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Ford’s marketing of BlueCruise as a “hands-off highway driving experience” is potentially misleading to consumers. People may be confused or feel misled when they find out that BlueCruise wants them to have their hands on the steering wheel quite often on curvier sections of highway. Many customers may assume “hands-free” actually means “hands-free at all times,” and in our experience so far, that simply isn’t the case with BlueCruise, even on premapped sections of divided highway. BlueCruise 1.2 improves upon an already very good driver assist system which was recently rated the best ADAS by Consumer Reports.
Ford’s hands-free BlueCruise feature is now available as a monthly or annual subscription
Ford's other tweaks in BlueCruise v1.2 include Predictive Speed Assist, which promises to change the speed setting ahead of places where human drivers might typically slow down. That might be as you enter a curve, for example, or as the speed limit on a stretch of highway changes. The news comes as the broader auto industry is shifting to subscription products as a major new source of revenue. Everything from driver-assistance features to heated seats is on the table — with customers growing increasingly nervous about having to pay more often for services they previously only had to purchase once. The system has cameras that monitor the driver's eyes to make sure they are focused on the road. Not only is it annoying to have to reactivate the system, but having to do so can also be a deterrent to the driver adding their own steering inputs, or using the system at all.
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Not all the systems we've tested that offer lane changing seemed to have that dialed in as properly as BlueCruise does. The system will also suggest a lane change when the vehicle in front of you is moving slower than your set speed in and if the traffic in neighboring lanes is moving faster. It's only a suggestion though, and will not make an automatic lane change on its own as GM's Super Cruise can. In addition to the $600 subscription, vehicles must have a driver-facing camera to use the system. F-150 Lariat, King Ranch and Platinum models need the $995 Ford Co-Pilot 360 Active 2.0 package for a total $1,595 including the subscription charge. While hands-free Level 2 systems remain controversial, not least because of the potential for drivers to overestimate just how capable (and autonomous) they really are, I'm still a fan overall.
We check out how the new system works in a 2023 Mustang Mach-E.
The system uses a driver-facing infrared camera perched atop the steering column that monitors the driver’s eyes and head gaze. The driver monitoring works effectively at detecting when the driver is looking away from the road, and it was not thrown off by sunglasses or a face mask. We’re happy with Ford’s decision to utilize a driver monitoring camera to ensure that the driver is paying attention to their surroundings any time the system is active, whether on highways or secondary roads. One night when we were entering a construction zone and our lane was being closed, the system failed to recognize that and issued no warnings whatsoever.
In-lane wandering, our biggest complaint with BlueCruise 1.0, seems to have been nearly eliminated with BlueCruise 1.2, and the addition of the three new features, particularly lane change assist, makes the system even better. This feature will most likely be the least used of the new additions to BlueCruise, but can make for a safer hands-free driving experience at highway speeds. We've noticed with BlueCruise 1.0 that the system will often notify the driver they need to engage the steering wheel when traveling on highways and a curve in the road is approaching. There are no fully-autonomous cars on sale today, but that's not to say you're completely on your own when it comes to driver assistance on a road trip. Advanced Level 2 systems like Ford BlueCruise can't take responsibility away from the person behind the wheel, but they can let them take their hands off that control.
In practice, I noticed it most when BlueCruise suddenly overruled the speed I'd set it to. Certainly, I can't argue with being reminded that I was exceeding the current limit — which the system will still allow in hands-off mode — but suddenly cutting the target pace without warning felt like a problematic way of communicating it. That was particularly the case when it led to the Mustang Mach-E slowing aggressively while I had another vehicle close behind me. Ford says that more extreme lane bias will prompt an on-screen message, explaining what's happening, but I never saw that appear in my test driving.
While the headline features of v1.2 are useful, the system in general feels more stable and predictable than when I first tried it. For a start, there were none of the unexpected moments where BlueCruise decided it simply couldn't handle an otherwise-regular corner and threw control back to me in short order. BlueCruise is currently available on the F-150 full-sized pickup and Mustang Mach-E EV.
BlueCruise is watching you
We've seen hands-free highway assist systems arrive on cars from Nissan, for example. The all-electric Ariya can do the same lane- and speed-holding as BlueCruise, though currently lane maneuvers are completed manually. Ford's system feels like a sensible, fairly conservative driver from behind the wheel. There's a definite pause, as BlueCruise does the positioning math, and it's enough to miss narrower gaps that human drivers might feel confident taking advantage of in order to get out from behind a slow-moving truck. On the plus side, even if you're adjacent to said truck when you hit the turn signal, BlueCruise will generally wait for a gap to clear rather than instantly canceling the move. BlueCruise's driver-facing interface is clean and makes good use of the Mustang Mach-E's relatively small cluster display.
The Camera Is the Key
The new payment structure will first come to all trims of the Ford Mustang Mach-E and will soon be available to all 2024 model-year vehicles where BlueCruise is available, like the F-150 Lightning, Ford F-150, and Ford Expedition. The Essential Guide for MenThe Manual is simple — we show men how to live a life that is more engaged. As our name implies, we offer a suite of expert guides on a wide range of topics, including fashion, food, drink, travel, and grooming.
Currently, Ford has over 100,000 miles of pre-mapped highways in the US and is adding more miles of highways for the "Hands-Free Blue Zone" every month. With some competing systems, adding your own steering inputs deactivates the steering assistance, which means the driver will then have to reactivate it. It’s also available in the 2022 Lincoln Navigator, but it’s marketed under a different name — the Lincoln ActiveGlide. Ford delivered on its promise to make the BlueCruise or ActiveGlide one of the most advanced self-driving software currently available. More succinctly, you can drive your Mustang Mach-E or F-150 without putting your hands on the wheel for over 100,000 miles of highways across North America. The Ford BlueCruise will also warn you if you take your eyes off the road so you don’t get distracted while it’s in self-drive mode.
If there is one thing we’ve learned from Netflix, companies will capitalize on every opportunity to increase their subscription revenue. Sometimes it could be something as ridiculous as paying a subscription to access Apple CarPlay in your BMW, or even unlocking heated seats. In addition to improving the existing system, BlueCruise 1.2 adds three new features. Ford said it expects to sell 100,000 vehicles equipped with BlueCruise in the system’s first year on sale.
With BlueCruise, even if the driver takes over the steering, the system still provides lane centering steering-wheel torque, but we found that it works with the driver instead of feeling like it’s working against them. According to the automaker, the $200 per year subscription cost was a discount when BlueCruise was first introduced in the 2021 Mustan Mach-E models. Besides that, Ford upgraded BlueCruise last year with new features such as In-Lane Repositioning, Predictive Speed Assist, and Lane Change Assist. The new BlueCruise 1.2 is a standard feature in the latest Mustang Mach-E models, and it could be another reason why Ford is increasing the subscription cost. Of course, it’s likely that other Ford models like the F-150 Lightning or the gas-powered F-150 truck that will come with BlueCruise 1.2 will also be affected.
Ford's BlueCruise hands-free system to cost $600 for 3 years - Automotive News
Ford's BlueCruise hands-free system to cost $600 for 3 years.
Posted: Wed, 14 Apr 2021 07:00:00 GMT [source]
BlueCruise worked well during our preliminary evaluations on a Mustang Mach-E rented from Ford. The system is easy to activate because it takes only a single press of the cruise control button on the steering wheel to simultaneously engage the ACC and LCA. After that, all the driver has to do is stay attentive, ready to take over the steering on certain curvy sections of highways and manage the little stuff, such as steering to avoid potholes and manually adjusting the ACC’s speed, if they wish.
There's an escalating series of beeps and visual alerts, and finally BlueCruise will deactivate completely if it deems the driver isn't playing their part. As before, BlueCruise relies on a camera to make sure you're paying attention to the road. It's mounted just above the steering column, and — while you can't see them — there are infrared lights in there to allow the system to keep working even at night. We were quite surprised at how well this worked, and how often the system employs in-lane repositioning. It didn't just do it for large vehicles, like tractor-trailers, it also executed the maneuver when a passenger vehicle wandered a little too close you the lane we were driving in.
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