In 2022, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) logged 758 complaints about Teslas suddenly decelerating for no reason on American highways (NHTSA ODI, 2022).
Drivers describe their vehicles “slamming the brakes” out of nowhere, with one shaken owner telling reporters, “It just slammed the brakes”.
These aren’t isolated glitches. U.S. District Judge Georgia Alexakis recently gave the green light to a class-action lawsuit, citing allegations that Tesla knowingly withheld warnings about this dangerous defect.
Same experience with autopilot. How are you able to use the limited autopilot?! My single downclick on the right stick on my Model 3 takes me straight to full auto and the limited lane keeping and passing is greyed out for a year now.
I was excited to be part of the beta that was going to bring in a new era of safety with autopilot driving back when it was finally released. I stopped using it a couple years ago with the increasingly poor changes and more and more limits to options. With other manufacturers making superior autopilots and safer cars it seems pointless now.
Side note: I have always found it frustrating hearing the autopilot haters especially at the beginning (now with the bad updates I have to agree with them). They bought it expecting a fulling function system that would flawlessly get them from point A to B like Musk promised. It was a beta release for the first mass autopilot service. What were you expecting?? All these people crashing for the most part were letting the car drive. You had to treat it like a 10 year old kid was at the wheel and be EXTRA attentive to everything because you not only had to watch out for outside dangers but your car possibly wanting to take on oncoming traffic. The second autopilot chose to turn sharper or start to do anything I wouldn’t do I took over. The audio feedback they had added was a great idea too. Hearing why I took over is important to know where the defect in the system is. I’m sure they have text to speech then AI scan the data to look for enough common responses so they can focus on the bigger issues.
Elon really ruined such a great thing by going drug addled insane. My plate holders say “SORRY! Bought it before he went crazy”. I feel bad for all the engineers stuck working there who signed on excited to bring in the new era of driving. There’s still good people there which is why I’m not a huge Tesla hater necessarily but absolutely a Musk hater. I wouldn’t buy another Tesla, and the fall from innovations and safety offsets this but the one thing they did that I’m glad for is they forced other manufacturers to take EVs seriously as a mainstream option. They finally decided to dump money on the ”risky world of unknowns” that would open them up to possibly countless recalls and class action lawsuits for anything they took a chance on and got wrong. They’ve been scrambling to catch up ever since.
I dumped my Tesla stock a long time ago and suggest anyone still holding on to do the same. I feel with the more unhinged Elon becomes the more likely it is the board will replace him and his tie to brand identity will tank the stock the second it’s announced. They know this which is why they continue to hold on. Profits over everything, including safety as always.
Hey friend, mine is a gen 2 S, so the menus may vary, but when I’m in park, I can turn off the “full self driving” option. Then that lets me turn lane centering on and off. That will put you back to the one click for cruise, second click for lane keep.
I made a second driver profile, one with autopilot and one without. That lets me switch in and out quickly without needing to find a safe spot to stop the car. I hope that helps!