We purchased EAP and are on the free trial of FSD Beta until January. We're on 2023.27.7, and the loaner I picked up today while our car is in for minor warranty service is a USS-equipped Model 3 running 2023.32.9.
In our car on the way to the Tesla SC roughly 33 miles from our house I tried FSD for the first time today. Doing so mostly confirmed for me that our decision to go with EAP vs. FSD was probably a good one. It also confirmed for me that as FSD stands today, my spouse will never use it, and that when she or anyone else are in the car with me I'll never use it anywhere except on controlled access highways.
By and large, FSD and EAP do a fine job on limited access highways where EAP is willing to do it's thing. One caveat: in my trial of FSD today, just as with EAP, it occasionally makes poor decisions in merge scenarios. One, with a large truck climbing the entrance ramp, was handled beautifully. The car smoothly moved over and made room, so nice. However, in a different circumstance where the car could not move over and another vehicle was entering via the onramp, it failed to make any allowances when it should have slowed slightly to allow the car to smoothly merge in front while next car could merge behind us. In one other highway scenario while driving through a construction zone, the car neither tried to move left nor slow down as it approached and drove by construction and police vehicles, all of which had lights flashing. In many states, the law says move over or slow down, but FSD did neither.
On local suburban streets, FSD generally made terrible decisions in the following scenarios, all in full daylight, with excellent weather conditions.
- Struggled a bit with our neighborhood’s only traffic circle. No cars in the circle. Stopped before entering, and then after entering failed to curve properly in a way that would keep it neatly in the traffic lane. On the way back, the loaner vehicle with a newer software version handled this empty traffic circle better, so that's nice.
- Couldn’t pick one of two left turn lanes from one street to another when approaching a light. Both streets are divided, and as the car approaches the light, two left turn lanes are added on the left side. The car pulled toward the two left lanes and then randomly swerved back and forth between the lanes, never really committing to either one. So, I seized control and picked one. Fortunately, no cars behind me to get confused or report our car to the cops for such bad driving. White lines were fresh and clear - these are new streets, and for now the painted lines are quite visible. Weather conditions were perfect.
- As we approached a 3-way intersection controlled by a light in the loaner car, it properly pulled into the left turn lane and prepared to make the left turn, but then right at the end, it suddenly did an early and dramatic left yank on the wheel for the turn, which could have put us into oncoming traffic or head-on into cars waiting patiently at the light so they could get their turn to enter the road we were on.
- As we approached an unprotected right turn, the loaner car "California stopped" and tried to pull into oncoming traffic when it should have come to a full and complete stop, and waited for traffic to clear before turning right.
- As we approached an unprotected left turn from an added left turn lane from a 2-lane road onto a divided street with four lanes and a median, the car suddenly pulled hard left and tried to drive right into the lane of cars closest to the median at the stop sign instead of staying to the right of the median. Very very not cool, and pretty darn scary.
So, yeah, technically, FSD tried to crash the car at least 2-3 times on this drive to and from the SC. And no, we'll not pay for FSD any time soon, as EAP mostly performs acceptably on roads where it's available for use and for now FSD seems to be quite a risk on local streets and roads.
