INSIDE AMG | Active Safety – Bringing AMG’s to Their Limits and Beyond Part (1/2)
Welcome to a new episode of INSIDE AMG! Today, we are at a top secret proving ground in Spain where we will try to bring our AMGs to the limit. Lay back and enjoy an action-packed episode dedicated to active safety. In the back, I can already see our expert for today.
Hi Hendrik, what an entrance, nice! Hi Catrin! Great jacket, good taste. -Thank you, you too. -Thanks! Please tell our viewers what you do at AMG and what you have planned for us today. Sure, my name is Hendrik and I have been with AMG for 13 years.
I am the team lead for active safety, also for steering development and system integration for all driving dynamics ECUs. But today, we want to focus on active safety. It is actually wet. We normally do not test when it is wet but so we can use it for filming so it is perfect.
Lucky us! Yes, so the day is not lost. Perfect! What is actually the difference between your job and the passive safety or the active assistance systems? Our job is basically to prevent the customer from having the passive safety in use. Because passive safety is more like the airbag stuff and the belts.
So, we do all kinds of driving tests at different proving grounds. We do high-speed stability, corner braking, steering manoeuvres, so that we can always give customers a stable car where they can drive at any speed. Nice! The active systems, the driving systems basically keep the distance to the car in front
Or during a lane change or if you are losing the lane. That is basically it. I guess we will experience a lot of that today and I have seen a lot of special equipment on the cars you brought us.
Take me through it: What are you doing with this? What kind of equipment is it? As you can see, we use all kinds of measuring equipment. Here you can see the Correvit sensor, it measures the slip angle and the velocity of the car. Would you say that the measurements
Are more subjective based on the driver’s feelings or on objective data? No, our team measures all the data to have an objective view so that we can compare all the car types and the different tires we use. We also have some manoeuvres where we judge the car subjectively.
In the end, both play a role, right? That is right. We have some more equipment inside; I can show you if you want. Sure, let’s go. OK, perfect. Wow, that looks like a lot of tech! Yes, that is our measuring equipment. We pack it into every car.
This is the sensor you saw up front. Then we have the inertia platform. This measures the car’s acceleration in all three directions, X, Y and Z. And an extra device catches all the FlexRay signals of the car. But this car is special:
We have a steering robot inside, you are going to experience that later. I am excited! For our first manoeuvre, we are going to jump into the GT. Yes! Alright, this looks like a slalom, I know this from my work in the press department. A lot of journalists do this test with our cars
Because handling, of course, is an important criteria. But what do you pay special attention to on this manoeuvre? Sure! You are right, that is a slalom – it is a 10 x 36. We start off to see how the car behaves with a stability program on in Comfort mode
And see how all the systems are working together. Usually, we want to have the fastest time. So, we will switch to RACE mode – then you have no stability program. Let us see what we can get. We will see what happens. OK, we start with ESP on
And AMG DYNAMICS in Comfort mode. Are you ready? I am ready. Perfect, let’s go! Here it comes. Yes. OK, let us start. Now, you are feeling that the car is rolling a lot, but it is always stable. It feels very stable. So, how did you feel? The car felt really stable.
Like you could do whatever you wanted to, but the car would always keep its form. Yes, that is what we pay attention to: that with the stability program on, customers do not have any problems driving on the open street. It is always perfectly controlled and is also keeping its lane.
But as you felt, it is still pretty fast. Yes, but it makes you feel confident and safe – exactly what you wanted to achieve. Yes, that is why we always look at the tires and the different development phases of the stability program. That makes the customer feel comfortable in the end.
So, what is next? Now, we go in RACE mode and try with no stability program and see what happens. I am going to be honest, I am a little afraid. So let us see. You don’t have to. Here we go!
While this is a lot of fun, it feels like it is more for the experienced driver. Yes, it is all on the driver, no stability mode anymore. You have a different AMG DYNAMICS setting, so it did feel totally different. You felt that the car did not roll anymore
And it was a little bit looser than before. But the tires are really good and really stable, so it was not too bad. Now, I hand you over to my colleague who will show you the next manoeuvre. OK. Perfect, then let’s go! Hi, Martin. Nice to see you!
Hi, Catrin. Nice to see you too. Please quickly introduce yourself to the community. What is your role at AMG? Sure! My name is Martin, I have been at AMG for almost three years now. I do active safety in Hendrik’s team.
When I look at the car you brought us, I see some crazy installations and frames. Tell us a little bit more about that! This is one of the very specific special setups we do with cars. We test the car very extensively to make sure that it will never roll over.
We put a frame on the car that makes it impossible for the car to flip. And we put a roof rack to put weights on, as you can see here. We simulate the worst-case weight distribution for the customer. So, customers can do whatever they like with the car.
They can drive as sportily as they like. But we make sure it is never going to roll over because Mercedes has had some experience with that in the past. So, we commit to make sure that that does not happen. You are referencing the elk test. Is that what we are doing today?
Pretty much. That is one of the manoeuvres we do and we are going to do it now, let’s get in. Alright. Who are the nice fellows in the back? Those are actually our best employees because they never complain. They always do their job, which is to simulate weight in the car. OK.
So we have the worst-case weight distribution. Now, we are going to drive through the test and I will do this twice. First, I will show you slowly what is happening. Then I will do a worst-case test how we actually test the rollover stability. Let’s go! I just drove through it quite slowly.
You could feel that the car was slipping a little bit, but it was not very dangerous, it was not going to roll or something. Could you get it to roll over? I can show you how I drive when I really test the worst case. So we can see what happens.
What a crazy experience! Feels very weird, but I will try to do it. It is not that hard, so… OK, let’s do it. That was crazy! OK, that was pretty much worst case.
Immerse yourself in the fascinating world of vehicle stability and driving dynamics at AMG.
In our latest episode of #INSIDEAMG, we push AMG vehicles to their limits and beyond. Host Catrin meets active safety expert Hendrik to go behind the scenes of AMG’s state-of-the-art approach to vehicle testing.
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