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Comment by jakobegger | Hacker News Reader

Also, „hands were not detected“ does not mean that they really weren‘t on the wheel. Maybe someone who drives a Tesla can comment on how reliable the hand detection is.

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This came up last month and a Tesla driver had this to say.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16822623

The driver clearly didn't take any action to intervene, so his hands probably genuinely weren't on the wheel.

Hand detection is pretty good. You only need to rest your hands on the wheel. Have a model s as my daily driver.

Lots of drivers have problems where they have to "shake" the wheel to make the car understand that they do indeed have their hands on the wheel. The system is pretty rubbish.

It seems to me that my 2015 S70D expects me to be holding the wheel firmly enough to actually take action.

Mostly I just keep one hand lightly on the wheel when driving down a motorway with autosteer on and just give it a gentle squeeze or wiggle once in a while. If I use it on less good roads I keep both hands on the wheel in the proper location for taking control.

It seems pretty good to me.

Then it must vary significantly per car. I have to squeeze the wheel pretty hard to dismiss the message on mine.

Or, perhaps more probably, by driver. I am far more inclined to think that a large variation in hands exists, rather than a large variation in mass-produced steering wheels.

No idea about tesla, but how do you screw up hand detenction?

It's based off measuring torque on the steering column, not some sort of (say) heat or pressure sensors on the wheel itself.

So, having your hands on the wheel and not moving them can be sensed by the Tesla as "not having your hands on the wheel".

Learned something new, thanks a lot.

In my car (a Honda) I can have my hands on the wheel and if I’m not doi enough steering it will yell at me.

There are one or two spots around town that are straight enough that I don’t need to give any steering input and it will sometimes flag me there even though my hands were on the wheel the whole time.

On a freeway? Don’t think I’ve ever had thay happen though.

The hand not applying any pressure and barely touching the wheel. It happens consistently on my Ford Fusion when I am driving on a straight line. Car says my hands are not on the wheel when they are touching it.

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