Replacing physical controls with touch buttons continues to be an incredibly dumb idea. Luckily several other manufactures who hopped on the trend are realizing it was a bad choice.
Is nobody gonna mention this horrible KITT steering wheel?!? That damn thing is dangerous.
Yeah round wheels are not a fuckin style choice. It’s so you can grab it anywhere in any situation. This steering wheel looks fuckin deadly
The only way a yoke would make sense is if it was drive by wire and could vary the ratio of the wheel dynamically depending on speed.
Oh, I think I would hate that. Variable turning seems so bad for intuition to me.
If poorly executed yes. If done right it may be really awesome. Just like your steering gets stiffer at higher speeds. But obviously I never tried it (although I bet you could rig a simulator to test that theory)
They are the worst drivers by infractions. Dead wheel is a culling tool.
You can’t even grab 10:00 and 2:00 on it. Looks like the closest you can get is 4:00 and 8:00
10 and 2 is actually no longer taught. 9 and 3 is the new thing
Or 8 and 4.
Keep those arms away from the airbag’s path
It’s a yoke because top tier race cars use yokes and Elon thinks his teslas are that for some reason. Completely disregarding all the setup and engineering race cars have that make a yoke the more viable option than a wheel…
The funny thing is that they put it on the S/X without changing absolutely anything else, then brought out the Cybertruck with steer-by-wire (where a yoke might actually make sense) and put a squircle on it.
I’m still gobsmacked the Cybertruck is now a thing. Does nobody remember that we were ridiculing the design of that monstrosity 15 years ago?
Like it disappeared for a while, and now it’s suddenly in production with no changes, nearly two decades later? I feel like I’m from a Mandela universe.
They also don’t ship with the yoke by default anymore, the default is a regular round one and have been for a while.
I am a Knight Industries 2000 with a 1000 megabits of memory and a one nanosecond access time.
Ever seen what real life F1 car steering “wheels” look like?
They aren’t meant for public roads, just like Teslas.
You mean those extremely dangerous, highly specialized cars that require a trained athlete to drive?
Those are way more sensitive so there is no need to turn hand over hand. The downside is that that sensitivity can be really hard to handle at high speeds.
It’s great for Tesla, for one reason - modularity.
If your input/control has a physical button, that immediately needs independent wiring, assembly steps, A THOUGHT OUT PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT PLAN, another BoM item to build the car/widget, and usually markings that limit its use for other functions (present and planned).
Tesla can bury controls and change interfaces as much as they like on the main touchscreen, or even add new features. It’s still trash for driver usability except when parked for all the obvious reasons, but hey they get to ‘push’ new features over cellular networks as they’re developed. Y’know, instead of selling a complete product in the first place.
If your input/control has a physical button, that immediately needs independent wiring
No it doesn’t. It just needs a PCB and a microcontroller connected to a CANbus. And that’s what we’ve had for decades.
another BoM item to build the car
I don’t really understand this either. Like yes, it is, but if we’re taking that approach, why not remove the door panels? And the trunk liner? And that pesky center console? Oh what’s that, these are all valuable features of the car?
Wiring/PCB header or connector/common data hub yes - but my point was that has to be thought out ahead, and cannot be modified afterwards in the same way touch screens can
BoM complexity and cross commonality is a challenge in manufacturing. It’s why we see all these ‘global platforms’ among automakers trying to build one unibody core subframe for all or most of their cars, adding different panels and roof assembly for an SUV or sedan respectively. Fewer parts to stock and build is a cost saving (for the manufacturer, don’t expect them to pass that saving along) - same with tactile controls.
It’s great for Tesla, for one reason - modularity.
Not really as far as the touch controls on the steering wheel goes. The icons are static and can’t be changed, so their functionality is kind of tied to the icon.
As for configuring additional controls for them, it’s exactly the same as if they were physical buttons, it’s all a wiring harness going to the computer either way, what that computer does with the input signal is not any less configurable for a physical button. The limiting factor is the static icon, not whether it’s touch/tactile.
In regards to selling incomplete products, this is unfortunately not even limited to Tesla. All car manufacturers release several updates and bugfixes for new cars, they just can’t send them OTA, they need to get them in the shop. My colleague’s VW ID4 has been in the shop for no less than 3 SW updates to fix various bugs and add basic features such as battery preheating for DC charging, it fucking shipped without that!
As a user experience designer, we were having this discussion 15-20 years ago.
I’m so glad everything we brought up at the time was completely ignored. Warms my heart.
For those that don’t want to read the article:
Tesla is going with buttons on the steering wheel instead of a stick to the left of the wheel
Tesla is going with buttons on the steering wheel instead of a stick to the left of the wheel
Its even worse than that. The buttons are smooth surface (like a touch screen) with haptic feedback. These are truly a horrible idea:
If I had one of these Tesla cars I’d look into retrofitting the stalks back in.
If you buy a Tesla at this point, you deserve to be stuck with it.
They might get in trouble with EU laws if they do it here as well…
Gotta love good regulation.
Holy shit that’s worse than how the article put it
Up for right and down for left. Yeah, that makes fuckin’ sense. Did they take their inspiration from the keyboard on the Apple 2GS?
It would have been smarter to zip tie the turn signal switch assembly from a 1980’s motorcycle onto the steering wheel. At least on a motorcycle switch left means left and right means right (and center is cancel).
That doesn’t sound like it’ll be legal in a lot of countries.
If this catch on, maybe 3rd party Bluetooth/USB stalk will be a thing.
Wtf, seriously? I’ve tried using media buttons on the steering wheel during a turn. It’s not reliable in the slightest, because it’s a moving target.
Does the non circular steering non-wheel never go past 90 degrees or something?
I once accidentally dialed 911 from my steering wheel phone buttons while pulling a turn. Surprised the shit out of me and the dispatcher didn’t sound like this was the first call of the type. This is a fucking terrible idea.
Tbf you are supposed use the signal before turning wheel
Covered in the article. In Norway you are required to signal when exiting a roundabout. It’s a fair concern.
Just in civilized countries, not only Norway.
Some countries don’t have roundabouts
Civilized countries have roundabout
And Australia, at least state of NSW made it mandatory
If you are going hand-over-hand in a roundabout, you’re doing something very wrong…
That’s not the issue, imagining driving through a roundabout that curves left and having to find a button somewhere on the steering wheel, which is at an angle, in order to indicate right before turning tight in order to exit the roundabout.
A stalk will always be in the same position. The same cannot be said for buttons.
imagining driving through a roundabout that curves left and having to find a button somewhere on the steering wheel
Your don’t have to “find” anything, it’s right next to your thumb
Again, it depends on the angle of the steering wheel. The buttons may be upside down if the car is turning sharply enough.
Drivers frequently change their hand placement as they turn the wheel. You lose precision and basic ability to manipulate the wheel if you don’t.
The point is that there will be no way to handle the turn signal through muscle memory. With a traditional control, it is always in the same place in relation to your body. It doesn’t move. When it’s in the steering wheel, it can be in many, many different places. If you have media controls on your steering wheel, try using them during a turn without taking your eyes off the road. Now pretend they are smooth and act like a touch input on a dual shock controller.
With a traditional control, it is always in the same place in relation to your body
As is the one on the wheel. Right next to your thumb.
Your thumb stays at the same place on the steering wheel when you’re not driving straight? O.o
In addition to roundabouts, there are plenty of freeway exists that loop around where you can be at an extreme turn and need to initiate a lane change. Or making a right turn into a gas station after a left turn at an intersection… lots of use cases.
You wish but it’s not drive by wire. You steel to turn in multiple times in sharp angles. Of the ratio were to change relative to speed it would make sense but right now it’s just plain dumb.
What? You’d be hitting the turn signal when you’re going straight. Do you drive a BMW or something?
What about exiting a roundabout?
Very true, although in my experience you’re more likely to encounter someone putting on their blinker mid-turn as someone properly signaling a roundabout exit…
Or driving down a twisty road, which where I live is most roads.
Turns exist on curved roads too. So do lane changes.
In Norway, you have to indicate your exit in a roundabout by activating your turn signal, and he found it difficult while turning the steering wheel, which you have to do in a roundabout. A driving student would fail their test if they don’t activate their turn signal in a roundabout in Norway.
He said:
I tested the Model 3, and noticed that I lost both focus and direction in roundabouts. It’s not directly life-threatening, but you run the risk of both driving on curbs and other cars if there are two lanes.
After posting his findings in a group for driving schools, he was met with agreement by many other instructors who said that they experienced the same issue and the risk is much higher with students.
It’s like car features that have been around for 70+ years are the way they are for a reason.
Reminds me of the guy that built that sub that got crushed. There are standards in place for good reasons and ignoring them is a bad idea.
Yup, and just like the sub Tesla did multiple things that were substandard because they worked in controlled environments and even worked ok the real world for a short time before failing.
People who actually know how to signal in a roundabout are a rare breed. Dunno how it’s in other countries but the German rules actually make sense: Don’t signal when entering. There’s exactly one way to go, so why would you. Don’t signal when driving around the roundabout as that’s straight ahead (even if it’s a circle). Do signal before the exit you want to take, this is for the benefit of people waiting to enter (or maybe those behind but only on 2-lane roundabouts). As a corollary: If you signal while you enter you’re pining straight for the first exit… but honestly avoid it too many people signal wrong so it’s better to not play fast+loose.
That’s not the way I learned in France, where they make you signal left before entering and use the inner lane, only if you’re going further than halfway through the roundabout.
You signal right before entering only if you’re taking the first exit.
In any case you signal right after driving past the last exit before your own.
in the Netherlands people often do signal left while on the roundabout but that feels mostly because of cyclists who also do so.
The new Tesla Model 3 should be banned from the whole of Europe until they put the indicator stalk back. It is virtually impossible to safely and legally traverse a roundabout without it.
How do people indicate without it? Is the car supposed to automatically turn it on once it senses you leaving the lane?
It has little buttons on the wheel for left or right instead of a stalk. Problem is when you’re going through a roundabout you’re twirling the wheel around so it is almost impossible to to know where the buttons are at any given point in time. A stalk stays put, the buttons are anywhere depending on where the wheel is at. I think this video demonstrates it most clearly - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBFxbKTEWu8
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://www.piped.video/watch?v=QBFxbKTEWu8
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
What the fuck is the point of an indicator after you’d already started the action. That light ain’t indicating any more about the driver than the fact that they bought a Tesla after 2022, and that tells you everything you need to know about them.
That’s just too late to signal…
When I drive roundabouts I keep my hands on the wheel in the same spots so in relation to my thumb, the turn signals are in the same spot?
I think if the wheel wasn’t a yoke shape, it’d be different because I might just put one hand on top, but in this case it works OK.
Since the yoke forces you to keep your hands on the same place relative to the button, presuming you’re keeping your hands on the wheel
Give it another few years and I think all Teslas will use the new steer by wire in the CT and the problem will go away anyway.
Edit: maybe few is generous, whenever the next major refreshes happen after a few years.
Tesla’s reasoning for going away with a method universally used for signaling turn for decades is that it enables them to remove a physical part, the stalk, and it believes activating a turn signal will soon be unnecessary with the advent of self-driving.
Spit my drink up a bit when I read that.
Meanwhile Teslas are quickly building a reputation of being impossible to repair, so replacing an industry standard component that never breaks for a digital system is a great way to keep the title.
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They are unsafe in every situation, not just on roundabouts.
While in the EU Teslas were already “banned”, if you want a proper cat B license, and not just a cat B(78). If you take the test in a car with automatic transmission you get a code 78 license, with which you can legally only drive automatic transmission vehicles.
Is the EU mostly manual transmissions?
In the US, seeing a manual transmission these days is somewhat rare. I used to work at a car dealership’s service department as a valet, and most of us younger guys who’d never driven a manual before had to get someone else to drive it whenever one showed up. (That happened maybe once a month or less.)
Manuel transmission used to be the norm. The last couple of times I rented a car/got a loaner at the mechanic, I was asked if an automatic would be OK. I have met people who avoid automatics altogether. Probably because they’re unsure of how to drive them. TBF the first time I test drove an automatic, the first stop I made, I was glad to be wearing my seat belt, as I was used to use left foot, push that pedal hard and then brake… My wife and I were almost climbing down from the dashboard after that.
When I said earlier that manuels used to be the norm, that’s because of the emergence of EVs and PHEVs. Our EV was our first car with no clutch.
Sooo after writing that boring drivel above, I decided to look it up on the most used second hand car platform. Turns out the about half the cars registered as pure ICEs are automatics. But then sampling the search results it’s evident that a lot of the cars on the first page, have been registered wrong, and are in fact hybrids. So I don’t have a solid figure. I’ve loitered the sales floor of my mechanic for 30mins, while my car is in for diagnosics. Looks like about 3 out of last 20 or so ICEs I’ve looked at are automatics.
Yes Europe is mostly manual. You pay a heavy premium to get a car with automatic transmission. Anecdotally, I bought a Skoda ~5 years ago and had to pay ~20% more for automatic transmission than manual.
I live in the UK, I’ve only ever driven manuals. I know one or two people with automatics, wouldn’t fancy having one myself though. I feel like the manual shift gives me more control.
I prefer manuals, they’re more fun to drive, but the future is inevitably automatic with EVs.
Had a quick look at used cars here.
https://www.ooyyo.com/france/used-cars-for-sale/c=CDA31D7114D3854F111BFB6FAA651453/
Seems very much dependent on which country you’re in. France seems 50/50, Germany a lot more Automatic, Belgium prefers manual. Been to Iceland a few times and that is mostly automatic. The UK is mostly manual.
I was even told that my insurance would be lower because manuals were harder to steal because so few people can drive’m.
I wish that was true in my city. I love driving the manual shift car but it certainly hasn’t saved us anything on car insurance. The idea of a car thief who can’t drive stick shift is so funny, needs a movie. The only benefits beyond fun and not worrying about an automatic transmission failing is some odd respect from valet guys and mechanics and old men.
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I’m an American living in Denmark. Everyone here knows how to drive them even if their current car is automatic. They are becoming more popular, though.
Of course everyone knows how to drive an automatic, there is nothing to learn if you already know how to drive a manual. You just push the pedal and the car moves.
Nah, automatic are common.
The reasoning is, if you know how to drive manual you also know how to drive automatic, but not vice versa.
Used to be, but the transition to mostly automatic is happening as we speak
Leak of Tesla’s next-gen Steering wheel:
What? Physical controls? It’ll be a touch screen.
I didn’t realize Tesla’s even came with turn signals. They must be hard to find because they never get used.
To be fair, they were just following the trend of BMW and Mustang cars
I swear to god Tesla drivers are going for the worst drivers award.
Just let your fucking car drive itself if you cannot.
Tesla’s even
Odd too. Or did you pluralize with an apostrophe? If it’s the latter, you’re sentenced to repeat the third grade.
Imagine crying like this because someone’s phone autocorrected.
Yeah, it’s not designed with roundabouts, (i.e. road infrastructure designed with logic and common sense) in mind.
It’s not designed with any common sense in mind. They just figured they could a) cut costs and b) make the vehicle look “cleaner”, because Musk and the people who work for him are intellectually incurious morons who refuse to learn why things are designed the way they are before trying to reinvent them.
The thing about breaking the rules is that if you want to really do it well, you have to understand why those rules exist in the first place. That’s hard to do when you start from the position of just assuming that you’re smarter than everyone else.
i am not sure they even kept the cost down since they had to reintroduce the option of normal steering wheels, this just another case of Musk thinking it looks cool so it should be, but then done poorly because they don’t have the engineering expertise to do it properly like lexus did it
This is just another case of Cybertruck shit.
It was designed to cut costs and hope fanbois would think it was innovation. It’s so dangerous a change it should be banned in countries where drivers are expected to properly indicate while traversing roundabouts.
Cuz that’s the only place you want to signal intent to other drivers?
Well, in a roundabout how else are the other drives gonna know you turn right?
There are other places you signal intent. At every turn in fact
Tesla has the highest accident rate of any car brand. And Tesla intends to remain number 1 in that regard
Rapid acceleration, with your eyes pointed a center touch screen. What could go wrong?!
Yikes, that is incredibly dangerous. Hopefully, they get recalled to fix that issue. No turn signal stick is going to cause a lot of accidents if people are unfamiliar with the car or are spinning the steering wheel and pressing the wrong button (or no buttons, because it’s too difficult).
Can we just ban them entirely? Horrible cars.
they are the most advanced company in cost-cutting. They will put everything in 10 sub menus on the screen instead of costly buttons. And the people are confused, they see big screen they think cool. But having metal physical buttons and crowns with haptic feedback is just on another level 🤤. Especially those crowns where theres a silent click that you feel with every turn. Feels so fricking good damn.
The comment about roundabouts is the same for Australia. You wait a roundabout entrance, with your indicator telling people what you intend to do on the roundabout, and that indication stays until you are ready to leave the roundabout, which you are then required to indicate left (unless you were already indicating left!).
Having moving buttons on the steering wheel is an absolutely absurd idea. Not just for indicating, anything important (I dont mean volume control for the radio, or phone answer button) should never be on a rotating object, where it can be inaccessible or “not where it should be” in a time of need (or required).
That’s a regional thing - I was very confused when I lived in QLD and that’s how people were driving. In Victoria everyone indicates the final direction before they enter the intersection (eg indicate right before entering if you’re taking 3rd exit, indicate left if you’re taking first exit).
I think that is what I said.
But on exiting we will have to indicate left. so if I’m taking the 3rd exit, I am indicating right, until just before I get to it, where I then change to left indicate to say I’m exiting. Even if you are going straight (so not indicating) you are still require to indicate left when about to exit.
Its less meaningful on a 3 or 4 road roundabout, but when the roundabout has 5 or more roads, or maybe even a double roundabout (There is one here, and its an accident hotspot!!) then indicating your leaving is very important.
Pretty sure that this road rule in a national rule, not per state. But I know that some places do not enforce the exit indication.
It’s not law in VIC iirc, it’s a common courtesy but not a requirement. Like when indicating to jump in a lane, giving the driver who let you in a wave. Or blinking your headlights when there is a copper in the direction you came from.
I found it, just to put it to bed. It is a National rule, but it is interpreted differently between states.
https://www.yingtongli.me/blog/2019/06/16/arr-roundabout-exit.html
I wished that the link was more from our government, however I followed up the National laws this posts states, and they are indeed correct. Australian Road Rule 118 says it is required (in any circumstance) but only if practical. And that seems to stem from Vic and other states with larger 3 or 4 lane roundabouts (which would suck).
The post also comments:
A casual search of internet forums reveals many confused drivers believing that this is optional, or is not a road rule, or is, indeed, a silly thing to do. From personal experience, the vast majority of drivers do not indicate left when leaving roundabouts. The law, however, is clear that a left change of direction signal must be given when leaving a roundabout, ‘if practicable’.So I’m happy to indicate left on leaving the roundabout, it doesnt bother me anyhow. But it would be a total headache for Tesla drivers, and my indicators are on my wheel and not in the right location at the time, would not constitute as “impractical” as far at the process. The car might be impractical, the the process should not have been,
Yeah if a roundabout is small - single lane, 2-3 exits, 10m or less in diameter - you can get away with doing this (indicating your final direction).
Once they get bigger - bigger diameter, multiple lanes, more exits - its safer to indicate your intention to enter and exit the roundabout.
Style over substance, and a ugly style at that. Of course lots of people are gonna love it and say it is the best thing ever.
lots of people are gonna love it and say it is the best thing ever.
Kind of funny reading this in a thread filled with a bunch of tripping over each other trying to show how they hate Tesla the most.
The Fediverse does not represent the real world. There is big anti-corporate and anti-Elon bias here. Most people just don’t give a shit.
I understand that. It’s the irony of seeing someone partaking in a circle jerker shitting on other people for circle jerking.
