Tesla Software Irritations

[LewisSimon]

Hi everyone, I'm new to this forum and am hoping to be able to learn more about my Model Y and - in particular - some tips of optimal configuration of the software. Given I'm in Australia (Sydney), my experiences might be a little different from others, but I'd appreciate any thoughts people have nonetheless.

I've owned a Model Y for about 6 months now. First EV.
While I love the drive of the car - beats driving petrol-driven cars hands down for me and I'm NEVER going back.

I confess however to being disappointed with aspects of the software and associated firmware/sensors. Maybe I played the notion of Tesla being well ahead of anyone else on this front too much in my mind, but at the moment it's interfering with my satisfaction with the product.

First up is the Enhanced Autopilot:

• When cruising along a freeway at 80/100 kmh, I expect that the car will read the speed limit signs reasonably accurately and have some redundancy associated with it. In some instances - for no apparent reason - over a distance of about 1 km, the car reads signs as 80kmh, then 50, 70, 40 and then back to 80, all within a kilometre or so. When it first detects the drop, if I don't have my foot poised on the accelerator, the car brakes sharply and if someone is following behind me, then they also need to brake sharply;
• Open road travel can be just as dodgy, particularly in situations where another car crosses my car's path (to get to the other side of the road). If the other car was doing this within 50 metres I'd understand, but not within 150m - again, if I don't have my foot poised on the accelerator, the car brakes sharply and if someone is following behind me, then they also need to brake sharply;
• Can't 'disconnect' Auto Windscreen wipers from Autopilot - there's apparently a known issue that the wipers will come on when in auto for no reason...while this doesn't happen all the time, no one from Tesla seems to know when that issue will be fixed. I don't know about anyone else, but if there's a known issue, then a lot of effort should be put in to solving it.
• It would be amazing if I could configure the right hand steering wheel 'button/control' to allow me to turn Autopilot off rather than having to move the gear stick up.

In some kind of summary, Tesla's Autopilot doesn't behave the way most people (safely) drive - if I see a car crossing my path ahead, most will typically keep an eye on its progress and they might ease their foot on the accelerator if they think the other car is taking too long. I will only 'throw out the anchor' if it's becoming clear that the car ahead isn't going to get across in time. Given the use of and response time of technology, I'd expect that something automated would do this much better than I would. Further, Autopilot, like Cruise Control, is supposed to be all about reducing the effort for drivers and ensuring that they don't tire too quickly. Having to keep your foot poised over the accelerator in case the car senses incorrectly shouldn't be a feature of the Autopilot experience.

Second up is the connectivity:

• I expect that if I use my phone app to open the car, the car should automatically connect to my phone - it doesn't and most of the time I'm having to do this manually;
• If my wife and I are both in the car and I leave the car, the car automatically locks as I walk away. That's not so bad, but if my wife then decides to get out of the car, it sets off the alarm which can't be turned off easily without her closing the door and using her own app to open it;
• This morning I opened the car up to put some gear in it - my wife subsequently went to drive the car without me in it. Aside from having to use her 'card key' to start the car, she also couldn't connect her phone to the car without stopping it, locking it and then reopening the car with her own app.

Finally, Autopark:

• I can't speak for other countries, but in Australia, if someone wants to parallel park, they typically put their turn signal on as they move along the row of cars looking for a suitable space. With the turn signal on however, the 'Autopark' sensors won't kick in and the option therefore doesn't come up. This needs to be done better - without putting turn signals on, people behind don't provide enough room for a parallel park to be performed, rendering the function/feature useless.

These may seem to most others like minor irritations. However, there are enough of them to add up to frustrations and my impression is that Tesla are not spending any time/effort on advancing the intelligence of the car. If they are, then they are looking at additional features rather than 'nailing' the basics. Further, they don't seem to be focused on developing an automated experience that is similar to the way people would drive.

I really want my total experience to be a great one, so any constructive thoughts are greatly appreciated.

 

[gtae07]

Open road travel can be just as dodgy, particularly in situations where another car crosses my car's path (to get to the other side of the road). If the other car was doing this within 50 metres I'd understand, but not within 150m - again, if I don't have my foot poised on the accelerator, the car brakes sharply and if someone is following behind me, then they also need to brake sharply;

Yeah that one has gotten me a few times (using TACC). The first time was legit and I really did need the brakes. But the other occasions were cases where I didn't even need to slow down, but the car braked hard enough to slide stuff off the seats and/or throw my passengers into the belts.

 

[SidetrackedSue]

I suggest that you modify your signature line to include manufacture date (and location if you know it), and your latest software install. These will help with more specific answers.

1. Enhanced Autopilot: I used to have all of those issues. Most have gone away in the past year. It could be my software version. I have FSD (and FSDb) so am on a different update stream than others (hence my comment about including what you have.) The last one to check is my drive to our rental cottage next month. It is on highway 60 and the speed limit is 80kph and the car keeps changing its speed limit every time it sees a highway number sign. Last year, EAP was still too dangerous to use (for many other reasons you stated) and not having TACC or EAP was a real drag on that long drive. FSDb has improved amazingly in the past 6 months so I'm looking forward to seeing if that problem is gone. A mile from my home, on the freeway, both EAP and FSDb still see a 'phantom' speed lowering but don't actually brake for it. The speed was only 80 over 2 years ago for construction but that has all cleared up yet the software still changes the speed limit there.

2. Connectivity: we had issues but my husband has an ancient phone so he bought a fob and that cleared up those problems. Lately I see a lot of thread on people with BT problems with the latest updates so that might affect you. (I'm way behind those people because I'm on the FSD stream so don't have all the neat new UI features they have.)

3. Autopark: Don't use it because it is too slow. We test it out every once in a while, mostly backing up at superchargers. I'm in NA so don't have to parallel park. If I lived in Sydney I would be using it all the time so that seems to be a problem for you and a valid comment.

I, like you, expected amazing tech on a Tesla. I've been sorely disappointed, to the point that I'm unlikely to ever own another. Brace yourself. Not only does Elon add new features in updates (for instance after over a year I finally got blind spot monitoring), Elon takes away (in my case a microphone on the main screen so the passenger can use voice command, and of course, RADAR.)

 

[LewisSimon]

I suggest that you modify your signature line to include manufacture date (and location if you know it), and your latest software install. These will help with more specific answers.

1. Enhanced Autopilot: I used to have all of those issues. Most have gone away in the past year. It could be my software version. I have FSD (and FSDb) so am on a different update stream than others (hence my comment about including what you have.) The last one to check is my drive to our rental cottage next month. It is on highway 60 and the speed limit is 80kph and the car keeps changing its speed limit every time it sees a highway number sign. Last year, EAP was still too dangerous to use (for many other reasons you stated) and not having TACC or EAP was a real drag on that long drive. FSDb has improved amazingly in the past 6 months so I'm looking forward to seeing if that problem is gone. A mile from my home, on the freeway, both EAP and FSDb still see a 'phantom' speed lowering but don't actually brake for it. The speed was only 80 over 2 years ago for construction but that has all cleared up yet the software still changes the speed limit there.

2. Connectivity: we had issues but my husband has an ancient phone so he bought a fob and that cleared up those problems. Lately I see a lot of thread on people with BT problems with the latest updates so that might affect you. (I'm way behind those people because I'm on the FSD stream so don't have all the neat new UI features they have.)

3. Autopark: Don't use it because it is too slow. We test it out every once in a while, mostly backing up at superchargers. I'm in NA so don't have to parallel park. If I lived in Sydney I would be using it all the time so that seems to be a problem for you and a valid comment.

I, like you, expected amazing tech on a Tesla. I've been sorely disappointed, to the point that I'm unlikely to ever own another. Brace yourself. Not only does Elon add new features in updates (for instance after over a year I finally got blind spot monitoring), Elon takes away (in my case a microphone on the main screen so the passenger can use voice command, and of course, RADAR.)

Hi SideTrackedSue, thanks for your thoughts and tips on this.
My vehicle is Model Y, 2 wheel drive, built January 2023 (China); Currently on software version 2023.20.9 - I'll put this in my signature going forward.

Regarding the software version, we appear to be one version behind - I'm pretty sure I'm up to date.

It's also not clear to me whether there are differences in the FSD in NA versus what we have access to here - ours is Beta and at this stage I haven't paid for it, but am prepared to, particularly if it takes care of any of the items I've discussed.

Simon
Sydney, Australia: Model Y, 2 wheel drive, built January 2023 (China); Currently on software version 2023.20.9

 

[SidetrackedSue]

Regarding the software version, we appear to be one version behind - I'm pretty sure I'm up to date.

It's also not clear to me whether there are differences in the FSD in NA versus what we have access to here - ours is Beta and at this stage I haven't paid for it, but am prepared to, particularly if it takes care of any of the items I've discussed.

Your car will tell you when there is a new update available. (An orange download symbol in the top right.) Until Tesla decides you are worthy of a download version, there's little point in thinking about it because there's no reliable way to force your car to be offered a download. Some people have had luck with holding their tongues a certain way while rebooting or checking for latest version but nothing definitive. Part of the reason is that there are so many different versions of cars out there. For you and I, we are outside the US, therefore some things come a bit more slowly as legal requirements in other countries vary.

I currently have (accidentally) downloaded part of 2023.7.20. My version is way behind yours because I am in the FSDb update stream and you are not) and have stopped that because I don't want that version, which would move me up to FSDb 11.4.4. I'm holding out at least until the forums report better version of FSDb and the forums indicate 11.4.4 is a step backwards in ability in certain areas. (There are three different software 'numbers', one for the app on your phone, one for the main firmware (starts with the year the version is released) and one for the FSDb version.)

For me, v11.4.2 is very good for highway driving and we don't use in for street driving (except driving through a town when on a highway without making turns) because it seems either out to kill us (that's true even on the highway but more predictable) or too hesitant. It also didn't react to a deer (my husband did and the side camera proves we didn't hit the tail but we both thought we did). So you really, really, have to pay attention. The camera placement/angles mean it missed it coming out of the bush until it was too late for it to react. I have no idea in this case if our radar would have made a difference had it not been disabled by Elon. (BTW, are there roo bars for EVs? my son installed one on his ICE car here after returning home from living in Australia because it makes sense here due to our 'roos' (deer) yet is not part of our auto culture.)

We just got home from a 3500km road trip and used FSDb for almost 100% of the long haul driving. In fact, V11.4.2 is so smooth, at the beginning of the trip, as passenger, I couldn't tell when it was engaged except by looking at the screen. This experience was completely different from in January when I asked my husband to resort to TACC because FSDb was making me car sick. By the end of the trip, I could tell when it was engaged because it was smoother than when my husband was in control and I had him turn it on a couple of times in stop-and-go traffic because it was smoother than he was! (I have no idea why he wanted it off in stop-and-go traffic, since we got the car I've always used AP for that because it makes the 'sitting' a lot less boring since I can look around more, or just focus on whatever I have on the sound system.)

I'm pissed that you have many features I don't have (specifically a customizable scroll wheel and ability for larger fonts.) So I'm trying to not update again until I get those features. That is easy for me since my car's home is an underground garage so I have to either take it some place with high speed wifi in the parking (I go to our local Tesla service centre) or use my mobile phone data (data plans are very expensive in Canada compared to Australia). I downloaded V11.4.2 by accident because I had turned on data while having a picnic and the car took the chance to update. This latest half update happened when I was at my son's and parked the car close enough to his wifi that it connected and started the download. His credentials were in the system because we had updated the car last year when visiting him.

BTW: I found that, despite paying for premium connectivity, I needed data on my phone to deal with the car problems/questions/non-Tesla charging options while my husband is driving, plus I'm bored on road trips because my husband won't let me drive because he never gets over-tired. This is unlikely to be an issue for you (our last Australian trip we streamed music in the rental car because it was free to do so on my cheap pay-as-you-go SIM) but be aware that your passengers may be more bored than you when on road trips.

If you haven't found it already, there is a forum for Australian Tesla owners in TMC: Australia and they will be able to cover more accurately the FSDb capability in Australia to help you decide when to pull the trigger on buying FSD Capability. Also look for a local Facebook Tesla group. Here in Ottawa, our group covers all sorts of stuff (and also lends out adapters and group buys for winter tires), including how FSDb is handling local traffic circles as it it improved. Our city is on a border: think ACT/NSW except with two sets of traffic laws, signs in a different language, and a very different driver culture so how FSDb reacts on both side of border is not a trivial piece of knowledge.

 

[hmadsen]

We just went on a holiday driving 2500 miles in the car from northern europe to Italy and back, and with regards to the sign reading, i have to agree, the car is completely retarded in that way.

I have had it read speed signs that were only applicable to people using an offramp (Signified with an arrow sign below the speed sign) i have had it read signs on roads parallel to the freeway and i have also had it think a speed sign sticker (Put on the back of lorries to signify how fast they can go) was the speedlimit and slam on the brakes (Multiple stickers for different kinds of roads, but it chose the 40 kph sign)

Also, where i live there is an offramp right before the motorway starts, this offramp ends in a rather tight right hand corner, and there is a sign there that shows the recommended speed being 40 around the bend.

This sign is square and has 40 and then a tight right hand arrow but for some reason the Tesla thinks this is a speed sign.

It shows 40 in the display, but continues for about a mile at the set speed of 80 (After the bend) but then as said, after 1 mile it suddenly remembers the 40 sign and slams on the brakes even though it is a wide country road with a speed of 80. I have to be ready with the foot on the accelerator and after ½ a mile it gives up and just lets me drive 80

Also autosteer is annoying.

The allowed speed on the motorway most places are 130 kph (80 miles) so i use autosteer to keep in the lane.

If i press the accelerator even the slightest to gain just a wee bit of speed for some reason, for, whenever it gets to 140 (happens fast in a tesla) the car starts to scream at me for exceeding 140 kph (87 mph) and in a split second it disengages the autosteer, gives me multiple loud alarms and a big angry red steering wheel across the screen, and then the feature is disabled until the car has been in park, forcing me to exit the motorway, stop, put the car into P and then D to continue to use the function.

It is simply retarded that the car simply disables a feature if it feels i dont use it the right way.

Also the auto functions as a general feels very scared and overprotective...

If a car pulls across the road 50 meters ahead, and it is clear to me that the car will be "long gone" when i get to where it is now, the car will still panic and start braking way to soon.

The same if i approach a car in front of me on the freeway, i have to start to change lanes way before it is actually needed to stop the car from starting to brake to avoid hitting the car. (My lane change will be finished long time before i get to where the car is going to be)