyhow, to open up the space you just take your foot off the gas. The car gradually slows and provides a "human" adjustment time. The people behind you can slow down without a violent adjustment.

Now if the ACC is on, when you slip in behind another car it's going to say: whoa! There's not enough space in front! And it will do something a human driver won't: It will hit the brakes to open up more distance. Because it can't tell whether you're hitting the brakes due to a sudden jam up ahead forcing the whole highway to slow down, or whether you just need to reposition. This braking is an "inhuman" adjustment and it always surprises the people behind you. It's not good.

You have a couple of options. One is to reduce to the minimum your following distance (the button is on the steering wheel). This will deal with most situations but even the minimum doesn't really do what you need, because sometimes your first second or two behind that car you're within ten feet or so which is less than even the minimum setting.

Your second option is to put your turn signal down, hit the "CANCEL" button on the steering wheel, change lanes, and drop back by taking your foot off the gas. In other words you have to accept that the ACC is not suited for this maneuver.

You can kill the lane change monitor by hitting "main." Then you're basically driving a car like in the old days.

Frankly I'm trying to make my peace with the lane change monitor. It encourages me to break the bad habit of not signaling a lane change. This is one of my weaknesses as a driver and I accept that I need to improve on that score (and a lot of other drivers too). The act of signaling also makes me pay attention as to whether someone is in the blind spot. (criminal that we don't have blind spot monitor as standard feature, it is the single most important electronic assist, IMO.

Yesterday I was on a four lane boulevard behind a car with ACC on. Moderately heavy traffic. The car in front of me, which my ACC had "acquired" via radar and was using to set the pace, changed in to the lane to the left while I stayed in the right. So this space opened up in front of me. A fairly large space. There was a car ahead but my radar did not "acquire" it. As we all came rolling up to a red light, my car accelerated! I didn't wait to see if it would figure out its mistake (accelerating towards a red light with a car in front of me, but not acquired by the ACC).

To conclude, it's a mistake to think that any of these features lets you off the hook for driving. One of the most critical functions of the ACC function is the CANCEL button. It's not there for occasional use. It's vital.

You can of course turn all of this stuff off but I have been, more than once, in situations where I was in danger of rear-ending someone, so I am trying to find a middle path where I use these options as an enhancement but not an excuse for not driving.

Greg N

 

[S2sailorlis]

I’m looking into an Accord and have been reading of many issues with the automated safety systems. Can you just turn all of the systems off permanently? Or does it reset to ”on” after each start? I don’t need the safety nonsense although blind spot is a nice feature....

 

[Fired00d]

I’m looking into an Accord and have been reading of many issues with the automated safety systems. Can you just turn all of the systems off permanently? Or does it reset to ”on” after each start? I don’t need the safety nonsense although blind spot is a nice feature....

I would say most (majority) of them will reset on a restart. I mentioned earlier in this thread as nice as all these safety features are we as drivers still need to be attentive and rely on our defensive driving tactics we were taught when learning to drive. IMO these features are just an "accessory" and not intended to take over driving our cars. If there were autonomous cars available in my lifetime that would drive for us I don't think I would be confident in letting it totally control the vehicle... anything mechanical/electrical/computerized will fail at any given time.

 

[Mspaulovich]

I have 2018 Touring, been having numerous times this problems with my ACC. Getting the message "Collision mitigation braking system problem see your dealer" I just had it to the dealer last week, supposedly did the TSB 19-051 since then the message came up twice. I guess it's back to the dealer again. Has anyone found any iformation on the NHTSA web page?

I reset it using the home fuction on steering wheel. It was under maint. Errors or something. I just pressed the clear or ok button and its been gone ever since