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Tesla's FSD – A Useless Technology Demo

- a Useless Technology Demo - Introduction - Rules of Engagement - Test Ride 1: from Kings Beach to Truckee (11 miles) - Test Ride 2: I-80 from Truckee to Blue Canyon (36 miles) - Test Ride 3: from West-Valley College to I-85 Entrance (1 mile) - Conclusion Introduction In the past months, Tesla has been offering a free, one-month trial of their full self-driving (FSD) system to all current owners. It looks like they are rolling this out in stages, because I only got mine only a few days ago.

Early on, I had one case where the autopilot started slowing down for no good reason, but since I distrust these kind of systems and since phantom braking has been reported quite a bit in the press, I try to keep attention to what the car is doing at all times. There were two nearly identical cases, where the 2-lane road was dead straight, with excellent paint marks, and with cars right of me, yet FSD made nervous left-right oscillation-like corrections that I have never experienced before in autopilot mode. With the limited functionality of autopilot, you hit the sweet spot: adaptive cruise control and lane centering work reliably, and you don’t need to worry about any other mischief.

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