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Scary Lane Assist

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Ever since I took delivery and updated my X to 8.1, I turned on all the new features and lane assist is one of them. Oh man, that was one scary experience.

So I had a model S 90D as a loaner for over a month and I updated it to 8.1 with all the new features turned on, there were times that I felt like I completely lost control of the steering wheel when I switched lane on highway. When I tried to gain the control back, I fishtailed. So I think, no biggie, I should've blinked the signal. I did, and the feeling remained the same. OK, maybe it's just the car. Since it's a loaner, I happily returned it and picked up my X. Crap, the lost control feeling passed from the loaner to my own X. Then I thought it could just be the design and even thought I bring it back to service center, the tech would just tell me it's normal so I started researching on lemon law, buy back from Tesla or ebay it out. With such a low mileage, maybe I could've got most of my money back for a Porsche or Range Rover (sorry Tesla, bad influence from this forum...). All the sudden I thought of "Lane Assist", I immediately turned it off and started driving and changing lane. Voila, that was the culprit.

Bottom line, Turn OFF Lane Assist if you feel like your car is losing control when switching lane.
 
There is no "Lane Assist" feature by that name, though there is a Settings section by that name. The only feature in that section is "Lane Departure Warning", which just vibrates the steering wheel when you go out of your lane without the proper turn signal on. I can just barely feel the vibration, and several posters have not felt it in their testing. If that's really your problem, go to the Service Center and have them fix it. That feature is not supposed to steer the car in any way.

Sounds more like you have Autosteer activated and are then fighting it to change lanes. You can change lanes with Autosteer active by simply using the turn signal and letting it do its thing (carefully) with the latest firmware. Or turn it off before changing lanes. Or do what you're doing, which also cancels Autosteer. That would definitely feel like it was fighting you as you changed lanes, but it would let you win. Both my wife and I have done that without too much drama, though it might be interesting if you weren't expecting it.
 
There is no "Lane Assist" feature by that name, though there is a Settings section by that name. The only feature in that section is "Lane Departure Warning", which just vibrates the steering wheel when you go out of your lane without the proper turn signal on. I can just barely feel the vibration, and several posters have not felt it in their testing. If that's really your problem, go to the Service Center and have them fix it. That feature is not supposed to steer the car in any way.

Sounds more like you have Autosteer activated and are then fighting it to change lanes. You can change lanes with Autosteer active by simply using the turn signal and letting it do its thing (carefully) with the latest firmware. Or turn it off before changing lanes. Or do what you're doing, which also cancels Autosteer. That would definitely feel like it was fighting you as you changed lanes, but it would let you win. Both my wife and I have done that without too much drama, though it might be interesting if you weren't expecting it.

I meant to say lane departure warning under lane assist since that is the only feature under lane assist. I know what autosteer is and that's not it.
 
Lane departure merely vibrates when you are drifting over the line. It doesn't steer or try to correct. I have never experienced what you are describing in 17,000 miles. Sounds like you may have a problem elsewhere. BTW, somewhat off topic, if you want to get terrified, try driving a Volvo with auto-steer on a curvy road. My son's tried to take me into the woods several times.
 
So since OP had this on two 8.1 cars, I'm sorta confused. Are we talking about Lane Depsrture Warning or something else? Neither seems to make sense since LDW is described as so low level you can barely tell it's on. Not trying to steer you all over the place.
 
It is the lane departure warning (the only option with 8.1 ap2) under lane assist. And I can definitely feel it even it's at a very low level. Try to steer back to your original lane ( or make a shaper lane changing) during that very few seconds of vibrating and you will know what I meant.
 
It is the lane departure warning (the only option with 8.1 ap2) under lane assist. And I can definitely feel it even it's at a very low level. Try to steer back to your original lane ( or make a shaper lane changing) during that very few seconds of vibrating and you will know what I meant.
Interesting.... not seen anyone say that LDW is intrusive at all.. most say they don't even recognize it. But, this is the first time we've discussed trying to 'turn back' so perhaps 'getting stuck in the middle' of the change does something to the vibration actuator and it resonates weirdly? I'm getting an X for overnight demo at the end of this week and will certainly give this a try!
 
GoTzilla - I have another thought - Did you have auto-steer engaged? Because if you did, when you override it with the steering whee,l in the middle of a lane change, you will feel significant resistance in the steering wheel at first, and when that releases it will tend to swerve back into the original lane.
 
GoTzilla - I have another thought - Did you have auto-steer engaged? Because if you did, when you override it with the steering whee,l in the middle of a lane change, you will feel significant resistance in the steering wheel at first, and when that releases it will tend to swerve back into the original lane.
Unfortunately no, it has nothing to do with auto steer. It's not that the car tried to steer to either way. It's like the car ignored the steering input in that 2 seconds of vibrating so I steered more or less but all the sudden the steering wheel reconnected with too much or less steering input for changing lane so the car swerved or fishtailed when I tried to correct it.
 
I'm in the middle of a long road trip. I've triggered the LDW many times now. Feels like mild rumble strips, you can feel it as a passenger as well. I actually don't feel it much through the steering wheel, more like an audio effect. I don't feel any difference in steering. I can go ahead and ride the line (to avoid a semi in the other lane) with no steering difference, the LDW constantly vibrating. That's how it should work.

If you can repeat your problem, demonstrate it to the Service center. Safely of course!
 
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