While unprotected left turns can be nerve-wracking for novice drivers, many FSD Beta participants still experience anxiety when their car is faced with such a turn.
Unprotected left turns are one of the harder driving maneuvers to make for humans and AI, as they leave your vehicle vulnerable while turning (instead of turning with traffic).
Tesla quickly recognized the difficulties their AI was experiencing in safely executing these turns and has been working diligently to improve the AI’s ability to discern oncoming hazards.
Solve Chazman's Complicated Left Turns
FSD Beta 10.12 improved unprotected left turn issues, but there are still some lingering issues.
Chuck Cook (@Chazman) has been iteratively testing FSD Beta's ability to make unprotected left turns on a busy route.
It's a complicated turn that involved crossing three lanes of traffic before reaching the median and then turning left.
Often it involves crossing the three lanes and waiting at the median before finding enough clearance to get into a lane.
It's complicated, even for humans. However, Elon Musk said in a recent tweet that beta 10.13 would solve Chuck's complicated left turns 'most of the time.'
Chazman on FSD Beta 10.12.2
Smoother Intersections
Elon also added that 10.13 would "smooth out intersection control," hopefully reducing the vehicle's hesitation and steering jerkiness that can happen in busy intersections.
Going Deep on Roundabouts
In addition to unprotected left turns, traffic circle/roundabout navigation has become a focus of FSD engineers.
While popular abroad, roundabouts are seldomly used in the US. Although there are estimated to be 2600+ roundabouts across the country, so FSD Beta needs to be able to handle them well.
FSD Beta's navigation of roundabouts has been spotty, although one could argue that multi-lane roundabouts are challenging even for experienced drivers.
With FSD Beta 10.13, Musk says that Tesla is going 'deep on roundabouts,' and that it should be noticeably better in that iteration of FSD Beta.
There are certainly some complicated roundabouts out there that can challenge even the most skilled drivers. Some roundabouts include multiple lanes and may require you to change lanes within the roundabout, some may even include roundabouts leading into or out of the roundabout, such as the 'Magic Roundabout' in Swindon, England.
Magic Roundabout in Swindon, England
Navigate without Map Data
Musk also hinted at another major improvement that may be included in 10.13: the ability for FSD beta to navigate roads with no map data.
The vehicle will be able to navigate to a specific GPS point or pinned location (ex: rural roads), says Musk.
Dead Reckoning Navigation (Navigating without GPS)
In addition, Elon alluded to the fact that Tesla is also working on the AI’s ability to complete 'dead reckoning' navigation (navigating only on “inertial measurements, wheel movement & vision”).
He gave underground parking garages as an example of where FSD would need this ability to navigate without GPS or map data.
The car will be able to do this by using its last known GPS location and then determining its future location using only a compass, wheel movement and speed.
Yes, car will navigate to a pin location, even if in a complex surface parking lot or hotel entrance.
When in covered or underground parking lots, car will have to navigate using only inertial measurement, wheel movement & vision, as GPS signal is no longer available.
Elon said that he expects FSD Beta 10.13 to be available in about two weeks.
Why is it always two weeks? Tesla may use an agile approach to software development. In agile development work is planned in 'sprints' that span one or more weeks, with two weeks being a common length.
It's possible Tesla uses two-week sprints when planning and developing upcoming features.
For drivers that have experienced the intense nature of FSD left turns through busy intersections, it looks like they won’t have to wait long for FSD Beta 10.13.
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“We have updated our future vehicle line-up to accelerate the launch of new models ahead of our previously communicated start of production in the second half of 2025”. This was one of the key sentences that were part of Tesla’s deck shared on Tuesday directly before its financial results.
Since Reuters’ report a few weeks ago saying Tesla had “scrapped” the highly expected cheaper model— which Elon quickly denied on X —retail and institutional shareholders started asking for more details on Tesla’s product roadmap for 2024 and beyond.
In the earnings conference call, Elon Musk reiterated that Tesla expects to launch the next model in “early 2025, if not late this year”.
“We've updated our future vehicle lineup to accelerate the launch of new models ahead of previously mentioned start of production in the second half of 2025. So, we expect it to be more like the early 2025, if not late this year. “
Over concerns of temporary production halts to update the factories for these new models, Musk said that Tesla will produce new models with certain aspects from their next-generation platform and current models. This will reduce the number of changes needed on production lines and allow Tesla not only to ramp up production faster but also to get the vehicles to market quicker.
Model Y Redesign
Tesla appears to hit that their next-gen vehicle will be less “next-gen” than they were initially aiming for, but to get a new vehicle out the door by late 2024, the process would already have to be in motion. Tesla may likely be referring to the redesigned Model Y, which is expected to reuse many parts from the new Model 3. Earlier this year, Tesla said that the redesigned Model Y will not be released this year, so it makes sense that they’re looking to speed up that production.
Tesla CEO concluded by saying that these measures will allow Tesla to reach a capacity of over 3 million units. Tesla produced 1.84 million vehicles in 2023. However, this year they’re ramping up Cybertruck production and introduced the new Model 3 into new markets.
And we think this should allow us to get to over 3 million vehicles of capacity when realized to the full extent.
Tesla reported on Tuesday its earnings results followed by a conference call where it teased its upcoming Robotaxi and its next-generation platform saying its “purpose-built Robotaxi product will continue to pursue a revolutionary ‘unboxed’ manufacturing strategy”.
Earlier in the day, Tesla announced the new Performance variant of its sedan Model 3 with deliveries in the United States starting already next month. The new version starts at $45,490 (after applying the $7,500 Federal EV tax credit) and goes from 0 to 60mph in 2.9 seconds.
On Tuesday Tesla reported its earnings results followed by a conference call that brought several updates on the company’s roadmap for future vehicles, autonomous driving, Optimus and much more.
While answering a question from Goldman Sachs analyst Mark Delaney about updates on the licensing of Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) technology, Elon Musk said they’re talking to one major auto manufacturer and there’s “a good chance” the company signs the first deal before year-end. However, he went on to say that it would probably be three years before the necessary changes are integrated into the car.
I think we have a good chance we do sign a deal this year
Brings Benefits to Tesla
The technology would require other automakers to start using the same cameras and hardware as Tesla, meaning that Tesla may not only generate money from licensing FSD but also from selling the hardware itself. However, there would be other benefits as well. When licensing FSD, Tesla would likely own the data gathered with the system well, further helping them with data and edge cases that need to be solved to reach full autonomy.
people don't understand all cars will need to be smart cars… Once that becomes obvious, I think licensing becomes not optional.
Tesla’s Chief Financial Officer Vaibhav Taneja commented pointing out that future partners “take a lot of time in their product life cycle” resulting in a gap between the deal signing and the arrival in the market of Tesla’s FSD software.
Miles Driven With FSD
On the conference call, Musk added that Tesla now has over 300 million miles that have been driven with FSD v12 since it was launched just last month. He added that it's becoming “very clear that the vision-based approach with end-to-end neural networks is the right solution for scalable autonomy”.
Tesla said it will continue to increase its “core AI infrastructure capacity in the coming months” adding that in the first quarter, it completed the transition to hardware 4.0 with China now receiving the upgraded FSD computer and cameras.
Over the weekend, Tesla reduced the price of FSD dropping it from $12,000 to $8,000 for customers in the United States and from CA$16,000 to CA$11,000 in Canada.
Earlier this month, Tesla implemented a 50% price reduction for FSD subscriptions in the U.S. and introduced the subscription model in Canada at a great value of CA$99 per month.
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