Tesla’s figurehead becomes a laughing stock

Technically, Tesla’s electric cars are often considered the spearhead of the industry. However, according to a recent study, the e-car pioneer is no longer able to play at the forefront, especially when it comes to the previously highly acclaimed driver assistants, and the competition is now pulling away. Drivers are also given a bitter pill by Tesla boss Elon Musk.

Tesla written off? Other e-car brands drive away

The times when Tesla’s driving assistants set the tone are obviously over: the e-car manufacturer has since moved from second place passed up to 7th place. The consumer organization Consumer Reports (CR) from the USA examined a total of 12 advanced driver assistance systems. Since the last test in 2020, Tesla has slipped a lot. According to CR, first place goes to Ford’s “BlueCruise” system.

Tesla has practically not worked on improving its systems since the introduction. Although new functions would be introduced, the already known ones would no longer be changed significantly. “After all this time, the autopilot still doesn’t allow for shared steering and has no real driver monitoring. While other automakers have evolved their adaptive cruise control and lane departure warning systems, Tesla has fallen behind,” said Jake Fisher, CR Auto Testing Manager. Consumer Reports).

With its tests, the US consumer organization gives an overview of what the programs from different providers can do. On the other hand there is no claim to completeness. Similar to the ADAC car test, only the vehicles that are available to CR during the test period are tested. In addition, only those cars are included in which lane keeping and distance assistants can work in parallel.

Tesla’s safety systems have many loud critics:

Musk lets customers run up: no upgrades for Tesla drivers in sight

But that’s not enough for Tesla drivers, the driving assistants will probably continue to cause headaches for many in the years to come. While Elon Musk recently announced the current Tesla numbers, the CEO hinted that Owners of older models don’t have the latest hardware need to hope for the so-called full self-driving package (FSD). When questioned, Musk stated:

“The cost and difficulty of Upgrading from hardware 3 to hardware 4 are significant. So I think it would be economically not feasible to do that” (Source: Insideevs). According to Musk, Hardware 3 is already safer than human drivers. In addition to the assistants mentioned in “Autopilot”, this also includes automatic traffic light and stop sign recognition – which, however, are far from working properly. This calls into question the supposed security advantage of the system.

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