8 ms·

> The side of the trailer is corrugated metal painted white. It's not a smooth white surface. The vision system should have been able to range that. I'm not su

by NickM 10y ago

> The side of the trailer is corrugated metal painted white. It's not a smooth white surface. The vision system should have been able to range that. I'm not sure if the vision system is smart enough to be used for collision detection. The radar and ultrasonics are used to detect vehicles, but I believe the camera is just used to help follow the lines painted on the road.

shimon 10y ago
If that's true, then this crash certainly points out the value of integrating those systems to better identify potential collisions.
- daveloyall 10y ago
  Some years back, some federal organization made new rules for semi-trailers with regard to the space between the road and the bottom of the trailer. These rules were designed with one problem in mind: decapitations due to rolling under the trailer. I think there was a rash of fatal wrecks that would have been non-fatal if the car was taller or the trailer was shorter, or something. I am under the impression that the rules are generally met these days by installing metal frames that stick down from the bottom of the trailer and prevent cars from fitting underneath. Could it be that this trailer was out of spec? Could that be why 1. there is little damage to the truck, 2. The body is mostly intact but the roof is gone, and 3. the car did not detect the obstacle?
  - Gracana 10y ago
    None of the trailers around here are like that, fwiw. All tall and open underneath.
  - retroafroman 10y ago
    You're talking about the 'Mansfield bar'[0], or 'underride bumper' named after a famous case of a celebrity killed by rear-ending a truck. [0] http://www.sparebumper.com/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=48 http://www.sparebumper.com/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=...
    - raisedbyninjas 10y ago
      A lot of underride guards are still capable decapitating people at low speeds. http://www.iihs.org/iihs/news/desktopnews/underride-guards-on-big-rigs-often-fail-in-crashes-institute-petitions-government-for-new-standard http://www.iihs.org/iihs/news/desktopnews/underride-guards-o...
  - Animats 10y ago
    The US requires a rear bumper on most semitrailers [1] to prevent underrunning on rear-end collisions. But it does not require side bumpers. [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/49/571.224 https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/49/571.224
    - daveloyall 10y ago
      I didn't realize that! Thank you.
    - dsfyu404ed 10y ago
      But it won't do much to save you if you look up from your phone and swerve at the last minute but and only clip the outside of the trailer. (look at the NHTSA crash test videos on youtube)
- freyr 10y ago
  Depth estimation from cameras is challenging. I've seen recent research in generating depth maps using camera arrays, and even with precision camera calibration and state-of-the-art techniques, there are typically many glaring artifacts in the resulting depth map. It might be that cameras introduce enough noise and artifacts into the mix that its not worth integrating them at this point.
davidf18 10y ago
> The radar and ultrasonics are used to detect vehicles I don't understand why the truck wasn't detected. Not exactly a small target.
- Kliment 10y ago
  Because the radar is at headlight level, and the truck had a lot of ground clearance.
  - davidf18 10y ago
    Well that's clearly a design flaw and speaks to the lack of engineering on the part of Tesla which I find frightening. In a different domain, nuclear power plant design, the Three Mile Island plant had a solenoid activated valve for letting high pressure out of the reactor vessel. The problem was that although the plant operators said set the valve to close, the valve was stuck open. It turns out that the control panel light signifying that the valve was closed simply displayed the signal sent to the solenoid, not that the valve had actually closed. No secondary valve, no meter to determine flow. There had been a operator's manual change for TMI and other plants of the same design, but the proper hardware change was never made. Hence TMI. But I worry about the kind of thinking as in TMI and also in Tesla.
    - vvanders 10y ago
      FYI the dashboard on the Tesla shows exactly what the sensors are seeing, so in some respects it's a full feedback loop unlike the 3MI example above.
      - davidf18 10y ago
        Well, yes, they got that right, but I was speaking in terms of not thinking through the engineering in a mission critical design (and in the case of the TMI reactor it had to be approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission or whatever its predecessor was). TMI failed in this level of design thinking which would seem fairly obvious (as did NRC in plant design review) scares me in terms of overall engineering thinking. (In other words, if they got that wrong, what else did the designers get wrong). In the case of Tesla, they have to engineer so that the cars knows about obstacles before crashing into them. The fact that Tesla did not think through this pretty obvious scenario is frightening and suggests a fault in their overall process in engineering. I just feel that Tesla cannot be trusted in terms of engineering unless they have some very smart group check their design. I doubt BMW would have made such a mistake.

by NickM 10y ago

shimon 10y ago

If that's true, then this crash certainly points out the value of integrating those systems to better identify potential collisions.

daveloyall 10y ago
Some years back, some federal organization made new rules for semi-trailers with regard to the space between the road and the bottom of the trailer. These rules were designed with one problem in mind: decapitations due to rolling under the trailer. I think there was a rash of fatal wrecks that would have been non-fatal if the car was taller or the trailer was shorter, or something. I am under the impression that the rules are generally met these days by installing metal frames that stick down from the bottom of the trailer and prevent cars from fitting underneath. Could it be that this trailer was out of spec? Could that be why 1. there is little damage to the truck, 2. The body is mostly intact but the roof is gone, and 3. the car did not detect the obstacle?
- Gracana 10y ago
  None of the trailers around here are like that, fwiw. All tall and open underneath.
- retroafroman 10y ago
  You're talking about the 'Mansfield bar'[0], or 'underride bumper' named after a famous case of a celebrity killed by rear-ending a truck. [0] http://www.sparebumper.com/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=48 http://www.sparebumper.com/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=...
  - raisedbyninjas 10y ago
    A lot of underride guards are still capable decapitating people at low speeds. http://www.iihs.org/iihs/news/desktopnews/underride-guards-on-big-rigs-often-fail-in-crashes-institute-petitions-government-for-new-standard http://www.iihs.org/iihs/news/desktopnews/underride-guards-o...
- Animats 10y ago
  The US requires a rear bumper on most semitrailers [1] to prevent underrunning on rear-end collisions. But it does not require side bumpers. [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/49/571.224 https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/49/571.224
  - daveloyall 10y ago
    I didn't realize that! Thank you.
  - dsfyu404ed 10y ago
    But it won't do much to save you if you look up from your phone and swerve at the last minute but and only clip the outside of the trailer. (look at the NHTSA crash test videos on youtube)
freyr 10y ago
Depth estimation from cameras is challenging. I've seen recent research in generating depth maps using camera arrays, and even with precision camera calibration and state-of-the-art techniques, there are typically many glaring artifacts in the resulting depth map. It might be that cameras introduce enough noise and artifacts into the mix that its not worth integrating them at this point.

davidf18 10y ago

> The radar and ultrasonics are used to detect vehicles I don't understand why the truck wasn't detected. Not exactly a small target.

Kliment 10y ago
Because the radar is at headlight level, and the truck had a lot of ground clearance.
- davidf18 10y ago
  Well that's clearly a design flaw and speaks to the lack of engineering on the part of Tesla which I find frightening. In a different domain, nuclear power plant design, the Three Mile Island plant had a solenoid activated valve for letting high pressure out of the reactor vessel. The problem was that although the plant operators said set the valve to close, the valve was stuck open. It turns out that the control panel light signifying that the valve was closed simply displayed the signal sent to the solenoid, not that the valve had actually closed. No secondary valve, no meter to determine flow. There had been a operator's manual change for TMI and other plants of the same design, but the proper hardware change was never made. Hence TMI. But I worry about the kind of thinking as in TMI and also in Tesla.
  - vvanders 10y ago
    FYI the dashboard on the Tesla shows exactly what the sensors are seeing, so in some respects it's a full feedback loop unlike the 3MI example above.
    - davidf18 10y ago
      Well, yes, they got that right, but I was speaking in terms of not thinking through the engineering in a mission critical design (and in the case of the TMI reactor it had to be approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission or whatever its predecessor was). TMI failed in this level of design thinking which would seem fairly obvious (as did NRC in plant design review) scares me in terms of overall engineering thinking. (In other words, if they got that wrong, what else did the designers get wrong). In the case of Tesla, they have to engineer so that the cars knows about obstacles before crashing into them. The fact that Tesla did not think through this pretty obvious scenario is frightening and suggests a fault in their overall process in engineering. I just feel that Tesla cannot be trusted in terms of engineering unless they have some very smart group check their design. I doubt BMW would have made such a mistake.