Suggestion For Change To Auto-Folding Mirror Operation

[jerry33]

I park in a parking garage with narrow parking spaces. My parking spot has a large concrete column at one rear corner. The concrete column ensures generous spacing between parked cars, but the spacing is tight where there is no column separating adjacent parking spaces.

Kind of like this?

 

[ChadFeldheimer]

Kind of like this?

Actually, exactly like that! Except our column appears to be deeper - it blocks the driver's door if I were to back in.

 

[Cyclone]

Kind of like this?
View attachment 105364

I'd like to see Auto-Parking tackle that! Ha!

 

[supratachophobia]

I have started this poll to see how the community feels about a suggestion I've made to Tesla concerning changing the way the auto-folding mirrors operate.

While many have suggested a GPS-based system, and while that can remain the ultimate goal, I fear that may be too much to ask for in the immediate future, so my suggestion is for a very basic change that should be fairly easy to implement.

Quite simply, my suggestion is that if mirrors are folded manually, they should not unfold until they are either unfolded manually, or until the car reaches a speed of 25 MPH.

(<Edit:>For those who never fold the mirrors manually, nothing would change. Automatic folding and unfolding would operate exactly as it does now.<End Edit>)

There are several advantages to this behavior over the current behavior, in which the mirrors unfold on their own. For example, if a driver regularly folds his or her mirrors to pull into their tight garage, the mirrors will remain folded until after the car has been pulled out of the garage, without additional folding actions having to be taken by whomever is driving the car at the time. Similarly, if a driver has folded the mirrors manually before parking in a tight spot near walls, poles, or other cars, the mirrors will not unfold into those obstructions on their own. Finally, this behavior is more intuitive. When set to auto-fold, the mirrors fold on their own and unfold on their own automatically when locking and unlocking the car, but a manual override to fold should only be undone by a manual override to unfold. It's more straight forward, and what we would expect to happen.

If enough TMC members respond to this poll, and if the results show what I expect they will show, I will write to Tesla again, to make them aware of the poll results.

Thanks!

Andy, did you submit/vote on this in the 7.1 Suggestion thread? That particular item got a huge response from those who voted if I recall correctly. But everyone should still vote here too.

 

[Andyw2100]

Andy, did you submit/vote on this in the 7.1 Suggestion thread? That particular item got a huge response from those who voted if I recall correctly. But everyone should still vote here too.

I honestly don't remember if I submitted it or just voted for it, but if it was there I would have at a minimum voted for it.

There are now twenty people who are opposed to the suggested change, but not one of them has been able to explain why. I'm wondering if some people are just selecting that answer in the poll out of spite or something. I know a lot of people disagree with my position on other contentious issues discussed on TMC. Until one of the people who selected that answer presents an argument to explain what they believe they would be losing if my suggested solution were implemented, I have to believe the people selecting that answer either don't understand the proposed solution, don't understand how the system currently operates, or are selecting that answer just for the heck of it. I am very open to being shown something that I may have missed, but so far no one has done that.

 

[bxr140]

There are now twenty people who are opposed to the suggested change, but not one of them has been able to explain why. I'm wondering if some people are just selecting that answer in the poll out of spite or something.

I'm actually a bit perplexed why you keep brining this up, as you've already answered your own question.

The bottom line is that it was not a well constructed poll. Your supporting posts are not concise, technical explanations; rather, they are lengthy and wandering, with contradictory passages.


For the record, I don't know anything about you or your posting history, so I'm not in this trying to bruise an Internet ego or anything. This kind of thread can be quite valuable, and hopefully you learn something about creating a poll that's truly useful and accurate.

 

[Andyw2100]

I'm actually a bit perplexed why you keep brining this up, as you've already answered your own question.

The bottom line is that it was not a well constructed poll. Your supporting posts are not concise, technical explanations; rather, they are lengthy and wandering, with contradictory passages.


For the record, I don't know anything about you or your posting history, so I'm not in this trying to bruise an Internet ego or anything. This kind of thread can be quite valuable, and hopefully you learn something about creating a poll that's truly useful and accurate.

You're the only person who has posted that opinion. I think it's important to explain things in enough detail for people to understand them. The poll asks people to read the first post before responding. The first post is a few paragraphs long. If you think asking people to read that is too much to ask then I guess we just disagree.

Basically your argument comes down to people are too stupid to understand a detailed post, or won't be bothered to read it. I disagree.

 

[jerry33]

No folding mirrors on my car at all (other than physically moving them). However, i'll make the following points:

1. There isn't a lot of difference between folded and not folded.

2. If I manually fold them, I would like them to stay folded.

3. There are some streets that are so narrow that folding and keeping them folded is a necessity.

4. I'm not opposed to the auto unfold at some speed as long as it's an option like creep mode.

5. The backup camera has removed almost all of the times I use the wing mirrors (and over half of the times I use the rear view mirror).

 

[bxr140]

Basically your argument comes down to people are too stupid to understand a detailed post, or won't be bothered to read it.

In a effort to make this constructive and find some common ground, yes, human nature needs to be considered when gathering data. People naturally tend to be conservative when they are uncertain. People also have an attention span inverse to time (or in this case, words).

While the OPs intent was fine, his construction clearly needs refinement. Again, the numbers don't lie. 27% of the respondents came away thinking the OP wanted to change the way their auto-fold works. Hell, it says so right in the thread title. And the poll picks. And the first paragraph of his first post. (Not to mention all the subsequent contradictory phrasing.)

Lets not play dumb here. Nobody in their right mind would oppose a modification that simply didn't affect them.

 

[Soolim]

In a effort to make this constructive and find some common ground, yes, human nature needs to be considered when gathering data. People naturally tend to be conservative when they are uncertain. People also have an attention span inverse to time (or in this case, words).

While the OPs intent was fine, his construction clearly needs refinement. Again, the numbers don't lie. 27% of the respondents came away thinking the OP wanted to change the way their auto-fold works. Hell, it says so right in the thread title. And the poll picks. And the first paragraph of his first post. (Not to mention all the subsequent contradictory phrasing.)

Lets not play dumb here. Nobody in their right mind would oppose a modification that simply didn't affect them.

That is also my impression, i.e. the suggested change does not affect the auto-fold. So why should there be a 27% auto-fold user be against? May be I am confused.

 

[Andyw2100]

2. If I manually fold them, I would like them to stay folded.

3. There are some streets that are so narrow that folding and keeping them folded is a necessity.

4. I'm not opposed to the auto unfold at some speed as long as it's an option like creep mode.

Thanks, Jerry.

Your post makes me realize that it is possible that some of the people who are indicating they are opposed to the suggestion may be saying that because of what I wrote about the mirrors unfolding automatically at 25 MPH, without realizing that I was just restating the behavior Tesla states in the manual is the current behavior. My suggestion was consistent with that, as opposed to suggesting multiple changes at once, which might give Tesla more reason to not implement the suggestion. Also had I proposed doing away with the auto fold at speed people who currently like the fact that the manual says that the system behaves that way now would have had a reason to be opposed to the suggestion. I thought it would be simplest to change just one aspect of things that no one would object to.

Incidentally not only is the manual wrong about the mirrors unfolding on their own at 25 MPH (they don't unfold at any speed), it is also wrong about the mirrors not being able to be folded at 25 MPH or above. I folded mine last night at 50 MPH, just to see if I could.

 

[Cyclone]

I still think the "answer" in terms of best efficiently meeting most needs and using few programmers is to add a flag. If the mirror is folded manually, nothing absent a manual unfold (by button or physically) should let auto-unfold kick in.

I.E., Jerry's #1 - If I fold the mirrors in manually, I want them to stay that way!

If we expand that to speeds, location, etc, it requires more resources and there are a few use cases where it may impact someone.

 

[Andyw2100]

I still think the "answer" in terms of best efficiently meeting most needs and using few programmers is to add a flag. If the mirror is folded manually, nothing absent a manual unfold (by button or physically) should let auto-unfold kick in.

I.E., Jerry's #1 - If I fold the mirrors in manually, I want them to stay that way!

If we expand that to speeds, location, etc, it requires more resources and there are a few use cases where it may impact someone.

I'm fine with that.

It requires just one change to the way the mirrors are actually working now, though Tesla would think it would require two, based on the way the manual is written.

 

[Whitmarsh]

No folding mirrors on my car at all (other than physically moving them). However, i'll make the following points:

1. There isn't a lot of difference between folded and not folded.

2. If I manually fold them, I would like them to stay folded.

3. There are some streets that are so narrow that folding and keeping them folded is a necessity.

4. I'm not opposed to the auto unfold at some speed as long as it's an option like creep mode.

5. The backup camera has removed almost all of the times I use the wing mirrors (and over half of the times I use the rear view mirror).

I agree with this (though I'm not sure what 1. means). As I said in another post, I want to be in control of the mirrors. Andy, I think you should add this to the choices in the poll, in which case I could vote, or add 'provided it were an option' to the 25mph choice.

 

[Andyw2100]

I agree with this (though I'm not sure what 1. means). As I said in another post, I want to be in control of the mirrors. Andy, I think you should add this to the choices in the poll, in which case I could vote, or add 'provided it were an option' to the 25mph choice.

You can't add options to a poll once it has started.

The 25 MPH thing is what Tesla has in the manual now. I only included it in the suggestion to be consistent with what Tesla already said they were doing, and to minimize the amount of change Tesla would have to make.

Perhaps I will need to start another poll in a week or two, worded differently, leaving out any reference to the speed limit, and just stipulating as others have suggested, that a manual close is never over-ridden. The problem, though, is that that will fly in direct contrast to what Tesla thinks is happening now at 25 MPH. Someone at Tesla made a conscious decision that the mirrors should always unfold at 25 MPH. It will take even more to overcome that than to get Tesla to make the simpler change, but we can certainly try.

 

[Whitmarsh]

You can't add options to a poll once it has started.

The 25 MPH thing is what Tesla has in the manual now. I only included it in the suggestion to be consistent with what Tesla already said they were doing, and to minimize the amount of change Tesla would have to make.

Perhaps I will need to start another poll in a week or two, worded differently, leaving out any reference to the speed limit, and just stipulating as others have suggested, that a manual close is never over-ridden. The problem, though, is that that will fly in direct contrast to what Tesla thinks is happening now at 25 MPH. Someone at Tesla made a conscious decision that the mirrors should always unfold at 25 MPH. It will take even more to overcome that than to get Tesla to make the simpler change, but we can certainly try.

I wonder whether the speed thing was part of the design and someone thought better of it but forgot to change the manual. Best to leave well alone, I think.

 

[MikeBur]

There's no question that there are better, "sexier" ways to improve the mirror folding and unfolding in Model S. It's just that though I'm not a programmer, I have to think that involving GPS or Homelink in the process would mean significantly more programming, and would take this to a whole different level. I'm in no way against Tesla going that far if they are willing. But since we have no indication of that, I'm suggesting something that should be fairly simple, and thus provides huge bang for the buck, in that it makes the current system a heck of a lot better, and requires very little of Tesla from a resource standpoint.

sorry, "lost" this thread. I honestly don't know how you all have the time and spare memory cells for working all these differing threads ;-)

I can't believe it would be that much more programming effort, though it may be more validation effort for sure. Test always gates engineering imho

as as far as mirrors retracting, I have not had this happen, even when accidentally hitting the middle button after adjusting the mirrors at >70mph... (On some cars the middle button/ center of switch is to disable accidental adjustment). Catching up on rest of thread now. Kinda surprised this is so long - lol

 

[jerry33]

I agree with this (though I'm not sure what 1. means).

The difference in distance between open and folded is small. At least on my car it's only about 50 mm, on many cars it's more like 150 mm.

 

[Whitmarsh]

The difference in distance between open and folded is small. At least on my car it's only about 50 mm, on many cars it's more like 150 mm.

The manual says:
Overall Width (including mirrors) 86.2in/2189mm
Overall Width (excluding mirrors) 77.3in/1964mm

so a difference of 8.9in/225mm - which makes a big difference on a narrow road.

- - - Updated - - -

You can't add options to a poll once it has started.

The 25 MPH thing is what Tesla has in the manual now. I only included it in the suggestion to be consistent with what Tesla already said they were doing, and to minimize the amount of change Tesla would have to make.

Perhaps I will need to start another poll in a week or two, worded differently, leaving out any reference to the speed limit, and just stipulating as others have suggested, that a manual close is never over-ridden. The problem, though, is that that will fly in direct contrast to what Tesla thinks is happening now at 25 MPH. Someone at Tesla made a conscious decision that the mirrors should always unfold at 25 MPH. It will take even more to overcome that than to get Tesla to make the simpler change, but we can certainly try.

I have a version of the NA manual and an EU manual which do not have the 25mph paragraph, so perhaps it was never implemented.

 

[Andyw2100]

The difference in distance between open and folded is small. At least on my car it's only about 50 mm, on many cars it's more like 150 mm.

The manual says:
Overall Width (including mirrors) 86.2in/2189mm
Overall Width (excluding mirrors) 77.3in/1964mm

so a difference of 8.9in/225mm - which makes a big difference on a narrow road.

I haven't measured anything, but just want to point out that the measurements above from the manual say "excluding mirrrors", not "with mirros folded."

So it is entirely possible that Jerry's correct about the difference being small.