Simulator Could Help Protect Troops, Teen Drivers

Here’s the problem. A vehicle begins to slide and the driver does the wrong thing. The result is a serious crash.

The proper training in a car at a special school can show a driver what to do. But that takes lots of time and money.

For years Tim O’Neil has been thinking about this problem. He runs a rally driving school in Dalton which teaches people how to drive fast on slippery surfaces, in unpredictable situations.

He figured he could save many lives if he could develop an affordable and realistic driving simulator that doesn’t seem like a video game.

A few years ago O’Neil teamed up with Greg McKinney. They formed Vehicle Control Training, located in Franconia.

Their goal is a simulator that would feel like a real vehicle on a slick surface like mud, sand, gravel, or ice.

Greg McKinney: “Those are the surfaces where people get into trouble.”

As they see it, their invention could have far greater use than high schools.

Since the Pentagon uses thousands of drivers, many just out of high school themselves, the military could also benefit from such a simulator.

McKinney convinced Rep. Paul Hodes to earmark about $3.8 million in the Defense Department’s budget to develop a simulator.

They are working with researchers and engineers from Ford, MIT and the Army’s Cold Regions Research & Engineering Laboratory in Hanover.

Sally Shoop heads up the Cold Regions group working on the project.

“This is really for vehicle control, if something unusual happens you can control the vehicle, pull yourself out of a skid.”

Ideally, says Shoop, for Pentagon use the simulator would mimic vehicles ranging from Humvees to big trucks.

Researchers got a chance to evaluate the simulator’s worth at O’Neil’s school in Dalton.

For 10 weeks they have been training people in Hanover on a prototype.

The exercise simulates driving 35 miles an hour and suddenly having to change lanes as if the path was blocked.

But drivers don’t know until the last second whether to go right or left.

Now those same students are going to try the same exercise in a real car.

There is also a second group that had no training.

Radio transmission: “Okay, I guess we want the first student Mark.”

Mark Scalese of Windsor, Vermont, is first up.

He puts on a helmet and fastens his seat belt.

He’ll drive straight down a slightly muddy surface at 35 mph.

A panel of lights will change from green to red.

That tells him which lane – left or right – is open.

There’s no hint in advance.

His job is to brake, release the brake, turn the wheel and then accelerate slightly to keep the tail of the car from sliding.

That’s a lot to do in a car covering about 40 feet per second.

Vehicle accelerating away sound.

At the last second the lights change. Scalese brakes, turns and zips the car into the correct lane.

Shoop: “He is good, man.” Followed by happy laughter.

After two more runs Scalese gets out of the vehicle.

“The simulator was very similar to the vehicle, it had all the same aspects, the pitch and yaw. It was very close.”

Over the two days other students go through the exercise.

The untrained group tried the exercise 30 times.

Only once did a driver succeed.

That compared to 20 successes for the group that had training.

Designer Greg McKinney is obviously pleased.

“The results were pretty outstanding, better than I thought they would be.”

But he says there is a lot more work to be done.

At the company’s office in Franconia the prototype simulator has a bare bones look to it.

It could easily be disassembled and moved.

That’s one goal.

McKinney says another is affordability.

He hopes it will be less than $10,000. That would make it widely available to high schools and the military.

Sitting in the prototype simulator the driver looks at three large computer screens hooked together to look like a windshield.

Turning the steering wheel makes the driver’s seat moves sideways.

Pressing on the gas and the scenery comes faster.

But it still feels somewhat distant, more like a video game than car.

They have not yet gotten the feel of a real car, something McKinney is the first to note.

But he says they are getting closer and a simulator is likely to be available in 18 to 24 months.