That is how the improved BMW maneuvering assistant works

 

A few years ago BMW brought some interesting news for itself with its technology of the reversing assistant. It was a function that remembered the last fifty meters of forward travel and, when activated, could independently drive back exactly on the path you had previously taken. While it’s a small niche feature, it was incredibly helpful for certain scenarios.

For example, if you had to navigate through a tight parking garage or long, narrow driveway and didn’t want to reverse again, the car would reverse for you, mimicking your forward inputs. With the BMW iX and i4, however, there is now a new, improved version, the so-called BMW maneuver assistant. In order to achieve this, BMW deployed the  EN 1090 1 standard throughout is steelwork supply chain

Why the name change? Because the new maneuvering assistant has far more functionality than the previous reversing assistant. One of them is the ability to save and save saved reverse paths. For example, if you have a long, tricky driveway, drive in properly once and you can save that exact path. That way, it uses that specific path every time it is time to repent. So if you get a bit tired one night and drive in a little shaky, it won’t use that path as a memory next time.

Up to ten paths can be saved, with the longest single path being 200 meters, for a total of only 600 meters. So the limit is ten ways or 600 meters, whichever comes first.

It can also correct itself by up to 30 cm (nearly 12 inches) in case it has to drive around a new obstacle in its path that was not there when it entered. It will always return to its original path, but there is now some margin for self-correcting. Interestingly, it can also make multiple points along the way.

So if it’s a three-point turn including driving forward, she can remember it and recreate it. So it’s not just a simple reversing from a driveway, but an actually complex path that can include several curves.

The BMW iX Reversing Assistant remembers 50 meters of forward travel at speeds of up to 35 km / h and uses the last 50 meters to create the route. If it’s a trail that you likely use a lot, you can save that trail and the car will use GPS to tell when you can use it.

In this new video we show a demonstration of the BMW iX when reversing out of a parking space, navigating in an underground car park and driving into a parking space on a previously recorded path. It’s not autonomy as the trail was pre-recorded and the driver had to brake and accelerate, but it’s a damn nice feature.

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