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Twelve car gadgets you can't live without

By Rory Reid on 26 March 2009, 5:59pm

Inevitably, having a car full of gadgets will distract you to the point where you make a mistake, spin off the road and die. Luckily, scientists have created anti-gadget gadgets -- gadgets that reduce the likelihood of gadgets making you, your passengers and even the people you crash into, dead.

External airbags and passenger-slapping bonnets
External airbags could save lives. Psychopaths will love Jaguar's Advanced Deployable Bonnet System (ADBS). It waits until it detects the sound of pedestrians' bones snapping against the bumper before popping the bonnet to slap them in the face as they hurtle towards the windscreen. Why? Jaguar reckons raising the bonnet creates a cushioning effect between the engine and the bonnet, which helps isolate the pedestrian from hard points in the engine compartment. Sick puppies. A more sensitive solution -- the external airbag -- is being devised by Toyota, among others. In the event of a pedestrian impact, airbags deploy, cushioning the impact and potentially saving lives. 
Available in: Jaguar XKR

Lane-departure prevention system
Stray out of lane and you might get a ticking off from your car. Common sense and a functioning pair of eyes should keep most of us from drifting out of our lane, but tiredness, hot girls on the pavement and other distractions all affect our driving. That's where lane-drift-sensing systems come into play. In most implementations, a camera mounted above the rear-view mirror detects the lane markings in front of you. If the system senses that you're about to leave your lane without indicating, it issues an audible warning. Ignore that, and it'll actually apply brakes on the opposite side of the car, helping to bring the car back into lane. Don't worry though -- it'll never take steering control away from the driver, and it usually only activates itself when the vehicle is doing more than about 40mph.
See it in action: Vauxhall Insignia, Volvo XC60

Adaptive cruise control / auto braking
ACC allows the car to follow a specific vehicle ahead of you, accelerating and decelerating automatically. Adaptive cruise control is where it's really at. This works just like standard cruise control, except it uses radar technology to monitor the road ahead for dangers. Should a car ahead of you do something as idiotic as slowing down, it'll apply the brakes automatically to keep a safe distance. When they decide to speed up again, adaptive cruise control automatically increases your speed to the original pre-determined setting. Volvo's City Safety system is similarly awesome. The driver manually controls acceleration, but the system constantly monitors for cars in front of you whenever you're in a 30mph zone. If you get too close to someone and fail to hit the brakes, it applies them for you. Yes, friends, the days when you can put your feet up as you drive are finally here.
See it in action: Volvo XC60

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