OT - For Car Lovers: Some Recent Exotic Spottings

kl8ton

Everyone put their cars away.  Plows are back out.

saluki2007

I love the look of that house. Any chance there are photos on zillow?

GrateEggspectations

saluki2007 said:

I love the look of that house. Any chance there are photos on zillow?

I know. It’s beautiful. One of the neighbours places was recently up for sale for about $5M. It featured an indoor skatepark and a deep, deep backyard backing onto the river.  Truly a gem of a spot. 

alaskanassasin

welp its official.   this should just about kill this thread.

 https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/us-eliminates-human-controls-requirement-fully-automated-vehicles-2022-03-11/?utm_source=reddit.com

JohnInCarolina

alaskanassasin said:

welp its official.   this should just about kill this thread.

 https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/us-eliminates-human-controls-requirement-fully-automated-vehicles-2022-03-11/?utm_source=reddit.com

It's going to be interesting to watch how this all evolves.  I think we are still a ways away from fully autonomous vehicles being sufficiently robust.  

kl8ton

I don't wish to lose the ability to "control" my vehicle. . . on the other hand, this new generation of drivers (my 16 year old son) who just want to get from point A to point B could legit benefit from this.  My son hasn't wrecked the car yet.  I had wrecked my first car quickly as I attempted a double car pass (front car was turning left with no signal).  The new drivers seem more timid/passive to generalize.

lousubcap

@klaton - you may dodge the young male driver virus that enables speeding tix and wrecks.  I have three data points (self and two sons) and all confirmed the virus did exist at least a little over a decade ago.  

alaskanassasin

I can just see you getting into one of these and getting dropped off unwillingly had a vaccination clinic. Or tax office 

RyanStl

I think it was taken from a jeep with a sticker that reads "If You Can Read This Flip Me Over".

JohnInCarolina

alaskanassasin said:

I can just see you getting into one of these and getting dropped off unwillingly had a vaccination clinic. Or tax office 

Not in this country.  

nolaegghead

JohnInCarolina said:

alaskanassasin said:

I can just see you getting into one of these and getting dropped off unwillingly had a vaccination clinic. Or tax office 

Not in this country.  

Hyperbole? Yes, I think it exists here too.

Botch

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

Foghorn

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

Exactly.  If computer controlled cars cut crashes and deaths per mile traveled by 90% - but not to zero - each of us will think that we don't want to give up control to a computer because we could die - and we KNOW we can drive better than the computer...

Langner91

As George Carlin once said, "Any computer driving slower than you is an idiot, and one driving faster than you is a maniac!"

Gulfcoastguy

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

Unless the computer was Hal.

alaskanassasin

Foghorn said:

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

Exactly.  If computer controlled cars cut crashes and deaths per mile traveled by 90% - but not to zero - each of us will think that we don't want to give up control to a computer because we could die - and we KNOW we can drive better than the computer...

JohnInCarolina said:

alaskanassasin said:

I can just see you getting into one of these and getting dropped off unwillingly had a vaccination clinic. Or tax office 

Not in this country.  

737 MAX. 

A computer simply does not have any skin in the game

saluki2007

alaskanassasin said:

Foghorn said:

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

Exactly.  If computer controlled cars cut crashes and deaths per mile traveled by 90% - but not to zero - each of us will think that we don't want to give up control to a computer because we could die - and we KNOW we can drive better than the computer...

JohnInCarolina said:

alaskanassasin said:

I can just see you getting into one of these and getting dropped off unwillingly had a vaccination clinic. Or tax office 

Not in this country.  

737 MAX. 

A computer simply does not have any skin in the game

There was nothing wrong with that plane.  The pilots just didn't know how to turn the computer off.

In all seriousness there was just something on Netflix about the 737 and the plane crashes.  It's worth a watch if you are not familiar with a lot of the details about that plane and Boeing.

JohnInCarolina

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

You’d be surprised.  Large groups of vehicles operating under the same control algorithm occasionally get trapped in a corner of phase space that nobody wants to experience first hand.  

GrateEggspectations

Was going to take a photo from the back, as I’m a sucker for a nice rear end, but my phone died right as I took the above photo. I wasn’t even sure I caught this one until I recharged. 

I am connecting with a friend of a friend this weekend who is currently shopping for an Enzo. He’s the same one I mentioned earlier in this thread. 

Botch

JohnInCarolina said:

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

You’d be surprised.  Large groups of vehicles operating under the same control algorithm occasionally get trapped in a corner of phase space that nobody wants to experience first hand.  

Oh, I have no doubt that software can't f*ck up on occasion (my car sometimes doesn't turn on the rear-view camera when I put it into Reverse, and sometimes doesn't roll my window up all the way when I close the door.  
 
I'm just saying I have more faith in software than the guy driving next to me on the Interstate, texting on his phone.  

Botch

BMW iX.  Watch the first 60 seconds to catch that wild, wraparound computer screen (you EV wanna-haters will enjoy the 2nd half of the video, though):
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7H9VbWD_qg
 
When I get too old to crawl into my convertible and trade it and my Taco in for an SUV (fifteen years or so from now), I won't be buying this.  All touch-screen controls in a vehicle, for the driver, is a very bad idea.  
 
"Hey BMW, warm my butt-hole."    

Ozzie_Isaac

GrateEggspectations

Ozzie_Isaac said:

Pretty sure that soft-top is aftermarket. 

Ozzie_Isaac

GrateEggspectations said:

Ozzie_Isaac said:

Pretty sure that soft-top is aftermarket. 

It is a very rare convertible Toyota mini-truck RV conversion.

FarmingPhD

Botch said:

JohnInCarolina said:

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

You’d be surprised.  Large groups of vehicles operating under the same control algorithm occasionally get trapped in a corner of phase space that nobody wants to experience first hand.  

Oh, I have no doubt that software can't f*ck up on occasion (my car sometimes doesn't turn on the rear-view camera when I put it into Reverse, and sometimes doesn't roll my window up all the way when I close the door.  
 
I'm just saying I have more faith in software than the guy driving next to me on the Interstate, texting on his phone.  

I can explain the window issue, backup camera is a guess.

A lot of the self driving piece is handled by machine learning/AI.  Challenging piece is that the the result of what the AI does is only predictable if it has “seen” the situation before, meaning very unique situations lead to unpredictable results.  AI code is is also not something you can just jump into and debug to add a new “if” statement to handle a situation.  

Teslas approach of collecting data is pretty slick to support their self driving development.  

Disclaimer: I’m not an expert on this topic, but have worked with folks that are, supporting some of their data collection and learning techniques.  Folks that are much smarter than me, but rely on folks that know the application to help them fill in all the corner conditions (or find new ones together).

nolaegghead

FarmingPhD said:

Botch said:

JohnInCarolina said:

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

You’d be surprised.  Large groups of vehicles operating under the same control algorithm occasionally get trapped in a corner of phase space that nobody wants to experience first hand.  

Oh, I have no doubt that software can't f*ck up on occasion (my car sometimes doesn't turn on the rear-view camera when I put it into Reverse, and sometimes doesn't roll my window up all the way when I close the door.  
 
I'm just saying I have more faith in software than the guy driving next to me on the Interstate, texting on his phone.  

I can explain the window issue, backup camera is a guess.

A lot of the self driving piece is handled by machine learning/AI.  Challenging piece is that the the result of what the AI does is only predictable if it has “seen” the situation before, meaning very unique situations lead to unpredictable results.  AI code is is also not something you can just jump into and debug to add a new “if” statement to handle a situation.  

Teslas approach of collecting data is pretty slick to support their self driving development.  

Disclaimer: I’m not an expert on this topic, but have worked with folks that are, supporting some of their data collection and learning techniques.  Folks that are much smarter than me, but rely on folks that know the application to help them fill in all the corner conditions (or find new ones together).

You are wise.  I seem to remember when watching the Tesla videos on their AI that there is some human intervention on edge cases where you have shadows/reflections or other video artifacts that swings the AI or influences it somehow, but yeah, there's no adding a case/elsif statement, the code is hybrid.

FarmingPhD

There was a discussion a while back about making biofuel from corn stover (the non-grain portion of the crop), didn’t have time to reply in detail then, so I’m going to try and fill in what I know while chilling on vacation. 

In ~2014 or ‘15 DuPont started building a cellulosic ethanol plant in central Iowa.  Plan was to use corn stover as feedstock.  The harvesting plan Was a three year minimum rotation, meaning stover could only be harvested once every three years from an individual field.
Stover harvesting was completed post grain harvest by stalk chopping with a windrowing stalk chopper followed by baling into 3’x4’x8’ large squares.  This does remove organic matter, but because of high yielding corn and corn on corn rotations, they actually have some issues with too much residue as it tries to decompose. This also some public misnomer about sequestering carbon in soil as organic matter decomposes, surprise, it releases CO2.  Lot of logistics in moving harvested stover, storing, and preserving, won’t boor you with those details.

Fast forward to the Dow DuPont merger, the cellulosic ethanol plant they were building ended up in limbo as an asset they didn’t know what to do with and was sold off.  Now owned by VERBIO, supposed to be making ethanol, or already are from corn cellulose.  

FarmingPhD

Botch said:

JohnInCarolina said:

Botch said:

I don't want to trust my car to a computer, but I think I'd feel better if all the cars around me were controlled by a computer.  

You’d be surprised.  Large groups of vehicles operating under the same control algorithm occasionally get trapped in a corner of phase space that nobody wants to experience first hand.  

Oh, I have no doubt that software can't f*ck up on occasion (my car sometimes doesn't turn on the rear-view camera when I put it into Reverse, and sometimes doesn't roll my window up all the way when I close the door.  
 
I'm just saying I have more faith in software than the guy driving next to me on the Interstate, texting on his phone.  

Doh- forgot the window.  Safety protocol to keep the auto up from hurting someone, monitors current load on the motor, if a spike in current is seen, your window stops or rolls back down.  There are boring written standards that define the level of force where the window has to stop, so the jarring of the window when you shut the door likely causes a load spike.  My F150 will do this when rolling up my window on a rough road sometimes.

fishlessman

the window overload is actually nice, mine was frozen up the other day. dont want to tear a gasket

nolaegghead

Obviously designing a window regulator so it doesn't amputate passengers is massive government overreach.