Feds told Tesla to stop making “misleading statements” on Model 3 safety

"Your company has issued a number of misleading statements," NHTSA wrote to Musk.

Read the whole story

 

[Sarty]

What NHTSA did is use their model to say "based on the Model 3's results on this test, compared to other vehicles' results on this test we calculate a lower chance of injury." Tesla took that ball and ran it all the way over to "the Model 3 is safer than any other car period." And NHTSA's responding "that's not what we said."

Of course, if Tesla wants to say "the Model 3 is safer than any other car period", if they can remotely justify that statement, then whatever. Get out your bullhorn, Elon. It's only Tesla's name at stake.

Saying "the Model 3 is safer than any other car tested by NHTSA", that sounds an awful lot like (but is not) "the Model 3 is safer than any other car according to NHTSA tests".

As you note, the implied latter statement is completely false.

 

[lewax00]

But the NHTSA argues that this is statistical malpractice because it doesn't take into account vehicle weight. In a vehicle-to-vehicle crash, the occupant of the heavier vehicle is less likely to be injured. The NHTSA's tests, which involve crashing a car into fixed objects, don't necessarily account for this difference.

But wouldn't a fixed object be roughly equivalent to a very heavy object, in terms of how the collision works? Or even potentially worse? I'm not sure I understand this argument.

Not that I disagree that this is probably misapplying the statistics, but that's a standard marketing tactic.

I think a fixed object is identical to a vehicle of equal weight moving at equal speed in the other direction. It seems like this must be so for reasons of symmetry. A heavier vehicle is worse than a fixed object -- rather than arresting you completely, you're going to be thrown backward.

Unless it's a Wednesday afternoon and I can't brain good.

If it's a head on collision there are more factors to account for, like the speed/kinetic energy of the other vehicle. I guess I'm just thinking of a more directly comparable situation, like hitting a wall vs hitting a stationary vehicle. In that case, I'd tend to think the wall is worse.

I don't think hitting a fixed object is a good analogy for a head-on collision in general, but Tesla doesn't seem to be drawing that connection either.

 

[Bush Ranger]

NHTSA seems to be taking the position of "if you're going to play marketing-speak with the facts, don't attach our name to it".

It would certainly be worse if Tesla's claims were factually incorrect, but their being factually correct does not absolve them of using sneaky language to play on the public's good faith in a third party.

Sneaky language? Then its a lie simple as that and Tesla should be fined for misleading customers.

 

[Deleted member 221201]

Btw there is an article on this on Teslarati
I'm ignoring all the opinions on that site

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-3 ... deep-dive/


They have actually posted the letter & the response.
Ars should have posted both of them to make it an objective article


NHSTA Letter
https://www.scribd.com/document/4210684 ... from_embed

Tesla's Response
https://www.scribd.com/document/4210684 ... from_embed

 

[Hammerheart]

It is a fact that the Tesla Model 3 is significantly safer than other cars of similar size and weight. IMO, Tesla is fully within its rights to highlight that fact using publicly available NHTSA data.

Only allowing Tesla to advertise "5 stars", when it's vehicles are actually far safer than competing "5 star" rated vehicles, largely defeats the point of the NHTSA tests - to encourage auto makers to improve their vehicle's safety. Why spend time and money to exceed a 5 star safety rating if you're not allowed to tell anyone about it?

Except that is again not what they said. Tesla did not claim they are safer than any other car in its weight class. They said that it is safer than any other car period. That just doesn't hold up.

 

[dhughes]

Speaking of weight.

Jason Fenske on his channel Engineering Explained shows how weight and low profile tires can lead to big problems. One pothole caused two bent rims and two flat tires on his Tesla Model 3 Performance car requiring $2,600 in parts and labor.

 

[Dr Gitlin]

But the NHTSA argues that this is statistical malpractice because it doesn't take into account vehicle weight. In a vehicle-to-vehicle crash, the occupant of the heavier vehicle is less likely to be injured. The NHTSA's tests, which involve crashing a car into fixed objects, don't necessarily account for this difference.

But wouldn't a fixed object be roughly equivalent to a very heavy object, in terms of how the collision works? Or even potentially worse? I'm not sure I understand this argument.

No. This is demonstrated very clearly in a series of crash tests that IIHS conducted a few years ago. I wrote about them in this piece which Tim also linked in the article, but this video is probably a much better explanation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnLrgIBa2Pg

 

[ranthog]

It is a fact that the Tesla Model 3 is significantly safer than other cars of similar size and weight. IMO, Tesla is fully within its rights to highlight that fact using publicly available NHTSA data.

Only allowing Tesla to advertise "5 stars", when it's vehicles are actually far safer than competing "5 star" rated vehicles, largely defeats the point of the NHTSA tests - to encourage auto makers to improve their vehicle's safety. Why spend time and money to exceed a 5 star safety rating if you're not allowed to tell anyone about it?

Probably because if NHTSA thought there was a meaningful difference they would issue a 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, or 10th star rating values for their tests that exceed the minimums for a 5 star rating.

Not to mention the fact that you can't compare vehicles in different weight classes.

 

[pkirvan]

Misleading statements is their entire marketing plan. See: Selling "full self driving".

What's missleading there?

they can't currently self drive, and they've not shown that the hardware they're selling is indeed capable of full self driving.

That's the thing. The hardware is supposed to be 100% complete, and customers are just waiting for this mythical OTA software upgrade so they can sleep, read a book, or eat, during their commute.

It just isn't going to happen people.

I think there will be a lawsuit, and then all these Teslas will be recalled and brought back to retrofit with sensors that would work. And of course that will be years from now.

probably cheaper just to offer a partial refund of the price paid for the package.

It seems likely that the whole thing was a gambit. Tesla needed the cash at the time. Musk was hoping that by the time someone calls him on his FSD lies Tesla will have grown enough the payout won’t matter. And if it hadn’t, then the lawsuit wouldn’t matter because the company would be dead or dying anyways. Of course lying to customers is still fraud, but Musk doesn’t let little things like morality get in the way of his plans and rich white people seldom get jail time for fraud so there’s no reason not to do it. He has no qualms about deliberate stock manipulation, for a similar example.

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

This is a case where both sides are right.

(and where I'll be downvoted by readers who do fall on a particular side )

I like how in the moment you have exactly as many up votes as down votes.

Congrats on reaching nirvana.

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

"statistical malpractice"

Err, that's pretty much standard practice for Tesla anytime they talk about safety.

Like how they say Autopilot is statistically safer than driving manually, but they don't take into account that Autopilot is predominately freeways where the accident rate is expected to be less than surface streets where people are driving manually.

 

[Diznaster]

This is a case where both sides are right.

(and where I'll be downvoted by readers who do fall on a particular side )

I like how in the moment you have exactly as many up votes as down votes.

Congrats on reaching nirvana.

It was slightly imbalanced when I saw it, and added my attempt to balance it. Glad others helped out.

 

[Deleted member 221201]

I read the above letters for which I posted links and Timothy's link to the Tesla Blog

https://www.tesla.com/blog/model-3-lowe ... sted-nhtsa

Based on the advanced architecture of Model S and Model X, which were previously found by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to have the lowest and second lowest probabilities of injury of all cars ever tested, we engineered Model 3 to be the safest car ever built.

Based on the letter & the legal response, this will get interesting to see how it turns out.

I think there may be enough of a legal loophole here, otherwise I don't think legal team would
have stood their ground.

 

[S4WRXTTCS]

This is a case where both sides are right.

(and where I'll be downvoted by readers who do fall on a particular side )

I like how in the moment you have exactly as many up votes as down votes.

Congrats on reaching nirvana.

It was slightly imbalanced when I saw it, and added my attempt to balance it. Glad others helped out.

Ha, I probably would have done the same.

Not that I agree with him.

I own a Tesla, and I'm a fan of EV's in general. But, in this case I don't agree with Tesla.

Not that I really like the NHTSA either. For things related to safety I care more about what the IIHS has to say.

The IIHS is supposed to start crash tests of the Model 3 next week. So it should be interesting to see the results as they test a LOT more than what the NHTSA does.

https://twitter.com/iihs_autosafety/sta ... 70433?s=21

 

[lewax00]

But the NHTSA argues that this is statistical malpractice because it doesn't take into account vehicle weight. In a vehicle-to-vehicle crash, the occupant of the heavier vehicle is less likely to be injured. The NHTSA's tests, which involve crashing a car into fixed objects, don't necessarily account for this difference.

But wouldn't a fixed object be roughly equivalent to a very heavy object, in terms of how the collision works? Or even potentially worse? I'm not sure I understand this argument.

No. This is demonstrated very clearly in a series of crash tests that IIHS conducted a few years ago. I wrote about them in this piece which Tim also linked in the article, but this video is probably a much better explanation:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnLrgIBa2Pg

I think I've got a better understanding now, thanks. (Haven't had a chance to watch the video yet, I'll take a look later.) E.g., this seems like a pretty important difference (from the linked article):

The program came about in 1995 after researchers noticed that most frontal collisions were offset—unlike the National Highway Safety Administration's New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) 35mph (56km/h) frontal impact test. [...] But because the force is equally distributed across the width of the vehicle, it is a less demanding test of how well a car's structure absorbs or redirects energy away from the humans inside.

So at least in part, the test just isn't a good indicator of real world conditions like Tesla is implying.

(But that kind of seems like a different argument than what the NHTSA is making, but then again, they probably don't want to call out that their test isn't a great real world analog either...)

 

[Raistian77]

But the NHTSA argues that this is statistical malpractice because it doesn't take into account vehicle weight. In a vehicle-to-vehicle crash, the occupant of the heavier vehicle is less likely to be injured. The NHTSA's tests, which involve crashing a car into fixed objects, don't necessarily account for this difference.

But wouldn't a fixed object be roughly equivalent to a very heavy object, in terms of how the collision works? Or even potentially worse? I'm not sure I understand this argument.

Not that I disagree that this is probably misapplying the statistics, but that's a standard marketing tactic.

I think a fixed object is identical to a vehicle of equal weight moving at equal speed in the other direction. It seems like this must be so for reasons of symmetry. A heavier vehicle is worse than a fixed object -- rather than arresting you completely, you're going to be thrown backward.

Unless it's a Wednesday afternoon and I can't brain good.

You can’t brain good.

Another identical weight car has crumple zones to soften the impact. A “fixed object” is usually a concrete wall or similar.

A friend of mine was recently in a head on collision at pretty decent speeds and the airbags didn’t even deploy - that’s how good crumple zones are these days (both cars were a mangled mess). And no there were no neck injuries.

Don't forget that it also factors into the velocity of the other car, even if the weight is identical, if the other car has a much higher velocity it will be transferring much more energy than a stationary equal weight object.

 

[Pont]

But the NHTSA argues that this is statistical malpractice because it doesn't take into account vehicle weight. In a vehicle-to-vehicle crash, the occupant of the heavier vehicle is less likely to be injured. The NHTSA's tests, which involve crashing a car into fixed objects, don't necessarily account for this difference.

But wouldn't a fixed object be roughly equivalent to a very heavy object, in terms of how the collision works? Or even potentially worse? I'm not sure I understand this argument.

Not that I disagree that this is probably misapplying the statistics, but that's a standard marketing tactic.

I think a fixed object is identical to a vehicle of equal weight moving at equal speed in the other direction. It seems like this must be so for reasons of symmetry. A heavier vehicle is worse than a fixed object -- rather than arresting you completely, you're going to be thrown backward.

Unless it's a Wednesday afternoon and I can't brain good.

You can’t brain good.

Another identical weight car has crumple zones to soften the impact. A “fixed object” is usually a concrete wall or similar.

A friend of mine was recently in a head on collision at pretty decent speeds and the airbags didn’t even deploy - that’s how good crumple zones are these days (both cars were a mangled mess). And no there were no neck injuries.

Don't forget that it also factors into the velocity of the other car, even if the weight is identical, if the other car has a much higher velocity it will be transferring much more energy than a stationary equal weight object.

Yep. It's very much a case where the "spherical cow" math doesn't do justice to the real thing.

A fixed object is, well, fixed. And usually of a consistent substance (cinder blocks, concrete, steel, whatever). A real vehicle is of variable density, irregularly shaped, and suspended on wheels with tires.

 

[Thr2hrmrf]

This is a case where both sides are right.

(and where I'll be downvoted by readers who do fall on a particular side )

yeah, there could be a case for both sides, if Musk had not gotten on Twitter and tweeted that according to the NTHSA Tesla was rated the safest vehicle then had Tesla put it on their web page. That was a lie as no such rating was given.

 

[Thr2hrmrf]

It's called marketing. The whole point is to lie, keep lying, and double down on the lies.

I do marketing, and that is not marketing. Marketing, basically, in this case would have been to paint the NHTSA results factually in an attractive but accurate way and not go into the detail that Tesla and Musk did and not make claims for things that did not exist. This is not a 3 AM infomercial company on TV selling pimple poppers and diet pills for $19.95 (although, Musk seems to be trying really hard to make it one). Instead of acting like a responsible CEO and listening to his marketing people warning Musk got on twitter and tweeted that according to the NTHSA Tesla was rated the safest vehicle then had Tesla put it on their web page. That was a lie as no such rating was given. Now Musk and Tesla (via the Tesla lawyers) are relying on semantics and very specific re-interpretations to make their case which was based on their lie to begin with and its obvious. In short, Tesla and Musk are lying again while trying to save their first lie.

 

[Jim Z]

It is a fact that the Tesla Model 3 is significantly safer than other cars of similar size and weight. IMO, Tesla is fully within its rights to highlight that fact using publicly available NHTSA data.

Only allowing Tesla to advertise "5 stars", when it's vehicles are actually far safer than competing "5 star" rated vehicles, largely defeats the point of the NHTSA tests - to encourage auto makers to improve their vehicle's safety. Why spend time and money to exceed a 5 star safety rating if you're not allowed to tell anyone about it?

Probably because if NHTSA thought there was a meaningful difference they would issue a 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, or 10th star rating values for their tests that exceed the minimums for a 5 star rating.

Not to mention the fact that you can't compare vehicles in different weight classes.

I think the point is that once you qualify for the top rating (whether NHTSA’s 5 star or IIHS’s “good”) there isn’t really much you can do to reasonably do much better. Like the thing about the Model S and the roof crush test. The test says the car has to support 2.5 times the vehicle weight without deflecting more than a certain amount. Why 2.5x? Well, my guess is that it not only shows it won’t collapse if the car upends and is laying upside down, it also indicates the initial impact of it coming down on its roof won’t compromise the structure and allow it to collapse under the vehicle weight. But once your structure passes that threshold, is a car really any “safer” if it manages to support 2.8x or 2.9x the vehicle weight? I’d say no, because the only way that would be relevant is if another vehicle were to land on top of yours after you've flipped it over. It’s certainly no basis for what Tesla did when they claimed the Model S got “5.4 stars” based on some shit they made up.

The reality is that once you achieve “5 stars” or “good” you can reasonably be assured that in most real world crashes your injuries are going to be primarily airbag/seatbelt rash and deceleration related instead of having body parts broken. When you get into ones like very high speed (65mph +) crashes due to reckless or negligent (drunk) drivers, all bets are off. Nothing out there can reliably protect you from that kind of violent impact.

 

[Jim Z]

None of the FSD payments have been realized on teslas books, which means they cant use them or call it profit or whatever, close to $2bn from memory.

So you’re claiming that if you buy a Tesla car and get the FSD option, they set the money you paid for the option aside and don’t count it as income?

Interesting take...

 

[kkeane]

A friend of mine was recently in a head on collision at pretty decent speeds and the airbags didn’t even deploy - that’s how good crumple zones are these days (both cars were a mangled mess). And no there were no neck injuries.

Airbags deploying doesn't have all that much to do with crumple zones, actually. They deploy based on sensors, I believe in the front bumper, outside the crumple zones.

But, yes, I've also had friends in serious accidents where the airbag didn't deploy. And other friends whose airbag deployed with a minor fender bender.

Exactly why, I'm not sure.

 

[kkeane]

None of the FSD payments have been realized on teslas books, which means they cant use them or call it profit or whatever, close to $2bn from memory.

So you’re claiming that if you buy a Tesla car and get the FSD option, they set the money you paid for the option aside and don’t count it as income?

Interesting take...

That would indeed be the generally accepting accounting principle here. Same as when you, say, buy a gift card; the money does not get recognized until you redeem it. Until that point, it is essentially a loan.

But he is still wrong. Tesla can in fact use that money in many different ways, even when it is not recognized as a profit.

 

[Sarty]

But the NHTSA argues that this is statistical malpractice because it doesn't take into account vehicle weight. In a vehicle-to-vehicle crash, the occupant of the heavier vehicle is less likely to be injured. The NHTSA's tests, which involve crashing a car into fixed objects, don't necessarily account for this difference.

But wouldn't a fixed object be roughly equivalent to a very heavy object, in terms of how the collision works? Or even potentially worse? I'm not sure I understand this argument.

Not that I disagree that this is probably misapplying the statistics, but that's a standard marketing tactic.

I think a fixed object is identical to a vehicle of equal weight moving at equal speed in the other direction. It seems like this must be so for reasons of symmetry. A heavier vehicle is worse than a fixed object -- rather than arresting you completely, you're going to be thrown backward.

Unless it's a Wednesday afternoon and I can't brain good.

You can’t brain good.

Another identical weight car has crumple zones to soften the impact. A “fixed object” is usually a concrete wall or similar.

A friend of mine was recently in a head on collision at pretty decent speeds and the airbags didn’t even deploy - that’s how good crumple zones are these days (both cars were a mangled mess). And no there were no neck injuries.

In the totally unrealistic scenario of Car A crashing into Car B, where A and B are perfectly aligned with each other, of identical type, with identical weights aboard, at identical and opposite speeds, the crash is in fact the same as crashing into an infinitely rigid immovable object.

Intuitively, we know that in this idealized example that no part of either Car A or Car B will cross the plane of impact. They can't, because each bit of A will crash into its corresponding bit of B, which has identical and opposite momentum and mass. Every bit of Car A can interact only with other parts of Car A, or with the corresponding part of Car B at the plane of impact, where both must stop dead.

It's impossible in practice to engineer such a perfect collision, but if you could, it would be identical to crashing into a rigid and immovable barrier.

 

[Deleted member 221201]

None of the FSD payments have been realized on teslas books, which means they cant use them or call it profit or whatever, close to $2bn from memory.

So you’re claiming that if you buy a Tesla car and get the FSD option, they set the money you paid for the option aside and don’t count it as income?

Interesting take...

That would indeed be the generally accepting accounting principle here. Same as when you, say, buy a gift card; the money does not get recognized until you redeem it. Until that point, it is essentially a loan.

But he is still wrong. Tesla can in fact use that money in many different ways, even when it is not recognized as a profit.

So its R&D ? until it's realized ?

Take for example the jaguar i-pace or I forget which non tesla ev, that is supposed to get an update to enable faster charging at "a future date"

Well you've bought the car now, so does the company not realize a fraction of the sale until a future date ?

 

[traumadog]

Btw there is an article on this on Teslarati
I'm ignoring all the opinions on that site

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-3 ... deep-dive/


They have actually posted the letter & the response.
Ars should have posted both of them to make it an objective article


NHSTA Letter
https://www.scribd.com/document/4210684 ... from_embed

Tesla's Response
https://www.scribd.com/document/4210684 ... from_embed

1) quoting Teslarati as an independent, unbiased source of information is problematic, at least.

2) if you are going to say "Tesla Model 3 has the lowest probability of injury of all the cars ever tested" (the exact line stated from the Teslarati post), then to the lay public, it means "the Tesla Model 3 is the safest car out there".

And yet that is clearly not the case. Unless you're saying that NHTSA never tested a 2014 BMW 535i/xi... because per the IIHS, it had scored a zero fatality rate through 2018. Not something a Model 3 can claim.

 

[normally butters]

The weight thing is a red herring. Even if Tesla made all the technically-correct qualifications on their statement (according to NHTSA test data, within its weight class, etc.) they'd have still been in violation of NHTSA guidelines, which only allow automakers to use the star rating and specific other claims in their marketing materials. If consumers want to look up VSS scores in order to inform their purchasing decisions, the data is publically available, but it's not supposed to be used in advertisements or spec sheets.

 

[WaveRunner]

Ha... my worry about being in a Tesla has less to do with crashing and more to do with a nasty electrical fire.

But I realize that's just a result of media reporting, quite frankly I'm well aware a short in the car stereo is just as dramatic in a regular ICE.

 

[TROPtastic]

A friend of mine was recently in a head on collision at pretty decent speeds and the airbags didn’t even deploy - that’s how good crumple zones are these days (both cars were a mangled mess). And no there were no neck injuries.

Airbags deploying doesn't have all that much to do with crumple zones, actually. They deploy based on sensors, I believe in the front bumper, outside the crumple zones.

But, yes, I've also had friends in serious accidents where the airbag didn't deploy. And other friends whose airbag deployed with a minor fender bender.

Exactly why, I'm not sure.

I think the other commenter was saying that crumple zones have become so good at reducing decelerations in crashes that airbags don't always need to deploy (the sensors you mention measure the deceleration the car is experiencing).

 

[Deleted member 221201]

Btw there is an article on this on Teslarati
I'm ignoring all the opinions on that site

https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-3 ... deep-dive/


They have actually posted the letter & the response.
Ars should have posted both of them to make it an objective article


NHSTA Letter
https://www.scribd.com/document/4210684 ... from_embed

Tesla's Response
https://www.scribd.com/document/4210684 ... from_embed

1) quoting Teslarati as an independent, unbiased source of information is problematic, at least.

2) if you are going to say "Tesla Model 3 has the lowest probability of injury of all the cars ever tested" (the exact line stated from the Teslarati post), then to the lay public, it means "the Tesla Model 3 is the safest car out there".

And yet that is clearly not the case. Unless you're saying that NHTSA never tested a 2014 BMW 535i/xi... because per the IIHS, it had scored a zero fatality rate through 2018. Not something a Model 3 can claim.

I'm not claiming they are unbiased, which is exactly why I ignored their opinion/editorial, precisely because it's a pro tesla website

I linked the 2 scanned letters so people could read them & make up their own minds
Ars should have put links to those letters

In my next post I also stated this could get interesting as Tesla legal did not back down

I don't work for Tesla or pro/anti in this case, I read the letter & response & think this could get interesting.
I also clearly said above if Tesla is found to be wrong, then man up & apologize & pull the claim.

 

[RobDickinson]

None of the FSD payments have been realized on teslas books, which means they cant use them or call it profit or whatever, close to $2bn from memory.

So you’re claiming that if you buy a Tesla car and get the FSD option, they set the money you paid for the option aside and don’t count it as income?

Interesting take...

That would indeed be the generally accepting accounting principle here. Same as when you, say, buy a gift card; the money does not get recognized until you redeem it. Until that point, it is essentially a loan.

But he is still wrong. Tesla can in fact use that money in many different ways, even when it is not recognized as a profit.

So its R&D ? until it's realized ?

Take for example the jaguar i-pace or I forget which non tesla ev, that is supposed to get an update to enable faster charging at "a future date"

Well you've bought the car now, so does the company not realize a fraction of the sale until a future date ?

Because you are not paying for the faster charging in the iPace as a separate item no, but tesla FSD is a separate listed and paid option its easy to account for and partition off.

 

[TLStetler]

As part of its evaluation process, the NHTSA calculates a number called a vehicle safety score, which the agency has characterized as “relative risk of injury." The agency then awards each vehicle a star rating based on VSS ranges.

OK....VSS is a NHTSA number

Tesla noticed that the Model 3 had a better VSS score than any other vehicle on the market. That, in Tesla's view, means that a Model 3 driver is less likely to be injured in a crash than a driver of any other vehicle.

So would I. If NHTSA thinks the VSS isn't sufficient for such comparisons then the solution isn't to hammer Tesla's use. NHTSA needs to fix VSS then publish the scores.

 

[Sarty]

Tesla noticed that the Model 3 had a better VSS score than any other vehicle on the market. That, in Tesla's view, means that a Model 3 driver is less likely to be injured in a crash than a driver of any other vehicle.

So would I. If NHTSA thinks the VSS isn't sufficient for such comparisons then the solution isn't to hammer Tesla's use. NHTSA needs to fix VSS then publish the scores.

This sort of thinking led to the oft-mocked 100-point video game review scores and the like.of yesteryear. As if the subjective reviewer could really draw a meaningful distinction between, say, a 93-point score and a 92-point score.

The position of the NHTSA, which knows a lot more than you or me about crashworthiness and auto safety, is that crash dynamics are so complex that there is no utility in offering more than a five-level (six? I don't know if there's a zero-star rating) scoring system. More verbose information is not necessarily better, especially when attempting to communicate to non-experts.

 

[Deleted member 221201]

The weight thing is a red herring. Even if Tesla made all the technically-correct qualifications on their statement (according to NHTSA test data, within its weight class, etc.) they'd have still been in violation of NHTSA guidelines, which only allow automakers to use the star rating and specific other claims in their marketing materials. If consumers want to look up VSS scores in order to inform their purchasing decisions, the data is publically available, but it's not supposed to be used in advertisements or spec sheets.

Specifically prohibited from using and "not supposed to" are 2 different things

These same sort of loopholes allow audi & jaguar to advertise their ev's with EU mileage/ratings
which is quite short of U.S ones

This might explain in the legal response letter why the telsa lawyer did not back down.

 

[pkirvan]

None of the FSD payments have been realized on teslas books, which means they cant use them or call it profit or whatever, close to $2bn from memory.

You don't understand accounting. Pre-payments for future goods are not counted as revenue until the goods are delivered. They are classified as an asset with the corresponding liability of the value of the good to be delivered, so they are net neutral from a profit / loss perspective. However, the company still has the cash and can use it for anything they so desire and the money inflow still counts as part of their cashflow. There is no legal need to set the money aside until delivery and nobody does that.

If they did have to set the money aside, Tesla wouldn't have gone to the trouble of having hundreds of thousands of people put down payments on their Model 3. Why did they do that? Because they used that cash to help build the Model 3 assembly line, among other things.

 

[jack lecou]

But the NHTSA argues that this is statistical malpractice because it doesn't take into account vehicle weight. In a vehicle-to-vehicle crash, the occupant of the heavier vehicle is less likely to be injured. The NHTSA's tests, which involve crashing a car into fixed objects, don't necessarily account for this difference.

But wouldn't a fixed object be roughly equivalent to a very heavy object, in terms of how the collision works? Or even potentially worse? I'm not sure I understand this argument.

Not that I disagree that this is probably misapplying the statistics, but that's a standard marketing tactic.

I think a fixed object is identical to a vehicle of equal weight moving at equal speed in the other direction. It seems like this must be so for reasons of symmetry. A heavier vehicle is worse than a fixed object -- rather than arresting you completely, you're going to be thrown backward.

Unless it's a Wednesday afternoon and I can't brain good.

You can’t brain good.

Another identical weight car has crumple zones to soften the impact. A “fixed object” is usually a concrete wall or similar.

A friend of mine was recently in a head on collision at pretty decent speeds and the airbags didn’t even deploy - that’s how good crumple zones are these days (both cars were a mangled mess). And no there were no neck injuries.

In the totally unrealistic scenario of Car A crashing into Car B, where A and B are perfectly aligned with each other, of identical type, with identical weights aboard, at identical and opposite speeds, the crash is in fact the same as crashing into an infinitely rigid immovable object.

Intuitively, we know that in this idealized example that no part of either Car A or Car B will cross the plane of impact. They can't, because each bit of A will crash into its corresponding bit of B, which has identical and opposite momentum and mass. Every bit of Car A can interact only with other parts of Car A, or with the corresponding part of Car B at the plane of impact, where both must stop dead.

It's impossible in practice to engineer such a perfect collision, but if you could, it would be identical to crashing into a rigid and immovable barrier.

Umm, actually, I think you'll find that for an *ideal* example of that sort, they'd have to be of opposite types: i.e., mirror images, a right and left hand drive version.