I'm ordering my tsi vrs hatch today with lots of extras and was debating the front assist. I don't do a massive amount of motorway driving, mostly town stop start stuff. Is it a bit of an unnecesary gimick or has someone on here avoided a near miss to justify it? Also surely that radar must have some detrimental affect to the front cooling where it is?

I'm having high beam assist @£300 but read on here it can be done via vcds and is not needed?

I do want the light and rain sensor and its noted features though. Is it worth me dropping HB assist in lieu of front assist instead?

Cheers

This was a feature on a '14 golf I had through work, I hated it. Chugging along on cruise control and as soon as you got within about 37 miles of something it would completely kill the power, massive pain in the arse IMHO.

With regards to cooling I can't comment on it.. its bang smack in the middle of the front lower grille so can't imagine it having too much effect on it

Seems silly to pay for something you can have done for nothing. I wouldn't pay for front assist either, although must confess I've never had it before. How many time have you crashed into the car in front ?

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Seems silly to pay for something you can have done for nothing. I wouldn't pay for front assist either, although must confess I've never had it before. How many time have you crashed into the car in front ?

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Touch wood, never.

There is a difference between Front Assist & Adaptive Cruise Control...

If I am correct, Front Assist will only work at city speeds to apply the brakes before a pending impact. It doesn't slow the car at motorway speeds.

 

As a safety feature there's always the "do I need it" question because its not something that you benefit from every day but this kind of technology will soon become standard across Europe (like ABS)

 

Adaptive Cruise Control costs more (but uses the same sensor) to control the distance to the car in-front.

I find this a great feature (you can adjust the distance & agressiveness of cruise control) & use it 90% of my daily driving. (probably not as useful for you if you don't do much motorway or long A-road driving)

If you can justify the extra for this then Front Assist comes for free.

I've heard of a crisp packet being saved

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Seems silly to pay for something you can have done for nothing. I wouldn't pay for front assist either, although must confess I've never had it before. How many time have you crashed into the car in front ?

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My house has never burned down yet... but I still insure it. 

 

Front assist only needs to save you from one moment of inattention during the entire period of your ownership and it's likely to be cost effective...

There is a difference between Front Assist & Adaptive Cruise Control...

If I am correct, Front Assist will only work at city speeds to apply the brakes before a pending impact. It doesn't slow the car at motorway speeds.

As a safety feature there's always the "do I need it" question because its not something that you benefit from every day but this kind of technology will soon become standard across Europe (like ABS)

Adaptive Cruise Control costs more (but uses the same sensor) to control the distance to the car in-front.

I find this a great feature (you can adjust the distance & agressiveness of cruise control) & use it 90% of my daily driving. (probably not as useful for you if you don't do much motorway or long A-road driving)

If you can justify the extra for this then Front Assist comes for free.

I purchased FA as a standalone option when there was no info on it - I was after the front parking sensors!

+ although I have 15 years NCD it has intervened on 2 occasions - once when a car pulled out from a side street and even though I had seen the car the reaction time to trigger was immense. Second time I was at a roundabout where I had taken my eye off the car in front that had already begun to pull away, but stalled whilst I was concentrating on traffic approaching from the right - this prevented an accident that clearly would have been my fault. So in terms of vfm it has payed me back already. At motorway speeds according to the manual it will prime brakes to use max force and prime other safety systems i.e. Airbag etc. in addition it will also jab the brakes to jolt the car and provide visual / audio attention getters.

-unlike models where FA is fitted as standard my insurance company has not reduced my premium. For the additional cost would have chosen adaptive cruise over standard cruise (which I also paid for at the time!).

HBA takes 10 mins to recode and is not that great - certainly better ways to spend 300 quid.

My house has never burned down yet... but I still insure it.

Front assist only needs to save you from one moment of inattention during the entire period of your ownership and it's likely to be cost effective...

I see your point but it's down to how likely it is in comparison to the cost. Likewise, it's not a guaranteed fail safe either. I wouldn't pay to have it in a car as i would be unlikely to get the benefit. Most of my journeys are motorways, at speeds where front assist is inactive. Add to that the fact that it a company car, so of no detriment to me if involved in a low speed prang... Why would I opt for it?

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Front assist is active up to 160 km/h.

Under 35 km/h the City Safe is active (reacts to all objects whereas front assist only reacts to vehicles in front which is moving in the same direction).

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Well i've ordered it with FA, sod it! :-)

Front assist is active up to 160 km/h.

Under 35 km/h the City Safe is active (reacts to all objects whereas front assist only reacts to vehicles in front which is moving in the same direction).

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 What Stianol said...

 

It might be a company car so point taken about the damage being of no consequence...however, if it stops you getting injured from a higher speed collision then money becomes less relevant... 

 

I have front assist and like it. It has intervened twice for me. On both occasions a car in front was slowing quickly, I'd anticipated and was in process of braking but the warning alarm activated. Essentially it recognised the issue at the same time as me. So yes, technically I didn't need the system. However, if I'd been distracted at the time by something else it possibly would have prevented a collision....

 

Some on here will say they have driven for years and never had a prang...possibly they are very highly skilled drivers, possibly they have just been lucky. Everyone has a momentary lapse of concentration at some point.... just my opinion though....

Well, i stand corrected,.... that's not how i read it worked from other posts on here. But i still wouldn't have ordered it as a £300 option... But I'll get to find out one day when my new car arrives as ive speccd adaptive cruise control, which includes front assist

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Euroncap has a an explanation of how it works:

http://www.euroncap.com/rewards/skoda_front_assist.aspx

The best would be if front assist is standard on every new car.

Everyone of us know that we are driving better than 50% of the drivers (statistics shows that this is what people think).

But it would have been nice if the lower 50% had this (and that would have prevented my car being hit in the rear this summer).

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I'd never pay money for front assist. Had it as standard fit on my previous mk7 golf. Scared the hell of me a couple of times by slamming on the brakes as it thought I was going to run into the car in front which was turning left.

 

Also a few of the issues below are appearing now. It'd also be interesting to see what'd happen in the situation where the driver had turned off front assist then ran up the back of the car in front. Wonder what the insurance implications would be?

 

In any case, this would put me right off;

 

http://www.golfmk7.c...read.php?t=6223

I'm sure when i reach the age of 70 I will need all the help and technology to keep me on the road, front assist and park assist would be top of the list. A friend has a golf with front assist on and he loves it. I debated over that option when I placed my order and decided I couldn't justify the need for it and the cost.

Let us know how you get on with it when the motor arrives.

Is there a (safe!) way to test that it's working? I've turned it on, and tried slowly driving into the neighbour's car a couple of times but nothing happened...except I hit the brakes at (what I thought) was the last minute..

 

Edit to add - this is on an Elegance delivered this week. It has the little box on the front bumper, and it looks like I can turn it on and off...but was it a standard fit when I ordered it back in July, or has it just been added as standard in the new October brochure?

Edited 7 November, 201411 yr by robs12

Is there a (safe!) way to test that it's working? I've turned it on, and tried slowly driving into the neighbour's car a couple of times but nothing happened...except I hit the brakes at (what I thought) was the last minute..

 

Edit to add - this is on an Elegance delivered this week. It has the little box on the front bumper, and it looks like I can turn it on and off...but was it a standard fit when I ordered it back in July, or has it just been added as standard in the new October brochure?

 

I think it doesn't operate below 5mph. Safest way to test it would be with a big empty cardboard box!

In the October 2014 price list it states that Front Assist is standard equipment (Over SE) on the Elegance.

Adaptive Cruise Control costs more (but uses the same sensor) to control the distance to the car in-front.

I find this a great feature (you can adjust the distance & agressiveness of cruise control) & use it 90% of my daily driving. (probably not as useful for you if you don't do much motorway or long A-road driving)

If you can justify the extra for this then Front Assist comes for free.

I wholeheartedly agree. I test drove it a couple weeks ago, and it was much better than I anticipated. Once I had set the distance to a value I was comfortable with I was able to leave let go of the pedals for the whole freeway. I highly recommend picking it from the options list if you ever use your car for other than city driving.

robs12, on 07 Nov 2014 - 19:13, said:

Is there a (safe!) way to test that it's working? I've turned it on, and tried slowly driving into the neighbour's car a couple of times but nothing happened...except I hit the brakes at (what I thought) was the last minute..

 

Edit to add - this is on an Elegance delivered this week. It has the little box on the front bumper, and it looks like I can turn it on and off...but was it a standard fit when I ordered it back in July, or has it just been added as standard in the new October brochure?

 

You need to drive much faster towards your neighbour's car, really floor it.....

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER - don't try this at home.

OK, seems like this is the go...I might have it and it should work... right?

 

Piccies tomorrow....if I can't find a suitable cardboard box, the neighbour's Aston is a scrapper....

OK, seems like this is the go...I might have it and it should work... right?

 

Piccies tomorrow....if I can't find a suitable cardboard box, the neighbour's Aston is a scrapper....

A safer but indirect test would be to drive too close to a car in front of you. You should see "the dangerous proximity warning" symbol in the MFD. I have seen the next level "advance warnings" a few times where the traffic suddenly stopped in front of me on the motorway, but both times I was awake and applied the brake at the same time, but I can see the value if you are temporarily distracted.

I also agree that the ACC is great, but it's usefulness depends on your driving style. Also, it is not perfect; sometimes you have to intervene.

A safer but indirect test would be to drive too close to a car in front of you. You should see "the dangerous proximity warning" symbol in the MFD. I have seen the next level "advance warnings" a few times where the traffic suddenly stopped in front of me on the motorway, but both times I was awake and applied the brake at the same time, but I can see the value if you are temporarily distracted.

I also agree that the ACC is great, but it's usefulness depends on your driving style. Also, it is not perfect; sometimes you have to intervene.

and ACC is pretty pointless if you have a manual gearbox like me...

Both my S60 & V40 both have City Safe, both have stopped me hitting a bollard or fence when making. Its one of those things ...you never need it until you need it.

 

One thing for sure first time it hits the breaks it does leave you sat there in shock wondering what the hell just happened, and in my case with my with and girls shouting at me for slamming on!