Electrify America promises that more are on the way.
As reported by Engadget: Walmart has come a long way since it unveiled plans to add Electrify America chargers to its stores. The big-box retailer now has over 120 of the VW-backed fast EV charging stations across its stores, giving drivers in 34 states a way to top up while they're shopping. There are plans to continue expanding, too. Neither partner said how many more stations were coming, but Reuters sources claimed that 180 more stations were coming before the end of 2019. Most of the existing stations are placed at stores near key highways, although there are "dozens" more due near large urban areas. As before, the chargers range in power from 150kW to 350kW, offering enough speed for both the latest EVs as well as upcoming models that can take advantage of higher charging rates. Both Electrify America and Walmart have clear incentives to bring chargers to as many stores as possible. For Electrify America, it's about laying the groundwork for a deluge of VW group EVs that will need a fast charging infrastructure. This is also one more step in mending VW's bruised image following the diesel emissions cheating scandal. Walmart, meanwhile, can use this to keep its stores relevant in the online shopping era -- you'll need somewhere to charge, and you might just wander into the shop while your car is plugged in.
As reported by Engadget: After a pair of scrubbed launch attempts last week, SpaceX's first rocket loaded with 60 Starlink satellites has successfully taken off from Cape Canaveral. One hour and two minutes after the 10:30 PM ET launch the satellites were scheduled to begin deployment, heading toward their operational altitude of 550km above the Earth. The 227kg units will use Hall thrusters and energy pulled in from a single solar array to form a network that provides internet access around the globe. The rocket's first stage has already landed safely on a waiting drone ship ('Of Course I still Love You') -- this was its third flight -- and having a reusable booster will be key to launching all the satellites required.
Plans SpaceX filed with the FCC said it intends to have the Starlink units in orbit by the mid-2020s, providing internet connections capable of up to 1Gbps even in rural areas. At just over an hour after launch, SpaceX successfully deployed the 60 flat-packed Starlink satellites. In total, SpaceX plans to launch nearly 12,000 of these satellites, which will park themselves in low-Earth orbit and beam internet coverage to the world below. There will be two Starlink flocks: one constellation of 4,409 satellites and a second constellation of 7,518 satellites, according to an agreement with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The second, larger constellation will fly at a slightly lower altitude, but together both will provide affordable coverage to every part of the globe, SpaceX representatives have said.
One caveat: the FCC approvals require the company to launch half of the planned satellites within the next six years. SpaceX first launched Starlink craft in 2018, lofting two test satellites, dubbed TinTin A and TinTin B, in February of that year. Their mission seemingly went well, though SpaceX kept the pair in a lower orbit than first planned. Based on data obtained from that initial test mission, SpaceX requested that part of its fleet be allowed to operate at lower altitudes, and the FCC agreed.
As reported by Electrek: A Tesla driver has discovered an interesting new Autopilot safety feature that he dubbed ‘Autopilot isn’t on, idiot’ to help people who mistakenly think that they activated the driver assist feature.
In order to activate Tesla’s two main Autopilot features, Autosteer and Traffic Aware Cruise Control, the driver needs to pull down on the Autopilot lever on the right side of the steering wheel twice when the option is available.
Autosteer is not always available based on the road and driving conditions.
When it is available, a steering wheel icon appears on the instrument cluster side of the screen next to the Autopilot rendering of your vehicle:
Once Autosteer is activated, the same steering wheel icon becomes blue and now the vehicle is automatically steering:
There’s also a chime that lets you know Autopilot is active, but sometimes the activation can fail for a number of reasons.
Tesla owner and Redditor u/ENrgStar found an interesting feature to help those who don’t realize that their activation of Autopilot failed.
He described the feature which he jokingly dubbed ‘Autopilot isn’t on, idiot’:
I was driving today and tried to enable autopilot on a back road without lines and it rejected me. Right after I started to drift a little too close to the edge of the road and my Model 3 screeched at me and jerked the car back into the middle of the lane. It appears to address an edge case where a driver tried to engage autopilot, and it can’t engage, but then the driver somehow thinks it IS engaged and lets the car drive and it starts drifting. The car reacts by drastically jerking you back into line and yelling at you as if to so “NO… I said I’m NOT driving for you!”
He was able to capture the safety feature in action in this quick video:
Electrek’s Take
That’s a great safety feature. I have often attempted and failed to activate Autosteer when I see it available with the icon, but it disappears by the time I reach for the lever.
I’ve always realized due to the different sounds it makes, but I can totally see how someone could miss it.
As reported by Electrek: Ford might not be doomed after all. The American automaker has now finally announced that it is going to launch an all-electric version of its most important vehicle program: the F-Series pickup trucks. Last year, Ford announced plans to “bring 16 battery-electric vehicles to market by 2022” – starting with an all-electric CUV with 300 miles of range.
But the automaker still remained more focused on hybrids than all-electric vehicles.
It made Ford’s hybrid pickup plan a little weak, but now the company is planning to have its own all-electric F-Series truck.
Ford CEO Jim Hackett made the announcement at the Deutsche Bank Global Auto Industry Conference today:
“We are going to electrifying the F-Series with battery electric and hybrid and we are doing the same for Transit. We launched a PHEV version of Transit and that will be on a journey of electrifying Transit globally.”
It sounds like the previously announced hybrid version of the F150 is still planned for production, but it will be followed by an all-electric version of at least one pickup truck in the F-Series.
Rivian's Atlis XT is a rival all Electric Pickup Truck with a 400 mile range. The company is based in Mesa AZ.
He didn’t confirm a timeline nor which pickup truck in the F-Series – though the F150 is a likely option.
It’s one of many EV announcements from Ford over the last week.
The Mustang-inspired EV is supposed to be Ford’s first all-electric vehicle built to be electric from the ground up and it is due to launch next year.
Electrek’s Take
I’ve expressed before how disappointed about Ford’s EV effort to date, but this is the most encouraging announcement to date.
With the Rivian truck and the upcoming Tesla Pickup, I thought that it was ridiculous to plan a hybrid version of the F150 in 2020.
I can’t help but think that all the hype around those two vehicles has help convinced Ford to greenlight an all-electric version of the truck – or at least another F-Series truck.
Now it’s still light on the details. We will keep looking into this for more information. If you have any, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
But regardless of the details, it’s an important announcement for the US automotive market since the F-Series is the biggest vehicle program in the US and it looks like it’s starting to go electric.
Earth's Magnetic North Pole has been moving toward Siberia eer since its discovery. Forbes.
As reported by Forbes: I have been seeing some headlines pointing out that Earth’s magnetic field is acting up and that scientists don’t understand why, so I thought I would take the time to clear up the issue. What is happening? Earth’s magnetic pole is moving in the direction of Siberia and away from Canada. This is something that scientists have been tracking for a long time. It’s fairly easy to look up the location of the magnetic pole dating back to the early 1900s. The recent changes of the drifting pole are raising some concerns but the direction is not the problem. In fact, the direction of the drifting pole has been roughly the same for as long as scientists have been tracking it. The speed is the issue.
Every five years scientists recalculate the location of the magnetic pole. This is important information for global navigation, which includes GPS satellites and other technology. These changes can make a big difference in our everyday lives.
Scientists at NOAA and the British Geological Survey check how accurate the World Magnetic Model is every year and when they did their check this year they noticed some large differences. Primarily that the pole’s movement had sped up. The location data for the pole was supposed to last until 2020 before it needed to be updated but according to experts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, it needs to be updated now.
Why is this happening?
The global model was off because of a geomagnetic pulse the occurred beneath South America in 2016. This pulse just came at a bad time. The 2015 World Magnetic Model was brand new and not scheduled to be renewed until 2020. It seems that in the future we may not be able to wait as long between updates. The poles movement has sped up in recent memory from 9 miles a year in the 1990s to about 34 miles a year at present day. A new model needs to be implemented as soon as possible and even then they will have to rework the model again in 2020. Until then navigation might be affected.
What caused the geomagnetic pulse beneath South America is unknown. If you have been seeing headlines that imply the scientists are clueless or don’t understand what is happening this is what they are talking about. Anomalies like this happen from time to time and honestly, it’s nothing to be worried about.
Why is the pole moving?
In the northern hemisphere, deep within the Earth, there are two large areas of magnetic strength being generated by the liquid metal surrounding Earth’s core. One is under Canada and the other is under Siberia. What we are seeing now is the result of those two areas pulling against each other.
It’s also worth noting that the release of the new model is being delayed due to the US government shutdown. If you would like to know more about this issue please write your Senator and ask them to reopen the government.
Driving the Tesla in Ute Pass, from 8,500ft to about 6,000ft - and back using Autopilot and Cruise control features. A snow-capped Pike's Peak at over 14,000 ft can be viewed among the clouds in the distance. You can visit a variety of different climates in a single day in the mountains.
A follow-on from my prior blog post: At this point it's probably a good idea to review the various levels of autonomy for self driving vehicles as outlined by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) - 6 levels from 0 to 5:
The Tesla adaptive cruise control is cited as being a level one feature, with the current version of Autopilot being a level two feature - though with future hardware and software upgrades, it appears they hope to achieve at least level 4 self-driving automation. At the moment, it looks like their new AI chip will become available in early 2019.
At the time of my initial testing, the current version of software for the vehicle was 8.1. Of course as soon as I finished the initial testing, version 9 was announced. As I write this version 9 is not only out, but has also been uploaded to my vehicle. However, as I understand it, version 9 does not have any additional Autopilot features enabled for the driver - though some of the advanced features (Navigate on Autopilot) run in 'shadow mode' to help verify that the automation software is performing up to standards, while racking up miles on all of the vehicles that have the software installed. In any case, I'll rerun some of the tests again on version 9 in the future to see if I see any major differences.
For the most part, the adaptive cruise control mode under optimum driving conditions in Ute pass appears to be relatively safe. There are some exceptions though to keep in mind.
Using the cruise control to manage the vehicle's speed and distance from the car in front of in this last few week's testing has so far worked as expected - even bringing the vehicle to a complete stop if needed. Heading down the pass seems to be somewhat better than driving up the pass. As long as the driver is managing the driving and lane changes, it moved down the pass without a hitch. However there was some concern regarding vehicles parked road-side that may need some additional attention. The following three images show a vehicle parked on the shoulder, a truck in the same relative position (though moving, not parked) in a turn lane, and highway patrol with a vehicle pulled over (both parked) on the shoulder. Interestingly, the moving truck was identified as a vehicle and displayed on the screen, though the parked vehicle(s) and the emergency vehicle incident was not.
A vehicle on the left exiting the highway is shown on the display ahead, because it is moving.
The vehicle on the left does not show up on the display because it is not moving.
Neither of these vehicles on the shoulder are displayed to the driver, including the officer standing outside of the vehicles.
It's possible (and highly likely) that the automation software did identify these vehicles, but filtered them out of the display. Reviewing other Tesla blogs by users indicates this is a fairly well known issue; though it may be addressed in the update for version 9. In any case I think it would be helpful if the vehicle at least identified them - and if it can highlight the emergency vehicle for the driver (and possible alarm) - that would certainly be a bonus. Additionally, slowing down the vehicle since the officer was outside of his vehicle would have been welcomed behavior as well. Because of the traffic configuration there was no opportunity to move over a lane to provide additional clearance for vehicles or the officer.
On the uphill climb the cruise control did pretty well, even recognizing that it needed to slow down turning into some of the curves, and in some cases accelerating coming out of the curves - which is precisely what an experienced driver on this road would likely do.
The one glitch that made me feel like I needed to temporarily disengage cruise control was when the vehicle accelerated coming around a curve to a hidden stop light. The light has a flashing yellow light ahead of the turn so that drivers know to slow down when the light is flashing. Normally mountain drivers coast at this point till they can see the traffic buildup and the status of the light. Accelerating into the curve seemed hazardous enough that I tapped the brakes to turn the feature off - restarting it once we had passed the light.
Lane changing under Autopilot does not appear to be available on Highway 24 in Ute Pass (though it does under version 9). Information in the operators manual indicates that there are various restrictions (poor visibility, sensor damage, vehicle in your blind spot, etc), one of which is "The road has sharp curves". That may be the most likely reason - but it will need to be addressed to be viable for mountain driving in the future. It's unclear if this will be considered level 5 autonomy or not.
Overall, with close management, the adaptive cruise control was primarily good for this type of mountain driving in optimal conditions (good visibility, clear roads, etc). Autopilot though was not as good or reliable due to the algorithm's focus on keeping the vehicle centered in the lane, and in some cases edging uncomfortably close to the center line at inappropriate times. The unavailability of the lane change function is also a factor in Ute pass, but not the primary concern - Autopilot needs to recognize when it should hedge more toward the center line, or the outside lane line to provide more space between vehicles or in some cases more clearance for roads with steep drop-offs, or to avoid debris. Both features could embrace some idle slowing on blind curves where drivers tend to take their foot off the pedal and let it hover between the brake and the accelerator till what's around the corner becomes clear. V2V (vehicle to vehicle) communication may help with this concern in the future as well, but it will be several years before that additional information will be regularly available.
Additionally, it will be a welcome set of features showing progress toward self-driving autonomy when the vehicle recognizes speed signs and flashing warning lights as well as typical traffic lights parroting them on the driver's screen. This feature will initially help to potentially prevent drivers from inadvertently running lights, but will be a major step forward in providing drivers with confidence in the advancing technology. I would expect this level of automation to be available for the level 4 deployment. Some of the additional mountain driving requirements (such as hedging on narrow roads - especially in snow) may well end up being available only when level 5 autonomy is achieved.
So, it's pretty clear at this point that we're fairly far from reliable self-driving capabilities - and that may be the reason behind Tesla recently removing the 'Full Self-Driving Capability' package from its options due to 'confusion'. This is more of a future upgrade of software and hardware to steadily push the technology closer to level 4 and level 5 over time; not a short term feature. Fans of science fiction might feel like these features are very close to being a reality - when in actuality they are still several years off, with significant amounts of training and development to come.
That doesn't mean we should be disappointed though - this technology significantly improves driving safety now. Properly used it will help guard driver's actions while protecting many lives today as well as tomorrow - as long as the driver stays focused and diligent. We must keep patiently waiting for the technology to merge with our expectations.
One of the ways we can help to do that, is to drive and use the technology today; so that it will be ready for everyone in the future.
Next, will be the review of driving the vehicle on Pike's Peak Highway.
