Summons feature flaw

[Joe F]

@Joe F Thanks for the test and detailed report. It's interesting that multiple summons (as it stops for you when entering) are all tracked and it does a single "exit" summon to return to the place where you started it all.

That’s how it works, as indicated in the fine manual.

As long as the multiple summon events are in the same direction, and the car remains in park, a reverse motion summon always returns to the starting point, provided there are no obstructions introduced.

 

[Joe F]

Thanks.

I see the same behavior as you, and I've used the parking stalk-double-tap method and then key-fob summon afterwards. So it works the same on both.

I’ve done that as well, and find the same WRT reverse stopping where it started from. However, I never really trust summon to let it do its thing without the fob in my hand, just in case. For that reason I just use the stalk as a test case with new updates, just to make sure it still works.

 

[RogerHScott]

@Joe F Thanks for the test and detailed report. It's interesting that multiple summons (as it stops for you when entering) are all tracked and it does a single "exit" summon to return to the place where you started it all.

When the engineers discovered that, on average, it takes three separate summon commands to get the car into its final position the need for this "feature" became obvious.

 

[robotmechanic]

I just made this video as you can see it took at least 7 times? of me hitting the key fob for the x to stop, last time when it happened it wouldn’t stop at all

This seems like a low battery to me. It has enough juice to get the first few signals out, but every subsequent press of a button pulls the voltage down a bit more, and as the car is moving away simultaneously, the signal isn't quite strong enough to get the message through to make the car stop.

Batteries and capacitors can be visualized like the tank on the back of your toilet. If you only flush it once or twice a day, it will always fill the bowl and work the way you expect. But if you flush it once, and then you try to flush it again just a few seconds later before the tank is all the way full, that second flush is going to be pretty weak. And if you try to flush it 7 times in rapid succession when the tank is already empty, flush number 7 is going to be just as ineffective as flush number 3 because the tank is just as empty at 3 as it is at 7 and hitting the handle any number of times wont change that.

Summon is quite a workout for a key fob. Normally a fob just has to send one burst for lock, and then another one much later for unlock. For Summon we hold it down for 5 seconds. Then we press another command for a second (and if you're like me, you make long deliberate presses). And then we press again to stop the car. That's a whole lot of work for a power system that usually doesn't see much action. Tesla probably thought of that, and they might have beefed up the power system with extra capacitors to help out that little watch battery. But a toilet tank is still a toilet tank.

Another possibility is that the physical contacts in your main fob are getting worn, and maybe there's a little carbon dust building up or maybe the snaptron is wearing down (does anyone know which type is used?) and so the conductivity of the button isn't as zippy as your backup fob. And a low battery would exacerbate a wearing switch contact and vice versa.

A possible test for battery strength would be to put Summon back into Continuous Press mode, and see if the car will keep moving while you hold the fob button down. If it starts to move, but then stops before you stop pressing, then it might be because the longer you hold it, the weaker the signal gets, and the car stops moving because it stops getting a signal. Kinda like holding the handle down on the toilet even after the tank is empty and trying to refill. However, if it works fine in Continuous Press, but still doesn't work in in the Not Continuous Press mode, then the game is afoot, Watson!

 

[robotmechanic]

This was an interesting thread. Thanks a million to the mod who took out 6 pages. I could barely make it through at 10 pages in length.

For whatever reason, there was no point at which I doubted the OP's story. I was really grateful to see the conversation turn back to "how could this happen, from a technical point of view."

My first thought was that this was a phone problem. I'm using an iphone 6 and since upgrading to ios 11, it hangs, stalls, takes a bunch of commands into its buffer while seeming unresponsive, and then does all kinds of interesting things when the input buffer dumps out into whatever screen shows up at whatever time the os decides to catch up with reality. I'm fairly certain I'll end up getting a new phone because I'll eventually get so mad at this one that I'll crush it in my hand while grinding my teeth into powder. And while smashing it, I'll probably inadvertently send a selfie to 911 and unintentionally summon my car into sapling that is too narrow to be seen by the sonar sensors. But I digress.

It's not at all uncommon in my experience for a phone to buffer a lot of input commands, or alternatively (with similar outcomes) to take one command, (like a button press) and then not take the next command for a while (like the button release). I notice this kind of thing most often with volume controls on home theater receivers or similar devices that have app-remotes. I always have to be careful to press, wait, press, wait, press, wait; or else I run the risk of winding the volume up to [a lot] and having to deal with This American Life at an inappropriate volume level.

So my theory isn't that there was a connectivity problem. I think there was a great connection, and the reason the car kept going is because the phone kept telling it to, irrespective of what the OP was telling their phone. I can't help but wonder if the OP might have poked at the button a few extra times, trying to get it to respond, and maybe that didn't help. Or is it possible if the OP was freaking out (as I would be) and they had a death grip on the phone, and maybe part of their hand or part of a finger spilled over onto the touchscreen which the phone took to mean "keep pressing!" I'm really reaching with those ideas, and I honestly don't think I need to. I accidentally called a guy and cancelled it three times today because the display was so far behind the input buffer. I'm sure the iphone 7 is better than the iphone 6, but I think ios11 has a serious problem with trying to do something (I don't know what) in the time between a user pressing a button and the expected result occurring.

Not at all surprised that the sonar didn't see the straw man (how hysterical is it that this story has an actual straw man?) laying on the ground. Sonars on my car can barely see curbs. A soft round thing that is very low to the ground... not likely. I've worked with a lot of sonar senors and I'm amazed that they work as well as they do as parking sensors, given that I know how badly they work for everything else. As others have said, for big, flat, hard things - they work great! For everything else, I just assume they don't work until proven otherwise. And to keep it on topic, that means shelf units, ladders, broom handles, etc. in the garage when I use summon to creep the car in. Or the 4x4 post holding the deck up when I pull the car out... there's an excellent chance the sonars will miss those things.

Looking forward to hearing what we learn from @Matutino's experience.

 

[Tunytoons]

I still think if it’s a battery issue then the car should stop when loosing connection, whenever I use the app and I walk away once it looses connection the car stops.
Anyhow, I went to Best Buy and target in search of a battery replacement, this particular battery was not available.
Since I was dropping off my model S for service this morning I asked at the SC if they had a replacement battery in stock for me to purchase, they asked me how many I needed and w/o hesitate they brought me one at no charge.
I just replaced the battery and I’m waiting for my wife to get back home to test it, will do inside and also outside the garage.

 

[Joe F]

I still think if it’s a battery issue then the car should stop when loosing connection, whenever I use the app and I walk away once it looses connection the car stops.

Huh? Two issues here:

You have to have "Require Continuous Press" set to "NO", otherwise the summon would stop as soon as you took your finger off the fob. All of the video's your posted show you removing your finger after selecting a direction. So what you state above WRT loosing connection does not make sense if using the fob as you have been doing. Using the app would work the same way with the above set to NO.

Second, "walking away," despite being a risky thing to do should something go wrong, places you further away from the car and less able to stop summon by touching the door handle. You might want to reconsider that.

While I don't use the app for summon (too risky with having to depend on a solid network connection and potential delays) the docs state to "stand within 10 feet of the vehicle." I do not know if it is safety related, or senses where both you and the car are and will not work if further than 10 feet apart. Tough to do with GPS I believe with granularity. I did once try to move the car from a parking spot in an isolated parking lot, just a few feet to show someone how it worked with the app, and nothing happened. Kind of made me think the 10 feet was a requirement...

 

[Matutino]

Huh? Two issues here:

You have to have "Require Continuous Press" set to "NO", otherwise the summon would stop as soon as you took your finger off the fob. All of the video's your posted show you removing your finger after selecting a direction. So what you state above WRT loosing connection does not make sense if using the fob as you have been doing. Using the app would work the same way with the above set to NO.

Second, "walking away," despite being a risky thing to do should something go wrong, places you further away from the car and less able to stop summon by touching the door handle. You might want to reconsider that.

While I don't use the app for summon (too risky with having to depend on a solid network connection and potential delays) the docs state to "stand within 10 feet of the vehicle." I do not know if it is safety related, or senses where both you and the car are and will not work if further than 10 feet apart. Tough to do with GPS I believe with granularity. I did once try to move the car from a parking spot in an isolated parking lot, just a few feet to show someone how it worked with the app, and nothing happened. Kind of made me think the 10 feet was a requirement...

I think you misunderstood what I meant to say and assumed habits I dont have.
When I use the key fob w/o continues press, the key fob is connected to the car, I was under the impression if you walk away far from the car it would stop as it looses connection, I dont have continues press set to ON. I could be wrong as I have never tried it, only the phone app which in fact the car does stop when loosing connection with it.
I dont walk away when I do summon, the point I was trying to make is, if you walk away with the key as summon is "on" the car should stop as a security measure, same as loosing connection with the app, I dont trust summon to walk away, not yet.

After I typed this, I went ahead and tested a model S loaner I currently have, I activated summon, removed the battery from the key-fob and the car didn't stop, so the theory of stopping when loosing connection is not true.
Im hopping the issue with my model X is the battery, waiting for my wife to come back from the GYM so I can try the new battery I installed today, if not it then I will have to take it to the SC to check whats going on with it.

 

[Joe F]

I think you misunderstood what I meant to say and assumed habits I dont have.

I guess I was confused by your mention of using the app and walking away.

I think you’re confused by thinking the car should stop with either the app or the fob when there’s a loss of connection. You have Require Continuous Press OFF. There is no connection to lose; Your finger is not pressing a key, hence there is no connection as nothing is being transmitted. You only “have a connection” when transmitting. Make sense?

Actually, I’m more confused by who I’m conversing with. Can you use one profile, please?

 

[Matutino]

I guess I was confused by your mention of using the app and walking away.

I think you’re confused by thinking the car should stop with either the app or the fob when there’s a loss of connection. You have Require Continuous Press OFF. There is no connection to lose; Your finger is not pressing a key, hence there is no connection as nothing is being transmitted. You only “have a connection” when transmitting. Make sense?

Actually, I’m more confused by who I’m conversing with. Can you use one profile, please?

Hahah sorry I didn’t realize my phone and computer are not under the same profile .
It makes sense, hopefully the issue I’m having is battery related, will be testing shortly and report back.

 

[lotusland]

I'm not going to wade through this thread but hopefully someone pointed out that this Halloween plan was incredibly stupid. It does not matter whether the Tesla did or did not perform properly, this idea was terrible and if something bad had happened I would expect the OP to get roasted via lawsuit. It sounds like this was not even the first time this was done. Guys, please use common sense.

 

[BigMod3Fan]

On halloween this year I had what I thought was a brilliant idea to scare people using the Tesla model S. Leaving my car in the driveway, as people would approach I would use the summon feature to have the car pull 1-2 feet forward or backwards. In place of the driver was a ghost prop. This worked great, however at the end of the evening I went to use it one last time and when I began summon pulling forward the car stopped responding and continued driving even after I was no longer pressing forward and even trying reverse. In the middle of our quiet street I had a human sized stuffed mannequin that had been out also as a prop and the car failed to recognize this and ran it over. It continued to be unresponsive and didn't stop until it crashed itself into the curb on the opposite side of the street. It was witnessed by multiple people and was honestly terrifying because if that had been a real person, they would have been killed, not to mention the horrible sound of hearing my car crunch into the curb. So not only did the failsafe of losing response to the commands not work, but the safety measures that are supposed to keep the car from running into/over solid objects failed. I brought the car to the Tesla dealership and they could not identify the problem and stated that this was in Beta phase so essentially it is up to me to trust whether summon won't kill someone or crash the car. Honestly, that is far to cavalier for me to release a function that can malfunction with such a serious consequence and then say it is Beta. If they had at least found out what went wrong, I could assume they could fix it but now I can't trust summon at all for fear it will wreck something or hurt someone. I don't know if anyone else has had this issue but this is to me a serious safety concern and I would caution anyone from using the summon feature. I have not had this issue before, but one catastrophe is enough. I am trying to figure out next how to report this to the transportation safety board as I don't think Tesla has acted responsibly in releasing Beta products that can kill people.

 

[BigMod3Fan]

On halloween this year I had what I thought was a brilliant idea to scare people using the Tesla model S. Leaving my car in the driveway, as people would approach I would use the summon feature to have the car pull 1-2 feet forward or backwards. In place of the driver was a ghost prop. This worked great, however at the end of the evening I went to use it one last time and when I began summon pulling forward the car stopped responding and continued driving even after I was no longer pressing forward and even trying reverse. In the middle of our quiet street I had a human sized stuffed mannequin that had been out also as a prop and the car failed to recognize this and ran it over. It continued to be unresponsive and didn't stop until it crashed itself into the curb on the opposite side of the street. It was witnessed by multiple people and was honestly terrifying because if that had been a real person, they would have been killed, not to mention the horrible sound of hearing my car crunch into the curb. So not only did the failsafe of losing response to the commands not work, but the safety measures that are supposed to keep the car from running into/over solid objects failed. I brought the car to the Tesla dealership and they could not identify the problem and stated that this was in Beta phase so essentially it is up to me to trust whether summon won't kill someone or crash the car. Honestly, that is far to cavalier for me to release a function that can malfunction with such a serious consequence and then say it is Beta. If they had at least found out what went wrong, I could assume they could fix it but now I can't trust summon at all for fear it will wreck something or hurt someone. I don't know if anyone else has had this issue but this is to me a serious safety concern and I would caution anyone from using the summon feature. I have not had this issue before, but one catastrophe is enough. I am trying to figure out next how to report this to the transportation safety board as I don't think Tesla has acted responsibly in releasing Beta products that can kill people.

 

[BigMod3Fan]

I had a similar experience, though not as dramatic. I summoned my car when leaving work so I could get into it more easily. I kept the reverse button pressed and everything was going great. When I released the button, the car kept going. I would say it traveled another 6 feet. My theory on this is that there is latency on the button press on my phone (Samsung S8 Active) so that the button stays pressed for a few seconds even after you stop pressing it physically. I would welcome any thoughts that support or refute this theory. I didn't know about touching the door handle but will try that next time. Got my Model 3 two weeks ago and loving it.

On halloween this year I had what I thought was a brilliant idea to scare people using the Tesla model S. Leaving my car in the driveway, as people would approach I would use the summon feature to have the car pull 1-2 feet forward or backwards. In place of the driver was a ghost prop. This worked great, however at the end of the evening I went to use it one last time and when I began summon pulling forward the car stopped responding and continued driving even after I was no longer pressing forward and even trying reverse. In the middle of our quiet street I had a human sized stuffed mannequin that had been out also as a prop and the car failed to recognize this and ran it over. It continued to be unresponsive and didn't stop until it crashed itself into the curb on the opposite side of the street. It was witnessed by multiple people and was honestly terrifying because if that had been a real person, they would have been killed, not to mention the horrible sound of hearing my car crunch into the curb. So not only did the failsafe of losing response to the commands not work, but the safety measures that are supposed to keep the car from running into/over solid objects failed. I brought the car to the Tesla dealership and they could not identify the problem and stated that this was in Beta phase so essentially it is up to me to trust whether summon won't kill someone or crash the car. Honestly, that is far to cavalier for me to release a function that can malfunction with such a serious consequence and then say it is Beta. If they had at least found out what went wrong, I could assume they could fix it but now I can't trust summon at all for fear it will wreck something or hurt someone. I don't know if anyone else has had this issue but this is to me a serious safety concern and I would caution anyone from using the summon feature. I have not had this issue before, but one catastrophe is enough. I am trying to figure out next how to report this to the transportation safety board as I don't think Tesla has acted responsibly in releasing Beta products that can kill people.

 

[drklain]

I've never seen this behavior, but I always use the Keyfob for summon vice my phone. I wonder if that is the difference since the keyfob is talking directly to the car?