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Comment by colanderman | Hacker News Reader

I don't own a Tesla, but here's my pet peeve as a passenger:

When the driver opens their door, the driver's seat starts moving backward.

If you are sitting behind the driver, and have longer-than-average legs, this means your legs are now getting actively crushed by a motor.

If it's your first time in a Tesla, you are probably now panicking trying to figure out how to open the damn door, which inexplicably operates differently than every other car door in existence.

Not a pleasant experience. I've now learned to quickly and loudly remind the driver not to exit until I do when in this situation.

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It... it can't detect a stall current?

The seats in my 6 year old winter beater BMW will stop moving if they encounter resistance.

It's a two-door car so the seats move often too to accommodate my dog traveling in the back seats, I'd consider it a basic safety feature.

Edit: Just tested it again, the moment it encounters resistance it reverses direction for a second then stops

The amount of force it took is fairly low too, yet I've never had this failsafe accidentally trigger.

You'd think this stuff is table stakes for a mechanically advantaged system that can move hundreds of pounds effortlessly.

The current to move the seat with someone sitting on it is likely not all that different from the stall current as it starts pushing into someone's knees, particularly given it's likely geared down a significant amount so it can move slowly.

The current to move your seat likely does not change much while you are in it, and the occupancy sensor could help account for that.

In the case of automatic car windows everything from ambient temps to battery voltage is used to detect if there's an obstacle present.

And I think what makes it kind of unacceptable is you can get off the shelf modules that integrate anti-pinch features:

https://www.continental-automotive.com/en-gl/Passenger-Cars/...

It wreaks of NIH syndrome or just trying to shave off some cost.

A quick search shows Teslas even have rear seat occupancy sensors, so that alone should disable the movement if there's a person detected in the back.

Motorised seats moving automatically can be very dangerous.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-57908134

This is a completely optional feature. In fact it's off by default, you have to opt into Easy Entry and set up the exactly where you want the seat to go to. Many cars have this feature and it's 100% on the driver to make sure you set the depth to a reasonable level and to make sure you're not putting someone 6'3 behind you in the passenger seat when you know you have this feature enabled.

Every car I've owned in the last few years has a setting to move the seat when you open the door so it's easier to get out. This isn't Tesla specific.

Idk about Tesla but every car I’ve had with this feature allowed you to disable with a physical or software selector.

Not only is it not on by default in Teslas but it's actually quite a bit of work to setup.

Most cars it's just a toggle. In Teslas you have to setup a new profile and manually set the steering wheel and seat to the exit position. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94l43ILKRsA

It’s called easy entry and it’s very easy to disable on a Tesla. Far easier than the cryptic menus that most carmakers love to hide settings under.

This can be disabled in the Driver Profile settings on all Teslas FYI.

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