Autonomous driving is here and it’ll be here to stay, albeit some less than stellar feedback from car enthusiast. We’d still think that driving an automobile is an experience best felt by being fully in control but they’re obviously perks to being able to have the ability to control your vehicle autonomously or through a remote.
Pushing the boundaries of driving autonomously, the multi-talented UK based research team from Land Rover have been prototyping technology that allows you to move around your huge SUV or off-road beast, through fiddling with on-screen controls on your smartphone.
Usher your Multi-point turn enabled Range Rover in a relatively controlled environment at a max speed of 4mph and manoeuvre your way through tight situations. Handing you controls for steering, breaks and accelerator, you’ll be able to be outside your car as you carefully move it around challenging terrain or hard to see parking situations – taking bad viewing angles out of the equation.
Land Rover researchers also programmed the Multi-point turn technology to give those manning the virtual wheels the controls to adjust high and low range, angling the car in just the right manner to get around.
It doesn’t stop there, as these in-built sensors on the car will apparently work in all weather conditions and environments, always enabling you to get yourself out of a tight spot, if need be. There are some limitations, such as range, when considering that you’ll only be able to “command” the car from a distance of 10 metres, all while your smartphone and smart keys are in close proximity.
The team of researchers have also developed technology that allows you to turn your car a full 180-degrees in a tight spot; basically conducting a three-point turn. A much dreaded manoeuvre for anyone’s that has been in the driver seat of a large vehicle.
Although other carmakers have already started implementing some of these options, it’ll be interesting to see how the idea of controlling your car from your smartphone’s will run along. It won’t please any motorheads but given the notion, it might be pretty cool.
