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Inside Honda's ghost town for testing autonomous cars

On the edge of the San Francisco suburb of Concord, California sits a ghost town. Dilapidated buildings and cracked roads are framed by overgrowth and slightly askew street signs. The decommissioned five acre portion of the Concord Naval Weapons Station that once housed military personnel and their families is now home to squirrels, jack rabbits, wild turkeys and Honda's mysterious testing lab for autonomous vehicles. This former town within a Naval base – now dubbed "GoMentum Station" – is the perfect testing ground for Honda's self-driving cars. An almost turn-key solution to the problem of finding somewhere to experiment with autonomous vehicle inside an urban area. Thanks to the GoMentum Station, the automaker has access to 20 miles of various road types, intersections and infrastructure exactly like those found in the real world. Just, you know, without all the people getting in the way. While the faded lane markers and cracked asphalt might initially make it difficult for the car to figure out what's going on around it, that's exactly what you want when training a self-driving system. Many roads in the real world are also in dire need of upkeep. Just because autonomous vehicles are hitting the streets doesn't mean the funding needed to fix all the potholes and faded lane markers will magically appear. The real world doesn't work that way and the robot cars that will eventually make our commutes less of a headache will need to be aware of that. Plus, it's tougher to train a car to drive downtown than to barrel down the highway at 80 miles per hour. A company is going to want to get as much practice as possible. While semi-autonomous driving on the everyone-going-the-same-way-at-a-constant-speed freeway is already a reality, navigating in an urban environment is far more complex. If you've driven on the streets of Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York, Chicago or Seattle you know that driving downtown takes far more concentration than cruising down the interstate. With all that in mind, Honda's tricked out Acura RLX did a good job during an (admittedly very controlled) hands-free demo. It didn't hit either of the pedestrians walking across its path. It stopped at stop signs and even maneuvered around a mannequin situated in the middle of the road. The reality is, watching a car drive around the block and safely avoid stuff is boring. Not to metion, Google has been doing this for a while in the real world.

Honda charged another $363 million over Takata airbags

The Takata airbag recall is growing increasingly expensive for Honda. In the latest hit to the automaker's bottom line, the company is revising the expected costs of its global safety campaigns by an additional 44.8 billion yen ($363 million) after the massive expansion in May. Months ago, Honda announced that it had set aside 50 billion yen ($425 million at the time) to meet the predicted expenses. According to Automotive News, due to the rather arcane laws of accounting, these new costs will actually be applied to the fiscal year that ended on March 31, rather than the current one. Honda's revised earnings will be announced in late June. The company previously reported an operating profit of 651.7 billion yen ($5.3 billion), which was down 13 percent from the previous year. There has been no change to planned dividends for investors. In the US, Honda and Acura have a total of about 6.28 million vehicles in need of a replacement airbag inflator, and the automaker says about two million of those are already repaired. In addition to the Takata campaign, the company has faced other financial setbacks during this calendar year. For example, in early January, it received a $70 million fine from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for failing to report 1,729 cases of injuries or deaths over 11 years. As part of a strategy to improve quality globally, Honda cut back its global sales forecasts for the coming year, and it also decided not to make any volume predictions through 2017. To: Shareholders of Honda Motor Co., Ltd. From: Honda Motor Co., Ltd. 1-1, Minami-Aoyama 2-chome, Minato-ku, 107-8556 Tokyo Takanobu Ito President and Representative Director Notice of Events after the Reporting Period Regarding Product Warranty Expenses Honda Motor Co., Ltd. (the "Company") and its consolidated subsidiaries have been conducting market-based measures in relation to airbag inflators, such as product recalls and a Safety Improvement Campaign. Due to factors arising since May 2015 such as an expansion of the scope of these market-based measures based on an agreement between our supplier and the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, a change has arisen in the estimate relating to product warranty expenses. The amount of product warranty expenses now expected to be incurred is 44,800 million yen.

Honda Accord under investigation due to airbag failures

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration is opening a preliminary evaluation into the possibility of airbags not deploying in the 2008 Honda Accord. The agency has received 19 reports, including one injury, of the airbag control module failing, and the part is on an estimated 384,000 of the vehicles in the US. "For vehicles with a failed SRS module, some or all of the airbags may be unavailable in a crash warranting deployment," NHTSA's investigation says. Drivers are warned when the part stops working by a light on the instrument panel, but several of these reports indicate the module is unable to show diagnostic trouble codes when being inspected. The only way to fix the issue is to replace the whole component, and the Detroit News reports that can cost $500 or more. NHTSA's preliminary evaluations investigate "the scope, frequency, and consequence" of a problem and don't necessarily mean a recall is warranted. INVESTIGATION Subject : SRS Module Failure Date Investigation Opened: AUG 18, 2015 Date Investigation Closed: Open NHTSA Action Number: PE15029 Component(s): AIR BAGS All Products Associated with this Investigation close Vehicle Make Model Model Year(s) HONDA ACCORD 2008 Details Manufacturer: Honda (American Honda Motor Co.) SUMMARY: ODI has identified 19 VOQ reports alleging failure of the air bag SRS control module. One of the reports involved a frontal crash event where the frontal air bags did not deploy. The crash resulted in an injury to the driver and lone occupant, and the vehicle was subsequently inspected by the agency. According to the reports, the failure of the SRS module is indicated by the air bag readiness indicator lamp illuminating on the instrument panel. Consumers report the SRS control module had to be replaced to correct the condition. Several reports indicated that the SRS module was unable to communicate thus preventing diagnostic trouble codes from being retrieved. An inability of the SRS unit to communicate raises concern about the readiness of the entire supplemental restraints system. As a result, for vehicles with a failed SRS module, some or all of the air bags may be unavailable in a crash warranting deployment. ODI is opening this investigation to further evaluate the scope, frequency, and consequence of the alleged SRS module failures.