I was on the M1 in some pretty impressive heavy rain last in night , rounded a bend at 70 ish to see standing water across my path. Lifted off gently and since cars around me meant I couldn't change lanes to avoid it I hit it straight and just tried to do nothing, no steering, no, braking or accelerating. Car started to aquaplane.... OK.. .Don't panic, car is still straight and I'm not heading for any other cars.... Although the gentle bend means I'm drifting left toward the middle lane.   Then lane assist kicked in.... Oh dear! that made for a  squeaky bum moment as it tried a sharp steering input!  Thankfully no disaster and I got grip again.   Lane assist was then turned off until the roads had dried.   My boxers took longer to dry than the roads!

Firstly, never drive at a speed where you cannot judge the condition of the road in front of you. Next, fat tyres and light'ish car equals easy aquaplaning (just look at F1 cars in the wet). Finally, Lane Assist is gimmicky rubbish. I tested mine once to see whether it worked and haven't used it since. I don't like it in the dry and certainly wouldn't trust it in the wet, at speed and turning a bend. Glad that you are safe and no damage done.

Orville, on 09 Aug 2014 - 23:57, said:

Lane Assist is gimmicky rubbish.

Mine occasionally lets out a high-pitch warning and tells me to place my hands back on the steering wheel.

 

When they already are....... :think:

Mine occasionally lets out a high-pitch warning and tells me to place my hands back on the steering wheel.

When they already are....... :think:

No that's not the lane assist ! That's the wife telling you

Lane assist is rubbish. God invented a better technology and I have 2 of them at the end of my wrists

Yeh - 70 seems a little fast for the type of weather described.

 

I actually like drunk mode lane assist.. Means the car stays straight.

 

Yes I have eyes and hands and do pay attention, but it's that little bit of feedback to tell me I'm running a little close to the left / right hand side of my own lane.

 

Don't get me wrong - If my next car doesn't have it, it won't be an issue.  I just like it because I have it on this one.

 

SWMBO hates it, and won't drive my car with it on - Another reason I love it

There is an explanation of the logic of lane assist, front assist and fatigue detection, somewhere on the internet - it's along the lines of 15% of fatal/serious RTAs come about through drivers drifting out of lane on high speed roads and the technologies have been developed to help address that situation. There are also warnings about not relying on the tech especially in bad weather. I think the tech is helpful used properly.

Why drive so fast in heavy rain?

The problem of cars drifting out of lanes is not a technological one. Its that drivers are not paying enough attention. Adding all these gadgets like this, adaptive cruise control and speed camera detectors just makes the problem far worse. If you feel you're so busy with other things going around you that you might drift out of lane, then that means you're going too fast for the conditions.

 

In this heavy rain I saw so many idiots seemingly completely oblivious to areas of flooding and carrying on at full speed over the water.

Round a bend at 70 in "heavy rain"? Foolish IMO.

If your car was aqua planing then any steering input (lane assist or not) wouldn't really make a difference as by definition the tyres are "swimming" on top of the water.

It's only when you get grip again and the direction of the tyres isn't aligned with that of the car when you get a problem.

I think you were just a little fast and that's all. Slow down = no drama = no post.

Turned it off at first. Then tried it on dual carriageway. Now on all the time. If I do a spot of country road driving I may turn it off. As others have said, it would be nice to have a simple on/ off button on the dash.

I have mine in most of the time. At least it's not too tricky to turn off and on with the steering wheel controls and maxidot.

P

Turned it off at first. Then tried it on dual carriageway. Now on all the time. If I do a spot of country road driving I may turn it off. As others have said, it would be nice to have a simple on/ off button on the dash.

Hold down the ESP button for a few seconds, this switches the ESP to sport and turns off lane assist.

Ta. That sounds useful, especially for country roads. Will try once all this rain stops and the tyres get their grip back again...

As a guide you will aquaplane when there is more than 2.5mm of standing water and your doing a speed of 9x square root of your tyre pressure. So somewhere above approx 47 mph!

Lots of variables though, tyre tread depth, vehicle loading, tyre profile etc.

As regards the lane assist making a correction it would have been no problem while your aquaplanning, in fact if you wanted to you could turn the wheel from lock to lock! The tyres are not in contact with the road! It's what happens when you come off the water that the fun starts with the direction of the wheels! That's why the advice is to do nothing, cause chances are you wouldn't have been doing anything if there was no water there and the car would stay in the lane.

Tried the Esp button thing as a short cut to switch off lane assist. Didn't seem to work. Plus the high revs would irritate me. Not a major issue

Thanks for all the comments on driving, I know what I did wrong.

 

If your car was aqua planing then any steering input (lane assist or not) wouldn't really make a difference as by definition the tyres are "swimming" on top of the water.

It's only when you get grip again and the direction of the tyres isn't aligned with that of the car when you get a problem.

I think you were just a little fast and that's all. Slow down = no drama = no post.

 

Exactly bitchi, I was nervous lane assist may turn the wheels enough to upset things as grip returned. That is why I thought I'd post my experience, let others learn from my lucky escape as well as myself.

BTW, clearly with a near miss that's proof I was driving too fast, please take note that I wasnt pushing it, the car did aquaplane easier than my last car and apparently easier than the many many cars and vans around me ( 3 lanes of dense motorway traffic, all doing largely the same speed). The size of the puddle suggested a blocked drain. I watched the transit van in front of me pass through with no issue so wasn't too concerned, I knew it wasn't that long or that deep. I moved to the side of my lane to avoid the worst of it, but chose not to change lanes abruptly for fear of upsetting other drivers in the dense traffic. I still take away from it the reminder, you need very little water to upset grip, I'm grateful things didn't get messy. Hope others benefit from this too