So how does this compare with Tesla? Is what I’d want to know. These levels maybe ok for engineers . Consumers like me watch YouTube videos to tell how good a car is at self driving
This is an eyes off autonomy level. So you can read a book while it does its thing. It however only works in a very narrow set of conditions.
Tesla doesn't have anything that's eyes off yet. You need to monitor the road. Tesla seems to be going for breadth first (FSD beta working everywhere and doing every manouver) and not depth (autonomy only for highway without changing lanes but reliable enough for eyes off)
If that's the case, then I think Mercedes chose the best option. It's when doing long drives on highways it's really useful to be able to read a book, work, play a board game with the passengers, talking in a focused way, nap etc.
It's most likely also much easier to make a car drive autonomously on highways versus on smaller roads, city roads, dirt roads etc.
Much better than what Tesla offers since you can read a book, watch a movie, etc. Basically you don't have to pay attention. And Mercedes might be taking on legal liability for the system. They do that in Germany, not sure if they're doing that in the US.
Yes, as a manufacturer they (and everyone else in the chain of commerce) have strict liability for damages caused by product defects in the US, even with the US’s comparatively weak consumer protection laws.
I’d be surprised if that wasn’t the case in Germany, independent of any decision Mercedes would make beyond the one to make and sell the car.
Might also be a problem because I am sure this is a calculated risk. We can pay X amount of law suites until our profit is impacted.
Didn't Ford do a similar thing with their explorer? They knew about a roll over issue but decided that it was finacilly cheaper to pay the lawsuits than recall the vehicle.
But the level they're selling still requires that the driver be able to resume control when notified. So the "the car notified the driver to take over, disengaged, and shortly following that the driver crashed the car" narrative is still possible, even when the "shortly following that" might actually be "0.1s later". Sorry, our tech wasn't engaged at the time, you're actually the one at fault here.
Yes, the standard requires that the driver be given "a few seconds" to resume before the system disengages, but things can change dramatically in a few seconds at highway speeds.
I don't see that in the link you provided? I think I heard of this crash, but I don't remember specifics, and it looks like Tesla didn't comment.
On a page of statistics they put together, they said "we count any crash in which Autopilot was deactivated within 5 seconds before impact", and that seems sufficient for a level 2 system.
It makes much more sense to me then the non-sense Tesla does. Tt is a use case which would be very valuable for me. In Germany they are now in principle allowed to offer this up to 130km/h on the motorway. They don't offer it yet, but that would already be a killer feature for me.
Tesla doesn't have anything that's eyes off yet. You need to monitor the road. Tesla seems to be going for breadth first (FSD beta working everywhere and doing every manouver) and not depth (autonomy only for highway without changing lanes but reliable enough for eyes off)