FSD questions

[Diorex]

Have owned my Model Y for about 9 months. Have had FSD since delivery and have gotten a lot less use than I was expecting so far. I just never seem to be able to engage it for more than a few minutes at a time and frankly feel like I dont know what and how to operate it properly so I mostly dont. At this stage, I have mostly given up on it and when I do engage it I am left feeling scammed that I paid so much money for something that is just unusable.

Been to Tesla store and asked them for help a few times and got answers that left me feeling less confident than more in this feature. Its not like I want it to race up Pikes Peak in the fog, basic self drive on a mostly empty road would be a nice first step.

I see Youtube videos of people on the Beta and honestly think I must be on a back of the envelope rough draft version 0.001A. Huge difference in look and feel and functionality and frankly my comfort level of allowing the car to make any decisions...

Anyway had a 90 minute highway drive late last night and figured I would once again try to let the car drive on the mostly empty highway...

This went worse than I expected...

1. I am on a 3 lane highway with nothing in front or behind me for maybe 1000 yards, except for a semi truck in the right lane going much slower. Both time I was in the middle lane. I would typically move into the left lane or at least into the left half of the middle lane just to give myself some room as I pass... Twice last night I felt the car move towards the semi as I was passing - each time around the front of the trailer and the back of the cab. Both times I disengaged autopilot by breaking and changing lanes because I felt the car was being unsafe...

2. Totally open road - 2 lane interstate - nothing ahead or behind me. Cruising along at about 10 over the limit in the right lane and all of the sudden it signals to change lanes. I see no reason for it, but allow it to do so. Then almost immediately it signals to go back in to the right lane. Absent the signaling this looks like the actions of a drunk driver... Not exactly what you are looking for at midnight on a Saturday night... Happened twice.. The 3rd time I got the lane change signal was when I just disabled it entirely and drove myself home more than a little irritated about how much I paid for a product I cant use.

Looking for solutions rather than just a bitch session, I am thinking maybe I have some settings wrong, because this is not at all the behavior I would expect in either situation regardless of version of the software - no one ever wrote code for unnecessary lane changes or to see how close you can get to a semi at night.

Some questions that may have prevented the above situation...

Lane changes - can I prompt a lane change while in FSD? Currently I find I want to change lanes when the car does not, other than disengaging I dont know how to perform this action.

Same with saying no to a lane change - how do I say - no dont do that without disengaging...

To be fair, I love the adaptive cruise control and use it a lot more than I ever used cruise control in any other car. I also think FSD makes better decisions when there is a more traffic than less, because it did great as I left the city, the problems came when I got to emptier highways.

I want this to work, but every time I give it a try I end up disabling it pretty quickly because it takes more effort to let the car drive than to just drive myself. Last night I only ended up letting it drive for maybe 30 minutes before I took over permanently. At present, the car driving is more stressful than me just doing it myself which sort of defeats the purpose...

Appreciate any pointers to make this a more useful feature for me, because I am very close to just never using it again...

 

[EVRider-FL]

When Navigate on Autopilot wants to change lanes, you can tap the Lane Change message to cancel. You can also require confirmations for NoA lane changes, which will prevent it from changing lanes unless you confirm, except for taking exits.

 

[Supcom]

Lane changes - can I prompt a lane change while in FSD? Currently I find I want to change lanes when the car does not, other than disengaging I dont know how to perform this action.

Start by reading the user manual.

 

[phonetele226]

FSD Full Stress Driving

 

[Dan D.]

Have owned my Model Y for about 9 months. Have had FSD since delivery and have gotten a lot less use than I was expecting so far.
...
Appreciate any pointers to make this a more useful feature for me, because I am very close to just never using it again...

I realize this post is about FSD/NoA not FSD Beta but I have a personal rant to vent on anyway


There are two kinds of post that bug me about Tesla, not the OP, but Tesla:

1) "I paid $12k for FSD, and just got the car, why does my screen not look like the FSD Beta screens I've seen on YouTube. Do I have FSD Beta?"
2) "How do I use this XX feature, e.g. NoA, Smart Summon, FSD Beta etc? It's not working for me"


The first question is tough to grasp. Why do these buyers have the impression they'll actually get FSD Beta, who or what is failing to tell them the actual process and slim likelihood of actually getting FSD Beta?

The second questions keep coming up. My concern is why Tesla can't just do the extremely easy solution of making a set of clear video tutorials.

User manuals are no substitute for tutorials. Try learning to swim or ride a bike by reading a user manual. Why isn't there an tutorial area on their website of basic, intermediate, advanced instruction? It would be incredibly easy to do.

 

[Diorex]

It would 100% be possible for Tesla to have a worse manual. But that does not mean the current version is useful in any way. I almost never can find an answer quickly or clearly from it...

Youtube has by far been the best resource for Tesla "stupid questions I have never had to ask with another car" but I cant find an answer to this question anywhere.

Autopilot and Full Self-Driving Capability | Tesla Support

Autopilot is an advanced driver assistance system that enhances safety and convenience behind the wheel. When used properly, Autopilot reduces your overall workload as a driver. Learn more about Autopilot.

www.tesla.com

The manual mentions lane change settings and how to validate a lane change if you have chosen that setting.

Nowhere that I can find does it tell you how to initiate a lane change manually while in FSD.

So your answer is just as worthless as the manual... Although to be fair, your answer was much clearer and easily understood than the manual.

The end result is the same... I still dont have an answer to the question.

 

[Supcom]

The first question is tough to grasp. Why do these buyers have the impression they'll actually get FSD Beta, who or what is failing to tell them the actual process and slim likelihood of actually getting FSD Beta?

Because new buyers are easily confused by a wave of new capabilities, names and acronyms. There's TACC, AP, NOA, FSD, FSD beta, EAP and so on. Each of these has various capabilities and limitations. New buyers can be overwhelmed by the nuances that those following all this for months or years have learned. Not every Tesla owner geeks out over beta version numbers and subtle differences between ULTs. Many people just want to use their car.

 

[Twiglett]

Have owned my Model Y for about 9 months. Have had FSD since delivery and have gotten a lot less use than I was expecting so far. I just never seem to be able to engage it for more than a few minutes at a time and frankly feel like I dont know what and how to operate it properly so I mostly dont. At this stage, I have mostly given up on it and when I do engage it I am left feeling scammed that I paid so much money for something that is just unusable.

Been to Tesla store and asked them for help a few times and got answers that left me feeling less confident than more in this feature. Its not like I want it to race up Pikes Peak in the fog, basic self drive on a mostly empty road would be a nice first step.

I see Youtube videos of people on the Beta and honestly think I must be on a back of the envelope rough draft version 0.001A. Huge difference in look and feel and functionality and frankly my comfort level of allowing the car to make any decisions...

Anyway had a 90 minute highway drive late last night and figured I would once again try to let the car drive on the mostly empty highway...

This went worse than I expected...

1. I am on a 3 lane highway with nothing in front or behind me for maybe 1000 yards, except for a semi truck in the right lane going much slower. Both time I was in the middle lane. I would typically move into the left lane or at least into the left half of the middle lane just to give myself some room as I pass... Twice last night I felt the car move towards the semi as I was passing - each time around the front of the trailer and the back of the cab. Both times I disengaged autopilot by breaking and changing lanes because I felt the car was being unsafe...

2. Totally open road - 2 lane interstate - nothing ahead or behind me. Cruising along at about 10 over the limit in the right lane and all of the sudden it signals to change lanes. I see no reason for it, but allow it to do so. Then almost immediately it signals to go back in to the right lane. Absent the signaling this looks like the actions of a drunk driver... Not exactly what you are looking for at midnight on a Saturday night... Happened twice.. The 3rd time I got the lane change signal was when I just disabled it entirely and drove myself home more than a little irritated about how much I paid for a product I cant use.

Looking for solutions rather than just a bitch session, I am thinking maybe I have some settings wrong, because this is not at all the behavior I would expect in either situation regardless of version of the software - no one ever wrote code for unnecessary lane changes or to see how close you can get to a semi at night.

Some questions that may have prevented the above situation...

Lane changes - can I prompt a lane change while in FSD? Currently I find I want to change lanes when the car does not, other than disengaging I dont know how to perform this action.

Same with saying no to a lane change - how do I say - no dont do that without disengaging...

To be fair, I love the adaptive cruise control and use it a lot more than I ever used cruise control in any other car. I also think FSD makes better decisions when there is a more traffic than less, because it did great as I left the city, the problems came when I got to emptier highways.

I want this to work, but every time I give it a try I end up disabling it pretty quickly because it takes more effort to let the car drive than to just drive myself. Last night I only ended up letting it drive for maybe 30 minutes before I took over permanently. At present, the car driving is more stressful than me just doing it myself which sort of defeats the purpose...

Appreciate any pointers to make this a more useful feature for me, because I am very close to just never using it again...

Here are a few things that may help you.

• Main thing is to realize that you are never letting the car drive or make decisions for you. You're still in charge at all times.
• Autopilot/FSD/NoA (Navigate on Autopilot) are made up of discrete functions
  • TACC - Traffic Aware Cruise Control doesn't steer, but it maintains speed and distance
  • Autosteer - doesn't affect speed but keeps you in the lane
  • Braking will cancel all AP/FSD etc functions
  • Overriding steering will just cancel the Autosteer parts but leave the TACC type functions active.
• There are a bunch of in car options that control how each of the functions behave,
  • you can control initial set speed, lane change behavior etc etc - best read the manual for your car
    The manual can be accessed in the car
• At any point resisting the steering action of the car will cancel auto steer, braking will always cancel both.
• I've found that if you apply just a small amount of torque to the steering wheel you can feel what the car is doing. That can sometimes help with figuring out that its trying to do, then if you don't agree its really easy to stop it just by turning the wheel where you feel it should be.
• Personally I have auto lane change turned off, but I have it set to ask for confirmation which I often decline
  That way it's me who initiates the lane change by signalling, the car then executes the maneuver. Note that if you're overtaking the car will accelerate up to your set speed.
• Other options I have set are initial speed at 5% over, obviously easy to override but it works for my area.

Hope that helps some. Honestly some of it is just getting used to how the car behaves. It doesn't drive like human which can be disconcerting.

 

[Dewg]

Have owned my Model Y for about 9 months. Have had FSD since delivery and have gotten a lot less use than I was expecting so far. I just never seem to be able to engage it for more than a few minutes at a time and frankly feel like I dont know what and how to operate it properly so I mostly dont. At this stage, I have mostly given up on it and when I do engage it I am left feeling scammed that I paid so much money for something that is just unusable.

Been to Tesla store and asked them for help a few times and got answers that left me feeling less confident than more in this feature. Its not like I want it to race up Pikes Peak in the fog, basic self drive on a mostly empty road would be a nice first step.

I see Youtube videos of people on the Beta and honestly think I must be on a back of the envelope rough draft version 0.001A. Huge difference in look and feel and functionality and frankly my comfort level of allowing the car to make any decisions...

Anyway had a 90 minute highway drive late last night and figured I would once again try to let the car drive on the mostly empty highway...

This went worse than I expected...

1. I am on a 3 lane highway with nothing in front or behind me for maybe 1000 yards, except for a semi truck in the right lane going much slower. Both time I was in the middle lane. I would typically move into the left lane or at least into the left half of the middle lane just to give myself some room as I pass... Twice last night I felt the car move towards the semi as I was passing - each time around the front of the trailer and the back of the cab. Both times I disengaged autopilot by breaking and changing lanes because I felt the car was being unsafe...

2. Totally open road - 2 lane interstate - nothing ahead or behind me. Cruising along at about 10 over the limit in the right lane and all of the sudden it signals to change lanes. I see no reason for it, but allow it to do so. Then almost immediately it signals to go back in to the right lane. Absent the signaling this looks like the actions of a drunk driver... Not exactly what you are looking for at midnight on a Saturday night... Happened twice.. The 3rd time I got the lane change signal was when I just disabled it entirely and drove myself home more than a little irritated about how much I paid for a product I cant use.

Looking for solutions rather than just a bitch session, I am thinking maybe I have some settings wrong, because this is not at all the behavior I would expect in either situation regardless of version of the software - no one ever wrote code for unnecessary lane changes or to see how close you can get to a semi at night.

Some questions that may have prevented the above situation...

Lane changes - can I prompt a lane change while in FSD? Currently I find I want to change lanes when the car does not, other than disengaging I dont know how to perform this action.

Same with saying no to a lane change - how do I say - no dont do that without disengaging...

To be fair, I love the adaptive cruise control and use it a lot more than I ever used cruise control in any other car. I also think FSD makes better decisions when there is a more traffic than less, because it did great as I left the city, the problems came when I got to emptier highways.

I want this to work, but every time I give it a try I end up disabling it pretty quickly because it takes more effort to let the car drive than to just drive myself. Last night I only ended up letting it drive for maybe 30 minutes before I took over permanently. At present, the car driving is more stressful than me just doing it myself which sort of defeats the purpose...

Appreciate any pointers to make this a more useful feature for me, because I am very close to just never using it again...

1. The car should stay centered in the lane. When passing a semi, aerodynamic forces push your car towards the semi, however AP should adjust and keep you centered in the lane. If you find that your car is not centering, check the visualization on the screen. Does it show your car centered, even though you are physically not centered? In that case it could be a camera calibration problem. If the car is not centered in the visualizations as well, and is riding on the right side of the lane, then I would do the following: Press the voice button (right side button) and say "bug report". Then open a ticket with service and let the know what's happening and reference the bug report date/time so they can review telemetry. That will show them the car leaning in the lane and not staying centered.

2. There are two settings that control lane changes: In the navigation settings, "Exit Passing Lane", and in the Autopilot, Navigate on Autopilot settings, "Speed Based Lane Changes". Check those settings and adjust them to your liking. Otherwise, lane changes are typically for route, and usually it indicates at the bottom of the visualization screen why it's changing lanes. It may say "Changing Lane to continue route" or "Changing lanes to avoid cones", etc. You can also adjust the setting for Lane Change Confirmation. If you change this setting to require a confirmation, it won't change until you approve it.

You can also change lanes, even on FSD Beta by simply signaling. When you signal, AP/NoA will change lanes for you. Note that if you are on NoA and you change lanes away from a route requirement, the car may ignore you or may perform your change and then immediately change back. You'll see the notification about "Changing lanes to stay on route".

See my notes above about the setting for confirming lane changes. When the car is going to change lanes, there is a short blue notice at the top of the navigation route info. It will say "Press here to cancel the lane change" and you can press that to cancel. However, if you are on NoA and you cancel a lane change that is required for the route, it will simply pop up again, and again until you allow it.

If the system is in the process of changing a lane, meaning it's turned on the signal but hasn't yet started the move over, you can abort the lane change by using your turn signal half-down in the opposite direction.

I hope some of this helps. And asking for this thread not to turn into a bitch session is unfortunately beyond the capabilities of some of the members here.

 

[DarkForest]

Have owned my Model Y for about 9 months. Have had FSD since delivery and have gotten a lot less use than I was expecting so far. I just never seem to be able to engage it for more than a few minutes at a time and frankly feel like I dont know what and how to operate it properly so I mostly dont. At this stage, I have mostly given up on it and when I do engage it I am left feeling scammed that I paid so much money for something that is just unusable.

Been to Tesla store and asked them for help a few times and got answers that left me feeling less confident than more in this feature. Its not like I want it to race up Pikes Peak in the fog, basic self drive on a mostly empty road would be a nice first step.

I see Youtube videos of people on the Beta and honestly think I must be on a back of the envelope rough draft version 0.001A. Huge difference in look and feel and functionality and frankly my comfort level of allowing the car to make any decisions...

Anyway had a 90 minute highway drive late last night and figured I would once again try to let the car drive on the mostly empty highway...

This went worse than I expected...

1. I am on a 3 lane highway with nothing in front or behind me for maybe 1000 yards, except for a semi truck in the right lane going much slower. Both time I was in the middle lane. I would typically move into the left lane or at least into the left half of the middle lane just to give myself some room as I pass... Twice last night I felt the car move towards the semi as I was passing - each time around the front of the trailer and the back of the cab. Both times I disengaged autopilot by breaking and changing lanes because I felt the car was being unsafe...

2. Totally open road - 2 lane interstate - nothing ahead or behind me. Cruising along at about 10 over the limit in the right lane and all of the sudden it signals to change lanes. I see no reason for it, but allow it to do so. Then almost immediately it signals to go back in to the right lane. Absent the signaling this looks like the actions of a drunk driver... Not exactly what you are looking for at midnight on a Saturday night... Happened twice.. The 3rd time I got the lane change signal was when I just disabled it entirely and drove myself home more than a little irritated about how much I paid for a product I cant use.

Looking for solutions rather than just a bitch session, I am thinking maybe I have some settings wrong, because this is not at all the behavior I would expect in either situation regardless of version of the software - no one ever wrote code for unnecessary lane changes or to see how close you can get to a semi at night.

Some questions that may have prevented the above situation...

Lane changes - can I prompt a lane change while in FSD? Currently I find I want to change lanes when the car does not, other than disengaging I dont know how to perform this action.

Same with saying no to a lane change - how do I say - no dont do that without disengaging...

To be fair, I love the adaptive cruise control and use it a lot more than I ever used cruise control in any other car. I also think FSD makes better decisions when there is a more traffic than less, because it did great as I left the city, the problems came when I got to emptier highways.

I want this to work, but every time I give it a try I end up disabling it pretty quickly because it takes more effort to let the car drive than to just drive myself. Last night I only ended up letting it drive for maybe 30 minutes before I took over permanently. At present, the car driving is more stressful than me just doing it myself which sort of defeats the purpose...

Appreciate any pointers to make this a more useful feature for me, because I am very close to just never using it again...

I’m confused. Are you talking about Navigate on Autopilot or the Beta, and are you in the Beta? NoA typically doesn’t let you go more than 5 over the limit except for special circumstances.

I love the Beta and NoA, and in my experience, it’s just that much trouble to deal with (which I’ve learned to be okay with). Depending on the circumstances, it might require frequent interventions (using the turn signal stalk to initiate or cancel a lane change, speed changes with the right scroll wheel, and pressing the accelerator to get it to go or cancel a phantom braking event). If you can get used to being unfazed by it trying to kill you on occasion, then it can work great for you. Otherwise, it’ll be the biggest headache.

In other circumstances, it can require zero disengagements and few to no interventions. In my experience, this applies more often to well travelled areas that probably better match the training data. A lot of YouTubers drive through these kinds of areas despite claims suggesting they’re driving difficult routes. They might be difficult for humans, but if that’s what the beta has been trained on, it’ll do better there than in areas that don’t match the training data that well.

In the beta, you can initiate a lane change using the turn signal stalk. This is an intervention and not a disengagement, so the beta will continue driving. You can also cancel an intended lane change by pressing the turn signal stalk the opposite direction half-way.

Both NoA and the beta drive in the center of the lane (mostly…), and that takes a lot of getting used to. For weeks I felt like I was way too close to other cars. Now it doesn’t faze me anymore. Hopefully it’s something you can get used to.

The visualizations for an 18 wheeler are the worst right as you’re passing one, so that can’t be trusted. To see if it’s misbehaving, you’ll need to judge where you’re at in the lane both in reality and in the visualization.

If you’re hoping for a driver assist feature that lets you set it and forget it, I don’t think you’ll want to use NoA/the beta at all. Otherwise, it’ll require some getting used to it trying to kill you every now and then.

It also helps to anticipate when it’ll likely have trouble. For me, it has issues when something in the distance could confuse it. This happens a lot when I’m going over one hill and there’s another hill soon after (the two hill problem). Another issue is when a big vehicle is towing a smaller vehicle in the distance. That screws up its ability to judge how far away the vehicles are. It also happens if there’s a highway mirage in the distance. As you noted, it has way more issues when there isn’t a lead vehicle right in front of it to help it perceive its surroundings (or at least block the horizon).

 

[Dan D.]

Could there be a STICKY post for HOW TO DRIVE WITH FSD BETA?

Lots of new people have no idea really how to use it safely. People look to TMC for information. Maybe if there was an instruction page that would be helpful?

(I'm not volunteering to write one, but maybe someone could, or make a collection of useful posts/videos)

@ohmman

 

[Dewg]

Could there be a STICKY post for HOW TO DRIVE WITH FSD BETA?

Lots of new people have no idea really how to use it safely. People look to TMC for information. Maybe if there was an instruction page that would be helpful?

(I'm not volunteering to write one, but maybe someone could, or make a collection of useful posts/videos)

@ohmman

I love this idea - I was looking for tutorial videos on YT, and there are some, but the problem is that FSD Beta evolves pretty fast so the videos would need to be maintained and updated with new features/interface, etc.