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This is feels like a hit piece masking under the safety umbrella. Toyota had a similar issue in 2008 and recalled millions. I assume Cybertruck has less than a

by 1970-01-01 3y ago

This is feels like a hit piece masking under the safety umbrella. Toyota had a similar issue in 2008 and recalled millions. I assume Cybertruck has less than a thousand on the road. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2009/09/toyota_recalls_38_million_cars.html https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2009/09/toyota_recal...

condiment 3y ago
Toyota’s unintended acceleration was a yearslong scandal during which many accidents involving Toyotas became national news. Manufacturers don’t get a bye from safety just because they haven’t sold many units yet.
mattgreenrocks 3y ago
Given that, it makes this incident worse: they didn’t heed the lesson of the past.
smt88 3y ago
What's wrong with it being a hit piece? Are we supposed to stop caring about acceleration problems because Toyota had one? Should journalists have decided not to write about this at all?
- 1970-01-01 3y ago
  It doesn't belong on HN!! Note the article and the HN headline are not the same!
  - yareal 3y ago
    If it's of intellectual interest, it belongs here. A tech company failing to deliver for some reason is of interest. Tesla stopping deliveries is as interesting as cloudflare dropping traffic or aws down time.
    - 1970-01-01 3y ago
      The title was just changed, so now it can stay. The submitted title with many upvotes was "Tesla Cybertruck Production Halted Due to Unintended Acceleration Editorializing a title is frowned upon for a good reason! https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      - yareal 3y ago
        You said the article doesn't belong on HN, I'd say it clearly does. The title has been fixed.
      - smt88 3y ago
        The "editorialized" title was factual, unemotional, and more specific than the article's title. It's fine to say it violated guidelines, but it didn't transform this post into a hit piece. Other publications used an almost-identical title: https://jalopnik.com/tesla-cybertruck-hit-with-stop-sale-because-of-unintend-1851409651 https://jalopnik.com/tesla-cybertruck-hit-with-stop-sale-bec...
NovemberWhiskey 3y ago
The Toyota story is fascinating: somehow, despite floor mats for cars existing for many, many years without special locking mechanisms, we are supposed to believe that Toyota vehicles represented a unique risk, or that their drive/brake-by-wire software was much buggier than the rest of the industry. The fact of the matter is that no-one has ever been able to demonstrate an actual software/hardware failure that would cause unintended acceleration (of the kind that would not stop if you pushed the brake pedal to the floor); nor show that Toyota floor mats were particularly likely to jam the pedals. This was (almost to a moral certainty) a media-induced hysteria, with most cases being traceable to the usual cause of unintended acceleration - foot on the wrong pedal. ref https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3153815/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3153815/ For those who are unaware: all reasonably modern brake/throttle-by-wire cars have software that will disable fueling when the brake pedal is being pressed (that's why you need a special line-lock mode to spin the rears in your Mustang). Also, unless you're driving some kind of monstrously powerful performance special, your brakes can overpower your engine.
- kayodelycaon 3y ago
  For anyone trying to test the brake + accelerator safety system in a Toyota, there are no mechanical components. It's entirely in software and only engages when specific conditions are met. (Sufficient speeds sufficient pressure on the brake, accelerator pressed before brake, etc.) Please do not test safety systems, especially in a Toyota. They only work in specific conditions and usually too late for you to react if it doesn't trigger.
- perlgeek 3y ago
  > Also, unless you're driving some kind of monstrously powerful performance special, your brakes can overpower your engine. I've seen a few combinations of engine power and breaking power of car, and if I remember correctly, the breaking power was around 5x to 10x that of the engine. It kinda makes sense, if you accelerate to 100km in 6s, you certainly don't want the breaking process to take the same time, but significantly less. 0.6s to 1.2s sound more reasonable to me. If anybody has good data that compares these two powers in common vehicles, I'd like to see it, a quick search didn't find much useful.
phailhaus 3y ago
I don't think that reporting news is a hit-piece. Tesla has halted Cybertruck production due to this issue, that's just a fact. Any reason to stop production is newsworthy.
- 1970-01-01 3y ago
  We are told that there is a safety and unintended acceleration problem. Nothing like that has been confirmed from Tesla.
  - ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
    Unfortunately, a notorious history of dishonesty has left Musk and his companies with little credibility or believability. We can not rely upon Tesla to report bad news about themselves in a timely or reliable manner. If Tesla "confirmed" anything, we could likely conclude that the opposite is true. A recent relevant example can be found at [1]. 1 – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39944890 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39944890
    - mavhc 3y ago
      Companies are never allowed to change their minds?
      - ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
        Why do you say that?
Covzire 3y ago
"the stainless steel is already rusting" hoax was very recent as well.

condiment 3y ago

Toyota’s unintended acceleration was a yearslong scandal during which many accidents involving Toyotas became national news. Manufacturers don’t get a bye from safety just because they haven’t sold many units yet.

mattgreenrocks 3y ago

Given that, it makes this incident worse: they didn’t heed the lesson of the past.

smt88 3y ago

What's wrong with it being a hit piece? Are we supposed to stop caring about acceleration problems because Toyota had one? Should journalists have decided not to write about this at all?

1970-01-01 3y ago
It doesn't belong on HN!! Note the article and the HN headline are not the same!
- yareal 3y ago
  If it's of intellectual interest, it belongs here. A tech company failing to deliver for some reason is of interest. Tesla stopping deliveries is as interesting as cloudflare dropping traffic or aws down time.
  - 1970-01-01 3y ago
    The title was just changed, so now it can stay. The submitted title with many upvotes was "Tesla Cybertruck Production Halted Due to Unintended Acceleration Editorializing a title is frowned upon for a good reason! https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - yareal 3y ago
      You said the article doesn't belong on HN, I'd say it clearly does. The title has been fixed.
    - smt88 3y ago
      The "editorialized" title was factual, unemotional, and more specific than the article's title. It's fine to say it violated guidelines, but it didn't transform this post into a hit piece. Other publications used an almost-identical title: https://jalopnik.com/tesla-cybertruck-hit-with-stop-sale-because-of-unintend-1851409651 https://jalopnik.com/tesla-cybertruck-hit-with-stop-sale-bec...

NovemberWhiskey 3y ago

The Toyota story is fascinating: somehow, despite floor mats for cars existing for many, many years without special locking mechanisms, we are supposed to believe that Toyota vehicles represented a unique risk, or that their drive/brake-by-wire software was much buggier than the rest of the industry. The fact of the matter is that no-one has ever been able to demonstrate an actual software/hardware failure that would cause unintended acceleration (of the kind that would not stop if you pushed the brake pedal to the floor); nor show that Toyota floor mats were particularly likely to jam the pedals. This was (almost to a moral certainty) a media-induced hysteria, with most cases being traceable to the usual cause of unintended acceleration - foot on the wrong pedal. ref https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3153815/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3153815/ For those who are unaware: all reasonably modern brake/throttle-by-wire cars have software that will disable fueling when the brake pedal is being pressed (that's why you need a special line-lock mode to spin the rears in your Mustang). Also, unless you're driving some kind of monstrously powerful performance special, your brakes can overpower your engine.

kayodelycaon 3y ago
For anyone trying to test the brake + accelerator safety system in a Toyota, there are no mechanical components. It's entirely in software and only engages when specific conditions are met. (Sufficient speeds sufficient pressure on the brake, accelerator pressed before brake, etc.) Please do not test safety systems, especially in a Toyota. They only work in specific conditions and usually too late for you to react if it doesn't trigger.
perlgeek 3y ago
> Also, unless you're driving some kind of monstrously powerful performance special, your brakes can overpower your engine. I've seen a few combinations of engine power and breaking power of car, and if I remember correctly, the breaking power was around 5x to 10x that of the engine. It kinda makes sense, if you accelerate to 100km in 6s, you certainly don't want the breaking process to take the same time, but significantly less. 0.6s to 1.2s sound more reasonable to me. If anybody has good data that compares these two powers in common vehicles, I'd like to see it, a quick search didn't find much useful.

phailhaus 3y ago

I don't think that reporting news is a hit-piece. Tesla has halted Cybertruck production due to this issue, that's just a fact. Any reason to stop production is newsworthy.

1970-01-01 3y ago
We are told that there is a safety and unintended acceleration problem. Nothing like that has been confirmed from Tesla.
- ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
  Unfortunately, a notorious history of dishonesty has left Musk and his companies with little credibility or believability. We can not rely upon Tesla to report bad news about themselves in a timely or reliable manner. If Tesla "confirmed" anything, we could likely conclude that the opposite is true. A recent relevant example can be found at [1]. 1 – https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39944890 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39944890
  - mavhc 3y ago
    Companies are never allowed to change their minds?
    - ImPostingOnHN 3y ago
      Why do you say that?

Covzire 3y ago

"the stainless steel is already rusting" hoax was very recent as well.