Recent reports had circulated stating some Tesla vehicles would accelerate on their own, but after an investigation, Tesla has stated today in a blog post this is not happening at all.
The Tesla Team writes in a posted titled, “There is no “unintended acceleration” in Tesla vehicles”, to say “this petition is completely false and was brought by a Tesla short-seller. We investigate every single incident where the driver alleges to us that their vehicle accelerated contrary to their input, and in every case where we had the vehicle’s data, we confirmed that the car operated as designed. In other words, the car accelerates if, and only if, the driver told it to do so, and it slows or stops when the driver applies the brake.”
According to CNBC, the short seller in question is Brian Sparks, who “is currently shorting Tesla stock, but has hedged his bets and been long shares of Tesla in the past.”
Tesla says “the accelerator pedals in Model S, X and 3 vehicles have two independent position sensors, and if there is any error, the system defaults to cut off motor torque.”
The company goes on to explain, “likewise, applying the brake pedal simultaneously with the accelerator pedal will override the accelerator pedal input and cut off motor torque, and regardless of the torque, sustained braking will stop the car.”
Tesla says its Autopilot sensor suite also can help determine “potential pedal misapplications and cut torque to mitigate or prevent accidents when we’re confident the driver’s input was unintentional. Each system is independent and records data, so we can examine exactly what happened.”
“We are transparent with NHTSA, and routinely review customer complaints of unintended acceleration with them. Over the past several years, we discussed with NHTSA the majority of the complaints alleged in the petition. In every case we reviewed with them, the data proved the vehicle functioned properly,” concludes Tesla.
