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Neural Net Rain Drop Sensor??

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So,

Is anyone else still having some troubles with their rain sensor? Mine will not turn on or be delayed for small / medium rain and sometimes when its not even raining I cant get it to turn off without manual settings.

I just dont get why we need Neural Net learning machines as some previous cars basic sensors worked better :D
 
So,

Is anyone else still having some troubles with their rain sensor? Mine will not turn on or be delayed for small / medium rain and sometimes when its not even raining I cant get it to turn off without manual settings.

I just dont get why we need Neural Net learning machines as some previous cars basic sensors worked better :D
They were even worse half a year ago

I use the manual settings, I just wish it was a way to switch between them without taking my eyes off the road. Like a stalk
 
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I just dont get why we need Neural Net learning machines as some previous cars basic sensors worked better :D

The camera is already installed on the car, so it is the "other rain sensors" whose existence must be justified.

Elon makes a good argument that a human had 2 eyes, so what they can do a camera can do, but their software is not there yet.

Also, it is easy to tell why their software is confused - heavy rain and light rain look very similar. Sometimes the rain is very light, but it causes discomfort to the eyes and needs a higher setting.


So,

Is anyone else still having some troubles with their rain sensor?

Of course. It never worked perfectly, but it has been improving.
 
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Reactions: SlimJim
My wipers sometimes will take a couple of swipes as I'm backing out of the garage. I don't know if it's the LED bulbs in the garage door opener that's fooling it to think it's rain drops on the windshield or what. Once the car is out, the wipers stop.
 
I turned off auto wipers on my Model 3 a couple of years ago. Every once in a while it is enabled again (by system updates, possibly) but as soon as it starts to rain (or I see a phantom swipe) I have to shut it off again. Much like the auto-tilt mirrors (which fail to right themselves when shifting out of reverse about 5% of the time on both of my Model 3s), the feature just seems broken.
 
Surely a $100 or less Im sure light sensor would be a far cheaper option to integrate than a Neural Net which needs constant attention from developers and to link with software updates etc

Nope.

In the long term you save $100 on every car you ever build going forward from the change.

Even at 100k cars (pre-model 3) that's 10 million dollars a year saved.


Tesla built like 367,500 cars in 2019... that's 36.7 million in savings at $100 per car.

You can pay quite a few programmers with that. (even if it were a $10 sensor it's be over 3.67 million saved, more than enough to hire a dozen programmers for this ONE task and still be well in the black)


And the savings amount goes UP every year as they build more and more cars.

Looking at savings north of 50 million bucks in 2020 (well, pending impact of virus shutdowns I guess)
 
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So,

Is anyone else still having some troubles with their rain sensor? Mine will not turn on or be delayed for small / medium rain and sometimes when its not even raining I cant get it to turn off without manual settings.

I just dont get why we need Neural Net learning machines as some previous cars basic sensors worked better :D

Because a software based approach is the future not hardware. Everything on a Tesla takes a software based approach when possible. It is more than just cost savings. It allows them to do things like continually add features and upgrades easily OTA.
 
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Reactions: Kevy Baby
its improved greatly, to where it is acceptably good now.

far, far better than the "auto" high beams e.g.
You touched on two very YMMV topics. For me, the wipers are horrible and the high beams work fairly spot on. It's wild how we all seem to be getting different experiences. While some of this may be chalked up to personal perceptions and expectations, it seems to me there are differences between cars (though of course I could very well be wrong).
 
You touched on two very YMMV topics. For me, the wipers are horrible and the high beams work fairly spot on. It's wild how we all seem to be getting different experiences. While some of this may be chalked up to personal perceptions and expectations, it seems to me there are differences between cars (though of course I could very well be wrong).


There's probably some very small car to car differences (like 'exact' alignment of the headlights for example) but mostly I think it's differences in other things:

Driving environment- for example the auto highbeams have worked very well for me, but I only use em "out int he country" in NC- I could easily see working well for me being different to someone using them places in the EU, or even other different places in the US.... Likewise we get almost no snow here (and we usually aren't going anywhere if it DOES snow) so I can't comment much on the wipers in snow.

Previous experience- My previous Lexus rain sensor was flawless. In 11 years of ownership, I turned it on auto day 1, and (outside of car washes) never, ever, had to touch it again. On the other hand the one in our Acura is only "pretty good"... honestly it's roughly comparable to the present state of Teslas camera-only system- works fine 90%+ of the time now, occasionally you have to manually step in. My opinion of the Tesla system would be "Still kinda garbage, just less than it used to be" if I'd ONLY experienced the Lexus... but having experienced the Acura I rate it as "Used to be garbage, it's now pretty good but not perfect"


The biggest thing from that last though- The Acura sensor that's pretty good? It's always been- and never will get better. Not so the Tesla system that keeps improving.
 
Mine can be hit and miss. It is dark out when I drive into work and I have noticed that it seems to "see" less rain when there isn't much natural light. As I go past street lights the car would wipe more frequently than when between them. There is room for improvement for sure, but I have dealt with worse.

I traded in my wife's 2016 Honda Accord Touring for a 2020 BMW i3 and both of those vehicles feature "automatic wipers." I can confidently say that the Honda was the worst, the Tesla is in the middle, and the BMW is the most accurate.
 
You touched on two very YMMV topics. For me, the wipers are horrible and the high beams work fairly spot on. It's wild how we all seem to be getting different experiences. While some of this may be chalked up to personal perceptions and expectations, it seems to me there are differences between cars (though of course I could very well be wrong).

It's easy to tell when the auto high beams are failing. I dont have to make a subjective judgement -- drivers in the opposite direction do it for me!!!

Im baffled at how they can't get it right, because the boolean state of the high beams is easy to implement, given the car has capable sensor suite that knows if there are vehicles ahead or not.

On cars with true beam-forming technology, which should be harder to implement, you could literally see the lights actively carving the illumination around other cars. Really impressive tech that I wish was available on Tesla