Very Impressed with Ford Co-Pilot360 Assist+

[Raymo]

I took delivery of a fully loaded Badlands, yesterday. I don't have much to say about it that hasn't already been said. I'm loving so far. However, I haven't seen that much said about its more advanced driving features so I thought I'd share some impressions.

I went into the settings and activated the Intelligent adaptive cruise control. Once that is activated, you can press a single button on the steering wheel and the system does the following:

1. Engages the adaptive cruise control
2. Sets the speed to the current road's speed limit
3. Starts the lane centering steering

There's no swaying left and right between lines. Copilot keeps the vehicle in the center of the lane. When you pass speed limit signs, the car's speed is automatically adjusted. I've driven a few cars that have these features and this seems the most polished, besides something like a Tesla.

A few notes:

• There's a setting that can automatically add a buffer of 1-5mph on top of the current speed limit.
• You can still manually adjust the speed setpoint up and down, but the car will adjust the speed again when the speed limit changes.
• When you get notified to keep your hands on the wheel, the car continues the assisted steering for some period of time. This is nice, because my last car disengaged the steering simultaneously with the notification.
• Acceleration when the speed limit changes can be abrupt at lower speeds sometimes, I wish there was a way to lower it. I had an awkward situation where the speed limit increased as a cop was passing me and my car lunged forward as if I was trying to speed past the cop, lol.

EDIT: Adding the info from my post below about which features are included in the base Copilot360 vs Copilot360 Assist+ package.

The standard Copilot360 has the lane-keeping system.

The Lane-keeping System is a safety feature that detects when your vehicle is drifting out of the lane. It can be configured to provide an alert and/or a steering correction to assist in keeping your car from veering into the next lane over.

The Copilot360 Assist+ package has Adaptive Cruise Control with Stop and Go with Lane Centering.

ACC is standard radar based cruise control that most people are familiar with.

Stop and Go means ACC continues working even if vehicle in front of you comes to a complete stop. In older vehicles, ACC would cutoff below a certain speed and the driver needs to bring the car to a stop.

Lane centering is a convenience feature that actually steers the vehicle for you, keeping it in the center of the lane. However, it's far from a full self driving vehicle. The driver's hands need to remain on the steering wheel. It doesn't do anything fancy like lane changes.

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[Bdub]

A buffer of only 1-5mph is not enough for me, I'm usually 8 - 10mph over.

 

[Zander1ni]

A buffer of only 1-5mph is not enough for me, I'm usually 8 - 10mph over.

you can set it to whatever you want

 

[Raymo]

A buffer of only 1-5mph is not enough for me, I'm usually 8 - 10mph over.

Yeah, that's why it's nice that you can manually adjust it up and down still. Maybe, they will update it in the future. I doubt it, though, because larger buffer's become more of an issue at lower speeds. Right now, I've left it enabled because it gets me in the ball park to start. Also like that it will slow me down even if I didn't see a lower speed limit. That way I don't end up going 20mph over somewhere on accident.

 

[magicbus]

So is it 1-5 or 1-whatever? Here on the island where the highest speed limit is 45 and the main road is 7 miles of mostly straight, 1-5 is perfect. When I get to the mainland on highways I am a solid speed limit + 9 so I don’t have to worry about getting stopped.

 

[Donnie722]

Just to clarify, the lane keeping/steering assist is part of the 360 and the assist + is the adaptive cruise control/ stop and go?

There's prob a post somewhere

 

[Raymo]

Just to clarify, the lane keeping/steering assist is part of the 360 and the assist + is the adaptive cruise control/ stop and go?

There's prob a post somewhere

It's easy to confuse them because different manufacturers refer to things differently and have different levels of operation.

The standard Copilot360 has the lane-keeping system.

The Lane-keeping System is a safety feature that detects when your vehicle is drifting out of the lane. It can be configured to provide an alert and/or a steering correction to assist in keeping your car from veering into the next lane over.

The Copilot360 Assist+ package has Adaptive Cruise Control with Stop and Go with Lane Centering.

ACC is standard radar based cruise control that most people are familiar with.

Stop and Go means ACC continues working even if vehicle in front of you comes to a complete stop. In older vehicles, ACC would cutoff below a certain speed and the driver needs to bring the car to a stop.

Lane centering is a convenience feature that actually steers the vehicle for you, keeping it in the center of the lane. However, it's far from a full self driving vehicle. The driver's hands need to remain on the steering wheel. It doesn't do anything fancy like lane changes.

I'll add this info to my post.

 

[GregMG79]

The lane keep assist and centering is only for those that have the paid $795 360+ Option, correct? I have the options shown in my settings to turn off and on via the touch screen. It I do not have the 360+ on my badlands. Am I correct?

 

[FromQueens]

I love the Bronco Sport's auto steering feature. Took two long road trips recently (one was over 6 hours-long) and the Bronco basically drove itself, and in different kinds of weather--rain, fog. Awesome. I felt rested and was able to enjoy the trip much more.

 

[Sparky]

So what you are saying is my 360 will not steer the car wow ,now that is disappointing,here I thought it would.I do not have the 360+

360 will nudge you off the lane line. 360+ will actually steer you around corners etc.

 

[Powerz]

360 will nudge you off the lane line. 360+ will actually steer you around corners etc.

360 with the aid enabled on my base seems to do more than nudge off the center line, it actually does my turns for me as well on bends(idk if it's because of the sensitivity I'm on etc.) Now the fun/bad part is sharp turns/tight bends up here in two places where I'm at it jerks the wheel way too aggressively lol even if you're turning the wheel already. But wider bends or bends to get on/off the highway it has 0 issues with and as long as my hands on the wheel it keeps the car pretty much in line.

Just another tidbit outside of this topic, it's almost the same crap with the parking sensors. Base bronco sports have no parking sensors supposedly, yet the cross traffic detection straight up picks up cars directly behind you or pedestrians behind the car and even shows it on the rear view camera screen where they're coming from and beeps. ?‍

 

[wilbur_xmas]

Overall I have been very impressed with the driver aids as well, though this is the first car I have owned that has offered such features.

Unfortunately for me, the "Intelligent" cruise control setting is nearly unusable out here in CA. Why? Because almost every time there is a speed limit sign, it is followed by another speed limit sign indicating a 55 limit for trucks

So I'm cruising along at 77 mph (70 mph speed limit + my preconfigured 7 mph buffer), then the camera reads a 55 sign that doesn't apply to me, and decides to drop to 62 mph (55 mph + 7 mph buffer). Now there is a calculated difference of 15 mph, so the bronco sport quickly lets off the gas, then abruptly hits the brakes. It did it twice with cars behind me as I was passing slower traffic causing me to inadvertently brake check the car behind me. I quickly turned that "Intelligent" crap off.

Thankfully the standard adaptive cruise/lane centering setting works great and I am usually paying attention enough to notice speed limit changes that actually apply to me.

 

[SportWest]

Thankfully the standard adaptive cruise/lane centering setting works great and I am usually paying attention enough to notice speed limit changes that actually apply to me.

If I understand correctly, you can disable the feature that reads speed limit signs, while leaving adaptive cruise control (reduces speed as you approach slower traffic) enabled?

 

[wilbur_xmas]

If I understand correctly, you can disable the feature that reads speed limit signs, while leaving adaptive cruise control (reduces speed as you approach slower traffic) enabled?

Correct, there is a pretty big combination of settings you can use to tailor the Co-Pilot 360+ Assist to your preference:

• Adaptive cruise control with start/stop (and ability to set following distance with steering wheel button)
  • Can toggle lane centering on and off (steering wheel button)
  • Car camera will still read speed limit signs and display them in the information panel, but will not adjust speed based on read speed limit, or flash alert if limit is exceeded
• Intelligent cruise control with start/stop
  • Can configure "alert" buffer (in Sync 3 settings) where speed limit display flashes when set speed exceeds the last read speed limit sign + buffer
  • Can configure default "speed" buffer (in Sync 3 settings), where cruise control will automatically adjust to last read speed limit sign + buffer

 

[Fordson04]

I know this is an older thread but wanted to ask. I just picked up a Big Bend with the copilot 360 assist+ add on. In settings I have normal and adaptive cruise control options. I have seen several post about intelligent cruise control that alters the speed based of the speed signs. I have the speed sign recognition that alerts when you are "over" but I don't have the intelligent option to automatically adjust speed. Is this supposed to be on all 360 assist+ or only certain models?

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