VIDEO: We experience Toyota’s Highway Teammate autonomous driving tech in a modified Lexus GS

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It’s been a busy week thanks the 2015 Tokyo Motor Show, but we weren’t in Japan just for halls full of cars. We were also in the land of the rising sun for a Toyota media tour where we got to try out some interesting cars and technologies. Here’s one of them – Toyota Highway Teammate, which is the self-driving technology that the company is currently developing.

Toyota’s approach to self-driving technology is called the Mobility Teammate Concept. In a nutshell, they believe that interactions between drivers and cars should mirror those between close friends who share a common purpose, sometimes watching over each other and sometimes helping each other out.

The Highway Teammate system is the first system developed as part of this concept. It’s still under development of course – Toyota has been testing it on a modified Lexus GS designed to drive itself along Tokyo’s Shuto Expressway.

You can see that the Lexus GS used has been fitted with various sensory equipment such as a “millimetre wave radar,” a light detection and ranging sensor (LIDAR) and a camera placed atop the front mid section of the roof. This helps give the car a 360 degree “view” of its surroundings.

All of this helps the self-driving GS to brake, accelerate, intersect traffic as well as plan forward before it passes slower traffic. Perhaps in the interest of “transparency” to the driver so that we know what the system is thinking, the 12.3-inch screen in the middle of the GS dashboard displays the exact pattern of the road ahead and the direction the vehicle is going to cut into.

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Highway Teammate is basically designed to take over the driving from the driver upon entering a highway from the on-ramp all the way through to the off-ramp. In our demo, the automated driving kicked in after we passed the ETC toll booth to enter the highway. A special button on the steering wheel of the GS activates the system. The system operates the steering wheel, accelerator, and brakes to achieve the appropriate speed and driving lines in much the same way as a person would drive.

We recorded our experience in the Highway Teammate Lexus GS so you’d have an idea how the system works. Watch the video below which we recorded during our test ride in the car. If you listen to the audio you can hear an explanation of what the system was doing during the drive.

Overall, the car drives itself extremely smoothly and never once was there a hairy moment where we felt like we were going to hit something. It all felt very natural, and if I didn’t occasionally look to my right to see that the person in the driver’s seat wasn’t actually driving, I wouldn’t even know I was in an autonomous car.

As you would have learned if you watched the video, there was once instance where the driver took over because he felt the lane that the car was supposed to switch into had too heavy traffic for the system to handle. So you can basically override the system anytime just like cruise control. After that he simply resumed the Highway Teammate feature and the car took over again.

It’s basically one up on the semi-autonomous driving system available in the W222 S-Class which is called Distronic Plus with Steering Assist. The S-Class system works well on highways as well and can steer itself according to the curvature of the lane but based on trying out both systems, Highway Teammate can tackle sharper bends. Highway Teammate can also switch lanes and ease itself into moving traffic.

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Another difference is that the S-Class system still requires you to keep your hand on the steering wheel although it will perform the steering effort on its own, while Highway Teammate doesn’t require you to. So while Distronic Plus with Steering Assist will ‘assist’ you, Highway Teammate is designed to completely take the chore off you.

But of course, the biggest difference of all is that the S-Class system, while relatively more basic, is already in production and available in Malaysia. How soon will Highway Teammate come to a production car? Toyota plans to launch a production version of the Highway Teammate feature by around 2020.


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Paul Tan

After dabbling for years in the IT industry, Paul Tan initially began this site as a general blog covering various topics of personal interest. With an increasing number of readers paying rapt attention to the motoring stories, one thing led to another and the rest, as they say, is history.

 

Comments

  • Kamarul on Oct 31, 2015 at 3:36 pm

    Looks like rhe automotive industry is bracing for a shift of focus to this new technology.
    Bravo to them for planning & moving forward.
    Unlike our P1
    still struggling to source an engine :(
    #kipidapkepalahotaklu.

    Like or Dislike: Thumb up 17 Thumb down 5
    • karam singh on Oct 31, 2015 at 8:46 pm

      Sorry, But Proton not struggling as P2/Toyota & other carmaker to provide safety equipment in the small car segment like the Iriz.
      Why putting VSC in smaller car so hard for Axia,Myvi,Vios,
      even bigger car like 1.8 Altis, Fortuner & 7 seater people/family carrier like Innova,Avanza still dont have stability control. Life cheaper nowadays? Bodykits worth more than lives?

      Like or Dislike: Thumb up 8 Thumb down 16
  • Kamarul on Oct 31, 2015 at 3:36 pm

    Looks like rhe automotive industry is bracing for a shift of focus to this new technology.
    Bravo to them for planning & moving forward.
    Unlike our P1
    still struggling to source an engine :(
    #kipidapkepalahotaklu.

    Like or Dislike: Thumb up 7 Thumb down 4
  • Tis technology will pobably failed big time here…the roads white lines either nearly invisible or non existent, millions of potholes, thousands of confusing signboards, hundreds of thousands of Lewis Hamilton in their Mivis and God cars, Mat rempits and best of all “no signal” during rain..sorry but autonomous driving no match these low tech poblems

    Like or Dislike: Thumb up 6 Thumb down 0
  • Simply the best car tech video I’ve seen all year

    Like or Dislike: Thumb up 9 Thumb down 1
  • TopsyBoXyTurvy on Oct 31, 2015 at 8:34 pm

    We need to embrace good technologu but can these autonomous systems survive the “gila”ness of motorists and motorcyclists of Malaysia? Not to mention those bodoh rempits..

    Like or Dislike: Thumb up 6 Thumb down 0
  • sanss on Nov 01, 2015 at 9:47 am

    What about motorbike condition? . Japan has not much motorbikes on the road.

    Like or Dislike: Thumb up 0 Thumb down 0
    • I bet u mean Mat Rempit. We malaysia is famous on Mat Rempit. Most importantly, our roads in Malaysia are unmarked or simply marked. I think the system cant even recognize it to make judgement and decision.

      Like or Dislike: Thumb up 1 Thumb down 0
  • salim ab. on Nov 01, 2015 at 4:22 pm

    What technology when we can’t even implement AES & screwed up big time.
    Speed cameras & JPJ link-up still “work in progress” and taking ages.
    So don’t bother or even dream of this kinda tech being implemented here.

    Like or Dislike: Thumb up 3 Thumb down 0
    • Don't wake me up on Nov 02, 2015 at 9:05 am

      The thing is this tech is not determined by malaysian authorities. We’ll just adopt and adapt like how we did with tv, radio, tel etc

      Like or Dislike: Thumb up 0 Thumb down 0
 

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