Today i want to speak about parking sensors: Do we need them? Surely,we can do without them,and maybe in one ocasion,in a cloudy night,or a rainy afternoon,they can be useful. But other than that,we probably can use the money spent on them to buy anything else.
More and more cars come now with parking sensors standard,and i believe that in a couple of years,they will be on every car,of course,if the end of world in 2012 will not come upon us.
How do they work? By detecting obstacles behind you and also in front of you,to aid your parking and enabling you to get into those tight spots without rounding the corners of you car,or other's.
There are many variations of the design,but all work the same,emitting ultrasonic waves tens of thousand per second,and then by using a sensor,picking up the signal that bounces back from obstacles. They start emitting a horrible beep-ing sound that scares the hell out of me,if i'm not aware of them,and,as you approach an obstacle,the beep turns to a continuous tone,warning you to stop or else...
Apart from the horrible beeping ones,some also have a LCD screen, on wich they show the actual distance.
If you are not very skilled in parking maneuvers,financially,the parking sensors kit is worth because even from one dodged collision you will be avoinding money loss.
Normally, cars have parking sensors that activate when the car is in reverse,but standard new cars,have also front sensors,and,most important,to disable the sensors,if you don't feel like hearing them all the time.
The vast majority come with a DIY drilling head,that makes mounting them a piece of cake. This might seem easy,but don't act surprised if you start loosing the sensors from time to time,as you have drilled too big holes in your bumper.
There is also a parking sensor called Electromagnetic system do not look for a reflected signal, instead they create a wide electromagnetic force-field and this can extend through and beyond the car's body panels. For this reason, this type of sensor can be fitted behind the bumper so that no externally visible alteration is required, although the bumper and/or under body panel may need to be removed in order to fit the system. They have some main advantages over the classic sonic system,and here i will count them
- The sensors are compact and can be fitted without drilling the car's bumper. Maintaining your car's original factory look will improve its resale value.
- Electromagnetic systems provide a wider operating zone around, above and below the bumper,thus no dead-spots are allowed.
- They can detect closer the obstacles,so even a 4 cm-apart object is now shown.
- If you own a pick-up,or just have a towing hook,will no longer keep sounding,as the sonic system does.
