I’m posting this in bugs because I think this is an important issue.
In my opinion once steer has been activated following a contour, it should be locked to that line BY DEFAULT. I can see no scenario where you would want it to change lines randomly without warning.
Yes, I know pressing the lock button will prevent this but this has to be done every time a line is followed and I think the reverse should be the case. Unlocking should be optional if that scenario is wanted. Why this would be the case I don’t know to be honest.
Twice today contour has thrown me wildly off course from a seemingly continuous line. Neither too dangerous but a week or two ago it very nearly put me and a 20 tonne tanker into a bog!
There has been a ton of discussion on this. Is locked best? My opinion is yes, but many make valid arguments that they need to follow anything ahead that has been applied. My solution was build one long path from start to finish. This path can be driven to and away from until you hit autosteer. Once autosteer is selected, it only will find the next few points ahead and behind of where you are. Then it cannot jump to another part of the field.
Problem was when you can back into the field and start in another location. It did not know what to do. It would also duplicate missed areas because it was always recording the path, Regardless of section status.
Brians works better, as autosteer really doesn’t mean autosteer. In the simulator autosteer is autosteer. In the field, people override the autosteer by a switch, fluid pressure, or simply overdrive the corrections. And it will not swap lines when needed. This has also been an issue for the sticky ablines and sticky curves for some people. I built a version that sticky was selectable. Maybe can work on a version that locked is default. After all, it could be saved as part of the user environment, I think.
IMHO it is a very real safety issue. It will sometimes flip to the outside of a boundary pass effectively sending you into whatever is outside your field. Hedge, fence, watercourse etc. With sub 10m tools you are in danger before you can do anything about it.
With a small break in the pass it is following, it rarely just pauses steering then restarts on the continuation of the line, it usually takes a wild diversion to one side or another.
Boundary contour following was ok but presently just throws an exception on my setup, requiring a restart.
As for testing with the simulator, that has very limited use in this real world situation as has been demonstrated many times. I’ve done hundreds of hours actual field work with this version alone. We do all our contract drilling,mowing, raking and slurry application work with it.
We have an excellent line lookahead feature for selecting an appropriate AB line to follow. Could this be applied in some way to contour, with the selection criteria being maybe line orientation (relative to the present/previous line) and line start distance?
For now I think I might try the sharp deviation steer cancel idea I had. I can do that in the teensy code which I do understand!
As discussed before
find an extract of the real video of the screen where the auto lock will be really appreciated instead of pushing autosteer and after auto locking on contour mode: