[JSpira]

Originally Posted by BMWrules7

I want to stop you here. The collision detection when combined with HUD is quite probably one of the greatest safety improvements in this century for popular vehicles.

The system detects when the car in front of you dramatically slows down and displays a red warning in the HUD. (my personal view is that the non HUD version is much less effective for early warning---both display a warning but in different locations and the non HUD early warning may not be seen as easily.

Aside from the brake lights, the way you can tell a car in front of you has dramatically slowed down is when the apparent size of the vehicle changes. This shift in size can be virtually imperceptible when the car is directly ahead of you and all you see is a two dimensional object getting slightly larger.

The collision detection will provide a silent but visible warning in the early stages when the car in front of you is slowing down dramatically.

In almost every case I became aware of a dramatic change in speed by the car in front of my by way of collision detection in advance of my unaided peepers. Typically 300 to 1000 milliseconds before your unaided eyes would notice. That's a near eternity when it comes to strategic accident avoidance.

In many cases, you take no action. But, you are made ready by the advance notice.

+1. Well put.