Honda has just revealed their new concept car which combines the functioning of manual and automatic cars. This is the Honda Augmented Driving Concept Car. The concept car is made for the people who know how to drive manually but want to drive with automated driving, too.
The car is basically a four seater car without any roof, but with a windshield. Both the front two and the rear two seats are conjoined and look like two benches. It is colored silver and blue and bears similarity to the Honda E Electric.
The car offers transition from manual driving mode to automated driving mode, very seamlessly, with a switch, and in seconds. The automatic driving system is consistently on stand-by, so it can be turned whenever needed. This makes it very important for emergency situations, for example., when the driver suddenly notices something and needs to give it attention, they can quickly and simply just turn on the automatic mode.
The car features more than eight modes between manual and automatic driving systems.
The biggest innovation is the introduction of a steering wheel that is used to control all the functions of the manual mode. Want to start the car? Pat the steering wheel twice. Want to decelerate the car? Pull the steering wheel. Pushing the steering wheel will make the car accelerate, but the car won’t actually speed up if it senses that moving fast is a bad idea. The steering wheel also displays the speed of the car when it’s in manual mode and acts as a speedometer. While in automatic mode, the driver can simply swipe the steering wheel to make it change lanes on the road. All these controls can be transferred in front of any seat in the car, and hence, anyone can become the driver just by bringing the driving controls in front of them. This is all made possible with sensors present on the ring of the steering wheel. There are also eye-sensors which keep monitoring the drivers’ eyes to make sure that the driver doesn’t get distracted.
Honda’s goal when designing the augmented car was to free people from the responsibility of driving, but also, to let people enjoy driving whenever they want to. “Honda will introduce its Augmented Driving Concept to address the cultural transition to autonomous vehicles. In the autonomous future, Honda believes that customers will be able to enjoy mobility in new ways when freed from the responsibility of driving. At the same time, customers may still want to experience the emotion and thrill of driving.
The car was announced at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2020.
All Images: © Honda
h/t: Jalopnik