New Tech Coming to Enhance Group Riding Safety

Electronics company Bosch is developing a new piece of technology that is intended to improve the safety of riding in groups.

The basic point of the tech is to improve riding safety by reducing the involvement of the rider, as we’ve seen from plenty of other technical innovations over the last few years. 

In this case, Bosch intends to use a series of sensors - radar, lidar, and cameras - to accurately map the position of the motorcycle relative to other vehicles. In that sense, it’s a bit like lane assist or adaptive cruise control.

Bosch’s system, as shown in patent filings published by RideApart, would take this information and then decipher which of the vehicles the motorcycle is in proximity to are also motorcycles, and which are not.

Reportedly, the system can also decipher cars, trucks, and quadbikes. The idea is that the system can relay positioning information to the rider - presumably by a graphic on the dashboard - who can then reduce their reliance on the mirrors and spend more time with their eyes looking forward.
Additionally, by knowing which vehicles are bikes and which are not, the system could potentially work with a motorcycle’s adaptive cruise control function to maintain formation with other motorcycles. This should improve group riding safety by not allowing the motorcycle to stray too close to another, or into the path of another.

It does make you wonder, though, about what the enjoyment of riding in a group is if you’re not actually riding the bike yourself because the computer is doing it all for you - the tech is sure to prompt some debate amongst riders.

There’s nothing official from Bosch on the system as yet, so we don’t yet know when it will come to production bikes.

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