Tesla Wrongful Death Lawsuit

[TachyonBomb]

Originally Posted by jsimon7777

Musk is internationally known as a blowhard. It all depends on the judge and jury. Some people believe anything.

But how stupid does a guy have to be to use autopilot when he knows it's not going to work there? Sounds like suicide or personal negligence to me. I wonder if the family had debts. Lots of ways a lawsuit can go.

I spent last night looking into the Model 3 and S. Man, the PDL Teslas are fucking rockets. Compared to the I-Pace, do I want luxury and comfort with blistering acceleration or near-luxury and comfort with rocketship acceleration? I know that acceleration is addictive. I can totally see why people make these high twin HP builds and can't get satisfied with a mere 260WHP or even 400WHP.

Be aware that the way batteries deliver energy is different than what you're used to.

In a simplified example you car will give the same energy/power output from a full tank of gas all the way to an empty tank of gas.

In an electric car as the battery goes below 80-75% charge the power output of the motor will start to decrease noticeably. That decrease in power will keep growing until it has nothing left to give at zero charge. So to feel the car at its maximum power output you will want to keep the battery charged above 80%. This is a common trait with anything that is battery powered.

[EAGLE5]

Originally Posted by TachyonBomb

Be aware that the way batteries deliver energy is different than what you're used to.

In a simplified example you car will give the same energy/power output from a full tank of gas all the way to an empty tank of gas.

In an electric car as the battery goes below 80-75% charge the power output of the motor will start to decrease noticeably. That decrease in power will keep growing until it has nothing left to give at zero charge. So to feel the car at its maximum power output you will want to keep the battery charged above 80%. This is a common trait with anything that is battery powered.

We're on our third EV. We've hit 0% indicated charge many times on the shorter range ones and slowly puttered through the canyon on the way home. That said, with a longer range EV, we'll never even come close to the bottom 5% and rarely will hit 20%. We haven't yet. I think we got down to the 30s once when we didn't charge for a few days and did some relatively long trips. So we're not worried.

The ipace does limit the power going to the motors at all times. This is partly why it can maintain performance on the track through several laps. The Teslas seem to take whatever the battery can give in the moment, leading to overheating through overwhelming the cooling system, and varying performance. Still, at 25% battery up, the P100DL is going to hit 60 in 3 seconds or fewer.

Getting a new Model 3 right now is probably fine. No big changes anytime soon, I think. The Model S and X are getting new suspensions and motors soon, new interiors probably later this year, and possibly new batteries in the next 12 months. That'll significantly drop the value of used models.

[Irace86.2.0]

Originally Posted by TachyonBomb

There is a fully autonomous system in all models. For both freeway and street. I've seen it and was in the drivers seat while it was operating on public streets. The function is turned off for public use but is already build in every cars software..

I’m aware of this, but it doesn’t really change my point that the current level 3 autonomy, or whatever it is, is likely worse in these cases of abuse than with more advanced or with more basic levels of autonomy. I’m not saying this level of autonomy isn’t safer than nothing, but there is an incidence of negligence on the drivers in some cases whom treat the level of autonomy as if it were full when it is not.

[soundman98]

Originally Posted by maslin

We had a good discussion about Tesla and their media coverage at the GLC/S/GLE Hybrid training.

They made a good point, gas cars catch on fire all the time when they crash. Fire departments respond to all MVAs. No one brings it up because everyone understands gasoline is flammable and when you crash a car it may catch on fire. There's some assumed safety that removing the gas tank removes the chance for fire. The opportunity is still there, it just needs to be understood and managed in different ways.

Mercedes starting putting QR codes on the driver door jamb and fuel door years ago. Links directly to a page designating safety hazards, cut points, etc for first responders. I hope to see this take off industry wide in the (near) future.

https://www.mbusa.com/mercedes/servi.../rescue_assist

there was just that electric drift camaro that wasn't allowed to run because the local fire department stated that they weren't fully equipped to deal with it going up in flames.

a lot of it is just the fact that we've had over 50 years to develop ways to control/fight gasoline vehicle fires. electric while not new, is a 'new' technology, and the methods are completely different than gas vehicles to extinguish, and that scares a lot of people.

Originally Posted by TachyonBomb

Lithium ion batteries have long been known to be combustible when the jelly sacks inside are compromised in some way. That is what Samsung phone issue was a couple of years ago. There are plenty of videos out there showing lithium ion batteries catching fire when damaged. It should not be much of a surprise when an electric car battery pack catches on fire due to damage. All electric car battery packs are literally packed with rows and rows of those larger cylindrical lithium ion vape batteries.

but the truth is that lithium has been packaged in a cute little eco friendly form. the majority of people don't consider their cell phone batteries a fire risk. we don't use lithium to burn weeds, start bonfires, or huff the fumes of. lithium-ion is largely an unknown material to the majority of people. they plug it in for 'x', and it magically powers their car for 'x'. it might as well be voodoo. no liquids, no smells, no sounds.

so you're not wrong, but no one is really expecting these packs to erupt in flames because no one holds their cellphone like that, and if cellphones are safe, 'clearly' cars powered by the same technology are safe!

[Irace86.2.0]

Just fyi, Tesla says there was one accident for every 1.76 million miles traveled in their cars, but only one for every 2.87 million miles traveled when autopilot was engaged. Considering autopilot is engaged more often or necessarily during easier road conditions like on highways on summer days versus in cities on rainy days, these stats might not be very suggestive. I believe most accidents have historically happened at intersections.

[soundman98]

Originally Posted by Irace86.2.0

Just fyi, Tesla says there was one accident for every 1.76 million miles traveled in their cars, but only one for every 2.87 million miles traveled when autopilot was engaged.

this doesn't make sense statistically... it reads as 1.76 million miles per car...

[Irace86.2.0]

Originally Posted by soundman98

this doesn't make sense statistically... it reads as 1.76 million miles per car...

Not really. Read it again. “In their cars” means in their fleet. It really doesn’t matter if it was one car or a fleet of cars. The statistic is one accident per 1.76 million miles traveled. If a single car was driven the average 12-15k miles per year then it would take over 100 years to have an accident on average. Hence the logical inference that they are referring to their fleet.

https://www.tesla.com/VehicleSafetyReport

Average for other cars is 436,000 per accident, so Teslas (or Tesla owners) are safer.

[Irace86.2.0]

I should add that this safety and knowledge of it is the reason why they are also getting into car insurance. They have data on how safe their cars are, so they know they can undercut average market rates, while breaking even or making a profit. I wouldn’t be surprised if most Tesla owners in the future will buy Tesla Insurance.

[Atmo]

We won't have an accurate safety picture of autonomous safety systems until NHTSA becomes more transparent. They seem hell-bent on deploying self-driving vehicles at any cost. NHTSA provided cover for Musk's specious claims. FTA:

An agency hid Tesla crash data for nearly two years. Is that any way to build trust in driverless cars?

https://www.latimes.com/business/aut...214-story.html

The full report from Quality Control Systems Corp. that has no financial interest in Tesla:

http://www.safetyresearch.net/Librar...fety_Claim.pdf

I can't argue that autonomous systems have the potential to be safer than human guided vehicles, but until the liability question is answered and systems function as intended reliably and repeatedly in all conditions, I'm out. It isn't reassuring that autonomous vehicles operated on public roads usually need politically granted liability waivers.

Regulators were quick to put the screws to drone operators but are behind the curve with autonomous vehicle regulation. We're literally about to be run over by technology putting the cart before the horse.

[Irace86.2.0]

[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GnH_C6NrOM&[/ame]

[Irace86.2.0]

Originally Posted by Atmo

We won't have an accurate safety picture of autonomous safety systems until NHTSA becomes more transparent. They seem hell-bent on deploying self-driving vehicles at any cost. NHTSA provided cover for Musk's specious claims. FTA:

An agency hid Tesla crash data for nearly two years. Is that any way to build trust in driverless cars?

https://www.latimes.com/business/aut...214-story.html

I read the article. It seems to draw conclusions without really having evidence to the contrary. It was more about them questioning the validity of the statistics, which is exactly what I mentioned above. There are too many confounding variables to be certain. For instance, maybe Tesla owners are safer drivers than the average driver. Maybe luxury drivers are safer too. Maybe autopilot is engaged in perfect driving situations and less often in poor situations, so when it is engaged is when it is safer.

The fact is that Teslas perform literally off the charts in safety crash tests. Couple that with any type of autonomous system (let alone the best autonomous system so far) with an engaged driver then I can only imagine the car is probably the safest car to drive. The only argument imaginable to the contrary is that their level 2 or 3 autonomous system could cause a propensity for driver negligence or disengagement. I believe at level 4 or 5 autonomy, the issue with driver negligence becomes a moot point.

[Dadhawk]

Originally Posted by Irace86.2.0

Average for other cars is 436,000 per accident, so Teslas (or Tesla owners) are safer.

That's the inference, but you also have to include the driving population. Tesla's average age is most likely higher than the average driving population as a whole. They are also likely to be more affluent.

For a true comparison (to me at least) you would need to take the larger set of "all cars driven" then narrow it down to "all other cars whose demographics are similar to Tesla" for a true comparison.

[Irace86.2.0]

Originally Posted by Irace86.2.0

I read the article. It seems to draw conclusions without really having evidence to the contrary. It was more about them questioning the validity of the statistics, which is exactly what I mentioned above. There are too many confounding variables to be certain. For instance, maybe Tesla owners are safer drivers than the average driver. Maybe luxury drivers are safer too. Maybe autopilot is engaged in perfect driving situations and less often in poor situations, so when it is engaged is when it is safer.

Originally Posted by Dadhawk

That's the inference, but you also have to include the driving population. Tesla's average age is most likely higher than the average driving population as a whole. They are also likely to be more affluent.

For a true comparison (to me at least) you would need to take the larger set of "all cars driven" then narrow it down to "all other cars whose demographics are similar to Tesla" for a true comparison.

Yea that is pretty much what I said as you can see, but thanks for restating the same idea if my statements weren’t clear.

[Irace86.2.0]

If anyone is a skeptic and hasn't seen this then give this a viewing. The chip design and autonomous system is pretty cool. The fact that they are running simulations in ghost mode to build the neural network is also sweet.


If you don't want to watch the whole thing then cut the Q&A and other non-essential presentations out and focus on the chip design and the two autonomous presenters.


[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ucp0TTmvqOE[/ame]