I was at the Goulbourn Supercharger yesterday when I received the popup while on the way to see my sister in Kyabram (VIC) for Christmas.. Here is what I experienced on the remainder of the drive. Keep in mind that I never saw the value in paying the additional $10K for FSD or even the recent EAP. Thus, I'm not exactly a fan boy.
TLDR: I turned off Navigate on Autopilot after nearly 2 hours. I'll never pay for the current offering.
After turning on Summon and Navigate on Autopilot I set up the options, choosing the acknowledgement required for a lane change. I figured I needed to get used to the behaviour before getting confident enough for it to make its own decisions.
Driving on the Hume highway was annoying with NoA pinging on and off as it approached and departed one of the many cross roads. It took me a while to figure out how to confirm the lane change, but once I got the hang of it the process was straight forward. Unfortunately the car just wouldn't change lanes in a way that was natural enough for me. For example, it would come up behind a car and slow down significantly (more than 5 km/h) and still not overtake with no traffic in the right hand lane. Moving back to the left hand lane was not quick enough or the car just sat in the right hand lane after an overtake.
I had a couple of times when the car proceeded to move to the left hand lane and then started forcing itself back to the right hand lane, with no obvious cause. I can't remember if this was before I turned off NoA or after though.
Then there were the constant notifications of an impending lane change which I had to keep cancelling. We were driving straight to Gundagai, so there was no need to keep changing lanes.
After giving NoA a fair go over nearly 2 hours I decided to turn it off. It was a relief, with no more noises from the cross roads (the family was over it too) and having to cancel lane changes.
I was surprised to find that the car still performed a lane change when I turned the indicator on. I found this feature quite useful, as it allowed me to concentrate on what was going on around me and let the car do the maneuver. It also maintained a constant speed. On standard Autopilot I tend to leave the overtaking too late for the car and it assumes I'm going to crash into the car in front, slowing down, even with the indicator on when I'm already halfway across the lane! It's hardly worth paying for though, but it would be a welcome addition to standard Autopilot.
On Autopilot there were a few wobbles at highway exits, including one where I had to takeover. There are still far too many slowdowns or phantom braking episodes. I use TACC a lot on standard roads (avoiding speeding tickets) and it's the same situation there where I still find myself explaining to my family that it wasn't me.
I did this drive from the Gold Coast to Kyabram 2 years ago, albeit on different roads as Sydney was in lock down. I don't think there is a lot of difference in how Autopilot performs from that trip to my current one. It's still very usable, provided you know what to expect, and helps me arrive fresh. We did Gold Coast to Sydney in one day and I didn't even notice it (one Redbull may have helped!).
For reference, my car is a Model 3 Performance, purchased in Dec 2019. It's done about 41K kms and the software version 2022.44.25.2.
