[Theruleslawyer]

Originally Posted by BGM-M3COMP

I'm talking about the technology that is second to none right now. Im sure other car makers will catch up but they're not right now.

The other makes are catching up quicker on drivetrain stuff than Tesla is figuring out general quality control. TBH they aren't as far ahead as they claim. Their range figures tend to be very optimistic in the real world vs competitors who are more conservative. Once we get more dedicated ev platforms out and onto gen 2 drivelines I wouldn't be surprised to see Teslas edge disappear unless they have a battery breakthrough.

[BGM-M3COMP]

Originally Posted by heavyD^2

I have a 2022. Interior has actually exceeded expectations but my rear bumper doesn't fit right as there's a big gap one side, a front fender was misaligned, and one headlight was not flush. All have been fixed except the rear bumper cover as they may have to replace it or the mounting bracket. It's a pretty noisy car and just doesn't sound very solid when driving. It feels a little like driving a polished kit car. I knew what I was getting into so I'm not exactly surprised as some things are better than expected and some things as expected.

Yeah that's actually what my friend experienced with his performance, because of the 20 inch wheels.

I have the "poverty" 18 inch wheels on my LR and it makes a world of a difference. There are people who even say the performance isn't worth the extra money when you can just purchase acceleration boost and be nearly as quick and you have better range with a better ride. To me, i disagree. I think the performance is worth it however i got a decent deal on my LR. And at the time when i ordered, for some reason it would've taken 3-4 more months for a performance vs opting for the LR.

It's not a perfect car at all. I'm not saying tesla is the best company there is. I am saying in terms of EV, the charging network, the tech that comes with it, i don't see anyone competing with it in all 3. Maybe other car makers are better at build quality, but they don't have the performance. Maybe another can charge quicker but it really doesn't have the performance of a tesla.

That's why i said as time goes on car makers will eventually catch up.

Originally Posted by Theruleslawyer

The other makes are catching up quicker on drivetrain stuff than Tesla is figuring out general quality control. TBH they aren't as far ahead as they claim. Their range figures tend to be very optimistic in the real world vs competitors who are more conservative. Once we get more dedicated ev platforms out and onto gen 2 drivelines I wouldn't be surprised to see Teslas edge disappear unless they have a battery breakthrough.

Again i am talking about EV usage. Range, the charging network, the tech, performance and price.

Tesla really has all of them as a whole if you think about it.

I think the only car that comes "close" to a tesla would be a ford mach-e GT. Which would be tesla's model y performance competitor.

The price went up on the Y performance but it still has a better 1/4 time, slightly better range and a better interface system. As well as tesla's supercharging network.

I have no doubt other car makers are going to produce cheaper EV's with decent performance with better build quality. Of course it'll happen.

But that's why i am saying car makers are playing catch up NOW. When these car makers are improving, so will tesla. It's not like tesla will just stop innovating and improving while other car makers are.

It's going to be an EV race for the next 5-10 years. Tesla will still be top 3 for EV's, MAYBE still be number 1 at that time.

[KevinGS]

Soon, Ferrari, Lamborghini, and others are going to make money off copyrighting their engine and exhaust sounds, so that their symphonies can be piped into the cabins of electric cars, tuned perfectly to rise and fall as the electric engines spin up to create speed. The audio engineers are going to do a deep dive with the automotive engineers to come up with some amazing piped-in "music".

I assume they're not doing that yet in these first-run sports cars and supercar hybrids (like the Taycan, SF90, Artura, etc.) because they don't want to steal sales yet from their gas-powered cars. But just imagine a Taycan with a GT3 soundtrack? It's coming, trust me, it's coming. So sooner than later, they'll just pipe in your favorite V8 soundtrack (and they will charge you for it, as an expensive option).

And first we enthusiasts will cry about it being sacrilegious, but once we realize that we can get amazing speed, efficiency AND sound in one package, the wealthy will buy them. And eventually, we will too.
And I'm sure there will even be a factory option to add speakers that face outside so we "enthusiasts" can enjoy the music too as the car passes.

"If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” ― Henry Ford

[Equilibrandt]

Playing devil's advocate here, against everyone saying "it'll totally be worth more!".

I've had two coworkers sell their V8s in the last two weeks because of gas prices.

No one's going to want a guzzler if gas prices continue to suck; if (read: when) EVs take over, gas isn't going to get miraculously cheaper because there's more supply.

At best, I'd say your V8/V10/V12 is a gamble. It'll realistically be dictated by how much an enthusiast would be willing to pay versus how much it costs to own a guzzler.

Recall that places in England have a 'congestion' tax to act as a deterrent for people to own cars around London. I could totally see the US moving to some tax (or just bad fuel tax) to herd a portion of drivers toward EVs.

[Alfisti]

I agree with the comment above, depends on the car. If it a daily driver type thing then yeah, gas prices will dictate. But really sporty and a bit special, yeah will appreciate.

The tough ones to read are domestics, namely Camaro and Mustang, you can definitely daily them so not sure what direction they go.

[Tacoma]

Originally Posted by Alfisti

It's not the same as a consumer good at all, you're talking massive infrastructure costs that may be redundant in 3 to 5 years. Who is paying for all this?

New poll last night showed only 30% of Canadians would consider a pure EV right now, not buy, but consider. BANG on my estimate.

I am very bullish about this, I called out the optimism on AI tech and self driving and we have effectively gone backwards in 5 years. EV's will be more successful than that but the lack of home charging options for great, massive swathes of the population will kill the idea of market domination. ICE will be legislated out so the compromise will be PHEV to some degree.

I am a cold hearted pragmatist, i cannot see how the charging issue is addressed in a cost effective manner.

Looking at the video below, I don't see how you can say self-driving has 'gone backwards in 5 years." They weren't doing this 5 years ago.

I'm also not clear what you mean by infrastructure being 'redundant in 3 to 5 years"? They do only one thing: charge your car. The only advancement to this basic function may be to charging rate but you can just update those old chargers with new faster chargers. How is this a major impediment?

Most charging will likely be done at home where it'll cost you ~$2-3K to set up, so it may cost you a fraction of that to eventually upgrade your charger some years later. But you can also continue to use an old charger as long as you're willing to accept the slower charging rate. The other thing that can change is the connector but that can be upgraded as well in time or you can probably buy an adaptor/converter of some kind. It's not an impediment that can't be easily overcome.

And finally, cars will soon become just like other consumer goods. BMW is already converting to sell cars online; dealers will still exist primarily as service centers or if you want to try out vehicles before you buy - similar to Apple stores today. Just watch, it's coming.

[Alfisti]

It has absolutely gone backwards. We have had 5 years of development yet seem to have made very little progress. large companies that gave it a go have now shelved it and put it in the "too fucking hard" department.

5 years ago the CEO of LYFT predicted that by now 50%$ of rides would be autonomous.

It is a MILLION miles away, seriously it's a pipe dream unless we ban real drivers, mixing the two is damn near impossible.

[chris719]

Originally Posted by Alfisti

It has absolutely gone backwards. We have had 5 years of development yet seem to have made very little progress. large companies that gave it a go have now shelved it and put it in the "too fucking hard" department.

5 years ago the CEO of LYFT predicted that by now 50%$ of rides would be autonomous.

It is a MILLION miles away, seriously it's a pipe dream unless we ban real drivers, mixing the two is damn near impossible.

I don't think it's gone backwards. However, you are correct that they overpromised and underdelivered. I don't think the problem is mixing with real drivers either, it's actually going to take a computing paradigm shift to enable full Level 5 100% all conditions self driving IMO. People who think we are like a few years away from human driving being illegal etc. are crazy. The last 20% of the problem is exponentially harder to solve.

[BGM-M3COMP]

Definitely did not go backwards.

Tesla FSD has gotten a guy from NNJ (where traffic is the fucking worse), all the way to midtown (where traffic is the fucking worse) with 2-3 minor errors.

Where was this tech 5 years ago? The automatic emergency braking from other car makers were still hitting their targets thus killing them (if the test dummies were actual real people) 5 years ago. And even today they can't get that right.

Tesla FSD is still at the top in terms of that technology.

[BGM-M3COMP]

Originally Posted by Tacoma

Looking at the video below, I don't see how you can say self-driving has 'gone backwards in 5 years." They weren't doing this 5 years ago.

I'm also not clear what you mean by infrastructure being 'redundant in 3 to 5 years"? They do only one thing: charge your car. The only advancement to this basic function may be to charging rate but you can just update those old chargers with new faster chargers. How is this a major impediment?

Most charging will likely be done at home where it'll cost you ~$2-3K to set up, so it may cost you a fraction of that to eventually upgrade your charger some years later. But you can also continue to use an old charger as long as you're willing to accept the slower charging rate. The other thing that can change is the connector but that can be upgraded as well in time or you can probably buy an adaptor/converter of some kind. It's not an impediment that can't be easily overcome.

And finally, cars will soon become just like other consumer goods. BMW is already converting to sell cars online; dealers will still exist primarily as service centers or if you want to try out vehicles before you buy - similar to Apple stores today. Just watch, it's coming.

The denial of this inevitably happening is hilarious. Like why can't people just accept what's coming? No one is saying to embrace it or love it. But to say nah it's never going to happen is foolish.

Remember cars, to the MAJORITY of people who buy cars, are just appliances. It's a new "washing machine" to them. They use them, it gets old, a new model comes out, they replace it.

We represent a tiny ass percentage in terms of car culture. Even those who think M cars are cool, or performance cars are cool, couldn't give 2 shits if they become extinct and something new comes around that "we" might not agree with. People like new tech. This is how the world works.

[chris719]

Originally Posted by Efthreeoh

I still think the majority of people do not trust a computer to drive their car regardless if they are an enthusiast or not. Washing appliances are completely autonomous devices and when the appliance machine screws up the impact is meaningless. When autonomous cars screw up the impact can be painfully severe and/or financially severe. The problem at this point is moving from the infantile systems we have now (Level 2 - 3) to Level 5 is the propagation of watching the Autopilot system drive the car to trusting the Level 5 system drive the car perfectly (assuming Level 5 is actually the correct definition). With a clothes washing machine or a dish washing machine one does not watch the machine work. Watching a car Autopilot itself through traffic awaiting for the instance it will screw up and human intervention is required is actually more taxing than driving. Jumping from Level 3 to Level 5 has a whole lot of issues both socially and mechanically (i.e. super-reliable hardware).

The autonomous driving future has numerous decades to go before any hint of redundancy for safety is built into the system and as much time for social acceptance related to privacy rights and legal responsibility are realized or solved. I'd say (sadly) kids in their teens and early 20's are socially ahead of the curve regarding the privacy issue, but the legal industry is not anywhere near the resolution of the liability issue. And then hardly anyone addresses what influence the DOT (in the USA) will have on adaptation of autonomous driving. Having worked with the FAA for the last 15 years adapting a new aircraft surveillance technology (including drones), I have first-hand experience with the Governmental process. I just do not see the US Federal Government allowing private to industry implement autonomous driving on the US public highway system without a shitload of regulation.

The government has been really hands off so far but when these things do become popular it will definitely require regulation. Lots of thorny issues but I do think it’ll get sorted eventually.

I also think the tolerance for risk will have to be higher than we are comfortable with in aerospace. Human driving is so bad on the whole that we need to be careful to avoid making perfect the enemy of the good.

[10"]

an M5 will definitely be desirable in 10 years—not sure about an M550 though—"comfort" and practicality are not what hold value in cars—desirability, enjoyment, and fun do.

[BGM-M3COMP]

Originally Posted by Efthreeoh

I still think the majority of people do not trust a computer to drive their car regardless if they are an enthusiast or not. Washing appliances are completely autonomous devices and when the appliance machine screws up the impact is meaningless. When autonomous cars screw up the impact can be painfully severe and/or financially severe. The problem at this point is moving from the infantile systems we have now (Level 2 - 3) to Level 5 is the propagation of watching the Autopilot system drive the car to trusting the Level 5 system drive the car perfectly (assuming Level 5 is actually the correct definition). With a clothes washing machine or a dish washing machine one does not watch the machine work. Watching a car Autopilot itself through traffic awaiting for the instance it will screw up and human intervention is required is actually more taxing than driving. Jumping from Level 3 to Level 5 has a whole lot of issues both socially and mechanically (i.e. super-reliable hardware).

The autonomous driving future has numerous decades to go before any hint of redundancy for safety is built into the system and as much time for social acceptance related to privacy rights and legal responsibility are realized or solved. I'd say (sadly) kids in their teens and early 20's are socially ahead of the curve regarding the privacy issue, but the legal industry is not anywhere near the resolution of the liability issue. And then hardly anyone addresses what influence the DOT (in the USA) will have on adaptation of autonomous driving. Having worked with the FAA for the last 15 years adapting a new aircraft surveillance technology (including drones), I have first-hand experience with the Governmental process. I just do not see the US Federal Government allowing private to industry implement autonomous driving on the US public highway system without a shitload of regulation.

You'd be surprised at how many people use autopilot even though there have been many errors, faults or glitches in the system as it was improving throughout the years. I've seen first hand with the people i know of with teslas as well as what's reported in the community. A lot of my trips in my tesla are basically to work and back as i have other ICE toys to play with so i don't really use autopilot much. However i do have it and it works.

If you told me tesla has put out a fully autonomous vehicle TODAY with NO driver inside of it that will pick me up from my house and take me to work, i would do it. Not because i think they perfected the system, but because they need real world events to improve it's technology. I, for one, am all for this, even though i am a car enthusiast.

FSD is only getting better and at an accelerated rate with each year that goes by. Our technology has gotten better and that only improves rapidly we time goes on. For whatever improvements they have made say from 2010-2020, will improve twice or even 3x as fast today. I suspect it to get incredibly better by 2025.

We can't sit back and complain about this happening. We have to enjoy what we have now and if they take it away from us in the future, then that's what they'll do. Regardless if we take a stand or not.

Plus i happen to LOVE new tech. I'm one of the few people on this forum who loves the ID8 and can't wait to get it in my next M car.

[BGM-M3COMP]

Originally Posted by Efthreeoh

I have two former work colleagues who own Teslas. Both engineers, one a licensed GA pilot and the other a genius integrated systems engineer. One bought a Model 3 for the Tech and the other bought (his wife) a Model X because he's a car guy in many ways and wanted to experience the EV experience. The last time I was in the Model 3 and had the auto-driving demonstrated was probably 2 gens back now (2019). I was not at all impressed and wouldn't trust the system to save my life. The fetch mode was also demonstrated, and it failed miserably. All neat stuff, but the fetch mode took 5 times as long as for us to just walk over to the car and it failed anyway. There are too many conditions that need to be optimal for these systems to work correctly and safely. When the conditions degrade is when it matters, which is true for human drivers as well.

I love new tech too, but just when it makes sense. I do not think autonomous driving is going to drastically reduce road deaths, and not any less than if we just forced better driving behavior out of our citizens. Making better human drivers is trillions cheaper than trying to implement a change over to a computerized autonomous driving environment. My POV is not from an enthusiast position but rather realistic one; I just don't think autonomous driving will lower road deaths and the cost to try would be better spent elsewhere.

But that's the thing though.

This is the only way to implement any new technology, is to engineer it, test it and then test it again in the real world. That is why there are so many revisions done to the FSD beta. I believe next month it will be beta V11 or version 11. I forget. I don't option in FSD in my model 3 but i heard i can add or update the software later? That i am not even sure i have to find out. I'm not interested in that right now, at least not for this car as i do plan on getting a plaid (probably the model x plaid) in the next 2-3 years to replace my model 3 as a DD.

I am not saying today, FSD is the way to go and it replaces actual drivers. Nobody would admit that or even dare to admit that because it doesn't make sense.

But the advancements in this technology from when tesla first rolled out their model s to now?? I think they came A VERY LONG WAY.

Like i said in an earlier post. Ford laughed at tesla before tesla dropped their first car on the market. And now ford is playing catch up. GM has supercruise which is mainly pointed towards highway driving.

With city driving, nothing right now comes close to tesla's FSD. Other car makers can mimic what it can do but right now, with all the revisions and updates tesla has been making to their FSD, they are still the leader in this technology. And like i said it is only going to get better, not worse. I predict 2025 is when tesla has released FSD updates for heavy city driving with basically zero errors.

[RM7]

The march is steady.

Autoland Cat IIIc is one thing, but consider in the 1980s the Russians launched a space shuttle which came back and landed like an airplane. Unmanned. My buddy has a "return" button in his Piper Cub (yes) with autopilot that when you press it, it will bring the aircraft to the nearest runway and land. Just the fact that the tech has worked it's way down that far is just mind-blowing. Tech has a way of manifesting in ways you can't readily anticipate, vs. expecting jet packs and hoverboards. Progress is being made. Already, active cruise control and lane keeping systems take a huge burden off of driving from point A to point B. Besides a car that's solely for fun, I won't buy a car without ACC anymore. Too many accidents and stop and go situations that just aren't worth dealing with.

[M3WC]

Originally Posted by Alfisti

It has absolutely gone backwards. We have had 5 years of development yet seem to have made very little progress. large companies that gave it a go have now shelved it and put it in the "too fucking hard" department.

5 years ago the CEO of LYFT predicted that by now 50%$ of rides would be autonomous.

It is a MILLION miles away, seriously it's a pipe dream unless we ban real drivers, mixing the two is damn near impossible.

It has not gone backwards. Have some over promised the time frame of when full autonomous driving will be available...yes. But what early tech hasn't been over hyped?

Germany is first country to allow Level 3 autonomous tech on public roads. Mercedes-Benz started allowing consumers to order its DRIVE PILOT Level 3 self-driving assistant on EQS starting May 17th, in Germany. It is coming, just not at the pace some promised.

[Alfisti]

It has gone backwards because large companies with squillions of dollars have bailed or down sixed their efforts. Timelines have been pushed out, we are further away from where we were told we would be at. Yes it's improved in 5 years but just barely, at this rate of improvement we will all be dead before AI driving is a real thing.

Absolutely certain about this, it's a pipe dream.

[RM7]

Originally Posted by Alfisti

It has gone backwards because large companies with squillions of dollars have bailed or down sixed their efforts. Timelines have been pushed out, we are further away from where we were told we would be at. Yes it's improved in 5 years but just barely, at this rate of improvement we will all be dead before AI driving is a real thing.

Absolutely certain about this, it's a pipe dream.

There are always huge bubbles. Right now, about 10 or more companies will have you believe they are or very soon will be building supersonic business jets. Most of these are just illusions and BS. Maybe one will make it, but I think back to the VLJ days, "Very Light Jet" where there were again like 20 "start ups" promising a 1 million dollar business jet that could seat 4-6 people and cruise well into the flight levels. One that was leading the charge has all but gone away, Epic. Cirrus is pretty much the lone player...but they have delivered. They were building upon proven and established piston aircraft lines and not just claiming they were going to pull production and every other aspect out of their a$$ in a few years. It can happen...but quick movement is probably the worst way about it.

Anyway, my point is, yeah, there are a lot of pipe dreams out there...to a large extent, they start getting distracting, even to the point where the idea or concept can start to seem like a farce...but you also can't be surprised when someone established puts the idea to actual use and gets it out there. It generally takes more time than the pipe dreams...because they have to do it right, not take any shortcuts that will kick them later, be there for the long haul.

The pipe dreams seem more like just a way to separate foolish investors from their money. The entire time during the VLJ debacle I just couldn't imagine a market for 20 different small business jets. The shear number of sales required for even a decent number of the companies to "make it" could never happen, just a financial impossibility.

I'd have to wonder how many of those other companies doing self-driving stuff really never had any intent of bringing anything to market...Oh they won't admit that to investors...but still, I gotta wonder...

[Boosted_8]

I went through the same thought process as the OP about 18 months ago. On a £75k M550i BMW actuaries think it's going to be worth £25k in 4 years time. If government regulation bans all new V8s but leaves existing cars alone it's going to be worth a fair bit more than that. The M550 is extremely rare here and I think it will retain more novelty factor as a result. In the UK at least, the biggest risk is tax penalties on the CO2 level always going up. That would kill the resale down the road as it's not sexy enough as a second or third car.

[BGM-M3COMP]

Originally Posted by RM7

The march is steady.

Autoland Cat IIIc is one thing, but consider in the 1980s the Russians launched a space shuttle which came back and landed like an airplane. Unmanned. My buddy has a "return" button in his Piper Cub (yes) with autopilot that when you press it, it will bring the aircraft to the nearest runway and land. Just the fact that the tech has worked it's way down that far is just mind-blowing. Tech has a way of manifesting in ways you can't readily anticipate, vs. expecting jet packs and hoverboards. Progress is being made. Already, active cruise control and lane keeping systems take a huge burden off of driving from point A to point B. Besides a car that's solely for fun, I won't buy a car without ACC anymore. Too many accidents and stop and go situations that just aren't worth dealing with.

Literally 20 years ago when i inquired for lincoln tech (thank god i didn't pursue that as a career), i was speaking to some of the staff and even the intro teacher came and joked, "Not sure why you want to become an auto technician, in 20 years we're gonna be seeing flying cars".

Obviously that was a joke but the fact that people have a certain expectation of what's the future vs what is actually going to be the future just proves its unpredictable.

The reality that we came this far already in a short period of time means the only thing holding us back is not really more time but technology. And that always gets better. Will we see driverless cars or taxi's tomorrow? Nope.

But i can bet that there will be an approval of putting a driverless taxi in major cities, even if on a small restriction, by 2030. And that doesn't even include revisions to FSD programs implemented in cars by then as well.

[UPSROD]

The original question is completely gone!

[G MONEY]

Originally Posted by UPSROD

The original question is completely gone!

For real. F-ck this autopilot nonsense. It's about V-8's not the fucking Jetsons and their dog Astro