Autel IA700: The New Industry Standard

Originally published by Body Shop Business, August 12, 2024

The Autel IA700 ADAS Calibration System is the ideal solution for calibration in today’s aftermarket industries. Technicians are confronted with the fact that nearly every vehicle they service is equipped with an Advanced Driver Assistance System (ADAS), and often, even seemingly unrelated repairs or services may require calibration. The IA700 is not just versatile; it’s like a shapeshifter, able to morph into the perfect system for any type of shop or mobile repairer.

With the IA700, Autel has taken the best attributes of previous systems—the compactness and mobile attribute of the MA600 mobile frame, the wheel alignment pre-check and optical target positioning of the IA800, and the unlevel floor compensation and holistic approach to vehicle repair and calibration of the IA900—and created a new industry standard.

Introducing the IA700

The IA700 system provides a repeatable, streamlined diagnostic, alignment inspection, repair, and service workflow, enabling shop technicians to offer their customers the most comprehensive, key-to-key vehicle servicing. The holistic nature of the modern vehicle, where software, sensors, components, and modules interact over multiple communication networks, requires an advanced diagnostic tool to correct faults before advancing to any structural analysis and safety system calibrations.

Alignment Pre-check

Ensuring a vehicle is correctly aligned is essential to correct ADAS component calibration. The thrust angle, calculated in reference to the vehicle’s rear axle, determines its direction as it travels down the road. As discussed earlier, this reference enables the correct centering and position of the frame and its targets/patterns when positing the calibration frame and its patterns/targets to the vehicle. Pre-Check uses the IA700 camera system and targeted wheel clamps attached to all four wheels to determine the vehicle’s current alignment specifications and compare them with the vehicle manufacturer’s allowed tolerances. If within OE-specified tolerances, the technician can proceed to the optical positioning of the frame to the vehicle.

Optical Positioning

The precise positioning of a camera pattern, target, or radar calibrator to the vehicle is vital to successfully calibrating any ADAS component.

The IA700 optical positioning system uses the same camera and target method as the Pre-Check feature, plus the tablet positioning software to recognize the positioning targets and calculate the current angle, distance, and offset position of the frame to the vehicle. The technician simply follows the onscreen instructions to move the frame or adjust its angle until the current values match the required values. That’s it; the vehicle is ready for calibration. Compare that setup with one using mechanical tools such as plumb bobs and measuring tape, which takes 40 minutes on average and is vulnerable to human error.

Unlevel Floor Compensation

Level flooring is one of the critical environmental factors crucial to successful calibrations. The IA700 floor compensation feature enables technicians to calibrate regardless of the flooring status, whether performing calibrations in their shop or going to service others. The system software allows technicians to select the type of surface they are working on, whether an unlevel floor, a level floor, or a rack. Next, the system prompts the technician to initiate a rolling compensation whereby the unit camera system works with the targeted wheel clamps to determine the correction needed to ensure an accurate calibration. The tablet then displays any target height, pitch, and roll angle adjustments that need to be executed by the technician.

Step-by-step Calibration Instructions with Visual Guidance

The Autel tablet displays detailed, graphical illustrations to ensure every step in the ADAS calibration is performed efficiently and accurately. From pre-calibration vehicle and environment conditioning requirements through positioning, calibration, and documentation, the Autel workflow ensures a safe, efficient, and reimbursable calibration every time.

Vehicle & System Coverage

Autel leads the industry in vehicle brand and ADAS technology coverage. With the IA700 system, shops can calibrate every camera, lidar, and radar-based system on virtually every vehicle entering their bay, providing dynamic and static calibrations. Autel offers comprehensive static calibration packages with Lane Departure Warning targets and patterns for all major brands with ADAS-equipped vehicles, and Rear Collison Warning and Around View Monitoring mats for numerous vehicle brands. Available packages also include radar, lidar, and night vision calibrators.

Guided ADAS/ Remote Expert

Autel prides itself on having the fastest OE-released coverage to market in the industry. Still, we depend on vehicle manufacturers to share the latest model diagnostic, servicing, and calibration software and specifications, which creates a lag time for the newest vehicle coverage to reach our tablets. In response to this and to provide a comprehensive, all-in-one solution for our technicians, we developed the Guided ADAS application. Via Guided ADAS, Autel ADAS calibration frame users can use their system, including tablet, frame, targets, calibrators, and expedited setup, and a local or remote laptop with an OE subscription or OE tools to calibrate the safety or convenience system on the late model vehicle. The Autel Remote Expert platform enables technicians to contract with an experienced technician with OE tools or subscriptions to complete the calibration if needed. Remote Experts are also available for modular flashing, new ECU programming, and OE tasks that are currently not supported by Autel software.

Comprehensive Documentation

No company offers more comprehensive and insurer-ready documentation than Autel. It includes pre-scan and post-scan first to identify existing faults and then to ensure the technician corrects them. With detailed, illustrated multi-page reports, ensure your customers (vehicle owners, sublets, and insurance companies) that your shop performed all OE-required calibrations to OE specifications, requirements, and guidelines. IA700 documentation can include the Alignment Pre-Check report to illustrate that the vehicle was tested to ensure it was within OE alignment tolerances before ADAS calibration. Technicians can supplement reports with tablet screenshots and vehicle images. Reports can be customized with shop name, address, and logo and easily printed, emailed or shared on the cloud.

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