S driver claims his parked car moved on its own and hit parked trailer

[whitex]

This is precisely why I never even enabled Summon. To me it's mostly a gimmick feature. Doesn't work if your car is plugged in (plugged in Tesla Tesla is a happy Tesla that cannot Summon). It also doesn't detect plenty of obstacles, garage shelving, even people. I am not blaming Tesla, the car simply does not have the sensors required for this feature to be reasonably accident proof. If it's too tight for you to open the driver's door to get out, there is a very good chance the car will hit something so you have to stand there watching it like a hawk. Maybe if you are literally pulling into a box with solid perpendicular walls that are completely flat including and a completely flat door to close behind the car that would stop the car from pulling out if Summon was accidentally activated. So maybe useful to pull into transport containers and as an interesting trick to show people.

 

[wdolson]

I suppose it's good if you want to put a Tesla in a shipping container.

 

[Coolcarx]

When

This is precisely why I never even enabled Summon. To me it's mostly a gimmick feature. Doesn't work if your car is plugged in (plugged in Tesla Tesla is a happy Tesla that cannot Summon). It also doesn't detect plenty of obstacles, garage shelving, even people. I am not blaming Tesla, the car simply does not have the sensors required for this feature to be reasonably accident proof. If it's too tight for you to open the driver's door to get out, there is a very good chance the car will hit something so you have to stand there watching it like a hawk. Maybe if you are literally pulling into a box with solid perpendicular walls that are completely flat including and a completely flat door to close behind the car that would stop the car from pulling out if Summon was accidentally activated. So maybe useful to pull into transport containers and as an interesting trick to show people.

As I was showing off this feature to my wife, it was driving into the corner of garage entrance. She screamed "Stop". I told her I still need to work the kinks out. It would not steer into the garage for some reason. No more Summon for me.

 

[animorph]

You accidentally hit Park twice, miss the warnings, and get out of the car. Then you notice it moving forward. How do you stop it? Will opening the driver's door do the trick (if unobstructed)? Or do you have to dig out your FOB and find a button to push?

 

[mikeash]

Pressing a door handle is enough to stop it. Or you can walk in front of the car to make it sense an obstacle (you) and stop it that way. The fob also works if you have it handy, of course.

 

[Cobbler]

Maybe the software should be adjusted, during Summoning, that an torque limit on the wheels is active. As soon as the car hits something, the servo motor would pick up the increased current demand and this should trigger a failstop.
Would be safer than just relying on the ultrasonic sensors.

 

[chillaban]

Maybe the software should be adjusted, during Summoning, that an torque limit on the wheels is active. As soon as the car hits something, the servo motor would pick up the increased current demand and this should trigger a failstop.
Would be safer than just relying on the ultrasonic sensors.

The software already does this. The car will not climb the equivalent of a >1" obstacle due to torque limits. But it doesn't take a lot of torque to cause superficial damage to a windshield due to slowly driving into a sharp metallic object like in this case…

Of course, an equal number of people seem annoyed that Summon stalls on their garage door lip and wants the car to exert more torque

 

[Lloyd]

When summon is activated, the flashers are on. It seems hard to believe that they would not be noticed!

 

[tdelta1000]

Here's a simple solution to prevent this from happening again. TM, please make the auto park feature a three button press activation instead of two.

 

[jomo25]

Our X didn't include autopilot. As little as I expect to use autopilot, I see even less usage of summon, to the point to 'never' if I were to add AP later. Can one never enable Summon but still use AP? I.e. Is there a separate option to keep Summon off? I have 2 little kids and too tight a garage, so Summon would just be asking for a minor or major disaster. I can see adding AP, but I'd want Summon to remain disabled.

 

[msnow]

Our X didn't include autopilot. As little as I expect to use autopilot, I see even less usage of summon, to the point to 'never' if I were to add AP later. Can one never enable Summon but still use AP? I.e. Is there a separate option to keep Summon off? I have 2 little kids and too tight a garage, so Summon would just be asking for a minor or major disaster. I can see adding AP, but I'd want Summon to remain disabled.

Yes.

 

[RogerHScott]

press the park button ... a second time to extend the door handles

I've never heard of this "feature" -- is is documented? Given that the clearly documented function of double-clicking the park button
is to initiate auto-park it seems like a really questionable idea to use it for this purpose. And racing to touch one of the door handles "in time"? Wow. What can I say?

 

[RogerHScott]

If it's too tight for you to open the driver's door to get out, there is a very good chance the car will hit something so you have to stand there watching it like a hawk.

This is simply not true. Summon works just great for auto-parking in the common case of a narrow garage opening.

Doesn't work if your car is plugged in (plugged in Tesla Tesla is a happy Tesla that cannot Summon).

Oh, I forgot! Without Summon, you can drive off without unplugging your happy Tesla and it will auto-unplug itself. Silly me.

 

[RogerHScott]

It would not steer into the garage for some reason.

It is not intended to "steer" anywhere automatically. It goes in a straight line, only doing minor steering to avoid obstacles.
And any steering it needs to do is likely to mess up its trajectory, so you really want to minimize that.

 

[RogerHScott]

I have 2 little kids and too tight a garage

You realize you and the kids can be in the car while using auto-park/summon, right? Sounds ideal for your situation, to me.

 

[jeffro01]

Now the story has made front page news, at least on www.sfgate.com... The driver can dispute all they want but the logs and the data don't lie, people do.

The end blurb about the what if game with the car hitting a child is more than just a bit ridiculous. We all know, at least those of us that have used summon, the sensors are very adept to picking up objects it can see and then stopping. No doubt a human would have triggered the ultra sonics to stop the car.

Ugh...

Jeff

 

[msnow]

It is not intended to "steer" anywhere automatically. It goes in a straight line, only doing minor steering to avoid obstacles.
And any steering it needs to do is likely to mess up its trajectory, so you really want to minimize that.

Not correct. The car will steer to adjust and center itself in the garage, not just a straight line.

 

[jomo25]

You realize you and the kids can be in the car while using auto-park/summon, right? Sounds ideal for your situation, to me.

Sure they could be in it anytime I INTENTIONALLY engage it. But they may not be in it anytime I/they/someone else ACCIDENTALLY engage it.

 

[brianman]

I think it's probably worth noting that this particular AutoPark feature can be unintuitive for those who haven't carefully read the manual. If you double-tap the Park button then immediately get out of the car without touching anything, *by default* it will have activated AutoPark to pull the car forward (forward is the default direction of movement).

Incorrect. This is not the default, and to my recollection never has been.

 

[brianman]

I understand it is Beta and there is an agreement, but if the UX is confusing or allows for mistakes then Tesla needs to bear some responsibility.

Thinking like this is how you kill software development as a whole.