A (sarcastic) thanks to autopilot

[kirkbauer]

I'm driving in traffic with prevailing speeds of 85-90mph. I have AP1 enabled at 85mph.
My hands are on the wheel and my eyes are on the road. Somebody almost changes lanes into me and I accelerate to avoid an accident.

Oops, I hit 90mph. Now with my eyes on the road and trying to avoid an accident, my exact numerical speed isn't high on my priority list

So now I'm in the AP penalty box, with 150 miles left on this leg of my journey. So I pull into the shoulder and put my car in park. Then I go back into drive and get back up to 85mph to get back into traffic. Still in the penalty box.

So I pull onto the shoulder a second time, put the car in park, and get out. I'm thinking about how AP has enhanced my safety as I'm standing in the shoulder of an interstate and traffic is wizzing by at 85+mph. Oh and I get to merge into this from a standstill in a moment.

Of course for most of the trip, other than this, AP is great. Other than the constant, constant nags. My hands are on the wheel and my eyes are on the road. But since my hands are balanced the car can't tell. And since my eyes are on the road I can't see the visual indicator most of the time. It was easier when the whole display border flashed but I guess that worked too well so now we just get the top which is largely obscured by the steering wheel.

No problem I'll just continue to hold the wheel in an unnatural way and /or watch my display for nags instead of watching the road.

Of course I'm glad the car is making sure I'm being a responsible driver. Oh wait, it isn't. Turns out you can hold the steering wheel and pay zero attention to the road. Like one of the recent people who was asleep.

I have to assume Elon has nags disabled on his car otherwise he would never stand for such stupid constraints.

Yes I'm bitter. I understand that my 4yo Tesla won't continue to get better each year like it used to, but AP gets worse each year and that's not ok. Latest development: frequently going into hold mode in stop and go traffic. That's new. At least give an audible alert that this happened so I don't look like an idiot when my car just sits there on the road.

I love Musk and Tesla but come on can we get some common sense here??

 

[richrootes]

Autopilot was hobbled because of people who have no common sense

 

[Ande]

Autopilot was hobbled because of people who have no common sense

By this logic we should prohibit sales of chainsaws, hammers and lots of other good tools; if idiots can abuse them is reason enough.

 

[thecloud]

I'm driving in traffic with prevailing speeds of 85-90mph. I have AP1 enabled at 85mph.
...
I love Musk and Tesla but come on can we get some common sense here??

Speaking of common sense, you just admitted to violating the maximum highway speed limit in your home state by 15 mph. Hopefully you were driving in Texas, which does have posted 85 mph limits on some highways.

 

[IanMcL]

Should not drive so fast.

 

[richrootes]

By this logic we should prohibit sales of chainsaws, hammers and lots of other good tools; if idiots can abuse them is reason enough.

The individuals sitting in the back seat with a bag of spuds in the driver’s seat, attaching weights to their steering wheel or watching movies whilst driving are (were on one case) a special kind of stupid

Original autopilot should be made available after signing a hefty waiver

 

[ewoodrick]

I'm driving in traffic with prevailing speeds of 85-90mph. I have AP1 enabled at 85mph.
My hands are on the wheel and my eyes are on the road. Somebody almost changes lanes into me and I accelerate to avoid an accident.



I love Musk and Tesla but come on can we get some common sense here??

Since I've lived in Atlanta for many years, I happen to know that the prevailing speeds are never that fast. Generally, up to about 80, and while there may be a stream of cars going faster, it's not the "prevailing" speeds.
There's nothing about autopilot jail that requires you to pull off the side of the road. NEVER. You do it if YOU want to, but it is much safer to just wait until the next exit to be safe. If you feel unsafe pulling off the side of the road, then it "only makes common sense" to go to the next exit.

By the way, at 85, you now have an opportunity to become a member of the Georgia "Super Speeder" club.

By the way, there are many cars on the road that have the same type of "nag" feature that Tesla has.

 

[Electroman]

I agree with you on the incessant stupid nags that are actually counter productive. Plain STUPID. I would suggest that they have nags at the earlier reduced rate for upto 5 mph over posted speed limit, and increase nag frequency as you increase speed beyond that.

As for the AP jail for speeding above 90. You deserve it. And no one is recommending that you pull over unsafely to the shoulder.

 

[kirkbauer]

North Georgia has speed limits of 70 or 75 on the open interstates. People regularly go 10-15 over due to the fact you don't get points until you hit 15 over. At 85mph I was being passed by many and passing nobody.

It's a moot point though. In Texas speed limits are as high as 85mph. In an electric car with ludicrous mode intending to travel at 85mph which is safe and reasonable in some situations, it's not hard to hit 90 when making a manual maneuver.

Assuming that 90mph instantly makes a person a bad or unsafe driver is ignorant. In my case I was driving the car, but in an emergency situation that doesn't require steering, turning off AP before taking action is an unnecessary distraction and delay.

Fact is I was traveling at a safe speed based on other traffic and I avoided an accident. I don't need my car judging me and putting me in a penalty box. That's not what I paid for when I bought AP.

 

[Az_Rael]

So I pull onto the shoulder a second time, put the car in park, and get out. I'm thinking about how AP has enhanced my safety as I'm standing in the shoulder of an interstate and traffic is wizzing by at 85+mph. Oh and I get to merge into this from a standstill in a moment.

Are there not freeway exits to safely pull off in your land? Guess you really have to time the bio breaks well with 150 miles of unbroken freeway and no way off.

 

[Electroman]

Assuming that 90mph instantly makes a person a bad or unsafe driver is ignorant

I know you are a superman driver, BUT Autopilot simply cannot handle such high speeds. There is only so many frames it can take a second and make decisions, and as you increase speed, you travel larger distances in the few milli-seconds it takes from data feed to decision making, and thus decreasing accuracy, especially on undulations and curves.

So it is not you, it is the AP that is limited in its capability and you are not respecting that. Hence the jail.

 

[kirkbauer]

I know you are a superman driver, BUT Autopilot simply cannot handle such high speeds. There is only so many frames it can take a second and make decisions, and as you increase speed, you travel larger distances in the few milli-seconds it takes from data feed to decision making, and thus decreasing accuracy, especially on undulations and curves.

So it is not you, it is the AP that is limited in its capability and you are not respecting that. Hence the jail.

Agreed, except for the jail part. I don't expect AP to work at that speed, nor was I asking it to. It happened to be on, I had to take over, and the taking over involved barely hitting 90mph. Pop up take over immediately and turn off AP. I understand jail for ignoring warnings but immediately putting you in jail for this is annoying.

Of course if the car could actually detect that my attention was on the road and /or accurately detect my hands on the wheel without torque, then it would know I was in control.

Basically jail in this case is a poor solution to the fact that the car has no idea on your level of awareness.

 

[rooter]

The nags are intrusive and ridiculous. Those in this thread who seem to love them, deserve to have them. But those who can't root their cars should have an Off switch for nags if they so choose.

Of course Tesla is in a delicate position now, trying to get full self-driving approved. So this is why the incessant, infuriating nags. It is so bad I was forced to learn how to root my car myself, and stop this.

 

[kirkbauer]

Yes, I understand why they have to be careful. I'd just rather see a better system. Instead of making the AP that I paid for more and more annoying each year, offer a inside camera that can watch the driver instead. Then you can lose the nags, or minimize them. And then if there is an accident, instead of talking about whether my hands are on the wheel or not, Tesla has a video of what I was doing when the accident happened. Obviously some won't like that either, but it could be made a choice.

 

[Kutu]

If you disengage AP before driving over 90 mph, would AP not put you in "time-out"?

 

[Saghost]

If you disengage AP before driving over 90 mph, would AP not put you in "time-out"?

Correct.

The car freaks out if you ask it to continue steering while pressing the accelerator to force it past 90 mph.

If you break AP first with either the lever or the wheel, it won't have any issues restarting after you've slowed down again.

 

[kirkbauer]

If you disengage AP before driving over 90 mph, would AP not put you in "time-out"?

Yup, that's the ideal way to do it, which is certainly what I would do in a non-emergency situation in which I wanted to go over 90mph. But for me personally that doesn't come up.

 

[Electroman]

Emergency situations calls for nonstandard actions. So, take an exit, stop, put it in Park, and get back into highway again.

 

[Achilles]

Idk...Calling people who disable the nags idiots but then complaining about the nag frequency just doesn't make sense to me. So if they made it every 5 minutes or so it would be ok and idiot-proof? I pay attention to the road like I would have to do in any other car. Nagging me does not change that or enhance that. I get that some people have abused it, but...I guess you either trust yourself or you don't!

 

[kirkbauer]

Emergency situations calls for nonstandard actions. So, take an exit, stop, put it in Park, and get back into highway again.

FYI, that did not seem to work for me. On my second attempt I exited the vehicle. Some combination of taking off my seatbelt and/or getting out of the car is what seems to have worked.

I agree with your statement, however the AutoPilot that was advertised to me and I paid for did not penalize drivers for avoiding accidents.

I guess the crux of the argument is this: Elon would never stand for this on his car. But we are forced to.