Sick of driving? Let Stanley the robot car take the wheel

39-year-old Stanford professor, Thurn, of electrical engineering and his graduate students built the world’s first self-driving car called Stanley (a Volkswagen Touareg). The group won the DARPA Grand Challenge, a 131-mile robot car race across the desert near Las Vegas organized by the Pentagon.

That DARPA Grand Challenge gave Thurn and his group a $2 million prize, some of which they reinvested in an even more intelligent Stanley (a Volkswagen Passat), which will be unveiled at the next robot car contest. The next challenge will be on regular streets with obstacles that include stop signs, lights, and cars driven by humans.

The car works with lasers that help it built a 3D image of the road along with videocameras, gyroscopes and accelerometers to help it determine turns and look out for obstacles on the road. An onboard computer helps Stanley adjust speed and the route it travels along with an emergency shutdown that is activated remotely.

The group has received funding from Volkswagen, Red Bull, Google, Intel and others for their project.
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EL34 - 2/22/2007 12:28:25 PM

0 Boost

I would love to have a robot drive my car.

When can I sign up to buy one?

Terminal10 - 2/22/2007 1:29:44 PM

+4 Boost

If you want to experience a semi-robot experience why not let someone else drive you like a taxi cab.

EL34i - 2/22/2007 4:08:25 PM

+2 Boost

You're the only person who wants to drive your third-hand 1995 BMW 3 series.

S4cabriofoxone - 2/22/2007 6:24:26 PM

+5 Boost

I wouldn't. Unlike inconsistent EL34, I enjoy driving in most (if not all) situations.

S4cabriofoxone - 2/22/2007 9:28:24 PM

+1 Boost

When would Lexus make this for commercial models?

rg12345 - 2/22/2007 9:40:54 PM

-1 Boost

What's your point Will? For sure Lexus won't be the first to invent this, nor Toyoyoyota. Like you guys said last week about Toyota inventing the first navigation that will update itself (first after a few other companies like VW).

rg12345 - 2/23/2007 4:03:06 PM

+2 Boost

I didn't say that .. but for sure it isn't Toyoyoyota :)

They all(VW, Google, RedBull, Intel .. etc) work in a team to win the contest, not just VW. But for sure VW has something to add to the project beside money and a plain Passat. They did come out with the Veyron, didn't they?

The comment above was just underlining that L/Toyota is not the first, at least not in the fields about inventing stuff. They do get their points on some other stuff, maybe cheap(toyota) and reliable (like someone who spends $100.000 on an S class cares about reliability when jumping to a new car every 2-3 years).

S4cabriofoxone - 2/24/2007 7:11:48 PM

0 Boost

Yes, Will, that's what I asked. Since you're so informed, you know that Lexus will implement this into some future vehicle, right?

chewy - 2/22/2007 11:53:20 PM

+2 Boost

This has nothing to do with Lexus. Comparing Lexus self park (that VW has on its cheap Touran mini minivan) is like comparing a Geo Metro and the Bugatti Veyron.

Last year Stanford used the VW Touareg with the 2.5 5 cylinder TDI engine (Stnaley) to win the DARPA offroad 100% unmanned vehicle challange. This year Stanford will use this Passat Wagon (Junior) that will by itself (without any human control at all) navigate through a 6 mile course that replicates real life conditions. To win it isn't allowed to break any California driving laws.

More info:

http://cs.stanford.edu/group/roadrunner/index.html

chewy - 2/22/2007 11:56:03 PM

-1 Boost

Uhh

Comparing Lexus self park (that VW has on its cheap Touran mini minivan)to this VW/Stanford self driving Passat Wagn is like comparing a Geo Metro and the Bugatti Veyron.

rg12345 - 2/23/2007 4:11:55 PM

+1 Boost

Yeap, they buy the module necessary to make the car do something from one unknown company (by us, people who just buy the cars). Sometimes they develop it by them self, but not always.

In this forum is not about commercializing anything yet, it's about something never did before with 100% success. I was impressed last year seeing the contest. So many start, only one or two will finish. It's really an impressive project, extremely hard to make a car follow the street rules, with other regular cars, just like them. Who has a minimum amount of computer programming knowledge probably understands how hard is it to compute every single possibility out there, and even more to take the right decision (as a computer brain).

My opinion: will be commercialized, but not in the following 5-10 years.