
Another Tesla on Autopilot crashed into a stationary object – driver is suing - vezycash
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/10/man-sues-tesla-says-autopilot-steered-him-into-a-stalled-car-at-80-mph/
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ElBarto
"While the system can handle a range of driving conditions, it's not designed
to stop for parked cars or other stationary objects when traveling at highway
speeds."

IMHO this means that the system hasn't currently got a field of view that goes
far enough to be able to detect stationary objects and avoid them/stop in time
when travelling at high enough speeds.

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matt_the_bass
I don’t think it is a stopping distance issue. I think it is a data fusion
issue. At least this is the case with other brand’s technologies. The
emergency stopping is not related to the adaptive cruise control. In cruise
control mode, objects with large relative speed differences are ignored.

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ElBarto
The "when travelling at highway speeds" in the excerpt I quoted does sound
like this is a "field of view" issue considering that Autopilot may be turned
on from 17mph.

As the car's speed increases, it must be able to look further ahead and to
make sense of what it sees in order to avoid slow/stationary objects, and it
seems to me that they have a limitation there.

It seems crazy to supply ignore "objects with large relative speed
differences". These are the most dangerous ones!

They say Autopilot can detect a potential front collision within 160m and has
an emergency braking feature, but the statement above seems to contradict
that.

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matt_the_bass
I hear what you’re saying. I think part of the problem is none of the
manufacturers are clear in what is their algorithm other than “its good and it
works!” This is inline with the calls by many for a NTSB standard for testing
such features.

On a separate note, what’s the deal with min speed? My VW Atlas has a min
speed of 34 mph.

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ElBarto
I wouldn't be surprised if the min speed what a simple way to say that their
systems do not support congested urban environment, starting, and navigating.

Basically, without a min speed people would try to use the car as a fully
autonomous one: Get on the car, turn Autopilot on, wait for the car to drive
itself.

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matt_the_bass
That’s a good point. I hadn’t thought of that.

Just to clarify, the adaptive cruise control in the Atlas works as low speed
but lane keeping does not. I actually use ax all the time even in slow
residential areas. It prevents me from inadvertently speeding.

