Sandy Munro, a car engineer and critic, recently received a demonstration of Ford's hands-free driving feature BlueCruise. He wasn't impressed.
Munro spoke with Chris Billman (chief engineer at Ford Driver Assist Technologies) while trying out the new feature in a video.
After taking the car for a spin, Munro said that it was all okay. However, I have been spoilt by Tesla's Full Self Driving Beta. This is amazing.
Elon Musk, Tesla CEO, was also interested in the video. He surprisingly downplayed Tesla's progress.
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FSD Beta 9.2 is not really great [in my view], but Autopilot/AI Team is rallying to improve as quickly as possible, Musk tweeted.
I just drove FSD Beta 9.3 from Pasadena, CA to LAX. He added: "Much improved!"
It was an eloquent moment of humility, especially considering that Tesla just celebrated its AI Day during which the billionaire brag about how far Tesla has come.
Contrary to its name, Tesla's Full Self-Driving option ($10,000) doesn't allow Teslas to drive, but it is making progress.
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This is especially true given the Munros review on BlueCruise which allows drivers to take a break from driving and allow them to get off the wheel.
The FSD beta goes a step further, allowing the vehicle switch lanes, to take highway ramps and even to navigate traffic intersections.
Ford's BlueCruise feature makes it far less intrusive. It refused to send Munro along slightly steeper highway curves during the test drive and asked him to take over each time. The engineer pointed out that Tesla's Autopilot was never switched off while doing the same.
Tesla's FSD beta rollout was controversial. Critics claim that owners are being used to test unproven, and in Musk's words, not great self-driving features on public roads.
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Even Ford executives took this opportunity to critique Tesla's rollout.
It is not clear whether or not drivers should have this much autonomy. Tesla's Autopilot feature is a standard part of its self-driving suite. It has been involved in several high-profile crashes. This culminated in an official investigation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).
The approaches of Tesla and Ford are quite different. Ford uses infrared technology to verify that the driver is paying attention to the road ahead. Tesla uses a easily fooled steering wheel sensor.
This race is to allow drivers unprecedented levels of autonomy and a break from the driving. However, autonomy comes at a cost.
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It remains to be seen if the US carmakers are learning from their mistakes, but it is possible to say a lot about taking things one step at a while.
More FSD: US Gov Investigates Tesla Autopilot Crash Into Emergency Vehicles
