Autopilot goof. Good thing I was paying attention :)

[toastyToast]

Model 3 ap is awfully biased towards being in center of a lane. It works for normal lanes but in cases where lines are not standard, it sucks. I see my m3 struggle at exits and merges of Seattle I-5 express lanes where the lines are not clear like other exits as express lanes switch direction based on time of the day.

 

[SunCharged]

By the way, it is actually "normal" that AP failed in that scenario because AP was designed to simply follow lane lines. So if the lanes disappear, AP will fail every time. Again, AP was never designed to be full self-driving, it was always designed just to follow lane lines.

Autopilot will work without lane lines. Right now you just have to start autopilot in a section of road that does have lines. Once those lines disappear autopilot will stay on the correct side of the road within what you’d perceive to be the lane.

With all of the ongoing construction in MI it’s been fairly easy to find new pavement that hasn’t been painted yet!

 

[diplomat33]

Autopilot will work without lane lines. Right now you just have to start autopilot in a section of road that does have lines. Once those lines disappear autopilot will stay on the correct side of the road within what you’d perceive to be the lane.

With all of the ongoing construction in MI it’s been fairly easy to find new pavement that hasn’t been painted yet!

Yes, but the problem mentioned in the OP is a known problem. If the middle line temporarily disappear, it can sometimes get confused and will try to center itself in the adjacent lane since it sees those lane lines as well. AP has no awareness yet of what is your lane and what is the lane for incoming traffic, it just sees lanes and will try to center itself in that lane even if it is the wrong lane.

 

[Knightshade]

I'm going to have to disagree with your assessment. There are a lot of features built into autopilot today that aren't designed for Interstates. I also don't believe that Tesla even expects people not to use it on surface streets, I suspect that they want people to use it there.

Interstates don't have stop lights. Why did they add the ability to detect stop lights?

FWIW, they DO have stoplights at least on on-ramps in some places to control traffic flow- so that's something EAP at least would need to handle eventually.

 

[daniel]

I have experienced a time or two when the car got into the wrong lane due to poor lane markings. I've also experienced times when the center line disappeared and the car stayed where it belonged, guided by a single line on the outside. Overall I'm 100% satisfied with EAP operation. Of course I'd prefer Level 4 or 5 autonomy, but this car does what it claims to do extremely well: when there are discernible lane lines, it holds the lane, and with the exception of rare phantom braking it manages its speed extremely well.

I agree with the OP's main point: As great as the system is, it has a very ling way to go before it will be ready for TRUE FSD. I am eager to see whether HW3 makes a big improvement in performance, or merely opens up a new feature or two while remaining at Level 2 autonomy (hands on the wheel, eyes on the road). I'll pay the $5,000 if HW3 brings it to Level 3 (eyes off the road) but I think we're years away from that still.

What this car does right now, IMO, makes it the best car you can buy today.

 

[lolder]

AP, EAP and HW 2.XX will be able to handle this in the future. There is no difference between AP, EAP and FSD except level of maturity. These are not separate programs. Musk has said that HW 2.5 can handle FSD but it's a more difficult programming job.

 

[nvx1977]

I've done a lot of "unsupported feature" testing of AP as well around my area. I have a few roads that transition from lane-marked to no lane-marked. For a while now, AP can do some VERY BASIC pathing on unmarked roads. However if the roads are windy or hilly, it quickly fails and often starts driving in the middle or the wrong side of the road. It will also complain loudly that it's confused (red hands on screen). This hasn't changed in the year I've owned the car, and I don't expect to see much more improvement to AP in this regard.

I think we need to be careful making assumptions that FSD is just the result of an evolution of today's AP. In other words, we can't assume that if AP struggles with poor or absent lane markings that FSD will also struggle. It's clear that the software (AI) for AP and FSD has diverged, given Musk stating that the software running on HW 2.x is not optimized for HW3. Implicit in that comment is that the software (in development) that's running on HW3 is likely tacking specific issues like the one in the OP's video because the new HW is actually capable of that level of processing.

 

[Knightshade]

AP, EAP and HW 2.XX will be able to handle this in the future. There is no difference between AP, EAP and FSD except level of maturity. These are not separate programs. Musk has said that HW 2.5 can handle FSD but it's a more difficult programming job.

that's not correct at all.

On the investor call the head developed explicitly mentioned that HW3 allowed running much larger, more advanced neural nets than 2.x was capable of.

That's explicitly seperate programs.

If they could've actually done FSD on HW2.5 they wouldn't have bothered spending years and a ton of $ developing HW3.

 

[Jim R]

Halfway around the turn, there is a "line". Not a painted line, but a pavement line going to the left. This may have influenced the software.

 

[lolder]

that's not correct at all.

On the investor call the head developed explicitly mentioned that HW3 allowed running much larger, more advanced neural nets than 2.x was capable of.

That's explicitly seperate programs.

If they could've actually done FSD on HW2.5 they wouldn't have bothered spending years and a ton of $ developing HW3.

There are different programs for hardware 2.5 and 3 but Musk specifically said FSD was possible on 2.5 but some video cropping was necessary and the software was more difficult. I expect a near FSD will be released on 2.5 to spread the cost and time of retrofitting the 2.5 over time . Redundancy will probably be the problem with FSD on 2.5 so driver attention will still be required (nags).

 

[Knightshade]

There are different programs for hardware 2.5 and 3 but Musk specifically said FSD was possible on 2.5 but some video cropping was necessary and the software was more difficult.

Which is why it is never happening and they bothered to create HW3

Otherwise why would they develop an entirely new HW platform, which you admit requires entirely new sets of programs, instead of just putting all that effort into the 2.5 version Musk thinks is "possible"?

and since they did develop HW3 and the software for it- why would they bother ALSO doing the much harder job of trying to make it work on 2.5?


Musk has said- repeatedly, FSD will require HW3.... So much so the name of HW3 has officially changed to Tesla FSD computer. As in the computer that you need for FSD.

His speculating on what might be "possible" for it to work on 2.5 notwithstanding.

T
I expect a near FSD will be released on 2.5 to spread the cost and time of retrofitting the 2.5 over time . Redundancy will probably be the problem with FSD on 2.5 so driver attention will still be required (nags).

Literally none of that makes any sense.

For one- 2.5 and 3 have exactly the same sensors and wiring. They didn't add any redundancy there. The computer has redundancy, but so does 2.5 (it's one of the changes they made between 2 and 2.5)

For another-There's no such thing as "near FSD"- there's 3 levels of features depending what you bought, and when....

AP- the new lower level offering that only does autosteer and TACC within a single lane. HW2.x easily handles this, it's "done" So folks on HW2.5 don't need to do anything and they've already got all they're getting.

EAP- the old lower level offering that did AP, plus summon, autopark, Nav on AP on highways, and auto lane change. Once advanced summon is released (it's already late) that, too, is done. Entirely feature complete on 2.5, and again that's all their getting.


FSD- this is the higher level option regardless of if you were old or new on the lower one- though all the stuff in EAP but NOT in regular AP has been moved here if AP buyers want those things... so they can have em on HW2.5... but the additional features also listed in the package (and promised to the old EAP owners who also bought FSD) requires HW3


Cost of the free computer swap for FSD buyers is going to be pretty tiny. 30 minutes of time and the actual computer costs the same as the 2.5 one did.

More importantly they can finally recognize the thousands per person revenue they collected years ago from old FSD buyers who have thusfar received literally nothing for their purchase. That's a thing they'd rather do SOONER not later

 

[Kilotango74]

It is (the car, not the city)!

I'm sure that's why, yes. That's why I was trying it there. Chappie (my 2015 Model S) also had problems on that exact corner, so I was trying to see if it got any better at handling things like that. The outcome was far worse, but it tried harder. Chappie would just start beeping and braking and swerving and generally freaking out lol. Which is better? I guess it depends on what's coming the other way

Agreed. This is the kind of thing I like testing to see how it handles it.


I do admit, I'm not one for following arbitrary manufacturer rules. If you like to do what a manual tells you to the letter... I don't judge you.

You'll note that I never said it didn't behave contrary to what the manual said. I was pointing out a situation that Tesla is going to have a real hard time overcoming in their quest for Full Self Driving. It *needs* to handle situations like this, unless we've all been duped by this hope for an automated future and it actually depends on the city's ability/willingness to upkeep to an impossible standard (in which case every car is on basically equal footing because the AI part of it will be moot).

To be clear, I'm not knocking where they're at. It is AMAZING how well this system works. Yes, even in situations that you explicitly aren't supposed to be using it

Yeah so its not, as you put it, an "arbitrary manufacturer rule". Arbitrary, by definition would mean that there is no discernable reason for that rule, or the manufacture just wrote it in the manual for the hell of it. They put it in the manual because the system is not designed to operate off the highway. Whatever you chose to do is of course your own decision. But its not arbitrary. It was pretty clear why it happened, the center marking was non existent in the middle of the road so it's no wonder your other car has had problems there too. Your lucky there wasn't another vehicle in that lane on the other side of the curve. Then we would have had another "Autopilot crashed my car....." post.

 

[Kilotango74]

I'm going to have to disagree with your assessment. There are a lot of features built into autopilot today that aren't designed for Interstates. I also don't believe that Tesla even expects people not to use it on surface streets, I suspect that they want people to use it there.

Interstates don't have stop lights. Why did they add the ability to detect stop lights?

Have they done that yet? I thought the stop light feature had yet to roll out. Isn't that also a FSD feature not an autopilot feature?

 

[Kilotango74]

Yes, but the problem mentioned in the OP is a known problem. If the middle line temporarily disappear, it can sometimes get confused and will try to center itself in the adjacent lane since it sees those lane lines as well. AP has no awareness yet of what is your lane and what is the lane for incoming traffic, it just sees lanes and will try to center itself in that lane even if it is the wrong lane.

I agree with your assessment and also think that a contributing factor is the addition of the curve right where the line disappears. The car defiantly attempts to center itself where it thinks the middle would be, but because of the curve that middle ends up being in the opposite lane.

 

[cybergates]

Cities and counties need to start standardizing lane markings or in this case the absence of as well.

EDIT: I always felt AP1 cars handle this type of unexpected loss of lane markings better with much more grace before wildly thrashing to the center of the road (or trying to drive off the road into shoulder in a case where I have locally where the roads lines disappear.

(but I only drove one once as a loaner) - would AP1 ppl say this is true?

 

[Kilotango74]

Cities and counties need to start standardizing lane markings or in this case the absence of as well.

EDIT: I always felt AP1 cars handle this type of unexpected loss of lane markings better with much more grace before wildly thrashing to the center of the road

(but I only drove one once as a loaner) - would AP1 ppl say this is true?

I agree and tend to think that's why Tesla says its for highway use only, there are to many differences in lane markings off highway around the country, not to mention I believe the OP is in Canada. The issue is we can't get proper funding for basic infrastructure (ie bridges and road conditions) let alone to standardize road markings.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I wonder what, specifically, HW3/FSD will do to get smart about this problem? I understand that it has >10x the processing power as HW2.5. But does the algorithm/NN to avoid this sort of issue really take 10x the power? If Tesla could deal with it now, wouldn't they just do it (for safety)? Or is it really hardware limited?

Maybe they're just going to operate with an entirely new set of rules in the FSD hardware? (Like instead of a single solid yellow line being treated exactly as a regular single white line, they're going to treat it like a...yellow line?) I understand AP in this case was being used outside of the ODD, but still, would have thought it wouldn't have taken 10x the processing power to remember that there was a yellow line in the middle of the road a couple seconds prior, and that just because it disappeared doesn't mean all lanes are immediately available...

Hard for me to understand. I definitely understand that in many city situations a lot more compute power is required to really keep track of everything and that's where the FSD computer will be mandatory...but this did not seem like a complex case, though clearly outside the ODD.

I guess we'll see. The world changes on Monday.

 

[Kilotango74]

I wonder what, specifically, HW3/FSD will do to get smart about this problem? I understand that it has >10x the processing power as HW2.5. But does the algorithm/NN to avoid this sort of issue really take 10x the power? If Tesla could deal with it now, wouldn't they just do it (for safety)? Or is it really hardware limited?

Maybe they're just going to operate with an entirely new set of rules in the FSD hardware? (Like instead of a single solid yellow line being treated exactly as a regular single white line, they're going to treat it like a...yellow line?) I understand AP in this case was being used outside of the ODD, but still, would have thought it wouldn't have taken 10x the processing power to remember that there was a yellow line in the middle of the road a couple seconds prior, and that just because it disappeared doesn't mean all lanes are immediately available...

Hard for me to understand. I definitely understand that in many city situations a lot more compute power is required to really keep track of everything and that's where the FSD computer will be mandatory...but this did not seem like a complex case, though clearly outside the ODD.

I guess we'll see. The world changes on Monday.

Speaking of which, is there any possibility of watching that live....

 

[Matias]

I wonder what, specifically, HW3/FSD will do to get smart about this problem? I understand that it has >10x the processing power as HW2.5. But does the algorithm/NN to avoid this sort of issue really take 10x the power? If Tesla could deal with it now, wouldn't they just do it (for safety)? Or is it really hardware limited?

Maybe they're just going to operate with an entirely new set of rules in the FSD hardware? (Like instead of a single solid yellow line being treated exactly as a regular single white line, they're going to treat it like a...yellow line?) I understand AP in this case was being used outside of the ODD, but still, would have thought it wouldn't have taken 10x the processing power to remember that there was a yellow line in the middle of the road a couple seconds prior, and that just because it disappeared doesn't mean all lanes are immediately available...

Hard for me to understand. I definitely understand that in many city situations a lot more compute power is required to really keep track of everything and that's where the FSD computer will be mandatory...but this did not seem like a complex case, though clearly outside the ODD.

I guess we'll see. The world changes on Monday.

AP only needs to know that this is a two way street, so you don’t drive in the middle or on the left side of it. AP seems to have zero situational awareness.

 

[Kilotango74]

AP only needs to know that this is a two way street, so you don’t drive in the middle of it.

Except that when the middle line disappears around a corner it suddenly looks like a single lane...