Tesla vehicle in ‘Full Self-Driving’ beta mode ‘severely damaged’ after crash

https://www.theverge.com/2021/11/12/22778135/tesla-full-self-driving-beta-crash-fsd-california

50 39 5 years ago

slg5• 5 years ago

so I tried to turn the wheel to avoid it from going into the wrong lane but the car by itself took control and forced itself into the incorrect lane

Something doesn't add up about this report. Teslas are not fly-by-wire. Their steering wheel and brakes are mechanical. You can't turn the wheel without the wheels turning. It therefore shouldn't be possible for the computer to overrule the human. Considering that, it is unclear what intervention the driver actually did and what "the car by itself took control" means. My initial hunch is that the driver isn't being entirely truthful in an attempt to shift blame from themselves to Tesla. But even if that is the case, it wouldn't clear concerns about the safety of FSD.

buffington2• 5 years ago

I don't have FSD in my Model 3, but there are times when overcoming whatever Autopilot is doing with the wheel takes a surprising amount of force. I have no doubt that the motors used to control the wheel are way stronger than me.

slaw• 5 years ago

Motor that turns wheels is way stronger than human. Try to turn steering wheel with engine turned off.

slg5• 5 years ago

I have never experienced that and never heard of anyone else experiencing that. I have often disengaged Autopilot accidentally due to the limited forced required. And for the record, I also don't have FSD because I don't trust it.

Are you sure you couldn't overpower it or were you subconsciously holding back because you were worried about jerking the wheel too hard and how that would impact the vehicle? If you have ever driven a car without power steering, there is a surprising amount of force required to actually steer a vehicle mechanically, but it is something every driver used to do so it shouldn't be that difficult even in the worst situations when the power steering is refusing to cooperate.

ajross• 5 years ago

I think that's absolutely wrong. One of the first things I started playing with when I got the car was AP authority. It's true that Tesla steering is stiff overall. It's true that Tesla AP, unlike some other driver assistance UIs, wants you to apply full override force to disengage (that is, it will fight you as hard as it can, and the car will "pop" out of AP, sometimes with a distinct swerve if you don't reverse correct).

But the force required to do that is just not high. It's not. Just try this on an empty highway. Engage AP in a context where you're doing a lane change or something and hold the wheel firmly. It won't be remotely able to overpower you. You'll feel it tug and then it will chime and give up.

cleverpebble• 5 years ago

Yea, it doesn't sound like the driver is truthful in the report. It is super easy to disengage autopilot - I do it all the time on accident. Just a little nudge of the wheel and it just gives up. Of course, this is assuming there isn't a firmware bug, but such a bug would have likely been reported publicly on the dozens of Tesla forums given it's severity

nomel• 5 years ago

Possible FSD disengagement problems aside...

it wouldn't clear concerns about the safety of FSD.

If you follow FSD review channels like AI Addict, you'll know that there's no "safety" in the system. The human must maintain control at all times, as part of the agreement with Tesla for using the system, because it is clearly unsafe, if left on its own.

adwi• 5 years ago

Don’t they have games built into the car that let you use the steering wheel (while parked, of course) to control? Surely this wouldn’t be turning the wheels?

slg5• 5 years ago

Yes, the wheels turn when playing those games and it makes the steering wheel controls pretty stupid in my opinion. Who wants to put that much wear on their tires to play a video game?

m463• 5 years ago

True - when car is driving itself, it's relatively easy to override automatic steering and disengage.

rvz• 5 years ago

OK so now we are looking at yet another Tesla that is on 'LSD' instead of 'FSD' which explains the erratic behaviour that is going on with these vehicles crashing and swerving when activating the 'beta' feature.

Imagine using it when driving at night. The most dangerous time to drive.

No thanks and no deal to safety critical 'beta' software.

mhh__3• 5 years ago

LSD increases my reaction times by a factor of roughly 2.5x, for anyone curious.

jazzyjackson• 5 years ago

reaction time to what might be a factor here, as both AI sensor fusion and human perception are prone to hallucinations.

0xdeadb00f• 5 years ago

Anecdata against your anecdata: LSD decreases my reaction time significantly and I have a tendency to zone the fuck out

9999000009992• 5 years ago

To be fair, full automation just needs to be better than a buzzed frat boy texting his boys while driving 90 mph.

These things will happen, no one can write perfect code after all. But I'm still very optimistic. Right now we're in a weird Twilight Zone, where you're expecting drivers to be able to take command from an automated system at a moment's notice. Odds are the driver was zoned out or texting his partner or something.

FireBeyond• 5 years ago

Uh, no, it needs to be far far better than that. Unless your claim is that is the majority of drivers out there.

I have no idea how you could come to the conclusion that FSD "just needs to be better than a distracted speeding drunk driver".

9999000009992• 5 years ago

This was said in jest. But given the sheer number of people who drive while texting , get mad and run red lights, or generally don't respect how dangerous driving is , the bar is pretty low.

You can drive outrageously bad, and even when you hit something you typically aren't banned for life from driving. An AI wouldn't keep inching forward at a red light and rear end someone. Even with what we have now with Waymo is much better than the typical driver.

cbozeman• 5 years ago

My bar for Full Self Driving for any vehicle is better than the average driver. As long as it's better than the average driver, it's an improvement.

kwizzt2• 5 years ago

I'd like to add my anecdote. I have been driving my Tesla for about 2 months now, and it definitely feels safer than the ICE cars I drove before. This is mainly due to more information given by the Tesla such as the distance between my car and other objects, and it also shows the lanes around the car so it's easier for me to keep a safe distance from other cars nearby.

I also tried the 'FSD' on freeways where it can navigate on autopilot. It's really feels amazing and takes a lot of burden of driving at high speed off of me.

However, recently I was going onto the acceleration ramp, and turned on navigate on autopilot, Tesla told me to confirm a lane change to the right, I did and it somehow didn't see a car to the right of me trying to change lane to its left. That would be to same spot I would have gone to. So I had to manually intervene and take control of the wheel myself.

Manual override isn't difficult at all though, and there are multiple ways to do it. It can be done through turning the wheel manually, toggle the right stick upwards, or hit the brake. So I think if you still pay attention (maybe not as much attention as driving a non-Tesla car) when driving a Tesla, it's going to be okay.

IshKebab2• 5 years ago

Paying attention while a computer does a task for you automatically and correctly 99.9% of the time is basically impossible though. That point has been made many times before.

I wonder if this will paradoxically lead to Tesla's becoming less safe overall as the software improves, because errors will start to become uncommon enough that people really stop paying attention.

From the sound of it it is currently unreliable enough that most people know that they really do have to pay attention.

kwizzt2• 5 years ago

That’s a good point. I think that’s a phase that we’ll go through during the development and it’s inevitable, but that’s just my opinion.

panick21_3• 5 years ago

That point has been made many times before.

It has been assert many times without much actual evidence.

I wonder if this will paradoxically lead to Tesla's becoming less safe overall as the software improves

Again, something that people on HN are often totally sure is true but I have never seen any actual evidence that is true.

The believe in this is based on some specific cases in the airline industry that I am not sure necessarily translate to driving.

gambiting3• 5 years ago

"Despite its name, FSD is not an autonomous driving system"

Really, it's criminal at this point.

mlindner• 5 years ago

More fake news from the verge on Tesla. They are well known for this at this point.

Tesla vehicle in ‘Full Self-Driving’ beta mode ‘severely damaged’ after crash

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