This month our employee spotlight is on our Fixed Operations Manager, Dan Desharnais. Dan works for both our West Coast Nissan and West Coast Ford Lincoln dealerships and has been working with the West Coast Auto Group for 15 years.
Join us in congratulating Ken Homeniuk on his success for the third consecutive month as our top sales person of the month. Ken has been working at West Coast Ford Lincoln for four years and prides himself on his excellent and thorough work! Ken really truly enjoys his job and the people that he works with.
Ford Co-Pilot360 includes standard automatic emergency braking with pedestrian detection, blind spot information system, lane keeping system, rear backup camera and auto high beam lighting. Ford Co-Pilot360 will roll out across Ford’s new passenger cars, SUVs and trucks up to F-150 in North America, starting on the new 2019 Ford Edge and Edge ST this fall.
“Though our vehicles today are safer than ever, drivers tell us they are still stressed about getting in a potential accident,” said Jim Farley, Ford president, Global Markets. “That’s one reason why we’re making these must-have technologies accessible to millions of customers each year.”
Most advanced standard driver assist package
Ford Co-Pilot360 starts with standard automatic emergency braking – called pre-collision assist with pedestrian detection – that can help drivers avoid collisions with other vehicles or pedestrians who might accidentally cross in front of the vehicle’s path. If a potential collision is detected, a warning flashes and an alert sounds, and if the driver’s response is not sufficient, the system can automatically apply the brakes to help minimize a frontal collision.
The technology addresses Ford research showing a growing trend of people worrying about hitting pedestrians – and will be standard on 91 per cent of Ford vehicles in North America by 2020.
Blind spot information system, or BLIS, uses radar to identify a vehicle entering the blind spot and alerts the driver with an indicator light in the side-view mirror. Cross-traffic alert can warn drivers of traffic behind when slowly backing out of a parking spot or driveway.
Lane keeping system has three functions:
The first can notify drivers through steering wheel vibration that they need to correct course when the system detects the vehicle drifting close to lane markings
The second provides steering torque to steer back toward the centre of the lane
Third, a driver alert system continuously monitors driving pattern using a forward-looking camera and provides visual and audio warnings when the system estimates the driver’s vigilance level to be less than that of an attentive driver
Commercial customers can also benefit from Ford’s expansion of driver-assist technologies. By 2020, E-Series, F-650 and F-750 and even the F59 chassis will come with available automatic emergency braking, lane departure warning, driver alert system and more.
A National Transportation Safety Board study shows having technologies such as AEB can help prevent and mitigate rear-end crashes, which can help customers lower their cost of ownership.
Testing, trusting tech
Ford is also investing $500 million in the next five years to continue developing new driver-assist and safety technologies. Key areas of focus will be simplifying the technologies so they work as people expect – especially as driving controls become more automated.
Researchers test the user experience with many new technologies at Ford’s VIRTTEX driving simulator in Dearborn and run new systems through a battery of simulations built from more than hundreds of thousands of miles of testing across the country. For example, engineers tested a recent suite of radar and camera technologies for more than 660,000 miles across the country.
Make plans to experience the CoPilot360 suite of technologies when it begins rolling out this fall. We think you’ll be impressed and relieved at how effective it is at keeping you safe on the road.
