Recently, the California State Department of Vehicles
published a report on the study of unmobiles from eight different companies. Each of the vehicles had a problem,
one or several , there are no ideal machines with an automatic control system yet.
The report contains data that is provided once a year by the developers of robots, who have permission to test their vehicles on public roads. In total, such permits were obtained by 50 companies, but only eight have something to experience. The rest - either prototypes that are not ready for the trip, or robomobils are still being finalized.
It is clear that the problems of different robomobiles are different. Some vehicles have problems assessing the surrounding space around them. Others do not maneuver well on the road. Third, there are problems with software and hardware. The report that the agency receives from each of the companies contains detailed technical data on all these issues.
For example, one of the companies that sent the report complained that its system is not very well oriented on the road in the presence of a large flow of pedestrians or if the road markings are poorly visible. On Geektimes, an article was recently published that Tesla's romance mobiles apparently do not always work out the trip on the road with scratched markings, although this has not yet been proven.
Reports to the California office are sent not only by American companies, but also by any other, whose units operate in the United States, testing robomobils in California. In particular, Baidu, the Chinese telecommunications giant,
reported a problem when the driver was unable to take control because of the failure of the steering wheel. In some cases, the car incorrectly identified the traffic lights, made a mistake in estimating traffic intensity on the road, slowed down lately when it approached another car, went outside its own lane, determined the presence of a pedestrian on the road with a delay.
The developer of automotive systems Delphi said that its autonomous system was failing in the process of determining traffic signals, incorrectly determined its own location due to a GPS failure, and acted incorrectly in the event of unexpected actions by other road users.
Drive.ai, a company that develops a software platform for robo mobiles, spoke about the problem of getting the car off the line or uncomfortable vehicle braking. In addition, in some cases, the car was simply lost on the road, incorrectly assessing its location.
GM Cruise Automation develops robot systems and systems for them. The vehicles of this company did not always keep well within their lane; several times her vehicles incorrectly estimated the distances to other vehicles in the event of a crossing over. Robotic car did not always work correctly with the brake system, several times incorrectly identified the signs encountered. In addition, robomobils are “lost” when other road users break the rules or act too aggressively.
Nissan had difficulty working with its software platform. Several times the system on the road simply “fell”, and the driver had to take control in his hands. Also, roboMobi companies in some cases incorrectly assessed their location.
Telenav is another company that develops software and hardware platforms for roaming mobiles. Her systems did not always keep the correct distance to other cars while traveling on the road. Sometimes the ro-mobile was too close to an alien lane, which created a certain danger for other road users.
Finally, Google's Waymo division complains that one of its robots did not recognize the “red — no right-turn signal.” Plus, there were problems with the software and hardware platform when driving on the road.
Of course, all of these companies have a different number of kilometers rolled on the roads by vehicles. Someone, like Waymo, has been driving cars with autopilot for a long time, someone has only recently stepped onto the roads. Nevertheless, everyone has problems, and in order for robomobils to be sold, all difficulties will have to be solved. In addition, not all companies will launch a full autopilot to the market. Most are going to do the example of Tesla, equipping cars with "driver assistants" who help drive the car, but do not turn it into a completely autonomous vehicle.