Is ADAS the “real” challenge of the automotive industry?

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Is ADAS the “real” challenge of the automotive industry?

Michael Smyth • October 19, 2021

ADAS, or “Advanced Driving Support Systems”

The Internet is a beautiful thing, especially for those of us who are voracious about seeking out news, trends, obscure facts, and anything else that keeps the active mind satisfied. If you’re like me, nothing is better than sitting down with a few spare hours with YouTube. I can start with a lithium-ion battery presentation and end while watching a cat playing the piano a couple of hours later.

I thought of myself as someone who could see the trends and challenges of the automotive industry based on these frequent forays into the world-wide-web (no one calls it that anymore, do they?), and I was sure that challenge was electric vehicles.

Last month, I was lucky enough to attend the 2021 ATMC conference in Scottsdale, Arizona. It was very nice to finally attend a Covid-safe training conference that didn’t involve the word “virtual” or “Zoom” and to actually sit across the room from an honest-to-goodness live, breathing individual. The presentations were very informative, and per ATMC’s standard format, the conference agenda included roundtable discussions on various topics.

One of the sessions I chose to attend was a roundtable entitled, “What obstacles are you encountering in addressing the newest technology challenges such as ADAS and Electric Vehicles?” My assumption going into the roundtable was that the majority of the conversation would cover the rapidly growing segment of electric cars and trucks.

I was wrong.

Electric and hybrid electric vehicles were discussed, but almost all of the attendees I spoke, debated and conversed with thought ADAS repair and calibration was an even more significant challenge to today’s shops and techs than EVs.

For those new to ADAS, or “Advanced Driving Support Systems,” ADAS represents vehicular electronic systems that use advanced technologies such as radar, lidar, sonar, and cameras to assist the driver, with many of the assistive controls focusing on safety. ADAS systems are significant players in the current and future autonomous vehicle systems, which are currently classified as follows:

Level 0 – Manual driving: The driver is 100% in control of the vehicle.

Level 1 – Driver assistance: The driver can delegate steering, acceleration, and braking to the system. Examples of Level 1 autonomous would be cruise control and lane departure warning.

Level 2 – Partial automation: This level is a progression from Level 1. Several autonomous systems are combined so that the vehicle can independently perform some tasks such as parking or negotiating stop-and-go traffic.

Level 3 – Conditional automation: This level represents the beginning of systems that drive the vehicle autonomously under certain conditions.

Level 4 – High automation: This level, present in some of today’s more advanced vehicles such as Cadillac, Volvo, and Tesla, allows the vehicle to control complete journeys in both city and highway driving, operating predominantly independent of driver input.

Level 5 – Full automation: Level 5 is the end goal of autonomous systems, where a vehicle can operate totally independently of any driver, allowing transportation to take place without anyone in the vehicle holding the skills to drive a car.

Very cool, and simultaneously very frightening.

Supporting these different levels of automation are the ADAS systems. For example, the electronic controls of a light passenger vehicle or large truck need to effectively and safely direct the vehicle inputs of starting, stopping, and turning under an autonomous driving condition. These controls obviously need to sense the ever-changing surroundings of the vehicle they are controlling, and those systems are classified as ADAS.

ADAS sensors and cameras have been designed and manufactured by some of our industry’s brightest stars, and if you’ve not had the opportunity to take a spin in a Cadillac Super Cruise equipped vehicle, a Tesla with Autopilot, or A Volvo with Autonomous Drive (all fancy names for each brand’s autonomous systems) try to do so. The systems, their programming, and their sensors all work together for a pretty amazing driving experience. Are they perfect? Of course not. No system this new and this complex is 100% foolproof after only a relatively short development time period. However, they are good. Very good, and are getting better with every new innovation. Most experts predict that we are very close to developing and implementing a true Level 5 automated system, and our highways will be safer because of it.

So what’s the challenge? Simply put, the challenge is the repair, maintenance, and calibration of the ADAS systems.

Getting back to the ATMC roundtable discussion, I had the great pleasure of speaking to guys and gals from all automotive industry segments. Everyone agreed that we are struggling as a unit to maintain and calibrate ADAS systems. This is in regard to both OEM and aftermarket technicians and repair facilities, and some of the challenges may not be as apparent as you may think.

After a major collision, it is apparent that vehicle ADAS sensors need to be calibrated back into specifications for the autonomous systems to work correctly, but what about lesser scenarios? Simple tasks such as replacing a windshield with non-OEM glass can affect high windshield mount sensors. Likewise, a “bumper tap” can misalign those low-mounted proximity sensors. What about replacing structural parts such as a radiator bracket or headlight surround with an ADAS sensor attached to it? As I have described them, each of these requires a calibration of the ADAS system before the vehicle is released back into the hands of its owner. Understanding fully that multiple situations REQUIRE sensor calibration is the first step in overcoming the ADAS challenge.

The second step is having trained personnel and the right equipment available to them for calibration. OEMs are not known for their cooperation to design and build industry-standard systems to assist technicians in their duties. Every OEM has its own autonomous systems, with many companies designing and implementing multiple versions on different vehicle models they sell. This variation demands specialized equipment and training for each manufacturer and sometimes each OE’s model and year.

Daunting.

I don’t want all the doom and gloom of this article to turn anyone against autonomous systems. If designed and maintained correctly, ADAS has the capability of making our highways safer than they’ve ever been by taking the fail-ability of the human interaction partially or totally out of the formula.

Back to the premise of my article title.

Before the conference, I thought that the training of automotive technicians on electric and hybrid electric vehicles was our most daunting challenge, and it is still up there in the top two or three. But, as many of my peers also believe, ADAS diagnostic and repair training and guidelines need to be at the forefront of our efforts. Having non or incorrectly calibrated vehicles on today’s roadways and the related lack of autonomous safety systems to work correctly could cause governmental regulation to be implemented, something no one wants to see happen. So this is an opportunity to be proactive and show that we can self-police, setting industry training guidelines and parameters that parallel the growing ADAS technology. As the media overinflation of electric vehicle fires has shown, an accident caused by a failed autonomous system with a root cause of an incorrectly calibrated sensor can bring the wrong type of attention to the repair community.

- Micheal Smyth

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