this post was submitted on 17 Apr 2025
1166 points (99.0% liked)
Technology
69109 readers
3172 users here now
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
Our Rules
- Follow the lemmy.world rules.
- Only tech related news or articles.
- Be excellent to each other!
- Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
- Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
- Politics threads may be removed.
- No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
- Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
- Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
- Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.
Approved Bots
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
It's far more likely that the odometer in Teslas are just poor quality crap like the rest of the car.
We already know they knowingly lied about battery range, the capabilities of self driving, and a ton of other fraudulent practices. Tesla is doing it intentionally is more likely than poor build quality.
In fact I believe the odometer reading is calculated from the electricty consumption, not from a meter in the gearbox. So if the range reading is inaccurate (and they are) it would throw out the mileage as well.
Not necessarily, the incorrect readings may only occur at certain speeds or conditions.
That would make no sense. There has to be something spinning connected to something rolling in the ground.
All the AC motors have some kind of encoder to control rotation (and can easily be used to count rotations as well). But if Xitter and Doge have taught us anything, it’s that the programmers for Musks companies more not be very competent.
Apparently its based on the field rotations in the motor or something, remember this is a fixed gear vehicle. I don't think ICE cars use a gear either anymore, its based on the crankshaft sensor for the EFI, multipled by a gear ratio figure in the ECU. Even pushbikes don't have gear sensors for speedo reading, they count magnetic fluctuations in the rim.
I’ll bite, what is the evidence that Tesla knowingly lied about battery range?
Forbes article about it: https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2023/07/27/tesla-exaggerated-its-cars-driving-range-and-canceled-service-appointments-if-drivers-complained-report-says/
Ah okay this makes more sense. With all electric driving ranges the EPA/CARB more pessimistic than, say, WLTP. The probable place that could be gamed in determining this range, to my knowledge, is to shut off anything that might require more power (ie. AC).
However, if the range estimated in the software for the dashboard does not match reality, that is indeed the fault of Tesla
Makes the range look longer, also.
Odometers are one of the oldest consumer protection tools. If it's off, it's very illegal.
Yup, odometers were regulated specifically to protect consumers from widespread odometer fraud. Shit like companies requiring oil changes every 5k miles, and the odometer shows 5000 when it’s actually only 4000, so consumers pay for more service than they need. Or cases like this one, where a company is required to provide a warranty until the 50k odometer reading, and then fudges the odometer so it voids the warranty sooner than it should.
Used to be the other way around, undercount the miles so that you can sell it at a higher price.
Double dick move by tesla, shorten the warranty period, and lower the resale value! INNOVATIVE!
thats why you never hear people buying a used one, too defective.
I wonder how sophisticated this fraud is? They could have it rush to 50k, and then "catch up" by running more slowly for the next few 10s of thousands to cover the tracks.
That cant be a defense?!
When accused of crimes, deflect by admitting to even bigger crimes.
They cancel out
I have the worst fucking attorneys
Double it and give it to the next defendant!
For Trump justice is indeed ike playing Uno
I mean, VW tried to blame poor quality software (aka a bug) for their abnormal emissions, before it was discovered it's fully intended to cheat emissions testing.
I wouldn't put it above Tesla to do the same here.
Sorry officer, I'm just really stupid.
Sure, but if you apply hanlon's razor whenever it's applicable, you're right more often.
It can definitely be both. Trump is exhibit A. Its never enough for them to get what they want, it has to hurt the other person or party on the other end of any interaction. They are thoroughly malicious and stupid
Nah fuck hanlons razor. Evil people can be stupid but they are still evil. If the incompetence reaches this point it is also malice.
I'm not saying both aren't possible. And I'm not saying both don't apply here.
But in general, if you make it a practice to remember Hanlon's razor, you will be both correct more often and generally happier. I'm just suggesting, do it for your own sake. Assume the best of intentions in people, because usually people do mean well. And also expect them to let you down by making genuinely stupid choices, because then you won't be surprised when they do.
I assume the best intentions of people that haven't repeatedly proven that they do not have the best of intentions. Telsa has repeatedly shown that they are willing to break the law to accomplish something they want and this isn't a huge step farther all things considered.
Never attribute to malice or stupidity that which can be explained by moderately rational individuals following incentives in a complex system.
No, it isn't. Tesla's past behavior shows that they would definitely try to do this, because they would make a lot of money. And if the odometers were "randomly" poor quality, why would we only see reports of mileage being mistakenly high? Where are the mistaken low reports? Haven't seen any of those.
Would most people notice that? Would they say something if they did? If this particular warranty is mileage based, I'd keep my mouth shut if mine was abnormally low. It's not like it's something that affects the functioning of the car, and has other potential advantages like higher resale value.
And even if you said something, who is going to report on it? This is news because it's gone to court. You're not going to try to take them to court for it being low. At best you'll just try to get it fixed.
I'm not saying this isn't something they would do, I just don't necessarily think we'd definitely see reports of it being low, even if it was happening.
If they were actually doing this, and actually being smart about it though, they'd have it go over at a rate of say, 30% of cars, and under at a rate of like 10% of cars so they'd still come out on top but actually have it seem to be randomly faulty.
Sure, but then you'd also expect to hear about Teslas with odometers that massively underreport the distance, too. Or that fail altogether. And while no one would be likely to report the former, the latter might be a bigger deal.
Under-reporting mileage is an issue because you won't get the recommended oil checks at the right times, which will shorten your engine life. And it would be generally concerning to the owner, right? We really do assume the odometer is mostly accurate when we're going on trips.
So I think people would be reporting it if it were happening, but they aren't, so it's probably not. Of course this is speculation.
Ah yes, the recommended oil checks on a famously electric vehicle. /s
I get what you're saying, but more likely is that nobody would ever notice. Which also seems unlikely, since we're quite an oversharing culture.
Had a Tesla Model 3 before, have a VW ID.7 now. They're driven the same and it looks like they both agree about the distances driven.
FWIW
all the models have defects, it just nobody complained enough that the news picked on it. i remmeber on reddit, some fanboy bought one for 140k or something around the time twitter was bought, everyone was quesitoning why he bought it at a volatile time.
Even more likely there is a bug ticket in thier system that says some part is malfunctioning causing the odometer to count too fast. And that ticket has been depriortized by product management repeatedly as fixing it generates no increase in revenue.