Using Summon to park very close to a wall. Looking for advice to develop and improve my technique.

[PhysicsGuy]

I am interested in learning how to most effectively use the summon function to park very close to a wall in a storage lot. I have a 2018 model 3 with FSD. So far, I have tried this once, parking with the driver's door very close to a wall, as show in the accompanying picture. It worked okay but I feel like it could be better. In particular, I would like to be able to get closer to the wall (to get more shade from the wall later in the day). For a couple of reasons, I need to park with the driver's door along the wall. So this post is intended to be focussed on how to do that better.
Summoning the car away from the wall worked pretty well, as I recall, using the "Come to Me" function. Parking the car close to the wall in the first place, however, was more difficult. I could not really get close to the wall using "come to me", so what I ended up doing was:
1) parking really close to the wall myself (too close to open the door and get out).
2) then driving forward in a straight line at an angle away from the wall to a point where I could get out.
3) then using summon to back-up straight. That got the car back into the parking space and pretty close to the wall, but was not ideal since it leaves the car a bit angled and not as close to the wall as I would like.
I wonder if anyone has suggestions as to how to do this better and faster. I imagine that if there was a wall on Both sides that the car could do better, since that is what I think summon is partly designed for (pulling into really tight garage spots).
Originally I tried leaving the steering wheel at an angle and was hoping to use Summon to back into the space with the wheel angled, but as soon as I engaged the backup function in summon, it straightened the wheels as I recall. I wish there was a way to back up on a curved trajectory, but I couldn't figure out how to do it. Does anyone have any ideas?
Any suggestions that would help me with this problem would be much very welcome and appreciated. I expect to be parking there often. I am hoping to stay focussed in this thread on techniques for using summon.

 

[Dewg]

Autopark has limits for front and side. You may not be able to get any closer on the sides.

 

[RoBoRaT]

Can you open up one of those storage room doors? Then you can use that space to exit the car and summon back to close against the wall.

 

[PhysicsGuy]

Can you open up one of those storage room doors? Then you can use that space to exit the car and summon back to close against the wall.

Good idea, but no, I cannot do that.

 

[brkaus]

I personally wouldn't trust it. I've observed summon doing strange zigs and zags. Should be OK because you are next to a mostly solid wall and don't have to worry about the middle of the car blind spot to the sensors, but...

 

[KArnold]

Personally I'm with @brkaus and would not do that. Obviously be careful.

But maybe set your summon clearances to minimim - 8" as I recall. As you start the pull in, stand closer than 8" from the front right corner at an angle. Perhaps that will force summon to either 1) stop (which seems most likely or 2) pull to minimim distances on the left side. Maybe some trial/error.

I've caused summon to move slightly left or right using this technique but not far.

 

[ScoobyDoo82]

Honestly.. I wouldn’t trust Summon enough to get that close to a wall on purpose. You might pull it off a few times with a little luck and/or a proper technique. But.. all it takes is that ONE TIME for it to screw up and cause thousands (maybe even tens of thousands) of dollars in damage. Just one mistake…

I use summon only when I absolutely have to and that’s even without any walls or damage potential.

I work in construction and sometime I park far enough away from the job site where wheeling my toolboxes is a PITA. Especially lately when it has been raining and the parking area is full of mud. So, I have summon come to me and I load my (dry/mudless) tool box into my car without having to walk more than 10 feet. Makes all the other trademen jealous!

 

[sjg98]

Summon is a parlor trick they cooked up, shipped half baked, and don't maintain.

Use it at your own risk, don't be shocked if it does something insane 1 out of 10 times, or gets stuck causing you to need to climb across from passenger side to move it, etc.

 

[Durwood101]

I definitely agree with some of these posts in replying to your question. I use summon to move my car into and out of the garage with just about the same amount of space on both sides and I always have my thumb on the trigger to make sure that the car doesn’t maneuver in a way where it’s going to run into a wall because it’s almost done that a few times, I don’t know why but you just can’t completely trust it. Advice is to be very careful

 

[ScoobyDoo82]

Summon is a parlor trick they cooked up, shipped half baked, and don't maintain.

Use it at your own risk, don't be shocked if it does something insane 1 out of 10 times, or gets stuck causing you to need to climb across from passenger side to move it, etc.

Summon is like an idiot savant.. every once in a while it’ll pull off something crazy and be very impressive. But like you said 9/10 times it’ll leave you looking stupid and have you be pissed off by other people.
On only one occasion (out of dozens) has summon actually did what I exactly wanted it to do.

But.. using it manually (having the car pull forward or reverse 10-20 feet) with the buttons can have its major benefits. The “smart summon” features are indeed party tricks. But, having your car back up 10 feet because the idiot who parked next to you got too close is a wonderful thing to have. Worth its price for that alone in my opinion.

 

[PhysicsGuy]

Summon is like an idiot savant.. every once in a while it’ll pull off something crazy and be very impressive. But like you said 9/10 times it’ll leave you looking stupid and have you be pissed off by other people.
On only one occasion (out of dozens) has summon actually did what I exactly wanted it to do.

But.. using it manually (having the car pull forward or reverse 10-20 feet) with the buttons can have its major benefits. The “smart summon” features are indeed party tricks. But, having your car back up 10 feet because the idiot who parked next to you got too close is a wonderful thing to have. Worth its price for that alone in my opinion.

Thanks. I feel like if one could just steer it using a phone, that would be really helpful. It is a bit limiting to just be able to go straight. Putting 3 or 5 discrete steering wheel positions (1 straight ahead and 2 choices for left and right, respectively) in the app would be easy, no? Has anyone suggested that on twitter to "Elon"? I wonder if that might be implemented in the future?

 

[PianoAl]

I want to hear the reasons you can't park with the passenger side by the wall. Harder to estimate distance?

 

[ScoobyDoo82]

Thanks. I feel like if one could just steer it using a phone, that would be really helpful. It is a bit limiting to just be able to go straight. Putting 3 or 5 discrete steering wheel positions (1 straight ahead and 2 choices for left and right, respectively) in the app would be easy, no? Has anyone suggested that on twitter to "Elon"? I wonder if that might be implemented in the future?

This would be awesome! Then my Model Y would become the world’s most expensive RC car. But in all seriousness.. this is why I believe the ability to manually steer the car is prohibited.

 

[beatle]

I want to hear the reasons you can't park with the passenger side by the wall. Harder to estimate distance?

Yeah that's what I would do. Looks like it's no different than parallel parking. I watch my passenger mirror (angled towards the curb) and have not curbed a wheel yet.

I use summon pretty frequently in my garage when I'm cleaning the car as my garage isn't deep enough to let me comfortably around both the front and rear of the car. Works well for that.

 

[TjckTock]

I've never used this feature so forgive me if this suggestion is ignorant, but doesn't the auto-park cue off the parking spot markings? If so, I wonder if bringing black poster board to cover the existing and present new white markers closer to the building would do want you want. Maybe if it is too narrow it won't recognize it as a valid parking spot but might be interesting to try (with caution obv.).

 

[PhysicsGuy]

I want to hear the reasons you can't park with the passenger side by the wall. Harder to estimate distance?

No, that is not one of the reasons.

 

[PhysicsGuy]

This would be awesome! Then my Model Y would become the world’s most expensive RC car. But in all seriousness.. this is why I believe the ability to manually steer the car is prohibited.

An RC car that only goes 2 or 3 mph is not going to be that fun and, in all seriousness, I therefore don't see why it needs to be prohibited. It would make the summon feature much more useful.
I wonder if the reason is that, as a robotics company, Tesla wants to work toward a goal of having the intelligence and decision making in the car itself. A manual operation summon that included steering would be more difficult for the smart summon to compete with. Other than that, I genuinely do not see a compelling reason not to allow 3 steering positions (left, straight, right).

 

[brkaus]

An RC car that only goes 2 or 3 mph is not going to be that fun and, in all seriousness, I therefore don't see why it needs to be prohibited. It would make the summon feature much more useful.
I wonder if the reason is that, as a robotics company, Tesla wants to work toward a goal of having the intelligence and decision making in the car itself. A manual operation summon that included steering would be more difficult for the smart summon to compete with. Other than that, I genuinely do not see a compelling reason not to allow 3 steering positions (left, straight, right).

I think dealing with the latency of the current link it might be very difficult / risky (phone -> Tesla server -> car).

 

[ScoobyDoo82]

I think dealing with the latency of the current link it might be very difficult / risky (phone -> Tesla server -> car).

This is the main reason. The connection needs to be perfect for this to ever be a reality.

 

[TjckTock]

They don't have to go through the server once authorized. Bluetooth would be plenty fast. If not receiving consistent, redundant commands passing CRC it freezes and waits until the link is stable. Not that hard.