Cruisin' for a Bruisin'
Adaptive cruise control is an amazing feature. Like some Ron Popeil gadget you just "set it and forget it." With a battery of sensors, and possibly a little black magic, the system automatically adjusts your speed according to the traffic around you. In the Lincoln MKT Ford so generesoly loaned to us, this gee-whiz technology can even slow you down to 18 miles an hour if the traffic in front of you locks up its brakes or some jackass pulls out right in front of you. Anything less than that is your responsibility.
Altogether the system works amazingly well, when it wants to. Our pre-production Lincoln crossover had a few "issues," to put it politely, and one of the most annoying, ittitating and downright infuriating had to do with the cruise control. The damn thing only worked when it wanted to. Every so often -- roughly 30 minutes or or an hour -- the system would cut out and a message would flash in the instrument cluster "DRIVER INTERVENTION REQUIRED" followed by "COLISSION WARN NOT AVAILABLE." 10 frustrating minutes later the thing would work again! Talk about annoying! This electronic anomaly would be fine on a quick jaunt to the local grocery store but on a 34-plus hour road trip it's ridiculous. Hopefully this isn't an issue on production vehicles equipped with the technology.
~ Craig, Somewhere in Wisconsin
