Tesla has announced a brand new unveiling date for its self-driving robotaxi, after its reveal was delayed for unknown reasons.
Originally as a consequence of break cover on August 8, Tesla’s robotaxi – understood to be called Cybercab – is now slated to be revealed on October 10, CEO Elon Musk told investors today as an element of the corporate’s second quarter financial results call.
Mr Musk said the delay was as a consequence of “essential changes” he desired to be made to the robotaxi, without elaborating on what they’re.
“I desired to make some essential changes that I feel would improve the robotaxi, and we’re also going to indicate off a few other things,” said Mr Musk.
“Moving it back a couple of months allowed us to enhance the robotaxi in addition to add in a few other things for the product unveil.”
It appears unlikely the robotaxi will enter mass production at Tesla’s Texas factory this 12 months, as predicted by Mr Musk in April 2022.
We don’t know much in regards to the Tesla robotaxi, other than what has been pieced together from previous reports and teasers by the corporate.
It has been claimed the robotaxi can be based on the identical platform as Tesla’s reportedly cancelled entry-level electric vehicle (EV), which was tipped to launch in 2025 and begin at US$25,000 (A$37,800).
During a video uploaded by Tesla to X (formerly Twitter) in May, a temporary clip shows the front seats are effectively one unit, separated only by a fold-down armrest.
Afterward within the video, we’re shown the essential concept structure of what’s understood to be the robotaxi – though there seem like two separate front seats. It’s possible that is Tesla’s tackle the old-school split bench.
It’ll reportedly go with out a steering wheel – as a consequence of being a completely autonomous vehicle – but additionally appears to omit any rear seats, limiting the variety of occupants it may possibly hold.
When asked when the Tesla robotaxi will complete its first public ride, Mr Musk said it is determined by when the corporate’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) autonomous systems are released in full.
“I assume that’s really just an issue [of] when do I expect we will do unsupervised Full Self-Driving.
“It’s difficult. My predictions on this have been overly optimistic prior to now.
“Based on the present trends, it seems as if we must always get miles between interventions far enough in excess of humans that you could possibly do unsupervised possibly by the tip of this 12 months. If we cannot do it, next 12 months.”
Tesla’s semi-autonomous driving systems – available across its range of core vehicles – have been facing increased scrutiny overseas.
In 2019, Mr Musk said there can be “over one million Tesla cars on the road with Full Self-Driving hardware” by the center of 2020, able to allowing the motive force to fall asleep behind the wheel.
After first only being available to US ‘beta’ testers in September 2021, Full Self-Driving (also often called FSD) became publicly available to all Tesla vehicles within the US able to running the system in November 2022 – without road safety regulator approval.
Tesla markets Full Self-Driving – technically a Level 2 autonomous driving system, despite the name – as having the flexibility to speed up, brake and steer the automobile itself, with the system claimed to be able to navigating, changing lanes and following road signal directions.
Teslas with FSD were soon recalled in February 2023 as a consequence of concerns they weren’t adequately adhering to traffic safety laws, with an over-the-air update rolled out to resolve the failure.
FSD remains to be without regulatory approval within the US, despite its beta tag being removed within the back end of last 12 months.
This Article First Appeared At www.carexpert.com.au
