Tesla upgrading Autopilot system
Tesla has announced that it is upgrading its Autopilot system for autonomous cars – and the key changes including using radar as the primary control sensor and developing more fleet learning capabilities. In a blog posted on its website on Sunday (11 September), Tesla commented: “The radar was added to all Tesla vehicles in October 2014 as part of the Autopilot hardware suite, but was only meant to be a supplementary sensor to the primary camera and image processing system.
“After careful consideration, we now believe it can be used as a primary control sensor without requiring the camera to confirm visual image recognition.”
With “fleet learning”, Tesla will be using the data collected from all the vehicles in the fleet to build up a picture of how best to deal with different kinds of road conditions and situations, so all the vehicles can collectively learn how to drive better.
Tesla believes the switch to making the onboard radar the primary control sensor will reduce the potential risk of collisions. As previously reported, a Tesla driver was killed in May when the car he was driving hit a truck, and the Autopilot camera was unable to spot the white trailer against the bright sky.
