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Forward Collision Scare

Rjhagner

Rjhagner

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Had a harrowing experience this week....
Driving in hard rain I was swamped by a car traveling in opposite direction. I was in heavy traffic going maybe 5-10 mph and at least a car length behind the car in front of me. I began getting the BRAKE! Alert when I shouldn’t. It repeated half dozen times.... then it put me into an emergency braking situation bringing me to a complete stop in moving traffic! Lucky I wasn’t rear ended....but I’m certain I was cussed out!

I’m thinking that getting my front end swamped messed with the radar?
 
I think the OP wasn’t driving through floods, rather they were on the road and a car hit a puddle sending a wall of water toward the front of the truck. In that case the sensors most likely thought it was an object and activated the brake.


—-|||RAM|||-—
Phil

sent from my mobile device
 
BlckDT is likely correct, the sonar sensor isn’t so intelligent that it can determine that it is a wall of water vs a car or other object. That’s one reason I didn't buy the limited level 1 package. I didn't think the lane keeping and forward collision or cruise distance systems were that proven yet. My salesman, a 24 yr at the same dealership guy, felt the same way.
(That and not needing the HK stereo. The 360 camera was nice but not $3K nice (package).
 
BlckDT said:
I think the OP wasn’t driving through floods, rather they were on the road and a car hit a puddle sending a wall of water toward the front of the truck. In that case the sensors most likely thought it was an object and activated the brake.


—-|||RAM|||-—
Phil

sent from my mobile device
Click to expand...
Actually this occurred about 5 min after the water hit the truck
 
Thats not good, soaked sensors could malfunction in a heavy rain then... better take it in to get checked, somehow...
 
Willworkfortruck said:
BlckDT is likely correct, the sonar sensor isn’t so intelligent that it can determine that it is a wall of water vs a car or other object. That’s one reason I didn't buy the limited level 1 package. I didn't think the lane keeping and forward collision or cruise distance systems were that proven yet. My salesman, a 24 yr at the same dealership guy, felt the same way.
(That and not needing the HK stereo. The 360 camera was nice but not $3K nice (package).
Click to expand...

I've disabled auto-braking in the console menu, and i'm glad I did.
2 or 3 times the truck suddenly would brake while backing up, on its own.
I guess a leaf flew in front of the sensors or something, but after number 3, I was done.
The sensors are ultra-helpful when parking, and beyond annoying if they make my vehicle act in a way I do not want!
 
Rjhagner said:
Had a harrowing experience this week....
Driving in hard rain I was swamped by a car traveling in opposite direction. I was in heavy traffic going maybe 5-10 mph and at least a car length behind the car in front of me. I began getting the BRAKE! Alert when I shouldn’t. It repeated half dozen times.... then it put me into an emergency braking situation bringing me to a complete stop in moving traffic! Lucky I wasn’t rear ended....but I’m certain I was cussed out!

I’m thinking that getting my front end swamped messed with the radar?
Click to expand...
Shouldn't have. I've had many vehicles with radar based cruise & FCW/braking, no issues in rain other than sometimes in my Tesla getting a warning that it wouldn't work until the weather cleared.

Water does not reflect radar waves, therefore it should not think anything (like a vehicle) is in front of it. Instead, water will absorb the radar energy, which effectively reduces the radar's visibility (hence the reason my Tesla would send me warnings in bad weather - I guess other vehicles I've had are less careful about it).

ChadT said:
I've disabled auto-braking in the console menu, and i'm glad I did.
2 or 3 times the truck suddenly would brake while backing up, on its own.
I guess a leaf flew in front of the sensors or something, but after number 3, I was done.
The sensors are ultra-helpful when parking, and beyond annoying if they make my vehicle act in a way I do not want!
Click to expand...
He's not talking about the parking sensor brake assist, but the collision warning/braking when driving on the road.
 
Rjhagner said:
Had a harrowing experience this week....
Driving in hard rain I was swamped by a car traveling in opposite direction. I was in heavy traffic going maybe 5-10 mph and at least a car length behind the car in front of me. I began getting the BRAKE! Alert when I shouldn’t. It repeated half dozen times.... then it put me into an emergency braking situation bringing me to a complete stop in moving traffic! Lucky I wasn’t rear ended....but I’m certain I was cussed out!

I’m thinking that getting my front end swamped messed with the radar?
Click to expand...

Hi Rjhagner,
We understand how concerning this may have been. If this continues to happen, please let us know via private message so we can have this documented and help you get this properly addressed by your dealer.
Lydia
Ram Social Care Specialist
 
I've driven my 2019 Limited 1500 through plenty of ugly weather with no issues even remotely like the one the OP described. They must have had some bad cabling upfront where the water created a short. One of the things I looked at very closely when I was purchasing mine was the cabling work in the engine compartment. Shoddy work there usually means shoddy work elsewhere that you CAN'T see. It was all super clean, well secured, with no nicks or frays in any insulation. Today's vehicles live and die on the wiring harnesses as well as the reliability of those connected components.
 
How is your forward collision warning set up? Far, medium or near? You may want to set it to near.
 
Correct me if I'm wrong here, but isn't the forward collision warning part of the radar and camera system that's inside near the rear view mirror? Only the front parking sonar sensors are out front, and they're only used for the low speed parking.
 
I had mine go off in heavy rain once for no apparent reason. Thankfully I had read the multiple instances of the system braking suddenly here and the first thing I did after purchasing the truck was disabling the automatic braking. I left the audible warning. I’m still glad I got it but not comfortable enough at this point to allow it to brake for me.
 
cipherbreak said:
I had mine go off in heavy rain once for no apparent reason. Thankfully I had read the multiple instances of the system braking suddenly here and the first thing I did after purchasing the truck was disabling the automatic braking. I left the audible warning. I’m still glad I got it but not comfortable enough at this point to allow it to brake for me.
Click to expand...
It saved my dumb *** this last weekend. Stopped at a stop sign waiting to get on a 3 lane. Car in front of me had two open lanes to pull out. She hit the gas to go, I looked left and hit my gas. She decided the car coming 800 yards away in the far lane was worth jamming on her brakes. Ram did a complete avoidance stop.
This system is exactly why I didn’t buy a lower trim model. Plus the adaptive cruise is great in morning traffic on the interstate. Set it at 75 and kick back. You know drink coffee crawl into the back seats take a nap
 
Tundralag said:
It saved my dumb *** this last weekend. Stopped at a stop sign waiting to get on a 3 lane. Car in front of me had two open lanes to pull out. She hit the gas to go, I looked left and hit my gas. She decided the car coming 800 yards away in the far lane was worth jamming on her brakes. Ram did a complete avoidance stop.
This system is exactly why I didn’t buy a lower trim model. Plus the adaptive cruise is great in morning traffic on the interstate. Set it at 75 and kick back. You know drink coffee crawl into the back seats take a nap
Click to expand...

Once I finish the mod to replace the stock subwoofer with a coffee machine I’ll try that.
 
I’ve had a forward collision system in my FCA vehicle since 2013 and while it has break checked me a couple times with turning traffic in front of me, a little aggressive, I would take that over rear ending someone. I’ve never had it go off without someone in front of me, even if serious rain storms, so might be worth having it checked. I have had messages come up that say the sensor is dirty or something to that effect and needs to be cleaned and will be disabled until then. Being afraid of the system because it’s new to the Ram is a bit silly, it’s been tested in several FCA vehicles already. I have mine set to medium or whatever the middle setting is and has not gone off yet but it’s only been a month with the truck. If someone rear ends you, even if the system fails, that’s their problem and will be ticked for following to close and their insurance will have to fix any damage.
 
I've had issues with weeds triggering an emergency stop while in reverse. It's kind of annoying, to be honest.
 
You guys are really going to hate this post. Learn how your truck works. I know these systems are new, but if you think a well done level 2 vehicle automation like Ram has done is annoying, wait until you see a badly implemented level 3. If emergency braking occurs while backing when it shouldn't, figure out why and disable the rear parking sensors for those occasions. Slopes and brush are two well known examples you can easily work around simply by turning off the rear parking sensors when backing towards something like that. If emergency braking is occurring during any sort of normal driving forward without good cause (I.E. a vehicle in sensor range in front of you and a closure rate that might end in impact), then you need to take it in for repair. I've learned to alter my driving a bit to make the most of the automated driver assistance features and that includes both letting the system handle vehicle spacing (adjusting it as needed from the steering control button) and following it's cues when I'm manually overriding, or disabling the system for intentional aggressive maneuvering. Overall, I'm pretty happy with the level of help from the automated systems and not terribly annoyed by the occasional efforts the system has made to intervene in some of my more aggressive manual driving efforts.
 
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