ElectricMotorcycleForum.com
Makes And Models => Damon => Topic started by: NEW2elec on November 08, 2020, 11:19:05 PM
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For those who don't know the new Damon Motorcycles will come with a rider assistive warning system to give riders input and help to "look" in multiple directions and tract other vehicles and obstacles.
They will integrate multiple cameras and radar sensors to give blind spot warnings by lighting LEDS around the back edge of the windscreen. Also showing a 180 degree rear view from the rear facing camera on the dash display as an option.
With a forward collision warning system using haptic feedback in the bike's grips to alert a rider of an unexpected sudden stopping vehicle in front of you.
In a dense urban environment where riders are dealing with cars making last minute lane changes and cell phone addicts, what our eyes and mind are telling us is most serious situation and should have our attention, may not be the case.
I've seen a few early test riders praise the extra input and help to avoid at least one situation where a known vehicle was passing in the riders blind spot. As the vehicle passed the rider thought the lane was clear and could move over to the next lane.
They noticed the LED warning light was still lit and after first thinking it was a system bug they double checked the lane.
Sure enough another car was behind the first one and the system helped point out a danger where the rider assumed it was clear after the first vehicle had passed.
I'm not sure why they want to change the name. Maybe a copy right issue or maybe because it implies "control" of the bike which isn't the case at this time.
I submitted the name Palantir which is a Lord of the Rings reference but also literally means Palan "Far" and Tir "to watch over" but there seems to be a company that uses that name already so that might be a no go.
I also thought of calling it the "Dragonfly" system.
Like most flying insects they have large compound eyes to see in many directions at once and track movement. But their 350 million years old form and unique body and wing design gives it the ability to hover, fly side to side, and even backwards in the insect's case (we'll have to see if the Damon has reverse that's unknown).
Not just detecting a danger (or prey in racing) but having the speed and agility to go in the direction they want to go.
Any other ideas for a new name?
Post here or Damon's FB page.
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Probably because people hates the autopilot name, even though the people who hate the name ascribe abilities that autopilot has never had in the real world.
-Crissa
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Well "autopilot" is a Tesla term while Damon's was "Copilot". Which I bet Tesla wishes they had waited to name "full self driving" autopilot as that was what people expected from Tesla's "autopilot" not just some driving help.
But what would you call Damon's system and would you want the feature on your bike?
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I'd love the feature. I have something like it in my car.
-Crissa
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I'm thinking "Distraction to Minimum Viable Product".
How do they have the engineering and support resources and schedule flexibility to implement a complicated monitoring system like that and still make an affordable yet profitable vehicle?
Tesla has several orthogonal addon features like that, but at least their market has the potential volume and goodwill to justify the costs associated with them.
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Well I've posted almost every interview that Damon CEO Jay has done. If you watch them you'll find out the (former) "Copilot" system was the original idea for starting a company. They were going to set it up in a helmet but it was too much for the size and accepted weight of a high quality helmet.
He was trying to address what they felt like was one of the issues for lower motorcycle sales which was the perceived increase in danger.
They want to license the system to other manufacturers in the coming years.
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I am sure the lawyers have a bunch of names to not call it.
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The bike's called "HyperSport"... "HyperSense System"?
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Pita. Play in traffic assist.
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You know, I don't think that danger really figured in most people's decisions as to whether to get a bike or not, and I can't see any amount of electronic trickery actually convincing anyone they're going to actually be safer. When you fall off a bike, it still hurts, and it really does hurt, a lot, and that's the bit people think about when they make that decision, not the reasons for the crash in the first place as of course most people are already better drivers than you and considerably more immortal.
What I do notice is that in most other cultures in the world other than Northern European, that attitudes to motorcycle safety are, shall we say, a little "immature", and that extends from wearing safety gear right the way through to the quality of training, attitude to other road users (and vice-versa...), the attitude of the State towards road safety in general, and even some more bizarre cultural attitudes towards fatalism. And we can see a very strong correlation between likelihood of death or maiming and all of these factors. (Anecdotally I notice a very leery attitude towards "full self driving" in Teslas in the UK, for example, because it solves a problem that we just don't actually have).
/rant
Cas :)
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(sorry for the delayed post... Forgot we now had a Damon subforum)
No immediate new name comes to mind, but as for the likely reason for a change:
"pilot" is used by several carmakers (in combination with other words) to label various active ADAS (advanced driver-assist systems):
Ford Co-Pilot 360 <-----Same name as Damon has been using
Nissan ProPILOT Assist
Volvo Pilot Assist
Mercedes Drive Pilot
Even if Ford didn't have a system with the same name, all the above systems do active stuff (braking, lane changes etc.)
The Damon system is very different in purpose, since it's all about warning the rider of various dangers and does not do any active controlling of the bike.
That's a distinction that's very important to make, both marketing-wise as well as safety-wise and legally.
Many riders yours truly included, would not get on a bike that had any active ADAS. I wouldn't trust such a system, even if turned off, until there was decades of experience with it; conversely, there might be riders that expect the bike to do automatic emergency braking, which many cars have to avoid crashing into the vehicle in front (will be mandated in many countries in 2022).
Any name with "pilot" should probably be avoided; Tesla is in some hot water because many consumer expect that its SAE L2 ADAS is actually full SAE L4 or L5 autonomous driving capable, because it's called "Autopilot" (and most of them have never piloted an aircraft, and aren't aware that in aviation an autopilot is a pretty limited device that can usually only maintain straight & level flight). In Germany, Tesla is actually banned from using the term "Autopilot".
I like Damon's overall approach, especially the focus on trying making the system non-distracting, and am very curious to try it out.
However, personally, I wish that would have stuck with that only. My intuition says it's a full-time job for a startup to get this working well, and designing and producing a new e-motorcycle in parallel -- esp. a superbike -- is too much of a distraction.
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I would think that any sort of "copilot" system installed on a production motorcycle would make liability lawyers' brains explode and would likely be avoided like the plague by most motorcycle enthusiasts. ??? After all, most motorcycle customers can hardly even stand any colors other than black paint and loud noise. ::)
I might add that BMW will soon be introducing a system that will control the distance between the motorcycle and the vehicle in front of it, as well as one that will automatically slow down or brake if you get too close to an obstruction like a stalled car. While I can see the safety aspect of this concept, I really wonder how many their customers will pay extra for the system, or even want a motorcycle with it unless they can keep it turned off all of the time. ???
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I'd never dare use it. I'm even funny about cruise control on a bike tbh.
Cas :)
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Looking at this system it seems it will alert you by LED lights on the dash or vibrating handle bars. But those warnings might take your eyes off the road ahead at a time when you can least afford to do that to check out some sort of warning indicator on your dash. On my Energica Ribelle when I am looking at my speed the road ahead is mostly out of my vision. I would think on the surface a HUD type display on a helmet visor would work better for warning a rider of dangers ahead. But no question this brings in another complete set of challenges. There are going to be trade-offs either way. My Garmin GPS warns me of almost every turn in the road and to maintain the legal speed limit. These warnings go away after a few seconds or you can acknowledge them which requires taking your hands off the handlebars, not always a good idea. But the GPS is positioned so it is out of my vision when my eyes are on the road so very easy to ignore. It will be interesting to read riders experiences with this system once they are shipping bikes out to customers.
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Policy in the UK and probably EU at large is minimising accidents through improved rider training, including improving rider attitudes. Right down the bottom of the list of ways that TPTB reckon is a good way to reduce KSI stats is active rider aids, in fact, if you'll excuse the pun, it's not even on their radar. I think more than anything this highlights the fundamental differences between the EU and US in attitudes: the US is very much about "everyone else is the problem, protect yourself from them", the EU is very much about "you are the problem, learn how not to be". The current US attitude was very much the prevailing attitude here in the UK up until about the early 90s when there was a fundamental shift in road safety understanding.
All this tech stuff has very limited appeal here because by and large we do not feel that placing trust in it is a great replacement for being better at riding in the first place. And no, ABS is not the same thing.
Cas :)
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Looking at this system it seems it will alert you by LED lights on the dash or vibrating handle bars. But those warnings might take your eyes off the road ahead at a time when you can least afford to do that to check out some sort of warning indicator on your dash. On my Energica Ribelle when I am looking at my speed the road ahead is mostly out of my vision. I would think on the surface a HUD type display on a helmet visor would work better for warning a rider of dangers ahead. But no question this brings in another complete set of challenges. There are going to be trade-offs either way. My Garmin GPS warns me of almost every turn in the road and to maintain the legal speed limit. These warnings go away after a few seconds or you can acknowledge them which requires taking your hands off the handlebars, not always a good idea. But the GPS is positioned so it is out of my vision when my eyes are on the road so very easy to ignore. It will be interesting to read riders experiences with this system once they are shipping bikes out to customers.
Damon say that the way they have their system designed, the warning lights are at the periphery of the rider's vision, so you don't need to look at them directly, and that the location of the LED moves according to the severity of the threat (e.g., when approaching closer to the car in front of you). (*)
I'd love to try this out in person, to feel whether this and the handlebar vibration are indeed intuitive and don't add too much to the rider's sensory input; It would also be interesting what human-factors/MMI experts familiar with motorcycles think. I can see potential customization issues: The width of the field of vision (in degrees) isn't identical for all people, so in theory ideally the location of the LEDs would be customizable; also the degree of haptic feedback might need to be customized to the thickness of gloves worn.
(*) Incidentally, this is also why analog speedos are better than a digital one: What matters isn't the actual exact speed as whether you are slowing or speeding up, and by how much (rate of deceleration/acceleration), and you don't need to focus on an analog speedo for that: Seeing it peripherally is enough.
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Let me see if I can clear this up some.
The LEDs are incorporated into the back edge of the sport bike style windscreen. So if your in a tuck you will be down near the windscreen which will put the LED blind spot lights where you can see them but not in your way.
It's no more intrusive than the clear plastic windscreen would otherwise be.
The haptic handle grip feed back is reserved for frontal impacts. If your looking toward the side, maybe trying to change lanes, and naturally you wouldn't be looking in front of you. If the car in front does a hard brake or a person from another lane shoots in front of you, then the grips vibrate.
Really a simple but helpful system that does address the fact that it shouldn't take your attention away from riding.
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I think it sounds cool and intuitive; the edge of the windscreen is usually in my field of view, unlike the dash.
-Crissa
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I think it sounds cool and intuitive; the edge of the windscreen is usually in my field of view, unlike the dash.
-Crissa
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That's why I also liked the concept when initially reading about it; I have yet to see a picture/visualization of what it looks like from the rider's viewpoint.
I also hope their rearwards view is presented as a 2D bird's-eye view from above the bike -- IMO that's much easier to interpret quickly than a rear-view mirror's 3D view backwards.
In fact, I think cars could greatly benefit from that as well, instead of currently having such a view only for a parking camera when in reverse gear.
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Here's a quick video from Damon. The red LED curved strip is what goes on the windscreen. Flashes red for forward warning and left or right side yellow for blind spot warning.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QjG4Oz5pfo
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Here's a quick video from Damon. The red LED curved strip is what goes on the windscreen. Flashes red for forward warning and left or right side yellow for blind spot warning.
Thanks for that -- I've seen either that one or a longer version before, but couldn't find it again. I seem to recall that there were were multiple red LEDs on each side of the strip, and the lighted part would move progressive closer to the middle of the strip the closer (time-wise) forward impact was, but maybe I'm mis-remembering.
I do think actual camera views of blind spots aren't a good idea (if indeed the brief look 10sec into the clip represents the actual rider display), since they add too much info for a rider to process.
What I'd really like is a full cockpit mockup, but we'll have to wait patiently for that; I'm sure they'll demonstrate it.