I’ve had a Honda for a year and a half with lane keeping, adaptive cruise control and automatic breaking. They’re convenient and I like them but I’m curious about their perceived and actual effectiveness. The only time that mine has braked was times that it actually wasn’t necessary.
Have your safety features prevented a wreck?
Poll coming.
My car has automatic low-speed braking among other things and while that hasn’t prevented a full wreck, it did once prevent me from nosing into my driveway gate at a few mph. Likely saved me a few hundred dollars in deductible replacing my front grill. And yes, I was being an idiot and was distractedly trying to do two things at once as I glided slowly to a stop/park without paying full attention.
I gotta say that while the lane/blind spot warnings are a nice safety feature, it is the rear-view camera/rear-view approach warning that I love. Oh and auto-dimming rear-view mirrors, love those things as well. Modern cars are just better in every way except aesthetic nostalgia - always nice to see that kinda progress in the world.
I’m old enough that the first thing I thought of was antilock brakes. When they first came out I didn’t think I would benefit from them, because I had learned to pump the brakes, which you aren’t supposed to do with antilock. When the time came that I needed them, they just worked. I stopped on a slick road in a distance I was sure was too short to avoid a collision.
But, to answer about a newer safety feature, I did have the automatic braking kick in when I had to stop short to avoid an accident when someone cut in front of me. It was a borrowed car, and I hadn’t stomped on the brake hard enough. The car kicked in and applied the brakes harder. I think it prevented an accident.
I also find the rearview camera extremely useful, once I got.used to it.
On the other hand, the borrowed car also had a lanekeeping assist. I hated it. I sometimes adjust lane position for defensive driving reasons. Always staying in my lane, but moving to one side or the other sometimes. The car sometimes fought me on those moves. So that feature got turned right off.
All my cars are too old for that fancy stuff but the AWD in the Subaru is freaking awesome so yeah. It’s a sure footed little creature and I appreciate its low drama handling of snow and ice.
My new (to me) jeep has proximity lights for backing in tight spaces, love 'em!
At work, One of our newer trucks also has a backup camera which is super helpful when you don’t even have a rear window.
The Boss drives a company owned luxury pickup with all the bells and whistles. During the busy season, I’m one of the few employees who gets to drive it when the need arises, it’s very nice and easy to get used to.
My jeep’s lights have helped avoid a bump here and there for certain and my bosses truck has blindspot warnings which also help out sometimes
Not at all but I’m driving a 2011 so what it has is really basic. On the other hand we had a brand-new loaner recently that almost caused several accidents; before I figured out how to turn it off the lane-departure-thingy almost put me into a line of parked cars and a wall in a construction zone. I had to park it and call for help (Hello Subaru? How do I stop this crazy thing?) before I could safely drive it anywhere.
Antilock brakes kept me from T-boning a guy that pulled out in front of me. I was able to steer around him while braking at the same time.
ABS is outstanding. I once endo’d a pickup that did not have ABS. I think ABS would prevented that.
Another vote for ABS keeping me out of a wreck. The rest? Nah.
The back up camera on my car is nice, but not essential. ABS is.
The lane-warning device I like in our county is the rumble strip on the center stripe and the shoulder. They’re not on all roads, but they cover most of my morning commute, and on the dark, winding country road, they make me feel safer. Personally, I hate the idea of something in the car wresting control from me. I’m good with ABS.
What worries me: what happens when these features fail? If a driver has become accustomed to letting the car be in control, I expect he/she becomes complacent and lazy about paying attention. Then again, so many folks are inattentive anyway…
Get off my lawn, dammit!!! 
My wife has a Ford C-Max that has a feature that tells you if a vehicle is approaching from left or right as you’re backing up. It did save me once from backing out of my driveway into an oncoming car. It wasn’t visible in the rear camera and was difficult to see when looking out the windows.
I answered “I don’t think it has”, but forgot about ABS so it really should be “I think it has” because ABS probably has saved me a few times. Also, the automatic braking in my current car may have prevented a rear-end collision on the expressway once when the traffic came to a sudden stop, but I was on top of things and I think I would have avoided it on my own anyway.
The backup camera is also really helpful in those situations where you are parked in between big SUVs and can’t see to either side behind you. The camera, with it’s wide-angle lens and vantage point on the back bumper, has a better view.
My FIL hates the lanekeeping feature so much that when he is a passenger in my car and I’m the one driving, he still makes me turn it off.
electronic stability control saved my ass once. we had just had some pretty bad flooding a couple of days before, and after the waters receded there was a small section of pavement on the freeway which had heaved up and then settled unevenly. It was around a curve so I didn’t see it until I was on it, and at 55 mph it jiggled and bounced my truck’s suspension so bad I felt like I was going to skitter into the next lane. but ESC kicked in and straightened things out.
What exactly are we counting as safety features?
I’m pretty sure a seatbelt saved me from going through a windshield once, and the improved structure of the vehicle kept me from being crushed (I’ve seen crash test videos with older cars where the passenger compartment just collapses), though I guess that doesn’t count as preventing a wreck. I’ve never driven a car without antilock brakes; they had stopped teaching pumping the brake by the time I took driver’s ed, but I’ve had some hard stops on rain-slicked roads that I didn’t think twice about.
I’ve only had my new car with blind spot monitoring since January, but it’s yet to alert me to a car I couldn’t see in the mirrors. Maybe someday it will.
I was thinking of the newer computer driven features like automatic braking, lane keeping, blind spot detection, etc. I wasn’t considering seatbelts or even ABS.
WTF is “lane keeping?” It sounds awful! Does it really insist you have to stay right in the middle of a lane? Even when that lane has horrible hydroplane ruts in it and keeping to one side or the other means your tires are actually in contact with the road? Whoever thought that one up needs a good boot in the fork.
No. Unless you count things like brakes and lights as safety features.
That’s the one I’ve wondered about when I’ve seen it touted in commercials? Does anyone really have trouble staying in their own lane? Is this designed for the kind of driver who tries to steer with their knees while they’re texting? What is the point of this?
Here’s a video that was circulating a few weeks ago of a Tesla automatically stopping instead of hitting a motorcycle.
I’ve never driven, let alone owned, a car with those newer features. That makes answering the thread title question easy. No