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One of the advantages for solid-state LIDAR has to be an increase in reliability. Nobody wants to buy a car which requires a new LIDAR to be installed after 10

by generj 9y ago

One of the advantages for solid-state LIDAR has to be an increase in reliability. Nobody wants to buy a car which requires a new LIDAR to be installed after 100,000 miles for the sum of $7,000. Hopefully once production starts and yield rates increase the unit costs can shrink small enough to being becoming feasible for integration into lower-end products like cell phones or laptops. I think there are a lot of cool applications for LIDAR which have been blocked by the current expense.

cobookman 9y ago
and Manufacturing / shipping / installation costs
xbryanx 9y ago
That brings up an interesting thought. Self-driving cars are going to have to come with automated tests that must be passed for the car to even start. You won't be able to make a choice about whether to drive around with a slightly broken car part like that. Some parts of the system will have to not only work, but work near perfectly or require service.
- alkonaut 9y ago
  > You won't be able to make a choice about whether to drive around with a slightly broken car part like that. As I mentioned in another post: cars already have these sensors in the form of short range (ultrasound?) sensors for parking. These are regularly covered with ice if you live in a winter climate, and in that situation the parking sensors will continuously beep when you have the car in reverse. A human driver just ignores that and backs out anyway, because you look with your eyes and see nothing, so you assume the warning is false and due to ice. The device isn't even broken, it's just temporarily not able to work until the ice has melted, which is a few hours away when the sun comes up. An autonomous car could just say "I don't trust the readings from the sensors so you are on your own kid" and I'd drive. And that would be sort of fine (although it can't be several dozen mornings then it's annoying). But an autonomous taxi can't do that. This is why I think assistant drivers such as teslas autopilot, that can just defer driving to a human, will be around for a very long time (Decades) before we have fully autonomous cars that can drive without backup driver.
JoblessWonder 9y ago
It will probably lead to the advent of the "car as as service" sales model. Although the pushback from traditional dealers will be huge.
- ivl 9y ago
  Traditional dealers push back against anything and everything, so, that can only be expected.
- randyrand 9y ago
  For cities yes. For suburbs and rural areas, not as much.
jacksmith21006 9y ago
People will not be buying for a long time. Use will come through ride sharing services.
- mseebach 9y ago
  That's irrelevant. 7 cents per mile in LIDAR costs is expensive, regardless of how the vehicle is owned and it's use charged.
  - Cerium 9y ago
    7 cents per mile on LIDAR would be reasonable in a truly driver-less system. Uber costs like $2.8/mile and vehicle cost estimates are usually around $0.5/mile, leaving a healthy overhead for a driver-less system to live in.
cma 9y ago
>Nobody wants to buy a car which requires a new LIDAR to be installed after 100,000 miles for the sum of $7,000. How much does a chauffeur cost for 100,000 miles?

by generj 9y ago

cobookman 9y ago

and Manufacturing / shipping / installation costs

xbryanx 9y ago

That brings up an interesting thought. Self-driving cars are going to have to come with automated tests that must be passed for the car to even start. You won't be able to make a choice about whether to drive around with a slightly broken car part like that. Some parts of the system will have to not only work, but work near perfectly or require service.

alkonaut 9y ago
> You won't be able to make a choice about whether to drive around with a slightly broken car part like that. As I mentioned in another post: cars already have these sensors in the form of short range (ultrasound?) sensors for parking. These are regularly covered with ice if you live in a winter climate, and in that situation the parking sensors will continuously beep when you have the car in reverse. A human driver just ignores that and backs out anyway, because you look with your eyes and see nothing, so you assume the warning is false and due to ice. The device isn't even broken, it's just temporarily not able to work until the ice has melted, which is a few hours away when the sun comes up. An autonomous car could just say "I don't trust the readings from the sensors so you are on your own kid" and I'd drive. And that would be sort of fine (although it can't be several dozen mornings then it's annoying). But an autonomous taxi can't do that. This is why I think assistant drivers such as teslas autopilot, that can just defer driving to a human, will be around for a very long time (Decades) before we have fully autonomous cars that can drive without backup driver.

JoblessWonder 9y ago

It will probably lead to the advent of the "car as as service" sales model. Although the pushback from traditional dealers will be huge.

ivl 9y ago
Traditional dealers push back against anything and everything, so, that can only be expected.
randyrand 9y ago
For cities yes. For suburbs and rural areas, not as much.

jacksmith21006 9y ago

People will not be buying for a long time. Use will come through ride sharing services.

mseebach 9y ago
That's irrelevant. 7 cents per mile in LIDAR costs is expensive, regardless of how the vehicle is owned and it's use charged.
- Cerium 9y ago
  7 cents per mile on LIDAR would be reasonable in a truly driver-less system. Uber costs like $2.8/mile and vehicle cost estimates are usually around $0.5/mile, leaving a healthy overhead for a driver-less system to live in.

cma 9y ago

>Nobody wants to buy a car which requires a new LIDAR to be installed after 100,000 miles for the sum of $7,000. How much does a chauffeur cost for 100,000 miles?