Sobering demonstration of auto pilot’s vulnerability to certain road conditions.
This situation required razor sharp reaction from the driver. There’s a good chance of a wreck in any car. Any distracted driver probably wouldn’t react fast enough.
Would the dummy car being made of cardboard affect the Tesla’s sensor systems?
I wondered about that too.
I’d guess the sensors are looking for a solid object the width of a car. Probably doesn’t matter what the material.
They did paint the cardboard. So light reflects off it.
(Full disclosure: Tesla driver here).
And that is why Tesla does not call it an “autopilot”, but “driver’s assistance”, and why for already quite a while the system requires the driver to keep their hands on the wheel – otherwise an alarm sounds, accompanied of light flashes, and afterwards the driver’s assistance is disconnected and cannot be used again in the same trip. It is true that in the very beginning the system was more “hands off”, but that was changed already a long time ago.
The driver’s assistance in Tesla is quite useful and helps with a bunch of the more rutinary aspects of driving, but it is not an auto-pilot by any stretch of the imagination. The driver must keep an eye on the road and be ready to intervene if needed.
Unfortunately there are people who appear to think that it is an auto-pilot, in spite of the insistent terminology and the limits put (on purpose) on the technology.
JoseB does your car automatically get the Tesla updates? Do you get asked if you’re ready to update?
I see version 9 has a newly designed interface and comes out in a few weeks.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/electrek.co/2018/06/13/tesla-new-user-interface-version-9-elon-musk/amp/
Yes. Patches and updates come automatically “over the air”, and you as the driver get a notification when you start the car that “at such-and-such time (usually 2:00AM local time) on such-and-such day you will receive a Tesla update.” The system allows you to reschedule the hour when you want the update to be downloaded, but nothing else. The update will be coming no matter what.
I understand that, if for whatever reason you are driving at the precise moment the update time arrives, the car will not ask for it. But I do not know whether it asks later on for a reschedule, or whether it begins downloading when it is parked and stopped.
We will see how it goes, although I have my doubts that this will provide a real, proper “auto-pilot” feature.
Thank you JoseB.
Tesla seems to be taking a safer and more responsible approach then the competition.
The technology will continue improving.
It seems as though, rather than expecting hte passenger to take over driving responsibilities on a moment’s notice, just having the passenger bring awareness of a situation to the autonomous car would be better.
I have this happen from time to time, where my passenger will notice something that I didn’t, and they make some noise, clear their throat, or even say “Look out!”
If the car could pick up voice commands, and so if the passenger indicates that they see something that they are concerned about and the car is maybe not reacting to, it can change its reactions. It can take its foot off the gas, and reevaluate the situation, lowering the threshold on dismissing false positives. A yelled, “Look out!” may have the car go ahead and apply some braking, while essentially eliminating the dismissal of false positives, while a “Stop!” would have the car come to a stop as quickly as is safe.
Maybe even with some advances, you could even be like, “There’s a house up ahead with little kids that like to run out into the road.” And it will take that into consideration.
Still requires people to be paying attention, but not in a way that they have to take over at an instant’s notice.
Hi JoseB, I just went to the Tesla site. Tesla themselves call the features Enhanced Autopilot, and Full Self-Driving Capability.
?
That is not how the people at the Tesla dealer in the Netherlands called it when I was dealing with them when I was going to buy the auto.
The people from the Tesla dealer called it “driver’s assistance” at all times.
Weird! I have checked the Dutch-language page and there, now, they call it “autopilot”. Strange!
As I say, when I was dealing with the salespeople, they were very insistent in calling it “driver’s assistance”.
I wonder when they changed that. Oh well! Disregard then my contention that Tesla does not call the feature “autopilot”.
However, as I user, I am very much aware that it is NOT a true “autopilot”.
That’s not autopilot being vulnerable, that’s everything being vulnerable.
Depends on whether the system relies 100% on camera information, or if it only reacts to camera + radar.
But these dummy cars are not cardboard, they appear to be made from fabric-covered mats. And if it’s designed to be a fair test, they would have included some metal in it.
Agreed. I was involved in a multicar pileup a few months ago, and it was caused by almost the exact same situation as this was. I, luckily, managed to stop in time- but the cars behind me weren’t so lucky.
They don’t call it “autopilot” they call it "Advanced Autopilot"with capital letters.
bolding mine:
“Your Tesla will match speed to traffic conditions, keep within a lane, automatically change lanes without requiring driver input, transition from one freeway to another, exit the freeway when your destination is near, self-park when near a parking spot and be summoned to and from your garage.”
If they’re calling it Advanced Autopilot and describing it as functioning without driver input and it can be summoned from your garage then where is the gray area here?
How much metal is in a person, a deer, or an infinite number of things you don’t want to hit?
Is a rebar filled cement barrier dense enough for you?