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I get frustrated when Tesla blames the driver for these crashes by saying that they aren't touching the wheel or are ignoring messages. It is extremely common f

I get frustrated when Tesla blames the driver for these crashes by saying that they aren't touching the wheel or are ignoring messages. It is extremely common for my car to warn me to keep my hands on the when WHILE I have my hands on the wheel. Even shaking it a little will sometimes not cancel out the warnings. It doesn't seem to matter if my hands are on the top or bottom of the wheel. Anything short of a deathgrip and constant jiggling of the wheel doesn't seem to consistantly register as keeping your hands on the wheel. Anyone who has used Autopilot for a significant amount of time has been beeped at for not having their hands on the wheel even though they are. And yes, the car will make crazy maneuvers at times that no driver in their right mind would make. I still like it and am glad I opted for it, but it is far from earning its namesake.

AckSyn 8y ago
Been driving one on long drives regularly the past year and I've never experienced the problems you describe before.
- thebluehawk 8y ago
  Same. My other annoyance about every single one of these threads are people making comments about how unsafe it is when you can tell they've never even driven a car equipped with it.
- chapium 8y ago
  I’d be really concerned about the news then. Will you react quickly if the car decides to drive towards a post?
ovao 8y ago
Interesting. Have you reported those issues to Tesla?
- uncoder0 8y ago
  It's a widely reported issue over at /r/teslamotors. I see a thread or mention of it at least once a week.
  - donarb 8y ago
    A reddit group is not a substitute for contacting the company directly.
    - pushtheenvelope 8y ago
      I kinda disagree with this. Its the company's job to be on top of whichever forum its users are using to discuss its products, especially looking out for security/safety issues. While it would nice for the Op to directly contact the company, I'd place more of the weight of responsibility on the company than the user.
      - webbles 8y ago
        Corporate shills love to shit all over the end user.
    - Phlarp 8y ago
      Really? It seems companies respond to problems that are aired in public much quicker and more thoroughly than through their official support channels. .@brand on a public twitter with enough followers to care about usually gets a pretty quick response. Hell, how many times have YC companies prioritized support issues because a user posted it here on HN? I see it all the time with coinbase and crew, even googlers hanging out seem to be able to get account bans reviewed relatively easily. I would argue the /r/teslamotors sub would be BETTER than going to Tesla directly. The motorist that died in this crash had contacted Tesla multiple times regarding this issue, since the crash plenty of others have made videos of similar behavior at similar median splits across the interstate system. If the driver had made those complaints public perhaps others would have corroborated his accounts and or recreated the issue with video proof. Certainly putting somewhat public pressure on Tesla to fix the problem quickly.
cpt1138 8y ago
So if your hands are on the wheel is the autopilot still in control and you are not? I'm curious because if their telemetry says his hands were not on the wheel but they were, then did he just drive himself into the barrier?
- avs733 8y ago
  Tesla's autopilot is setup to check if the driver's hands are on the wheel. If it does not detect hands on the wheel it disengages. The argument they make is that having hands on wheel is, effectively, having the driver in the loop as a part of the safety system ready and able to take over 'instantaneously' if necessary.
  - cpt1138 8y ago
    So his hands weren't detected on the wheel and the autopilot disengages at highway speeds? I can't really understand how this is supposed to work.
    - dingo_bat 8y ago
      It doesn't work. That's my whole takeaway. It's just a fancy lane keeping and cruise control system.
- lafar6502 8y ago
  what telemetry? Why would anyone trust this data?
shifter 8y ago
Yep, this used to happen frequently on road trips. It relies on squeezing the wheel fairly firmly. I got into the habit of periodically giving it a good squeeze while resting my hand on it.
- delive 8y ago
  It doesn't want a squeeze though, it needs resistance/feedback on turning the wheel. Having your hands on the wheel isn't enough, you actually have to give it a little tug, so the alert happens pretty often unless you have a good cadence of tugging on the wheel randomly while in Autopilot.
  - m1n1 8y ago
    Might those tugs affect its learning?
    - x0054 8y ago
      It is NOT learning.
  - kybernetikos 8y ago
    That sounds almost dangerous.
  - LeoPanthera 8y ago
    Hence the increasingly common tactic of Tesla owners to hang a water bottle from one side of the wheel, which provides constant torque, and fools the system into thinking you are always holding it.
unclebucknasty 8y ago
>it is far from earning its namesake. The FTC should require them to stop using the term Autopilot. The common understanding of that term makes it misleading. Words matter and Tesla is trying to have the benefit of the term without the responsibility for what it implies.
- bapbap 8y ago
  I agree, something more like Volvo's "Pilot Assist" makes sense to me.
  - justherefortart 8y ago
    Adaptive Cruise Control seems even better.
    - Joky 8y ago
      ACC is a different feature that exists separately: it does not touch the steering.
  - GeekyBear 8y ago
    Adaptive Cruise Control with Lane Keeping Assistance seems to be the most common industry name for it.
- drbawb 8y ago
  Autopilot, as used by the aviation industry, still requires an attentive pilot. It is a pilot-aid to reduce workload, it does not obviate the need for a pilot prepared to maintain control of the aircraft or correct for unexpected conditions. Autopilots can and do malfunction, in this video[0] it attempts to make a >1G maneuver unprompted. You'll note the pilot in command in this video is actively scanning for traffic, he is physically positioned to take control of the aircraft, he is paying attention to instrumentation, and is actively participating on frequency. In other words despite having an autopilot: he is still piloting the aircraft. I don't think the issue here is Tesla misusing the word. The issue is that the common (non-pilot) understanding of the term is wrong. People piloting heavy machinery have an onus to maintain their currency & proficiency, as well as be ready to correct for faults in their instrumentation and pilot aids. Autopilot is intended to be a tool to reduce pilot workload so you can focus on other aspects of maintaining correct control of the vehicle. (Namely in an aircraft it assists you with aviation, leaving you better able to navigate & communicate.) Instead what we are seeing with these assists in cars is that people are using these pilot aids and then engaging in unrelated distractions. [0]: https://youtu.be/QbvfkKyurJI?t=13m25s https://youtu.be/QbvfkKyurJI?t=13m25s
sschueller 8y ago
A lot of people also paid for autopilot before it had the hands on wheel every few minutes requirement.
gcb0 8y ago
> blames the driver well, you are driving a car from a paypal mafia founder. why everyone forget that Musk started by ignoring banking regulations and mostly laundering money quasi legally, while later on holding funds from everyone for arbitrarily enforced rules, while completely ignoring user complaints. (bye HN karma :) seriously, why is that everyone hates paypal ethics but loves musk and hold him as holy?
- weltstub 8y ago
  He launched a car into space tho. He has to be good. He wouldn't have had the money to launch that car into space if he didn't bust unions and defy regulations.
- WhompingWindows 8y ago
  I think you're overestimating the amount that people hate paypal ethics. For instance, I don't know what you mean by ignoring banking regulations and laundering money quasi-legally? I read his biography written by Ashlee Vance and I don't think this was covered.
  - goldenkey 8y ago
    PayPal has changed a lot. Back when my parents sold thousands of items on eBay, PayPal would screw them over many many times, and not just with disputes - PayPal often locked funds for months without cause. It is fairly easy to find out what PayPal used to be like when Musk ran it - just ask some older eBay sellers.
    - reaperducer 8y ago
      >PayPal often locked funds for months without cause. Not unique to PayPal. Deposit a check of an amount that's unusual for your "profile" at Chase and it'll sit on the money for three weeks.
      - goldenkey 8y ago
        That's just a check clearing. Paypal would lock entire account funds, payment clearance was not an issue.
gthtjtkt 8y ago
> by saying that they aren't touching the wheel or are ignoring messages. The funniest part of Tesla's statement is the fact that it basically renders "Autopilot" worthless. Or, at best, turns it into nothing more than an Adaptive Cruise Control system with an extremely misleading (and dangerous) name. Tesla has been all too happy to let people believe that Autopilot is what the name implies. They only make a real effort to correct that misconception when something bad happens. Then they finally say "It's not actually autopilot, you're still supposed to keep your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road at all times", to which we collectively shrug and say "Well then what the hell is the point of Autopilot? And why did you give it such a misleading name?"
- slavik81 8y ago
  I agree entirely. What's the point of an autopilot if I have to spend my entire drive watching it like a hawk to ensure it doesn't steer me into a wall? You know what I really want? I want a vehicle to save me when I screw up. I love skiing, but it's a dangerous sport, and the most dangerous part is driving home. You're in the mountains in the dark, the road might be icy, and you're tired from a long day of strenuous exercise. I want to see humans and machines working together. A car that could spot deer on or beside the road would save lives. They can be very difficult to see in the dark, and hitting one could send it through your windshield at highway speed. Augmenting human ability has a lot of potential. Even just adding sensors that humans don't have would be huge. I bet those deer are way more obvious in infrared.
  - kalleboo 8y ago
    Mercedes has a night vision system like that https://youtu.be/d03SuJ0TVcY https://youtu.be/d03SuJ0TVcY
  - shkkmo 8y ago
    > What's the point of an autopilot if I have to spend my entire drive watching it like a hawk to ensure it doesn't steer me into a wall? If you fall asleep while driving, it may prevent you from driving into a barrier or on-coming traffic. It's not meant to take over the act of driving from you, but to provide assistance.
aylmao 8y ago
> I still like it and am glad I opted for it, but it is far from earning its namesake. I trust the intelligence of drivers, but this brings up a good point. Could calling it "autopilot" be perhaps a bit much right now? I'm not claiming it's false advertising kind of bad, but I can see it being better for marketing than giving a reasonable sense of what the feature is capable of.
- sarah180 8y ago
  I would argue that the "creates false expectations that leads to fatal automobile collisions" kind of bad is potentially a more serious kind of bad than the "false advertising" kind of bad.
- shkkmo 8y ago
  It is an accurate use of the term. If the system is warning you when you take your hands of the wheel, you would have to be a moron to assume that your attention is not required.
jorvi 8y ago
IMO CoPilot would have been a great name that much more accurately covers what it does.
- jsight 8y ago
  As a pilot, I'd consider that name worse. Copilots literally fly the plane, often with no real supervision. Autopilots require supervision.
btian 8y ago
Why do you get frustrated if the driver failed to maintain control of the car? When autopilot on airplane crashes the plane, what do you think is the primary cause?
blensor 8y ago
While naming a product should usually be up to the company who creates said product, my opinion on this is that Tesla should no longer be allowed to call this "autopilot", for public safety reasons. Autopilot is a well known word which suggests a certain level of autonomousness and a car that might kill you if you take your attention away for 6 seconds simply does not qualify for that name. Tesla changing the name from autopilot to something better resembling reality would send a strong message to people to be more careful with using it while the attention is somewhere else
- illustrioussuit 8y ago
  I know nothing about aviation, but isn’t “autopilot” on a commercial plane pretty much just “maintain altitude and heading”? Pilots still have to be engaged and active, right?
  - cdowns 8y ago
    In General Aviation at least, there are varying levels of autopilot (depending on how nice the system is you can maintain heading and altitude or fly a pre-programmed course with navigational waypoints), but all of them will fly you right into the side of a mountain or into restricted airspace if you let them. You can't just set it and stop paying attention. It seems that is what people want when they think of "autopilot" for their cars.
    - markshead 8y ago
      If that is the case, autopilot on a plane seems to be more like cruise control expanded to maintain pitch, yaw, and roll than autonomous flying.
      - 0xffff2 8y ago
        There is tremendous variability, but this is basically correct. In addition, the sky is wide open and empty compared to even a not so busy street. Airplane autopilots really are solving a much simpler problem than even a level 3 autonomous car has to solve. The most advanced autopilots can automatically takeoff and land, but that requires substantial ground equipment at each airport to support.
linsomniac 8y ago
I also often find that the car doesn't detect my hands on the wheel when they are. Sometimes a gentle shake isn't even enough and giving it a firmer shake causes it to disengage.
my_first_acct 8y ago
As I understand it, other auto manufacturers provide similar capability, though they may call it "lane keeping" instead of "autopilot". What I haven't seen discussed: Are these cars from other manufacturers having similar problems with crashing into things? Are Tesla crashes considered more newsworthy, which is why we hear more about them? Or are drivers of these other cars more attentive? Or do these other cars actually have better technology? Just curious why the discussion is always Tesla "autopilot" vs Waymo "full autonomy" vs unaided humans, when other manufacturers are also putting level-2 "lane keeping" systems on the road.
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > Just curious why the discussion is always Tesla "autopilot" vs Waymo "full autonomy" vs unaided humans, when other manufacturers are also putting level-2 "lane keeping" systems on the road. Because, ironically, Tesla and Waymo (and Uber) have been more suscessful at deliberately drawing media attention. The thing is, once you draw media attention, it tends to stick around even when the story goes someplace you don't want it to.
- Someone 8y ago
  Tesla brags and thinks it is OK to use their customer as guinea pigs more than other manufacturers. Other car manufacturers are more careful than Tesla in what they let get out of the lab. For example, they wouldn’t have to send out a firmware update that, as a new requirement, forces users to keep their hands on the steering wheel (https://thenextweb.com/artificial-intelligence/2016/09/23/tesla-update-forces-you-to-keep-your-hands-on-the-wheel-or-else/ https://thenextweb.com/artificial-intelligence/2016/09/23/te...) because they wouldn’t yet dare deploy one that doesn’t. And I don’t think their technology is worse than Tesla’s. See for example https://www.technologyreview.com/s/520431/driverless-cars-are-further-away-than-you-think/ https://www.technologyreview.com/s/520431/driverless-cars-ar... (2013).
intherdfield 8y ago
That is very significant! Your comment suggests that Tesla's claims about the driver having his hands off the wheel for x seconds before a crash could be wrong. If the sensors detect the drivers hands are not on the wheel when they actually are on the wheel, then data logged about how long the driver's hands were off the wheel should be considered suspect. I hope that's being investigated. Personally, I'm having trouble believing the driver who died in the recent accident ignored the warnings for six seconds before the head-on collision, especially when he knew Autopilot didn't work well at that section of road. I'm not familiar with how the system works. If the warning engages, is there a guarantee that the driver will have to take over shortly? Or are there scenarios when the warning turns off by itself and so the driver could have been waiting to see if the car would correct? [Edit: lolc and Vik1ng pointed out that the warning isn't related to unsafe conditions as I implied. It's used whenever the sensors think the driver's hands are off the wheel.]
- lolc 8y ago
  The warning is not a reaction to unsafe conditions. It comes on when the system detects (rightly or wrongly) that the driver doesn't hold the wheel.
- Vik1ng 8y ago
  > ignored the warnings for six seconds There were never warnings at that time. Tesla just worded it like that to mislead people. It only talks about videos early in the drive.
  - shkkmo 8y ago
    I think the wording is pretty clear, but I think people didn't take the time to fully read the press release, just skimmed it. This seems pretty clear: "The driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive and the driver’s hands were not detected on the wheel for six seconds prior to the collision."
- robotcookies 8y ago
  That's the point of the investigation. Many things could have happened. Maybe the driver fell asleep, maybe he tried to move the wheel and it got stuck. Maybe the car slipped on a patch and had nothing to do with autopilot. We don't know yet. It takes time to review witnesses, multiple sources of information and that's the NTSB's job. Tesla seems to think they know exactly what happened after only reviewing data collected from the car. They see what they want to see and have become blind to any other possibility. I think that's terrifying. I couldn't trust an automaker with that kind of arrogance.
Waterluvian 8y ago
Hands on the wheel is also like not going above the speed limit. Yes, 10 and 2. But in reality we all bend those rules a bit.
- _s 8y ago
  A lot, if not most advanced driver trainings recommend 9/3.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
jsight 8y ago
Are you implying that it is likely that his hands were ON the wheel when he drove into the barrier? I don't see why he would have driven into the wall if that were the case.
cynix 8y ago
> It is extremely common for my car to warn me to keep my hands on the when WHILE I have my hands on the wheel. Even shaking it a little will sometimes not cancel out the warnings. This is not what I experience. Maybe the sensor in your steering wheel is faulty? For me, the warning goes away as soon as I lightly jiggle the steering wheel (I stop as soon as I encounter any resistance).
beenBoutIT 8y ago
Tesla blaming the driver for not using their steering wheel correctly is effectively admitting the obvious, that their car is badly designed. If the car needs to be used a certain way to be fully functional and they can't work that into the design in a way that compels the user to use it correctly, they have failed. The reason conventional wheels are an example of great design is that the user is forced to use them. Their no-knob, no-button interior was, until now the more obvious design fail. Some people see Tesla's badly-designed completely flat all-digital interface as the 'future of the automobile', while in reality what they're looking at is DeLorean 2.0.

AckSyn 8y ago

Been driving one on long drives regularly the past year and I've never experienced the problems you describe before.

thebluehawk 8y ago
Same. My other annoyance about every single one of these threads are people making comments about how unsafe it is when you can tell they've never even driven a car equipped with it.
chapium 8y ago
I’d be really concerned about the news then. Will you react quickly if the car decides to drive towards a post?

ovao 8y ago

Interesting. Have you reported those issues to Tesla?

uncoder0 8y ago
It's a widely reported issue over at /r/teslamotors. I see a thread or mention of it at least once a week.
- donarb 8y ago
  A reddit group is not a substitute for contacting the company directly.
  - pushtheenvelope 8y ago
    I kinda disagree with this. Its the company's job to be on top of whichever forum its users are using to discuss its products, especially looking out for security/safety issues. While it would nice for the Op to directly contact the company, I'd place more of the weight of responsibility on the company than the user.
    - webbles 8y ago
      Corporate shills love to shit all over the end user.
  - Phlarp 8y ago
    Really? It seems companies respond to problems that are aired in public much quicker and more thoroughly than through their official support channels. .@brand on a public twitter with enough followers to care about usually gets a pretty quick response. Hell, how many times have YC companies prioritized support issues because a user posted it here on HN? I see it all the time with coinbase and crew, even googlers hanging out seem to be able to get account bans reviewed relatively easily. I would argue the /r/teslamotors sub would be BETTER than going to Tesla directly. The motorist that died in this crash had contacted Tesla multiple times regarding this issue, since the crash plenty of others have made videos of similar behavior at similar median splits across the interstate system. If the driver had made those complaints public perhaps others would have corroborated his accounts and or recreated the issue with video proof. Certainly putting somewhat public pressure on Tesla to fix the problem quickly.

cpt1138 8y ago

So if your hands are on the wheel is the autopilot still in control and you are not? I'm curious because if their telemetry says his hands were not on the wheel but they were, then did he just drive himself into the barrier?

avs733 8y ago
Tesla's autopilot is setup to check if the driver's hands are on the wheel. If it does not detect hands on the wheel it disengages. The argument they make is that having hands on wheel is, effectively, having the driver in the loop as a part of the safety system ready and able to take over 'instantaneously' if necessary.
- cpt1138 8y ago
  So his hands weren't detected on the wheel and the autopilot disengages at highway speeds? I can't really understand how this is supposed to work.
  - dingo_bat 8y ago
    It doesn't work. That's my whole takeaway. It's just a fancy lane keeping and cruise control system.
lafar6502 8y ago
what telemetry? Why would anyone trust this data?

shifter 8y ago

Yep, this used to happen frequently on road trips. It relies on squeezing the wheel fairly firmly. I got into the habit of periodically giving it a good squeeze while resting my hand on it.

delive 8y ago
It doesn't want a squeeze though, it needs resistance/feedback on turning the wheel. Having your hands on the wheel isn't enough, you actually have to give it a little tug, so the alert happens pretty often unless you have a good cadence of tugging on the wheel randomly while in Autopilot.
- m1n1 8y ago
  Might those tugs affect its learning?
  - x0054 8y ago
    It is NOT learning.
- kybernetikos 8y ago
  That sounds almost dangerous.
- LeoPanthera 8y ago
  Hence the increasingly common tactic of Tesla owners to hang a water bottle from one side of the wheel, which provides constant torque, and fools the system into thinking you are always holding it.

unclebucknasty 8y ago

>it is far from earning its namesake. The FTC should require them to stop using the term Autopilot. The common understanding of that term makes it misleading. Words matter and Tesla is trying to have the benefit of the term without the responsibility for what it implies.

bapbap 8y ago
I agree, something more like Volvo's "Pilot Assist" makes sense to me.
- justherefortart 8y ago
  Adaptive Cruise Control seems even better.
  - Joky 8y ago
    ACC is a different feature that exists separately: it does not touch the steering.
- GeekyBear 8y ago
  Adaptive Cruise Control with Lane Keeping Assistance seems to be the most common industry name for it.
drbawb 8y ago
Autopilot, as used by the aviation industry, still requires an attentive pilot. It is a pilot-aid to reduce workload, it does not obviate the need for a pilot prepared to maintain control of the aircraft or correct for unexpected conditions. Autopilots can and do malfunction, in this video[0] it attempts to make a >1G maneuver unprompted. You'll note the pilot in command in this video is actively scanning for traffic, he is physically positioned to take control of the aircraft, he is paying attention to instrumentation, and is actively participating on frequency. In other words despite having an autopilot: he is still piloting the aircraft. I don't think the issue here is Tesla misusing the word. The issue is that the common (non-pilot) understanding of the term is wrong. People piloting heavy machinery have an onus to maintain their currency & proficiency, as well as be ready to correct for faults in their instrumentation and pilot aids. Autopilot is intended to be a tool to reduce pilot workload so you can focus on other aspects of maintaining correct control of the vehicle. (Namely in an aircraft it assists you with aviation, leaving you better able to navigate & communicate.) Instead what we are seeing with these assists in cars is that people are using these pilot aids and then engaging in unrelated distractions. [0]: https://youtu.be/QbvfkKyurJI?t=13m25s https://youtu.be/QbvfkKyurJI?t=13m25s

sschueller 8y ago

A lot of people also paid for autopilot before it had the hands on wheel every few minutes requirement.

gcb0 8y ago

> blames the driver well, you are driving a car from a paypal mafia founder. why everyone forget that Musk started by ignoring banking regulations and mostly laundering money quasi legally, while later on holding funds from everyone for arbitrarily enforced rules, while completely ignoring user complaints. (bye HN karma :) seriously, why is that everyone hates paypal ethics but loves musk and hold him as holy?

weltstub 8y ago
He launched a car into space tho. He has to be good. He wouldn't have had the money to launch that car into space if he didn't bust unions and defy regulations.
WhompingWindows 8y ago
I think you're overestimating the amount that people hate paypal ethics. For instance, I don't know what you mean by ignoring banking regulations and laundering money quasi-legally? I read his biography written by Ashlee Vance and I don't think this was covered.
- goldenkey 8y ago
  PayPal has changed a lot. Back when my parents sold thousands of items on eBay, PayPal would screw them over many many times, and not just with disputes - PayPal often locked funds for months without cause. It is fairly easy to find out what PayPal used to be like when Musk ran it - just ask some older eBay sellers.
  - reaperducer 8y ago
    >PayPal often locked funds for months without cause. Not unique to PayPal. Deposit a check of an amount that's unusual for your "profile" at Chase and it'll sit on the money for three weeks.
    - goldenkey 8y ago
      That's just a check clearing. Paypal would lock entire account funds, payment clearance was not an issue.

gthtjtkt 8y ago

> by saying that they aren't touching the wheel or are ignoring messages. The funniest part of Tesla's statement is the fact that it basically renders "Autopilot" worthless. Or, at best, turns it into nothing more than an Adaptive Cruise Control system with an extremely misleading (and dangerous) name. Tesla has been all too happy to let people believe that Autopilot is what the name implies. They only make a real effort to correct that misconception when something bad happens. Then they finally say "It's not actually autopilot, you're still supposed to keep your hands on the wheel and your eyes on the road at all times", to which we collectively shrug and say "Well then what the hell is the point of Autopilot? And why did you give it such a misleading name?"

slavik81 8y ago
I agree entirely. What's the point of an autopilot if I have to spend my entire drive watching it like a hawk to ensure it doesn't steer me into a wall? You know what I really want? I want a vehicle to save me when I screw up. I love skiing, but it's a dangerous sport, and the most dangerous part is driving home. You're in the mountains in the dark, the road might be icy, and you're tired from a long day of strenuous exercise. I want to see humans and machines working together. A car that could spot deer on or beside the road would save lives. They can be very difficult to see in the dark, and hitting one could send it through your windshield at highway speed. Augmenting human ability has a lot of potential. Even just adding sensors that humans don't have would be huge. I bet those deer are way more obvious in infrared.
- kalleboo 8y ago
  Mercedes has a night vision system like that https://youtu.be/d03SuJ0TVcY https://youtu.be/d03SuJ0TVcY
- shkkmo 8y ago
  > What's the point of an autopilot if I have to spend my entire drive watching it like a hawk to ensure it doesn't steer me into a wall? If you fall asleep while driving, it may prevent you from driving into a barrier or on-coming traffic. It's not meant to take over the act of driving from you, but to provide assistance.

aylmao 8y ago

> I still like it and am glad I opted for it, but it is far from earning its namesake. I trust the intelligence of drivers, but this brings up a good point. Could calling it "autopilot" be perhaps a bit much right now? I'm not claiming it's false advertising kind of bad, but I can see it being better for marketing than giving a reasonable sense of what the feature is capable of.

sarah180 8y ago
I would argue that the "creates false expectations that leads to fatal automobile collisions" kind of bad is potentially a more serious kind of bad than the "false advertising" kind of bad.
shkkmo 8y ago
It is an accurate use of the term. If the system is warning you when you take your hands of the wheel, you would have to be a moron to assume that your attention is not required.

jorvi 8y ago

IMO CoPilot would have been a great name that much more accurately covers what it does.

jsight 8y ago
As a pilot, I'd consider that name worse. Copilots literally fly the plane, often with no real supervision. Autopilots require supervision.

btian 8y ago

Why do you get frustrated if the driver failed to maintain control of the car? When autopilot on airplane crashes the plane, what do you think is the primary cause?

blensor 8y ago

While naming a product should usually be up to the company who creates said product, my opinion on this is that Tesla should no longer be allowed to call this "autopilot", for public safety reasons. Autopilot is a well known word which suggests a certain level of autonomousness and a car that might kill you if you take your attention away for 6 seconds simply does not qualify for that name. Tesla changing the name from autopilot to something better resembling reality would send a strong message to people to be more careful with using it while the attention is somewhere else

illustrioussuit 8y ago
I know nothing about aviation, but isn’t “autopilot” on a commercial plane pretty much just “maintain altitude and heading”? Pilots still have to be engaged and active, right?
- cdowns 8y ago
  In General Aviation at least, there are varying levels of autopilot (depending on how nice the system is you can maintain heading and altitude or fly a pre-programmed course with navigational waypoints), but all of them will fly you right into the side of a mountain or into restricted airspace if you let them. You can't just set it and stop paying attention. It seems that is what people want when they think of "autopilot" for their cars.
  - markshead 8y ago
    If that is the case, autopilot on a plane seems to be more like cruise control expanded to maintain pitch, yaw, and roll than autonomous flying.
    - 0xffff2 8y ago
      There is tremendous variability, but this is basically correct. In addition, the sky is wide open and empty compared to even a not so busy street. Airplane autopilots really are solving a much simpler problem than even a level 3 autonomous car has to solve. The most advanced autopilots can automatically takeoff and land, but that requires substantial ground equipment at each airport to support.

linsomniac 8y ago

I also often find that the car doesn't detect my hands on the wheel when they are. Sometimes a gentle shake isn't even enough and giving it a firmer shake causes it to disengage.

my_first_acct 8y ago

As I understand it, other auto manufacturers provide similar capability, though they may call it "lane keeping" instead of "autopilot". What I haven't seen discussed: Are these cars from other manufacturers having similar problems with crashing into things? Are Tesla crashes considered more newsworthy, which is why we hear more about them? Or are drivers of these other cars more attentive? Or do these other cars actually have better technology? Just curious why the discussion is always Tesla "autopilot" vs Waymo "full autonomy" vs unaided humans, when other manufacturers are also putting level-2 "lane keeping" systems on the road.

dragonwriter 8y ago
> Just curious why the discussion is always Tesla "autopilot" vs Waymo "full autonomy" vs unaided humans, when other manufacturers are also putting level-2 "lane keeping" systems on the road. Because, ironically, Tesla and Waymo (and Uber) have been more suscessful at deliberately drawing media attention. The thing is, once you draw media attention, it tends to stick around even when the story goes someplace you don't want it to.
Someone 8y ago
Tesla brags and thinks it is OK to use their customer as guinea pigs more than other manufacturers. Other car manufacturers are more careful than Tesla in what they let get out of the lab. For example, they wouldn’t have to send out a firmware update that, as a new requirement, forces users to keep their hands on the steering wheel (https://thenextweb.com/artificial-intelligence/2016/09/23/tesla-update-forces-you-to-keep-your-hands-on-the-wheel-or-else/ https://thenextweb.com/artificial-intelligence/2016/09/23/te...) because they wouldn’t yet dare deploy one that doesn’t. And I don’t think their technology is worse than Tesla’s. See for example https://www.technologyreview.com/s/520431/driverless-cars-are-further-away-than-you-think/ https://www.technologyreview.com/s/520431/driverless-cars-ar... (2013).

intherdfield 8y ago

That is very significant! Your comment suggests that Tesla's claims about the driver having his hands off the wheel for x seconds before a crash could be wrong. If the sensors detect the drivers hands are not on the wheel when they actually are on the wheel, then data logged about how long the driver's hands were off the wheel should be considered suspect. I hope that's being investigated. Personally, I'm having trouble believing the driver who died in the recent accident ignored the warnings for six seconds before the head-on collision, especially when he knew Autopilot didn't work well at that section of road. I'm not familiar with how the system works. If the warning engages, is there a guarantee that the driver will have to take over shortly? Or are there scenarios when the warning turns off by itself and so the driver could have been waiting to see if the car would correct? [Edit: lolc and Vik1ng pointed out that the warning isn't related to unsafe conditions as I implied. It's used whenever the sensors think the driver's hands are off the wheel.]

lolc 8y ago
The warning is not a reaction to unsafe conditions. It comes on when the system detects (rightly or wrongly) that the driver doesn't hold the wheel.
Vik1ng 8y ago
> ignored the warnings for six seconds There were never warnings at that time. Tesla just worded it like that to mislead people. It only talks about videos early in the drive.
- shkkmo 8y ago
  I think the wording is pretty clear, but I think people didn't take the time to fully read the press release, just skimmed it. This seems pretty clear: "The driver had received several visual and one audible hands-on warning earlier in the drive and the driver’s hands were not detected on the wheel for six seconds prior to the collision."
robotcookies 8y ago
That's the point of the investigation. Many things could have happened. Maybe the driver fell asleep, maybe he tried to move the wheel and it got stuck. Maybe the car slipped on a patch and had nothing to do with autopilot. We don't know yet. It takes time to review witnesses, multiple sources of information and that's the NTSB's job. Tesla seems to think they know exactly what happened after only reviewing data collected from the car. They see what they want to see and have become blind to any other possibility. I think that's terrifying. I couldn't trust an automaker with that kind of arrogance.

Waterluvian 8y ago

Hands on the wheel is also like not going above the speed limit. Yes, 10 and 2. But in reality we all bend those rules a bit.

_s 8y ago
A lot, if not most advanced driver trainings recommend 9/3.

deleted 8y ago

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jsight 8y ago

Are you implying that it is likely that his hands were ON the wheel when he drove into the barrier? I don't see why he would have driven into the wall if that were the case.

cynix 8y ago

> It is extremely common for my car to warn me to keep my hands on the when WHILE I have my hands on the wheel. Even shaking it a little will sometimes not cancel out the warnings. This is not what I experience. Maybe the sensor in your steering wheel is faulty? For me, the warning goes away as soon as I lightly jiggle the steering wheel (I stop as soon as I encounter any resistance).

beenBoutIT 8y ago

Tesla blaming the driver for not using their steering wheel correctly is effectively admitting the obvious, that their car is badly designed. If the car needs to be used a certain way to be fully functional and they can't work that into the design in a way that compels the user to use it correctly, they have failed. The reason conventional wheels are an example of great design is that the user is forced to use them. Their no-knob, no-button interior was, until now the more obvious design fail. Some people see Tesla's badly-designed completely flat all-digital interface as the 'future of the automobile', while in reality what they're looking at is DeLorean 2.0.