Ray Magliozzi
Dear Car Talk:
The cheapest car on the market right now, the Nissan Versa, supposedly has automatic braking, forward and backward. How do I know if it is actually working, and that I can trust it? The consequences for failure are huge.
— Chuck
How do you know if it’s working? When you go for a test drive, head right for the closed garage door of the service area and see if the salesman bails out of the moving vehicle.
I think you can trust it, Chuck. I’m not privy to the engineering labs at Nissan, but generally speaking, car makers try to buy as many copies of each part as they possibly can.
That’s because they get better pricing on that part. If Nissan buys 3 million of the same ignition switches each year, they’ll get them at a lower price than if they bought 300,000 of 10 different switches. And since these safety systems are becoming ubiquitous (to the point where they’re available on Nissan Versas), they’ve become subject to the same laws of bulk purchasing. And while the design of the overall system is probably handled by Nissan, the components — the sensors and computer brains — are made by outside suppliers. And it’s likely that Nissan uses the same basic components on their cheaper cars as they do on their mid-priced cars.
High-priced cars may have more sensors or combined technologies to make the systems even more robust. But I think it’s likely you’ll get a well-functioning automatic braking system (AEB) on your Nissan Versa. And remember, these systems are subject to NHTSA recall (and bad publicity) if they don’t function properly, so it behooves all manufacturers to make them work.
Nissan advertises that their standard “Nissan Safety Shield 360” is available on the Versa. But if you look carefully, you have to buy one of the higher-trim models (the SV or SR) to get blind spot monitoring and rear cross traffic alert. Those features share the same rearward-looking sensors that are not provided on the base models.
The other difference between trim levels is that while the lower trims have city speed AEB (typically designed to function up to around 50 mph), to also get highway speed AEB, you have to get what’s called adaptive cruise control, which uses additional sensors. Adaptive cruise allows you to set a speed and have the car maintain a set distance from the car in front of it, and it uses those same sensors to provide high-speed emergency braking.
Adaptive cruise is only available on the highest trim Versa. And I’d recommend you spend the extra $3,000 and get it, along with the blind spot and rear cross traffic. How can you know if it works? Well, most drivers find out before too long. If the system detects that you’re closing in too quickly on an object ahead of you, and you’re not starting to brake, it’ll alert you.
It won’t hit the brakes first. It’ll alert you first, so you can do it yourself. And that alert is designed to, let’s say, get your attention. And provide business for your dry cleaner.
So the first time you get distracted behind the wheel and don’t see a car slowing in front of you, you’ll find out the system’s working, Chuck. And you’ll be glad you have it.
Got a question about cars? Write to Ray in care of King Features, 628 Virginia Drive, Orlando, FL 32803, or email by visiting the Car Talk website at www.cartalk.com.
