Why do so few use cruise control on the motorway?

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Ricardodaforce

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Have you noticed how, when the roads are clear and moving, the speed of other road users varies quite a bit? The speed up, they slow down; and rarely travel at a constant speed.
I know a lot of these cars will be equipped with cruise control, so why don’t they use it?
I use CC when I can to avoid speeding (easy to do on a 900cc bike) and often find myself overtaking the same car more than once, even though my speed has been constant.
Puzzles me.
 
I have used cruise control for many years, but a friend once told me "Oh, I would never use it; I would forget to steer".
 
It depends on the type of cruise control you have, one just keeps your speed constant while others are more responsive to the traffic situation around you and will slow you down and speed you up, some will even steer for you.
 
There are 5 cars in our family group all are 5 years old or less and only 1 has cruise controll - you can set a speed and it will maintain it.

1 has speed limiting - you set the max speed and it will stop you exceeding this. You can bury the accelerator and it will go over the set speed.

The other 3 dont have any form of control.

I use the cruise control when in average speed camera sections and generally the traffic is at a constant speed or on open motorway when its not busy. usually on the M1/M6 heading north as M25 has too much variation of speed to use it.
 
I also use it on all roads not just motorways to avoid exceeding speed limits. A main road near where I live goes through a village for about 3/4 mile all 30mph. I find it useful to set the cruise control to 30 mph but many other motorist speed through this village which regularly has speed traps. Recall last year visiting a car racing track and the village are nearby was 30mph so my CC was holding up several impatient drivers. One driver could not contain himself and overtook zooming round the next bend at over 40 mph to see a police speed trap placed just for that. It was quite satisfying to see him waved down by the police and pulled over.

Dave
 
I don't use mine very often simply because I find it to be more trouble than it's worth, with other vehicles varying their speed all the time.
 
I find it useful for 20mph limit areas as 20 is sometimes difficult to stick to and to be honest I think concentrating too much on sticking to a limit can take your mind off other hazards so cruise control looks after the speed leaving me to look out for those other hazards.
 
I use cc for the sake of economy and because driving carefully within the speed limit is mind-numbingly dull.

It is frustrating when other drivers saw up and down over a range of speeds, using more fuel and wasting time. If you have cruise control then it makes sense to use it on the motorway.
 
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I frequently use CC to to stay within the speed limit, especially in 30 & 40 mph zones.
 
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I use my car's adaptive CC very often, and always on the motorway and fast dual carriageways (I have lane control as well, to bump me into awareness if I start drifting). My olf 2011 Fiesta had CC too, but not adaptive, and I used that a lot on motorways etc. It's just so good for economy and avoiding speeding.
 
Garry Edwards said:
I don't use mine very often simply because I find it to be more trouble than it's worth, with other vehicles varying their speed all the time.
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This, mainly.

Average speed actions, it is useful (and I have speed limiting too, which can be useful in those managed motorway sections)
 
Yes, I use it too. An excellent feature of modern cars. Mine slows me down if a car drops in the space in front of me, but then speeds up again when the gap grows. The only trouble, and the reason I don't use it all the times, is when the motorway is busy and there are lots of lorries one has to anticipate lane changes far in advance to be able to keep one's speed up; relying on the cruise control can see you stuck behind a group of trucks at 55 mph and then not being able to get by because of the density and greater traffic speed in the other lanes.
 
if the roads reasonable quiet I use CC especially through roadworks at 50 .. But if too busy then too dangerouse IMHO I can litrally go from Glasgow to Preston on CC as the moterways always reasonably quiet ..
 
KIPAX said:
if the roads reasonable quiet I use CC especially through roadworks at 50 .. But if too busy then too dangerouse IMHO I can litrally go from Glasgow to Preston on CC as the moterways always reasonably quiet ..
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I literally did just that the week before last on my bike.
It was the ride from Cardiff to Dumbarton (all motorway or dual carriageway) that prompted these musings.
 
I used to use CC on my old car, but it was frustrating catching cars on minor uphills then watching them out pace you on downhills just because they aren't capable or willing to maintain speed control at 70mph.
My current car has adaptive CC which is much better, slows down when I'm interrupted and speeds back up when I'm not. I've had it take me from 70mph to standstill with me just covering the brake when the road has snarled up
It also saved me when a luton hire van was blown into my lane on the motorway - hit the brakes faster and harder than I did even though I was paying attention and was on the brake asap.

I use it all the time 20,30,40 etc. just takes one boring part of driving away.
The only minor downside is it will wait until the car in front has completely cleared the lane which makes drivers behind even more impatient when the ACC has been keeping a safe 2 second gap from a car <70mph in the right lane.

Last summer I drove from NYC to LA via Niagra and Chicago - I imagine >99% was under adaptive cruise with lane keeping.

I don't tend to bother on country roads where you actually need to brake for corners and it might actually be fun to drive.
 
AMcUK said:
I used to use CC on my old car, but it was frustrating catching cars on minor uphills then watching them out pace you on downhills just because they aren't capable or willing to maintain speed control at 70mph.
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HAHA I hate it.. They are always little cars with a 1.2 engine that must be screaming at them when they are doing 80-90 to pass me downhill then struggle up the other side
 
I never use cruise control but do use the technology. I set my maximum speed to a little above what I know my speedo shows at the posted limit as insurance against speeding tickets. A hefty boot cancels the limiter (should I feel it necessary - faster than hitting the cancel button) and it gives me more control than CC.
 
All my CC cars have allowed me to drive faster than the set limit by just putting my foot down if I need to.
When I lift it goes back to the set speed.

One nice feature of the ACC is if I'm slowed down by traffic ahead and put on the right indicator it will begin to accelerate back to the set speed immediately - makes lane changes middle to right a lot smoother.
 
I use mine as and when it’s sensible , had loads of different ones over the years but the one on my current Honda CRV is the best I’ve ever used
 
Haven’t got it on my bikes but our car has it , it’s great for when I’m doing a long run especially
always use it if the road is quiet enough but as already said a bit of hassle when it’s busy
assume most cars come with it now ? Even our Yaris has it
 
Like many above, I use CC on motorways and national speed limit roads, where it is safe to do so.

In areas with speed restrictions I switch to the speed limiter as I find other traffic speeds vary more in those places than on the open road and the limiter makes it easier to slow down and regain speed without having to reset the CC every time. This is particularly useful in city traffic.
 
I have adaptive radar cruise control and auto steering but l must admit to not using it very often as l feel the more it does automatically the more distant I am from being in control.
 
Only got regular cruise control, rarely use it for similar reasons above. I sometimes wonder if adaptive cruise control would be nice, but I don't think I would trust it enough to relax, so for me I figure what's the point, or maybe it depends on the type of car.

I'm remember watching a video of an autopilot system (Lexus I think) where it follows the car in front, but then when the car in front crossed over to the other side of the road to overtake a truck the Lexus (I think?) copied it, despite not knowing if it was safe from oncoming traffic to do so!
 
I use mine on long, open stretches but they are hard to find these days! Also handy for 30 mph stretches but a lot of use of the "resume" button when busy.
 
The thing about cruise control and motorway driving is that it requires much more awareness of other vehicles and planning ahead than is usual for ordinary reactive driving. It's necessary to anticipate when other vehicles traveling at different speeds will become obstructions ahead or will box you in from behind, and to drive defensively so that can't happen.
 
We have "standard" cc on one car and adaptive on the other.
I like the adaptive one and use it on both motorways and A roads.
As Derek says, you can easily get stuck behind slow vehicles on the motorway, but IMO it's still good.
My recent car also has predictive cruise control. IMO this is dangerous and I got the dealer to disable it.

The other annoying thing about all this latest tech. is that on the new one, after setting the vehicle in front distance, when you turn off the engine it defaults back to the longer setting.
It also does this for lane assist, which can also be a bit dangerous. So, you have to turn it off every time you start it.
Dealer says this default setting is "EU safety law" and can't be turned off.

Too much tech I think. (all of this came with the car, so not an extra).
 
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ancient_mariner said:
The thing about cruise control and motorway driving is that it requires much more awareness of other vehicles and planning ahead than is usual for ordinary reactive driving. It's necessary to anticipate when other vehicles traveling at different speeds will become obstructions ahead or will box you in from behind, and to drive defensively so that can't happen.
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Welcome to the world of motorcycling!

If everyone was using cruise control, then the issue you highlight wouldn’t be a problem.
 
Except it is much harder to drive when neighbouring vehicles are going slightly faster or slightly slower than you. (Adaptive CC does this, but it's not available on most.) It is much harder to judge the speed of another vehicle if it is doing almost hte same speed as you. Overtakes are tricky, difficult to judge if you should, and slow to carry out.

If all CC systems were set to the same speed, it would be fine.
 
Ricardodaforce said:
Welcome to the world of motorcycling!

If everyone was using cruise control, then the issue you highlight wouldn’t be a problem.
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I was a biker long before I had cars. ;)

The idea of having cruise control on a bike seems a little weird, but most of my riding wasn't on motorways, so I can see how it might be helpful there.

The thing with CC is that speed calibration will vary enough to be substantially different between vehicles, and some will just input the official limit while others adjust the target speed based on speed measured by GPS etc.

It's likely that my experience as a biker has shaped my expectations of the need for awareness of other vehicles. And that coupled with driving quite a bit in Europe possibly also given me a more flexible view of speed than some.
 
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The adaptive CC is very clever, had it on a hire car in the USA (also semi-autonomous driving).

Used to have standard CC on my motorbike and liked it a lot but my new one doesn't have it. I ride less motorways these days so not too bothered.

Current car has it and I like using it especially in average speed zones.
 
the black fox said:
I use mine as and when it’s sensible , had loads of different ones over the years but the one on my current Honda CRV is the best I’ve ever used
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Same one on my Honda HR-V 2022 and I find it vey helpful. There was CC on the Civic I had before but not ACC - the latter is so much better and very useful.

Anthony
 
My car has both cruise control and a limiter. I find the limiter more useful in general.

Hyundai I30 instrument binacle A65 DSC03594.JPG
 
I will use it - my car has traditional rather than adaptive - but the motorway needs to be fairly quiet as too many middle lane morons and it gets more trouble that it's worth.
 
crikey i drive everywhere on cruise, mine goes down to 28mph in 4th so i can just roll arround town
i pretty much use it as much as i can
 
This is something I've wondered when doing long drives on the motorway as it's noticeable how variable the speed of other cars is when I'm on cruise control, adaptive cruise control is one of the features I'd really like on a newer car. I find cruise control is great when I'm on a long motorway drive since I don't need to think about keeping the car at the speed nor hold my foot on the pedal either.

For long roadworks sections it can be useful as a speed limiter as well although for lower speeds I've been impressed with some of the newer limit systems, on my Mum's car it cuts power when the car reaches the limit so when driving around in a 20 zone I can stick the limiter on and not have to focus on my speed so much. The car does have cruise control but my Mum never uses it, I've tried to explain it to her and show her how it works but she's not managed to get the hang of it and doesn't bother.
 
Yesterday I traveled on the M4, M50, M5, M42, and M6.

Same old story. My cruise control was set at a real 70mph. I’d overtake a car. A couple of minutes later they’d overtake me. Then I’d overtake them. At no point had my speed changed.
I saw people undertaking because of cars in lane 2 varying their speed, and cars in lane 2 speeding up so that cars in the overtaking lane then had to drop behind them, then pull back out when the lane 2 car lost speed.
 
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