My Rivian Driver+ almost killed me

[T_Famobile]

I have to report that I’ve experienced the car jolting to the left while engaged in Highway Assist twice in the last month, with the most recent being yesterday on our drive back to CA from Vegas. It was quite frightening as most passengers were sleeping and were awaken by me auto correcting the steering wheel. It was very dangerous but luckily I reacted quickly. @rivianguy has there been any updated response from Rivian since you are working with them. I noticed this second time happened as the vehicle was passing a big rig, so I’m guessing it thought the truck was trying to get over to our lane. Regardless, it was very scary and definately be aware when using Highway Assist.

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[TollKeeper]

My story is going to be a bit different.. TTLDR

I was NOT using Driver+, but did have the adaptive cruise on, with the lane departure assist.

This was on a road that I drive on daily, going to, or from, work.

Road is straight, 2 lanes total, 1 going North and one South with no shoulder, but does come off a rise, to a depression, and back up. While coming back up, my truck decided it was a good time to turn right. I did not have to fight hard on the steering wheel, but I did have to fight it some.

Went back to the same stretch off road walking, so see if there are any pot holes that caught a wheel or?

My thought process is that the Lane Departure System read the black tar crack fillers as road lines on the grey asphalt, and followed them, and as said in other posts, tried to put me in a ditch.

For me, it did this to me twice. I have since turned off my LDS, and have had no further incidents of this sort.

I have had issues with Driver+ trying to go straight, in the middle of a construction zone where all lanes now follow a different path. This time it did not fight me much at all, and was able to prevent hitting a jersey barrier. I was in the middle lane with no traffic on my left or right, and if I had not been paying attention, and a car had been in the right lane, I would have either hit that car, or hit the jersey barrier.

Again, this is easily overcome by turning off the Driver+ in construction zones, and using the cruise, or even turning it off, depending on the sharpness of the turns.

@COdogman might be able to verify, as I think he travels the area, its on I-70 at the Ward Road exit.

 

[COdogman]

My story is going to be a bit different.. TTLDR

I was NOT using Driver+, but did have the adaptive cruise on, with the lane departure assist.

This was on a road that I drive on daily, going to, or from, work.

Road is straight, 2 lanes total, 1 going North and one South with no shoulder, but does come off a rise, to a depression, and back up. While coming back up, my truck decided it was a good time to turn right. I did not have to fight hard on the steering wheel, but I did have to fight it some.

Went back to the same stretch off road walking, so see if there are any pot holes that caught a wheel or?

My thought process is that the Lane Departure System read the black tar crack fillers as road lines on the grey asphalt, and followed them, and as said in other posts, tried to put me in a ditch.

For me, it did this to me twice. I have since turned off my LDS, and have had no further incidents of this sort.

I have had issues with Driver+ trying to go straight, in the middle of a construction zone where all lanes now follow a different path. This time it did not fight me much at all, and was able to prevent hitting a jersey barrier. I was in the middle lane with no traffic on my left or right, and if I had not been paying attention, and a car had been in the right lane, I would have either hit that car, or hit the jersey barrier.

Again, this is easily overcome by turning off the Driver+ in construction zones, and using the cruise, or even turning it off, depending on the sharpness of the turns.

@COdogman might be able to verify, as I think he travels the area, its on I-70 at the Ward Road exit.

Must be someone else here who frequents that stretch. I’ve been through there in my Rivian a few times but didn’t use Driver+.

I’ve really only used mine between Fort Collins and Cheyenne and it works pretty well other than a couple times it gave me the “take control now” message. Once was during a bad rain storm and the other was while I was passing a semi truck/ trailer??‍

 

[bd5400]

My thought process is that the Lane Departure System read the black tar crack fillers as road lines on the grey asphalt, and followed them, and as said in other posts, tried to put me in a ditch.

...

I have had issues with Driver+ trying to go straight, in the middle of a construction zone where all lanes now follow a different path. ]

The only times where I've encountered serious steering direction issues with Highway Assist have been with tar snakes and construction zones. I now know not to rely on Highway Assist whenever there is a lane shift that is likely unmapped. Also, when I start to see a lot of tar snakes in the lane I'll disengage and take over manually. It's one of the reasons I actually like the vehicle visualization in the center display because I can glance down and quickly see if the truck is starting to have issues reading lane lines.

 

[Magicbus]

I recently completed an extensive survey from Rivian. The only real complaint I have is the driver assist. I suggested they go drive a Ford Bronco Sport equipped with 360+ to see how it should work.

 

[Dave Cundiff]

Anomalous Driver+ behavior also happens with phenomena other than shiny "tar snakes". (As I understand it, Driver+ is Rivian's term for the whole suite of driver assistance software. "Highway Assist" allows our R1's to have maximum autonomy, under constant driver supervision, on mapped expressways.)

My Lane Keeper warning goes off when the asphalt has linear cracks, parallel to the direction of travel, in any position other than the actual lane divider or fog line.

I DON'T mind when ACC slows because of irrelevant phenomena (oncoming traffic on two-lane road, someone turning into my lane several hundred feet in front of me and accelerating quickly, etc.).

I DO mind when Driver+ picks a higher speed than what I think is safe, and I'd be terrified if Driver+ changed my steering instructions because it thought it was seeing something I wasn't.

I love ACC, and I don't mind the LaneKeeper warnings, but some Driver+ features take more control than they currently deserve. Glad our Driver+ features are so customizable....

Best to all!

 

[PavilionSolar]

Pretty much every time I have used driver plus, it makes mistakes and had I not been alert or had hands on steering wheel, the results could have been bad. Same exact thing has happened when driving tesla "autopilot". The technology is simply not ready for prime time and every company seems to be racing to implement a system that is incomplete at best. I will continue to use the Rivian system when there isn't traffic and probably just use ACC otherwise. Sorry about your experience I remember the first time this kind of thing happened to me (in a 2023 Tesla Model Y) was quite disturbing. I will say even though the streer itself was pretty strong in all instances, disengaging seemed not that hard.

 

[VNCR1S]

Today, from San Diego to Los Angeles on I-5 while on Driver plus my R1S suddenly veered to the right fortunately I was able to immediately steer it back to the left but I had to exert force. It was flat and straight not sure happened but wanted everyone to be very cautious when using driver plus at highway speeds. With my experience today will never use driver plus on speeds over 30mph.

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