Elon "About to end range anxiety"

[Freudianly]

It is incredible how expectation get recalibrated. As Louis C.K. said, "Everything is amazing, and nobody's happy."

 

[clea]

+1 It would definitely be nice to have support for waypoints along a given route. Until then, a workaround would be to manually record the results for the whole trip (start -> destination) and use the navigation computer for each of the waypoints.

Hopefully we are wrong and the new Tripplanner update will include manually added waypoints. You know it can support them because they show automatically generated waypoints in the form of charger stops while routing you to a final destination ...

 

[brianman]

What is amazing is the enormously high expectations we all have of Tesla vehicles vs. ICE cars. It's like some of us want the darn Model S to become a transformer or something.

Well now I do....

 

[SW2Fiddler]

He didn't say free superchargers for businesses AFAIK he said free charging equipment for businesses. As in if a business wants charging Tesla will send a HPWC for free to be installed at the location as destination charging not supercharging.

Nowadays, the Destination Charging program provides Tesla HPWCs and J1772 charge points. You know, for fairness and functionality (and to forestall the dreaded LEAF Driver Rage incidents).

 

[Freudianly]

Just to state my opinion on this news released today, it looks like another "very nice" upgrade. Not earth-shattering, not revolutionary, but a lot better than a minor streamlining or reworking. It's going to be a very nice addition. There have been several of these very nice upgrades over the past year, and I think if they continue at this rate it's going to result in an unassailable advantage for Tesla.

It'll be great to live in San Diego and say to the car "I'd like to drive to Quebec without spending a penny on fuel. Where do I go?" and the car will work it out for you.

Or... Madrid to Moscow. Or... Lijiang to Harbin. etc. etc.

When the Model 3 hits, and people are driving long distances for free... it's going to make life for gasoline car makers pretty difficult.

Most people do not seem to realize that the 6.2 firmware is a checkmate move by Elon.
Check was the supercharger network.
Pure genius.

 

[brianman]

And if they had given everybody more range, they'd just go faster. A friend of mine drives 100 mph (just because he can, I guess) just so he arrives at the SC before he hits zero. If he had more range, he'd try for 105. Everything I read on this forum, people want more range so they can drive even further over the speed limit. Must. Get. There. Faster.

I know not everyone is like that, but when I have lots of range, I drive faster, too. When jumping from charger to distant charger, I'm in the slow lane.

Safety and laws aside.... Arriving at the supercharger with "close to zero without going under" is about as time efficient as you can get. Pairing that with always charging the bottom 2/3 of the battery rather than the top 2/3 means you'll have faster charge times per kWh as well.

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Safety and laws aside.... Arriving at the supercharger with "close to zero without going under" is about as time efficient as you can get. Pairing that with always charging the bottom 2/3 of the battery rather than the top 2/3 means you'll have faster charge times per kWh as well.

I thought you needed a non-negligible percentage above 0 before it hit full speed. Or is it only slow in the safety buffer?

 

[brianman]

Looks nice!

Caption contest:
"Honey, are you still cold?"

 

[Joel]

Fantastic news overall.
Exactly what the saner heads here (sorry) predicted and even a little outlook on Firmware 7.0.
10 days until 6.2 gets released, so that is (in Elon Time) mid to late April. Not bad, not bad.

You were correct by not identifying the year. Mid to late April 2016 is in play for Tesla Time.

 

[Saghost]

View attachment 75275

Looks nice!

Source: TM twitter

Huh. Looks like Tesla pretty much just gave us the 'road trip' firmware update I've been taking about off and on for a few months - with most of the bells and whistles even, including the how long do I need to charge for the next leg piece. (Not sure if it'll have the countdown timers I suggested - I think I saw something somewhere about sending a notification when you have enough.)

It'll be interesting to see what options they give you as it lays out the trip, and whether they are doing SC utilization predictions behind the scenes and adjusting the routes based on that.

If they don't tell us they are doing it, there might be no way to know without a forced overload test (at a gathering, take a dozen cars and sequentially route them to the same destination, then see if they all get handed the same plan, or if the fifth or tenth car to get the route is suddenly skipping a different set of SCs, with a higher charge in places.)
Walter

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

Just to state my opinion on this news released today, it looks like another "very nice" upgrade. Not earth-shattering, not revolutionary, but a lot better than a minor streamlining or reworking. It's going to be a very nice addition. There have been several of these very nice upgrades over the past year, and I think if they continue at this rate it's going to result in an unassailable advantage for Tesla.

It'll be great to live in San Diego and say to the car "I'd like to drive to Quebec without spending a penny on fuel. Where do I go?" and the car will work it out for you.

Or... Madrid to Moscow. Or... Lijiang to Harbin. etc. etc.

When the Model 3 hits, and people are driving long distances for free... it's going to make life for gasoline car makers pretty difficult.

It does seem that the 6.2 Driver Assistance updates have been somewhat drowned out by the nav stuff. With 6.2 Model S will have:
- (6.0) Speed assist
- (6.0) Lane departure warning
- (6.1) Adaptive cruise
- (6.1) Auto high beam
- (6.1) Collision detection
- (6.2) Emergency braking
- (6.2) Blind spot detection

So what's missing compared to other manufacturers?
- Lane keep assistance
- Semi-automonous parking
- HUD

Anything else I'm missing that's found across multiple manufacturers? Or is 6.2 the "No More Excuses" release?

 

[NuclearPowered]

The supercharger times displayed on the screenshots distributed as press material are a lot longer than the touted "half charge in 20 min" or "stop for a quick break and go". I wonder what kind of battery reserve margins the trip software will bake into the route plan.

 

[GLDYLX]

Would love to be able to use the trip planning feature without being in the car. Plan out the trip on the Tesla website beforehand, and if logged into the site, it would be aware of my car's location/type/SOC etc just as if I were sitting in the driver's seat.

This. Imagine planning a road trip at your kitchen table (while dinner is cooking), with multiple overnight stays, finding destination chargers and making hotel rezzies (in a separate browser window). THEN you can print or e-mail your itinerary for your house/pet/child-sitter and/or Emergency Contact. All through the one trip-planning app.

THEN, on the fly, itinerary changes (due to weather/traffic/whim) can be e-mailed to afore-mentioned contacts.

And heck, if something untoward were to happen, the app could notify said contact(s).

This lone wolf could wander the earth (or at least the continental US) without (causing the EC) anxiety (of whatever).

Someday...

Happy Thursday!

 

[brianman]

From the R&T live blog:

Regarding the claim that Auto Steering can drive from San Francisco to Seattle: "It's technically capable of going from parking lot to parking lot. But we won't be enabling that for users with this hardware suite because we don't think it's going to be safe in neighborhoods where there's no lane markings and kids playing in the street. It will only be enabled if you're on a highway or major road."

Perhaps it's being discussed already in another thread but I found this part interesting.

Elon made a comment soon after the D announcement along the lines of "no significant hardware advances for 2 years" which, to me, implied that at the very least the sensor suite in place at the D announcement would be "enough" for at least 2 years of firmware advances in the "auto pilot feature set".

This new quote (and related discussion I've seen from live blogging of the press event) suggests that the 10-50mph "neighborhoods with children around" functionality either [a] won't be available for at least two years or will require new hardware. If that would contract the previous statement.

Perhaps I'm missing something or misunderstanding.

 

[Jaff]

Agree...how do the other EV manufacturers counter this (without having any sort of Level III infrastructure)?

This brings in to focus (for those prospective Model III buyers and their competitive wannabees + all of the Model S / X buyers and their competitive wannabees) how Tesla has "eliminated" range anxiety as both a roadblock to purchasing an EV, and built a very compelling case to only consider a Tesla when considering any EV purchase...brilliant move imo...

Most people do not seem to realize that the 6.2 firmware is a checkmate move by Elon.
Check was the supercharger network.
Pure genius.

 

[apacheguy]

The supercharger times displayed on the screenshots distributed as press material are a lot longer than the touted "half charge in 20 min" or "stop for a quick break and go". I wonder what kind of battery reserve margins the trip software will bake into the route plan.

Yeah, I thought this update would include an improved SpC algorithm. Guess we are never going to see that.

 

[andrewket]

It does seem that the 6.2 Driver Assistance updates have been somewhat drowned out by the nav stuff. With 6.2 Model S will have:
- Adaptive cruise
- Auto high beam
- Collision detection
- Emergency braking
- Blind spot detection

So what's missing compared to other manufacturers?
- Lane keep assistance
- Semi-automonous parking
- HUD

Anything else I'm missing that's found across multiple manufacturers? Or is 6.2 the "No More Excuses" release?

Adaptive cruise
Auto high beam
Collision detection

are all in 6.1 (the current release)

 

[Discoducky]

Dont' forget Intelligent Speed Assist and Lane Departure Warning :smile:

 

[andrewket]

The supercharger times displayed on the screenshots distributed as press material are a lot longer than the touted "half charge in 20 min" or "stop for a quick break and go". I wonder what kind of battery reserve margins the trip software will bake into the route plan.

I was wondering this as well. I hope that's a user selectable option in % or miles.

 

[Saghost]

Perhaps it's being discussed already in another thread but I found this part interesting.

Elon made a comment soon after the D announcement along the lines of "no significant hardware advances for 2 years" which, to me, implied that at the very least the sensor suite in place at the D announcement would be "enough" for at least 2 years of firmware advances in the "auto pilot feature set".

This new quote (and related discussion I've seen from live blogging of the press event) suggests that the 10-50mph "neighborhoods with children around" functionality either [a] won't be available for at least two years or will require new hardware. If that would contract the previous statement.

Perhaps I'm missing something or misunderstanding.

I thought it was one year in that statement - and I'm expecting the Model X will have some additional sensors when it get released, which may or may not be retrofittable.

I would have thought that the main gap in the current system is side looking cameras/radar for stop signs and traffic lights, but the quote makes it sound like they are more worried about seeing kids (which I guess could still be running out from the side beyond the coverage of the camera/radar.)

It'd also be nice to have longer/more precise rear view sensing - but that would be for the freeway, where they are apparently comfortable with what they have.
Walter