Please Tesla - optional speed limiter

[Joewdwd]

Had my Tessie X for a month now and just love it. Drove Sydney to Melbourne last week to cure my range anxiety. No problems with Superchargers along the way. Seems the people with the most range anxiety are those that don't own a Tesla.

To the point.......I would love to have the option of a speed limiter. I often prefer the fun of driving rather than auto pilot or adaptive cruise control but then always need to be conscious of the changing speed limits and as you might imagine it is not hard to exceed the speed limit in a Tessie.

Elon, please consider this seemingly easy software update.

Thanks
Joe

 

[brkaus]

You can set a speed limit chime.

You can set it an an offset from the (estimated) speed limit or at an absolute number.

The demo cars are limited to 80 and there is a limit on valet so it would certainly be possible. Too many options becomes complicated.

 

[McManX]

It seems you are basically describing TACC.

 

[pilotSteve]

Turn on Valet Mode.

 

[ChicagolandMX]

Valet mode, chill mode, and chime over X number of exceeded mph over speed limit already address these. On top of that you have the nag of the computer which will tell you to reduce speed if you expect to make It to the next charging destination. It also wouldn't be safe to top limit as there are occasions where speeding up is a way of avoiding an accident. I think Tesla went above and beyond in this arena.

 

[caesartheday]

You can borrow my mother. She'll tell you when you're going too fast

 

[banned-66611]

Woah, another basic feature Tesla are missing! It's there seriously no speed limiter?

Still a few years from feature parity with a 1st gen Nissan Leaf then.

 

[Joewdwd]

Thanks for the responses but none of them satisfy the desire for a speed limiter, adjusted either manually or automatically depending on the speed limit. Many cars on the road now have both adaptive cruise control and adjustable speed limiter and the limiter is disabled if you push the accelerator to the floor so you can instantly accelerate to overtake. Tesla has the additional benefit of speed limit detection and therefore could adjust the speed limiter automatically. The hardware is already there as is all the sensor inputs for the software. And if you select the option you could turn it off in less than a second.

The objective of this is that you can then enjoy driving the car at any speed you like (up to or just over or just under the speed limit) without having to check the car speed all the time. Nobody really wants an annoying chime going off each time you exceed the limit and in any event you then still need to check your speedo and adjust your speed. The adaptive cruise control or auto pilot is great and I use it often but it sometimes takes corners too fast and sometimes you just want to drive yourself without having to worry about speed limits.

Valet and chill modes are for different purposes and don't go anywhere near achieving the objective of a variable speed limiter.
Regards
Joe

 

[BerTX]

Thanks for the responses but none of them satisfy the desire for a speed limiter, adjusted either manually or automatically depending on the speed limit. Many cars on the road now have both adaptive cruise control and adjustable speed limiter and the limiter is disabled if you push the accelerator to the floor so you can instantly accelerate to overtake. Tesla has the additional benefit of speed limit detection and therefore could adjust the speed limiter automatically. The hardware is already there as is all the sensor inputs for the software. And if you select the option you could turn it off in less than a second.

The objective of this is that you can then enjoy driving the car at any speed you like (up to or just over or just under the speed limit) without having to check the car speed all the time. Nobody really wants an annoying chime going off each time you exceed the limit and in any event you then still need to check your speedo and adjust your speed. The adaptive cruise control or auto pilot is great and I use it often but it sometimes takes corners too fast and sometimes you just want to drive yourself without having to worry about speed limits.

Valet and chill modes are for different purposes and don't go anywhere near achieving the objective of a variable speed limiter.
Regards
Joe

I'm still trying to decipher what it is that you want. Joe, so let me see if I understand.

You want the car to allow you to drive normally, adjusting your speed with the pedal, but never allowing your speed to go above a preset upper limit? So, if the limit s set to 60 and you push the pedal to the floor, it would accelerate to 60 an stay there. But if you let off the pedal to go around a curve, the car would slow down?

If that is right, not a feature I have ever heard of on any vehicle in the USA. Discounting, of course, my 1965 VW bus that did those exact numbers and performed just like that, except there was no actual setting for the upper limit -- it was set at the factory...

 

[brkaus]

It apparently is common in other countries. I'm not sure I understand the need, but having never used it, I may be missing something. I use TACC all the time. I'm not sure I would ever use this.

I'll save everyone three pages of comments: Modern cruise control (I do question the name "modern")

 

[Joewdwd]

Yes that is what an adjustable speed limiter does and as you say it is common in various countries. I have a Mercedes with it, my daughter has a Mini Cooper with optional cruise control and adjustable speed limiter and I have had rental cars in Australia and Europe with them eg Peugeot 308, Ford and others. Here is another link that explains it better then I have. What is a speed limiter? I am really surprised that it is not common in the US. If you don't want it then you don't select it, if you do want to use it, it is a great option to have available. TACC is great also but sometimes you want to drive the car yourself and not have to worry about the speed limit, especially in and around cities.

 

[Yinn]

Valet mode, chill mode, and chime over X number of exceeded mph over speed limit already address these. On top of that you have the nag of the computer which will tell you to reduce speed if you expect to make It to the next charging destination. It also wouldn't be safe to top limit as there are occasions where speeding up is a way of avoiding an accident. I think Tesla went above and beyond in this arena.

What would be nice is a parental mode too - or borrowed car mode in general. Basically allows full use of the car but restricts power and top speed like valet and chill mode. This way if I have someone borrowing the car, the features such as GPS can still be used but severely limited in the trouble they may or may not get into in terms of power.

 

[Krazaak]

My Zero motorcycle has options like that. Sliders allow me to customize the max speed between 60mph and 102mph, the max torque, the coasting regen level and the braking regen level as a percentage. The regen customization is very useful and I limited the torque while I was getting used to the bike. I've never lowered the max speed though because I feel that the driver already has full control over speed and setting an artificial cap lowers my options when it comes to accident avoidance or safely passing.

I've also never lowered the acceleration on my Model X down from ludicrous. The accelerator is an analog device and I don't understand why people treat it like it's either on or off.

It's the same reason I disagree with the people who want the car to hesitate when the driver tries to drive into a wall. When I am in control of the car, it's my responsibility to control it. The downside is that a distracted driver in control of the car can and will cause accidents, but a focused driver can and will avoid them. On at least two occasions, I've floored it through a red light to get out of the way of an out of control vehicle behind me. Once for a full sized tow-truck that slid through the space I previously occupied and the intersection without impact and another for a semi that was clearly distracted and made no effort to stop. Both of those incidents could have ended me in a small coupe had the car hesitated or limited acceleration because it recognized me running a red.

When the car is in control, it should obey its operational parameters, but when a human is driving it should do exactly what it is told to do, without hesitation. I'm happy if there's a cacophony of chimes and alerts that go off to warn me that I'm doing something the car disagrees with, so long as it does what I tell it to do.

There's already a setting to set a visual or audio alert to warn you for exceeding either an absolute or relative speed and TACC will obey the maximum speed set for it.

I would like to see Tesla add an advanced driving dynamics tab on a per profile basis that exposed more settings. It wouldn't really bother me if speed was one of those settings, but I would never use it.

 

[Yinn]

It's the same reason I disagree with the people who want the car to hesitate when the driver tries to drive into a wall.

Preach on. I will drive through as many walls as I dang well please. With or without the falcon wings open!

 

[Krazaak]

Preach on. I will drive through as many walls as I dang well please. With or without the falcon wings open!

I can't think of a faster way to remove the falcon wing doors in an emergency...

 

[jelloslug]

Woah, another basic feature Tesla are missing! It's there seriously no speed limiter?

Still a few years from feature parity with a 1st gen Nissan Leaf then.

My Leaf did not even have cruise control...

 

[LCR1]

For those not getting it, It's a common feature overseas even on something like a ford or toyota. It's not something seen on US cars.

 

[vandacca]

Tesla has already implemented a Speed Limiter. It's just not available to the general user (yet) only to Service Station. They turn it on the loaners when they give them out to customers. It limits top speed and I think max power (acceleration) too.

 

[mattack4000]

Waste of time like the auto wiper

 

[rush6410]

. What is a speed limiter? I am really surprised that it is not common in the US.

Never heard of this. I read the article you referenced. That isn't something I would use. Seems to be very similar to setting a speed with cruise. The limiter seems it is only as good as the user paying attention to the speed limit signs unless you have a car that reads the signs. I personally like the ability to override cruise with a gentle touch of the accelerator when acceleration is needed. I can't imagine needing to floor the accelerator to override the limiter when needed. That could be an issue with Tesla's.