In the past, laminated glass was usually installed in the windshield, with side and rear windows being tempered only.
The difference is that tempered glass is per-stressed so that when it cracks, it shatters into many tiny and dull pieces. Laminated is the same thing, but with layers of plastic sandwiched with layers of tempered glass. Laminated glass will still shatter, but will be held together by the plastic layers.
In an emergency, small improvised, or purpose built tools meant to shatter tempered glass will be useless if the glass is laminated.
The problem wasn’t the glass.
The problem was using wtf touchscreen controls to shift between drive and reverse. Mrs. Chao confused the two then died.
Shitty UI kills another person. Tesla fucking up basic UI design is the real villain here.
I still blame Jeep for thinking a rotating selector was a good idea for a gear shifter. RIP Anton Yelchin.
I thought his jeep issue was that P on the dial didn’t actually guarantee the parking pawl was engaged to stop it from rolling. Separate from the lack of positive engagement with the P position, more about the physical disconnect between the two. Unless that was just the non-offensive language version of “user didn’t turn the dial all the way and our polite warning chime was too polite”
At least you can still feel the rotating Jeep shitty gear selector.
Touchscreen controls on a Tesla have no feel or feedback. It’s a touchscreen.
Sounds like both things are a problem?
I’m more inclined to blame Tesla’s electronic locks and confusing manual override before blaming the windows though
Quick, do you know which panel to remove to find the non-electronic manual override in a Tesla? Car is sinking fast and the electronics just shorted out from the lake.
But sure, tons of bad design decisions here. It’s hard to blame any one of them as the singular cause. If Tesla had easier to use manual override doors instead of electronic locks, if the windows could be broken, if the screen wasn’t a confusing touchscreen mess, etc. Etc. Lots of factors and all are the cause.
find the non-electronic manual override in a Tesla?
a Tesla? There’s a legitimate point y’all are missing where they are different per model or over time
Probably doesn’t help that Teslas guess which direction you want to go in and you have to change it if it’s wrong. https://www.autoblog.com/2021/01/28/tesla-new-gear-shifter-guesses-direction-you-want/
Yeah, only on the newer ones tho. My buddy got I wanna say a 2022? And it doesn’t have that. He specifically said if it did, he wouldn’t have bought it.
she could have not floored it into a lake, but maybe I’m the only person that doesn’t go balls out when they’re backing out of a spot.
Accidents happen, and people panic. Maybe she thought she was pressing the breaks and made the problem worse. I highly doubt anyone would do it intentionally.
So then why blame the car?
By default, Teslas are set in “one pedal driving” mode, which makes it so that the wheels won’t turn without the throttle/accelerator being pressed. That’s a different interface and behavior from the traditional automatic transmission, where simply lifting the foot off the brake pedal allows the vehicle to roll either forward or backward, depending on whether it’s in D or R.
The selection of the “transmission” setting of P R D in a Tesla also doesn’t have tactile feedback that subtly communicates which direction it’s set to.
The combination of the two means that the car is different in these ways and can contribute to mistaken gear selection plus application of the throttle, compared to a typical car.
i felt more than a little sick to my stomach at “one pedal driving”.
Have you tried one pedal driving?
- I found it very easy to get used to the concept - it’s similar to taking your foot off the gas to coast up to a light but greatly exaggerated
- the hard part was driving smoothly, just what I was afraid of. Take your foot off the accelerator a couple hundred feet back expecting to coast to the light and come to an abrupt stop. Oops.
- it took some practice for me to drive smoothly with it, but also exploring the relevant config options. I do best with “creep”: mimicking automatics at very low speed but one ideal driving at all other times
honestly, i can barely tolerate two pedal driving, but the thought of just removing the ability to actively brake in an emergency seems profoundly short sighted and dangerous.
Ahh, no. Plenty of automatic vehicles will either not move or move very slowly when idling in drive, and you will always need to accelerate if you’re facing uphill.
It definitely sounds like the driver was at least partially to blame.
Cause people want to blame the car?
Because insufferable Tesla fanbois have for literally fucking years told us that touchscreen controls are better.
No they aren’t you dumb fucks. When you cant feel reverse vs feeling drive, people will get confused. And when you get confused on a 3 ton 600horsepower vehicle, people fucking die.
Go shove the shitty defense of touchscreen controls up all your collective asses. Tesla fanbois are insufferable.
Anyway, human computer interaction folks (HCI) have been talking about these issues for literally a decade. Tesla vehicles are prone to sudden unintended acceleration. Tons of people have gotten locked inside a Tesla unable to escape. Etc. Etc. Tons of terrible UI issues and human control issues. It’s well known at this point.
Anyway, human computer interaction folks (HCI) have been talking about these issues for literally a decade. Tesla vehicles are prone to sudden unintended acceleration. Tons of people have gotten locked inside a Tesla unable to escape. Etc. Etc. Tons of terrible UI issues and human control issues. It’s well known at this point.
These folks just wanna fanboy/girl over being scammed by their favorite billionaire for the lol memes.
The main problem is that all these companies have no experience with ISO26262 or Functional Safety for Road Vehicles. Replace “Tesla” with “BYD” and look at the number of news headlines regarding exploding cars in China.
Only benefit that comes from cars coming from the big 3 is that there’s at least a few years of experience behind the design (even if its a bad one) so that it at least it doesn’t blow up, or lock you in when its on fire.
Show us on the doll where the tesla drivers annoyed you?
Right here sir, where all the dead people are from obvious safety glitches.
Tesla cars can’t even reliably open their doors when they catch on fire or sink into a lake. Electronic locks, electronic touchscreen shifter, electronic death traps.
You can’t even turn on the windshield wiper without dumb electronics getting in the way of stupid Tesla’s.
Tesla vehicles are prone to sudden unintended acceleration.
Wait, has that ever been confirmed? I mean of course Tesla would deny it, but I’d be quicker to believe user error than a design flaw (but I wouldn’t rule it out either)
https://youtu.be/7csgV2CuKNg?si=q9vOaUlW9SRY2rsD
Like, it happens. No other car maker has videos like this.
So we know Tesla’s have it. What we don’t know is if it’s a UI issue or a physical malfunction. Given what I know about Tesla’s shitty UI design, it very well could be user interface issues.
Yeah this is a little nutty seeing people with axes to grind.
An old lady drives her 2005 car through a restaurant entrance and people blame the driver and say things like “driving tests should be mandatory every X years.” A woman in a Tesla launches her car into a lake and people jump to the drivers defense, make excuses as to why the driver isn’t responsible, and want to complain about whatever bullshit the CEO tweeted out in the last week.
It’s almost comical to witness.
she made a mistake. good design could have prevented her crash, and less negligent design should have let her live. absolute worst case scenario, it should have been an expensive mistake, but not a fatal one.
If you make a system idiot proof, nature will always come up with a better idiot
We live in an age of subway wrappers telling you not to eat them, and microwaves including warnings to not use them to warm up pet dogs and cats. Because nature keeps improving on Communi Idiota
Because they have changed the car controls radically. It’s not intuitive for many people.
The car relies on systems which add undue complexity and area for failure in unforeseen circumstances. Solenoid doors have been around since the 50s, but there are reasons they were never common until Tesla decided to use them.
I’m not saying the lady is blameless and it’s all the cars fault. But design decisions on the Tesla do makes them more difficult to use/escape from in an emergency situation.
I don’t know about you, but in these parts we spin the gear selector to random, floor it and yell “JESUS TAKE THE WHEEL!”
Hertz stopped offering Tesla rentals because Teslas are designed to go balls out when the pedal is lightly touched and too often that involves straight into a wall or a lake
One pedal braking makes this a bit tricky for people who are not used to it and/or panicking. You spend decades of your life having a seperate “go” and “stop” pedal, and then suddenly they’re the same one. You have your foot over the accelerator, lift a bit and feel the deceleration as if you’re pressing the brake.
Suddenly, something darts behind you, and your brain says “I’m feeling deceleration, so your foot is on the pedal that stops things” and you slam on it like you would the brake pedal. I’ve done it with the clutch/brake after hopping back and forth between a manual and automatic a few dozen times after a very long day of vehicle testing. Muscle memory is a powerful thing and your brain’s mental model of the world is not always correct.
No, I don’t see this at all. I suppose everyone is different but I fail to see how muscle memory if taking your foot off the pedal makes you press the same pedal. Those are opposite actions.
I definitely see the thing where you think you’re pressing the brake and don’t realize you’re on the wrong pedal so you press harder. That can happen on any car
Imagine if water spilled or leaked from the window onto the touchscreen, try using a wet smartphone… Could be touchscreen device malfunction or misclick causing the Tesla fatality
Good thing Teslas are known to not leak at all
I feel the sarcasm dripping from this comment…
You seem to have very detailed information on how the accident happened. Care to share?
Within minutes of saying her goodbyes, she called one of her friends in a panic. While making a three-point turn, she had put the car in reverse instead of drive, she said. It is a mistake she had made before with the Tesla gearshift. The car had zipped backward, tipping over an embankment and into a pond. It was sinking fast. Could they help her?
it shatters into many tiny and dull pieces
Those pieces are not dull. They’re just not jagged and shaped like knives like normal glass. I accidentally broke the rear window on my truck and, thinking it was dull like you described, started to pick it up with my hands. Big mistake.
You just unlocked a very unpleasant memory of picking up small glass pieces with my hand. Like you said, big mistake and the worst was that I didn’t notice it was cutting at first…
One time I was climbing a rock in a park in Illinois, and reached up into a pile of finely-ground glass.
I managed to pick all but one little piece out of my fingers. That one piece was so far in I couldn’t get it.
Later on, I couldn’t find it. So I figured it had come out.
But a few weeks later my palm itched and that fucking piece of glass poked its way out of my palm.
AHHHHHHHH FUCK
Yeah, they’re absolutely sharp. But since they’re not point, you’ll end with a hundred tiny cuts, instead of a giant shard stabbing through your torso…
Yeah, the part where it separated from the rest of the glass isn’t usually stabby or cutty; but the edges along the corners of the piece sure as hell are! I learned this the hard way…
Good news for 2023 Honda HRV owners, because the rear glass shatters spontaneously on its own.
Kia/Hyundai from 2011 to 2022 have that beat with their entirely key less ignition and universal free ride share program.
Ironically, that only works on the models with a key ignition. Actually keyless has the immobilizer.
You’ll still get a free window opening from amateur thieves, though.
Better safe than sorry…
We need HARD rules and regulations for car door handles and common controls. This push for screens and lack physical elements needs to stop.
And Tesla, being the helpful sort, also makes it hard to open the doors in an emergency. The front might have manual door release mechanism somewhere - good luck finding it when the car is on fire or sinking. The rear… not so much.
EuroNCAP is changing its testing regime to negatively score manufacturers who remove critical physical controls and it should probably include door handles in that regime.
I feel they should outright ban them from sale, not just reduce the score.
I think NCAPs are not government institutions, but I agree that funding, oversight and more power to recall, and even ban the sale of vehicles, is ought to be given to them.
Not that I disagree with you generally, but in the recent case, manual door release wouldn’t have helped, as it’s basically impossible to push open a car door against the water pressure outside a submerged car.
It’s still possible to open it before the car submerges. It’s also possible to open it if you have the wherewithal to wait until the inside is nearly full. That’s providing you know where the damned release lever is. But if you’re panicking and pushing the electronic release and nothing happens then you’re going to die no matter what. Same too if the car is on fire or whatever.
The front door emergency latches are so intuitive everyone tries to use them the first time they’re in the car. There’s 0 problem with them.
The problem is the rear doors not having them or being hard to access.
On the other hand, if you never use the mechanical release and have spent a long time only driving your Tesla, wouldn’t it be possible to forget it’s there while in a high-stress situation?
Anything is possible, but I think this would be very unlikely.
Like on the level of I forgot to take my seat belt off and can’t figure out why I can’t get out.
You’re not breaking a tempered glass without the designated tool either and almost nobody has that. There’s this famous clip of a news anchor demonstrating how “easy” it is to break a car window with a hammer and he needed like 8 attempts.
My algo shows me nonstop car break ins in the Bay area ( for some reason or another) and they have gloves and it’s amazing how quick they shatter.
Because they have special ceramic tools. Windows will always be incredibly easy for thieves to break with no effort, but they’re incredibly hard for people without specialized burglary tools to break.
Specialized tools oversells it. A chipped sparkplug will work.
Yeah, they’re nothing fancy, but that’s their sole purpose. People aren’t carrying around spark plugs unless they’re car thieves.
I’ve seen videos of them shattering when a coffee mug or spark plug hits them. Sometimes it takes a couple tries.
Ninja rocks, smash up a spark plug and the ceramic will annihilate car windows
I’d just like to point out that the same is true of your house. Your average deadbolt and doorknob can be defeated by a cordless drill in less than 30 seconds and with very little noise. Don’t ask me how I know :D
I don’t know how common they actually are, but I see car window breaker & seatbelt cutter gizmos being sold all over the place. I know I keep one in my car where I can easily get to it, though my car emergency kit is probably better stocked than most people’s, and most first responders also have them in their kit.
Also an automatic center punch will usually do the trick as well, it’s a fairly common tool, though in an emergency it may not be practical to go rooting through your toolbox to find one.
I have one on my pocket knife that goes with me almost everywhere.
The reason Tesla was in the news over this was because a rich lady reversed into a pond. So the rear windows wouldn’t be facing up in that situation…
Why did they switch to laminated in the side and rear windows?
Sound dampening. Common feature on high trim cars or electric vehicles.
Thanks.
Let me guess, it’s probably also heavier.
We have a 2020 Mazda 3 that probably has that, instead of useful features like a remote start or fog lights. I’ve found that I much prefer driving my car from 1999 or even our pickup from 2014 (which itself has double gaskets on the doors for sound isolation). The Mazda feels like I’m in this isolated chamber with no road feel or anything from outside encroaching. If that’s luxury, count me out.
Mazda used to get a lot of shit from car reviewers about road noise and started really beefing up their sound dampening to make it more “refined” starting around 2016 or 2017.
Ah. I could go into a whole rant about the car, but I really dislike driving it. I often say that I now understand why Mazda no longer uses “zoom zoom” in their commercials.
Tempered glass windows offer better theft protection which is why they are increasingly used.
Laminated*
They’re used for noise insulation not theft. In theft it’s just a minor inconvenience. Shatter the window with a rock, then punch the floppy laminated shards in.
No, more often, it’s smash the laminated window, get confused and then smash another window. If the 2nd window isn’t laminated, they’re in, if it is laminated too, then they smash your quarter glass since they’re basically never laminated.
Anyone know of a reasonable tool that can get through laminated glass and be kept near the drivers seat?
In the states? Gun.
Rest of the world? Crowbar?
Not a handgun if you want to be able to exit through the opening. Under water? Not sure a shotgun will even be helpful unless you fire at all corners to break it up more thoroughly.
18 pounder cannon, as the founding father’s intended.
vixtorinox (swiss army) rescue tool. It’s a locked knife - most probably illegal in many places.
They make safety glass shatter tools and they usually also come with seatbelt cutters attached to them as well. Looks like a really large, sharp ballpoint pen tip.
These don’t work on laminated glass.
I thought ‘victorinox rescue tool’ works for laminated glass. It even has glass cutter.
A “Glass-Master” is what I used in the fire service. Goes a lot faster than you would think.
Use the same type of glass tool as before to shatter it. Then just push it out of the way. It’s still the same glass. It just stays held together with the plastic.
Will that work when you’re submerged underwater and the pressure of the water is pushing against the glass?
The recommended (and slightly terrifying) advice is to let the car fill first. Basically, use the time and air to prepare yourself. When the car fills, the pressure will equalise, and you can push the windscreen out with your feet.
Unfortunately, unless you’ve thought it through beforehand, most people panic.
Instead of pushing out, the water pressure will make it fold in on its own after you crack it.
I would assume that when shattered it becomes flexible so you can move it out of the way
I would guess you could use a regular tool for breaking a normal window, then cut through the plastic with a sturdy knife. Not great to need two tools in an emergency though, and keeping a combat knife in your glove box might raise some eyebrows.
Unfortunately, being difficult to get through is the whole point
Small bits of ceramic, like from a broken spark plug easily shatter any tempered glass even when thrown lightly. https://www.jdpower.com/cars/shopping-guides/why-do-spark-plugs-break-windows
They asked about laminated glass not tempered glass.
Laminated, not just tempered. There’s a strong layer of plastic inside the window. Even if you shatter the glass you still can’t get out.
I guess those vehicles’ drivers should always roll down their windows when near bodies of water in case they go in
Unsafe back seat passenger exit starts earlier than that, my 2005 Saturn had a set of horrible doors. I avoided carrying more than one passenger as often as possible.
Your 2005 Saturn didn’t have electronic locks that failed when the 800Volt battery pack touches water.
The number of Tesla drivers getting locked in and dying is disturbing. Who puts a safety critical electronic only lock tied to the main battery pack? Tesla, that’s who.
Fire? Your electronic locks fail and you die. Water? Same same. Etc. Etc.
Keep ranting, but the door locks run off of the 12v.
Is there a separate 12v battery, or are the 12v bits run from a dc-dc converter powered by the high voltage system?
There is a separate 12v that gets recharged by the HV.
It have suicide doors? God I miss those. Terrible for passenger safety, but I could fit so much stuff into my ion with those. Made moving with a sedan so much easier.
