Collaborative Efforts

Ford Motor Company is involved with a number of partners to develop future technologies and enhance the safety of the driving experience.

PReVENT

Ford has been actively involved in a European partnership called PReVENT – short for Preventative and Active Safety Applications. This four-year initiative concluded in January 2008. With a budget of more than €55 million, the project has been aimed at developing new preventative and active safety applications and sophisticated driver information systems based on advanced intelligent technologies. It was co-funded by the European Commission.

Within the framework of PReVENT, Ford showed how digital data from navigation systems can be used to support future active safety systems in cars. For example, such data may allow vehicles to "recognize" potential hazard areas and react accordingly. Lane-keeping systems, in particular, will benefit from information provided by digital map data. These systems typically rely on cameras recording lane markings, but if the markings are deficient, the cameras cannot function properly. In such situations, digital data could provide the necessary information.

Digital map data could also enable "path prediction." Such data would be generated by analyzing the daily route pattern of a driver. As most people travel the same route every day, the on-board computer would use "probability calculation" to plot the route in advance. This would help the on-board computer to focus on relevant information and ignore the unimportant data of the surroundings. Among other benefits, path prediction could enhance a vehicle's adaptive headlamp system, which currently is controlled by the steering angle. The on-board computer could learn the angle of curves on the route in advance and thus light the curve at an early stage.

In addition to technical issues, PReVENT addressed legal issues to define when and to what extent different active safety systems may interfere with a driver's autonomy.

CAMP

In 1995, Ford and General Motors launched the Crash Avoidance Metrics Partnership (CAMP). Within CAMP, the Vehicle Safety Communications Two (VSC-2) Consortium, which includes Ford, GM, Toyota, DaimlerChrysler and Honda, is working with the U.S. Department of Transportation on two major projects to develop safety applications that utilize vehicle communications. Their efforts are focused on developing a communication system whereby vehicles can "talk" to each other and to the roadway. This would be analogous to wireless internet or cellular telephone for cars. CAMP VSC-2 successfully completed a project that demonstrated the basic feasibility of this technology, and they will be evaluating the following applications in a follow-on project:

• Cooperative Intersection Collision Avoidance System: Violation Warning
  As a vehicle approaches a traffic light, it would receive a message from the traffic light with the signal phase (red, yellow or green) and the amount of time until the signal changes. The vehicle would use this information, together with the vehicle position and speed, to decide if a warning or some other countermeasure (such as brake assist) is appropriate.
• Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communications for Safety Applications, such as Electronic Emergency Brake Lights (EEBL)
  The vehicle manufacturers in the VSC-2 are working together and with NHTSA to investigate the messages needed for a host of vehicle-to-vehicle safety applications, including EEBL. For example, when a driver applies the brakes, the brake lights are illuminated, but there is currently no way to distinguish hard braking from light or moderate braking. Further, often only the vehicle directly behind the braking vehicle is able to see the brake lights. If a vehicle performing hard braking could send a message to other vehicles, then those vehicles could warn their drivers, activate brake assist or even start automatic braking.

VII Initiative

Ford is participating in the Vehicle Infrastructure Integration (VII) initiative to assess the technical, economic and social/political feasibility of deploying wireless technologies to support the above vehicle communications applications as well as mobility and commercial applications (e.g., e-payment for parking, tolling and gasoline purchases). Under a $56 million cooperative agreement, the U.S. Department of Transportation, state departments of transportation and nine OEMs are evaluating the framework for a national strategy to implement vehicle-to-roadway and vehicle-to-vehicle communications to support safety, commercial and consumer services. In this partnership, the government would fund the roadside infrastructure and the OEMs would provide the wireless on-board equipment. Thus far, a special Dedicated Short Range Communications radio has been developed for this purpose, and the Federal Communications Commission has allocated bandwidth for its operation. In addition, the VII partners have developed appropriate on-board equipment, prototype applications and vehicle integration. The VII vehicle-based radio equipment was initially installed in a Ford Mustang. As a result of the lessons learned, the VII Consortium purchased four 2007 Ford Edge vehicles to begin building a proof-of-concept fleet. Proof-of-concept activities are scheduled to be completed by May 2008.

ComCARE Alliance

Ford is also a board member of the ComCARE Alliance, a nonprofit organization that encourages the establishment of wireless communication networks, infrastructure and technologies that enable emergency communications between the motoring public and public safety agencies. This alliance is a coalition of the medical community; public health and safety officials; automobile, telematics and technology companies; safety groups; and others.

As part of the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, Ford has provided seed funding to ComCARE for development of a Vehicle Rescue Portal Web site, based on an idea generated by a Ford safety scientist. This Web site will be a one-stop location for information about vehicles for emergency response teams as they deploy to crash sites. It will describe how many airbags are in a vehicle, where they are located, and where rescuers can cut into the vehicle for extrication without cutting power lines or airbag inflators.

New Crash-Test Dummies

Crash-test dummies are essential research tools that aid in the development of passive safety technologies, and Ford Motor Company continues to develop, often in partnership with other parties, more advanced test dummies.

Recently, Ford partnered with the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), the University of Virginia, Virginia Tech and the Takata Corporation in a multi-year project to develop a new abdominal insert and sensor for a crash-test dummy representing a six-year-old child. CHOP studies have shown that, in vehicle crashes, significant abdominal injury in four- to eight-year-old children is second in frequency of occurrence only to head and facial injuries. Abdominal injuries often occur when children too young (i.e., the four- to eight-year-old range) utilize adult restraint systems without a booster seat. The abdominal insert and sensor will allow restraint engineers industry-wide to test the potential for abdominal injuries in children and ultimately improve the development of in-vehicle restraint systems for young children. The Society of Automotive Engineers recently established a task force to perform "round robin" testing of the new dummy component. Tests will be performed by dummy manufacturers, other OEMs and NHTSA's Vehicle Research and Test Center.

In another effort, Ford, GM and DaimlerChrysler have been working together under the auspices of the Occupant Safety Research Partnership (OSRP), a group within USCAR, to research, develop, test and evaluate advanced crash-test dummies and other pre-competitive safety systems. A number of years ago, the OSRP initiated development of WorldSID, a male side-impact dummy that is recognized as the most advanced crash-test dummy ever created. In 2006 and 2007, the OSRP worked with NHTSA to help them evaluate WorldSID for potential use in the federal government's new side-impact crash-test standard. WorldSID is also the first side-impact dummy with the potential to be commonly used in side-impact regulations around the world.

Advanced Crash Avoidance Technology Program

Ford is part of the team that was recently awarded $1.9 million under NHTSA's Advanced Crash Avoidance Technology program to develop a simulation tool to estimate the benefits of future active safety features. Ford, Volvo and the University of Michigan's Transportation Research Institute are working together to research Lane Departure Warning, Driver Alert and Emergency Lane Assist as case studies. Accident database information and driver data from test track and VIRTTEX experiments will be used as input for this simulation.

Alcolock Blue Ribbon Panel

Reducing the incidence of impaired driving would go a long way toward improving road traffic safety. In the EU, 25–30 percent of all car accidents involve alcohol. In the U.S., approximately 40 percent of all traffic fatalities are alcohol-related (as defined by NHTSA).

The Automotive Coalition for Traffic Safety recently formed a Blue Ribbon Panel (BRP) for the development of advanced alcohol detection technology, often called "alcolocks." The panel consists of automotive manufacturers, alcolock suppliers, Mothers Against Drunk Driving, the IIHS, government representatives and other experts. Ford Motor Company is an active participant in the BRP, which held its inaugural meeting in July 2007.

The BRP and its research will be funded jointly by NHTSA and the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers. The purpose of the research is to "...engage major automakers in cooperative research that advances the state of alcohol detection technology...to promote the standardization of the technology, its widespread deployment, and acceptance by the general public."

University Partnerships

Ford Motor Company is increasingly collaborating with university partners on crucial advanced safety technology projects. Ford has major research alliances with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), the University of Michigan and Northwestern University and has utilized Ford's global University Research Program (URP) to collaborate with leading researchers at over 100 universities worldwide. Safety is a central thrust in our collaborative university programs.

Important projects are under way within the Ford-MIT alliance, yielding progress in areas of vehicle autonomy and "active safety" – that is, technology to prevent accidents from occurring, including computer vision, lane keeping, vehicle controls, obstacle detection and avoidance, and accurately assessing the driver's interaction with the vehicle. At the University of Michigan, safety work includes a portfolio of projects on 360° sensing and developing more robust and capable active vehicle control and enhanced collision avoidance systems, utilizing both onboard sensors and offboard information sources.

In addition to safety work at MIT and Michigan, our global URP has allowed Ford to access talented researchers at many other leading institutions. Ford has an ongoing project at Virginia Tech assessing the properties of maternal tissues from pregnant women. This project will enable the improvement of computer models to help gain a better understanding of the injury risk to pregnant women and their unborn babies. A project at the State University of New York's Downstate Medical Center should yield an improved understanding of human tolerance to pelvis injury, and collaborative work is ongoing with Purdue University investigating enhanced vehicle dynamics and stability control.

Collaborative university work catalyzes innovation at Ford by providing access to the leading researchers at the cutting edge of vehicle dynamics and stability control, accident avoidance and driver assist safety technology to name just a few. Ford will continue to integrate these collaborative innovations, driving continuous improvement in real-world safety and sustainability for all Ford Motor Company products.

Center for Child Injury Prevention Studies

Ford Motor Company participates in the research, and serves on the Industrial Advisory Board, of the National Science Foundation's Center for Child Injury Prevention Studies at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. Other members of the board include Britax, Dorel, NHTSA, Nissan, State Farm, Takata, Toyota and Volkswagen. The Center has sponsored research into many issues involving the safety of children in automobiles, including backover collisions, seat belt effectiveness, child restraint issues and many others. Ford's Board member, who is an established safety researcher himself, participates as mentor for several of these studies.