I couldn't see another UK post on autopilot since 7.1 came out claiming improvements and "officially" condoning use on single carriageway roads. So here are my experiences with it and I'd appreciate feedback.
I did experiment with the earlier software on empty Surrey country A roads and found it was very prone to diving towards the bushes if there was anything confusing about the roadside features and no white lines, and it also sometimes just seemed to lose it's way and cross the centre line then swerve back. All of that seems much better but it still does not seem truly usable.
It is generally scary that it goes so close to the kerb or other threshold, it also seems inconsistent in that sometimes the lane is wide but it chooses to ride the road edge and stay half a metre clear of the centre line, other times the line crossing rumble is triggered and it is half a metre from the verge.
It handles the road well if there is a white line at the roadside but very poorly for a simple grass verge. It quite often starts running on the dirt at the edge of the road.
The weird thing is that the car clearly shows a road edge on the display without the blue line (if it can't show that then autopilot won't engage) yet the car is clearly shown riding that edge with a big gap to the right hand white line shown blue. Why does the autopilot not know what the display does?
It still can't judge tighter curves properly and weaves around them.
It still gets confused by zigzag lines at crossings
It kerbs the tyres on clear kerbs even as the collision alarm goes off for the bushes and the display shoes it at the edge of the road.
In short it isn't good enough to trust.
Ray
I did experiment with the earlier software on empty Surrey country A roads and found it was very prone to diving towards the bushes if there was anything confusing about the roadside features and no white lines, and it also sometimes just seemed to lose it's way and cross the centre line then swerve back. All of that seems much better but it still does not seem truly usable.
It is generally scary that it goes so close to the kerb or other threshold, it also seems inconsistent in that sometimes the lane is wide but it chooses to ride the road edge and stay half a metre clear of the centre line, other times the line crossing rumble is triggered and it is half a metre from the verge.
It handles the road well if there is a white line at the roadside but very poorly for a simple grass verge. It quite often starts running on the dirt at the edge of the road.
The weird thing is that the car clearly shows a road edge on the display without the blue line (if it can't show that then autopilot won't engage) yet the car is clearly shown riding that edge with a big gap to the right hand white line shown blue. Why does the autopilot not know what the display does?
It still can't judge tighter curves properly and weaves around them.
It still gets confused by zigzag lines at crossings
It kerbs the tyres on clear kerbs even as the collision alarm goes off for the bushes and the display shoes it at the edge of the road.
In short it isn't good enough to trust.
Ray