Last week, Mark Rober, an engineering YouTuber best known for his glitter bombs, released a video where he tested Tesla's Autopilot against various conditions - including the iconic ACME painted wall.
During this test, many people noted that Mark was using Autopilot rather than FSD, even though his video was titled “Can you Fool a Self-Driving Car?”. The Tesla on Autopilot went up against a vehicle equipped with Luminar’s LIDAR rig, running some sort of basic autonomy or safety software.
New Video Tests FSD
Many people were disappointed with Mark’s video and his testing methods, so several creators got to work to actually test out Tesla’s FSD.
Creator Kyle Paul over on X made a much better follow-up video, using both a HW3 Model Y as well as an AI4 Cybertruck. In a relatively unsurprising turn of events, the Cybertruck was successfully able to detect the wall, slowed down, and came to a stop. The Cybertruck was running FSD 13.2.8.
Kyle’s team did a fantastic job building the wall and testing this in a private area using FSD rather than Autopilot. On top of that - they re-tested the results several times and recorded the entire thing in and out. While Mark’s video was more for entertainment, Kyle really set out to prove what would really happen in this unlikely scenario.
Sadly, the HW3 Model Y was unable to detect the wall, and manual intervention was required in each test. While the Model Y was running FSD 12.5.4.2 rather than an FSD V12.6 build, we don’t expect this to have had a significant impact on the test - this is more of an issue with how computer vision analyzes the environment.
There are several major differences between HW3 and HW4. The first is obviously that the version that runs on AI4 is more advanced, as the hardware is capable of processing a lot more data. However, AI4 also features much higher-resolution cameras than HW3, and Tesla recently added the ability for the video feeds to be processed at full resolution on FSD V13. This could have made the difference, although it’s not entirely clear. Perhaps if HW3 gets a version of FSD V13 in the future, HW3 can be retested to see if it passes the “ACME wall” test.
Watch
Kyle’s entire video is below. It’s only 10 minutes long, so definitely give it a watch. Props to Kyle on the quick and thorough execution.
What Does This Mean for FSD?
We broke down Mark’s test - and examined all the little issues that we discovered after doing some in-depth research - you can read our analysis here.
Putting aside the issues with Mark’s testing and instead using the new results - it seems that if you were to have to fight against Wile-E-Coyote and his ACME tools with your Tesla, cartoon logic may win if you’re on an HW3 vehicle. If you’re on an AI4 vehicle, you’ll likely come to a safe stop.
Vehicle depth perception is definitely something that Tesla has been hard at work to improve - and some fairly drastic improvements came with FSD V13 that haven’t been entirely translated to FSD V12 just yet. Future versions of HW3 FSD may be able to determine that the wall is there successfully. So Kyle - if you’re reading this - don’t get rid of that wall. We’d love to see more testing in the future.
However, this entire test scenario is so out of left field… there is a good likelihood this same test would fool some human drivers as well. The most important part is that the future of autonomy will not fall for these tricks, so it's very unlikely for someone to weaponize this idea as it’d only possibly work on a small segment of vehicles.
If Wile-E-Coyote is after you, someone else may drive into the wall before your Tesla does.
Not a Tesla App
We’re not kidding, this really happened already. This isn’t a realistic scenario outside of someone trying to play an insane prank - but it’s good to know that FSD V13 is capable of dodging this.
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Tesla’s Vice President of Vehicle Engineering, Lars Moravy, recently took to X and opened the floor for user input. There, he asked the community for features and improvements they’d like to see to make Teslas better heading into 2026.
This post generated thousands of suggestions - and we recapped the best of them. There were also a few that Lars responded to, giving owners hope for some much-requested future changes, so let’s take a look at what may be coming
Lumbar Profile Support
Today, lumbar support is one of the few items that is not saved in the Tesla profile. That means if you have multiple drivers who use the same vehicle, you’re often left adjusting this setting manually, as it retains the setting that was last used. One community member suggested saving your lumbar setting to your profile just like Tesla does for other seat settings.
Lars said making this change seems doable, but it’ll take some engineering magic. The lumbar support isn’t tied to an absolute sensor like the other seat settings. This suggests that Tesla does not have an exact value to save, as it does with other seat functions, but Lars believes Tesla can find a way to save lumbar preferences. Tesla could potentially time how long the motor runs to get to the user’s lumbar setting and save this value.
With that said, it seems the vehicle engineering team may take a look at this one, and we may see it included in a future update.
Model 3 Signal Stalk Retrofit
The move away from traditional stalks in favor of the steering wheel buttons on the Refreshed Model 3 has been a point of debate. While the author is squarely in the camp of steering wheel buttons (at least with the Cybertruck), many dissent and say that the buttons on the Refreshed 3 aren’t as satisfying or easy to use.
Many other drivers also prefer the tactile feel and muscle memory of a physical stalk for signaling. Tesla appears to favor stalks, as they retained the turn signal stalk with the new Model Y. There are also rumors that Tesla is going to reintroduce the turn signal stalk to the Model 3.
If Tesla adds stalks back to the new Model 3, current 2024+ Model 3 owners are still left without stalks. However, a user suggested adding stalks as a retrofit option. Lars said that he would try to consider a retrofitted signal stalk for the Refreshed Model 3, similar to the simplified version in the Refreshed Model Y.
While less definitive than the lumbar support response, it appears that Tesla may at least consider offering a stalk retrofit for the new Model 3. If you’re a lover of signal stalks and can’t wait for Tesla to get an official one - we recommend the Enhauto S3XY Stalks, which are customizable and feel very close to Tesla’s original fit and finish.
With that said, it’s nice to see Tesla incorporating more community feedback into its vehicle design these days. Perhaps one day, they’ll address the infamous auto wipers. They have gotten better, but they’re still not as reliable as what’s available in most other vehicles. With that said, we look forward to the changes that will emerge from these recent conversations.
Sometimes, even with Tesla’s intensive bug-testing regime, bugs manage to make it out into the wild. In this particular case, a European user (@darkwaffle48484 on X) noticed that their 2024 Model 3 was using up more battery than normal while parked. Normally, they noted that the vehicle would lose about 1-2% per week; however, recently, they noticed much larger drops of 3-4% per night.
They monitored their Tesla widget and noticed the car wasn’t entering deep sleep. The widget consistently showed a recent connection time—usually within the past 45 minutes.
Fix Inbound
After discussing the issue with other Tesla owners and realizing it was somewhat widespread, they contacted Tesla Service. The service team confirmed that it was a firmware bug affecting the Telematics Control Unit (TCU), which prevented the vehicle from entering deep sleep mode.
The TCU is essentially the communications hub of your Tesla - and is mounted on the ceiling of newer vehicles such as the Model 3 and the new Model Y. It enables cellular and location services (via GPS) and also handles Wi-Fi and Bluetooth services. Tesla Service stated that this bug is planned to be fixed in update 2025.14.6, although the exact version number could change. However, they confirmed that they are aware of the issue and it is being addressed.
@darkwaffle48484
When the user reached out to Tesla Service, Tesla Service responded with the following (translated from Dutch):
“It has been confirmed that this is a firmware bug. The fix is in one of the next updates. Currently, it is planned for 2025.14.6 (subject to change). Do you have any more questions?”
Potentially Region-Specific
This bug could potentially be region-specific. TCUs often require specific hardware components, such as modems, as well as specific firmware versions that support different regions and cellular providers. These enable Tesla to comply with local cellular standards and regulations and ensure that your vehicle can connect to the networks available in that particular region.
At this point, it’s not clear when the fix will roll out, but given that update 2025.14.1 has practically stopped rolling out, Tesla may be waiting to resume the rollout with update 2025.14.3 or this 2025.14.6 version.
If you’ve noticed this issue and are in a non-European nation, let us know.
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