Ride the Lightning: Tesla and EV Podcast Jan 25, 2026

Episode 547: A Wild Week of FSD News

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Term

FSD

FSD means Full Self-Driving, which is a feature from Tesla that helps the car drive itself. Right now, it still needs a driver to pay attention, but Tesla is working on making it fully autonomous.

Term

autopilot

Autopilot is a feature in Tesla cars that helps the car drive itself a little bit by steering and controlling speed. However, the driver still needs to be in control and watch the road.

Car

Tesla Model X

The Tesla Model X is an electric SUV that has unique doors that open upwards. It's spacious and packed with technology, making it a great option for families who want an environmentally friendly car.

Car

Tesla Model S

The Tesla Model S is an electric car that is very fast and has a lot of high-tech features. It's one of Tesla's main models and is known for its long battery life.

Car

Toyota Corolla

The 2026 Toyota Corolla is a small car that many people buy because it's dependable and gets good gas mileage. It usually has the latest safety and tech features.

Car

2026 Tesla

The 2026 Tesla is an electric car that will be available in 2026. Tesla cars are famous for their technology, like self-driving features and the ability to update software online.

Concept

fully autonomous cars

Fully autonomous cars are cars that can drive themselves without anyone controlling them. They use computers and sensors to understand their surroundings and make decisions.

Term

full self-driving

Full self-driving means the car can drive itself without needing a person to control it. Tesla is working on making this technology safer and more reliable.

Company

Lemonade

Lemonade is a company that provides insurance online, making it easier and faster for people to get coverage. They use technology to help manage claims and lower prices.

Term

telematics device

A telematics device is a gadget that tracks how you drive your car. Insurance companies use this information to help determine your insurance rates.

Term

Euro NCAP

Euro NCAP is a group that tests new cars to see how safe they are in crashes. They give ratings to help people know which cars are safer to drive.

Car

The Tesla Model 3 is a type of car that runs on electricity instead of gasoline. It's known for being fast, having a long battery life, and being very safe in accidents, which is why people often talk about it.

Car

Tesla Model Y

Car

Dodge Ram

The Dodge Ram is a big truck that can carry heavy loads and is often used for work. People talk about it because it's strong and can do a lot of tough jobs, making it a favorite among truck lovers.

Term

crash ratings

Crash ratings tell you how safe a car is if it gets into an accident. They are based on tests that show how well the car protects people inside during a crash.

Company

Accelerate Auto

Accelerate Auto is a business that provides services related to cars, such as warranties that help pay for repairs.

Term

extended warranty

An extended warranty is like extra insurance for your car that helps pay for repairs after the original warranty runs out.

Brand

Rivian

Rivian is a company that makes electric vehicles, like trucks and SUVs. They focus on outdoor adventure and sustainability.

Part

rear camera washer system

A rear camera washer system helps keep the camera on the back of the car clean, so drivers can see clearly when reversing or using the camera for parking.

Car

Tesla CyberCab

The Tesla CyberCab is a new type of taxi that Tesla is creating, which will use self-driving technology to transport passengers without a driver.

Car

Tesla Cybertruck

The Tesla Cybertruck is an electric truck that looks very different from regular trucks. It's designed to be tough and is meant to be used for work and play, which makes it an exciting topic for people interested in new kinds of vehicles.

Term

hardware three

Hardware three is the latest version of the computer that Tesla cars use to help them drive themselves. It's better than earlier versions and helps the car understand its surroundings more effectively.

Term

electric vehicles (EVs)

Electric vehicles, or EVs, are cars that run on electricity instead of gas. They are better for the environment and can save money on fuel.

Concept

Chinese EVs

Chinese EVs are electric cars made in China. They are becoming more popular in places like Canada.

Car

Ford Ranger

The Ford Ranger is a smaller truck that can be used for carrying things or driving off-road. It's popular because it's strong and can handle tough jobs while still being easy to drive.

Concept

Gigafactory

A Gigafactory is a huge factory where Tesla makes batteries and parts for their electric cars. These factories help produce a lot of batteries quickly and more cheaply.

Concept

Gen 1 Model 3

Gen 1 Model 3 means the first version of the Tesla Model 3, which was made before any updates or changes were introduced in later models.

Concept

Gen 2 Model 3

Gen 2 Model 3 means the second version of the Tesla Model 3, which has some upgrades compared to the first version.

Company

RPM Tesla

RPM Tesla makes upgrades for Tesla cars that fit well with the original design and features, like carbon fiber parts and better interiors.

Part

steering wheel upgrades

Steering wheel upgrades are changes made to the steering wheel of a car to make it look better or feel better to drive.

Company

Abstract Ocean

Abstract Ocean is a website where you can buy extra parts and accessories for Tesla cars. They have a lot of different items to choose from.

Term

aftermarket accessories

Aftermarket accessories are extra items you can buy for your car after you buy it. They can make your car look better or work better.

LIVE

On this week's episode of Ride the Lightning,

the Tesla and EV podcast,

it has been a wild week of FSD news

from Tesla discontinuing basic autopilot

on new car purchases to Tesla CEO

saying the price of FSD will go up

as unsupervised arrives to unsupervised actually arriving

for the first couple of test cars

in the Austin RoboTaxi fleet at least.

Plus, one insurance company

wants to drastically lower the rates of Tesla owners

who make frequent use of FSD.

The cyber cab gets a camera related upgrade

that Tesla customers have wanted for a while now and more.

What's happening friends?

Ryan McCaffrey joining you for episode 547

of Ride the Lightning, the weekly Tesla and EV podcast,

publishing on January 25th, 2026.

I'm recording as usual on Friday evening

here on January 23rd and boy,

I sure hope no other FSD related news happens

between the time I record this

and the time that I publish it

and the time that you hear it

because there has been so much,

so much FSD related news this week.

We've got a super busy episode planned for you.

Next week, by the way, will be the earnings call,

the Q4 earnings call for Tesla,

which means I'll be doing my usual thing

of giving you all the highlight clips,

the analysis from the call itself

as well as the shareholder letter,

so stay tuned for that on next week's episode.

But I do wanna start

before I get to all the FSD related stuff

with a spicy tip that was sent my way.

I do wanna preface this one by saying

that this is a second hand source.

I have first hand sources

that sometimes slip me bits of information

that I feel really confident in reporting to you

and passing along.

This one, being a second hand source

that I don't already have an established relationship with,

you know, I can't 100% say

this is absolutely gonna happen.

So I can't vouch for this one yet,

but I'm gonna pass it along with that caveat

and then we'll see if this source

proves themselves to be reliable.

So the tip is this,

this source told me that the Model YL

will go on sale in the United States next month,

meaning in February,

and that Tesla's higher up sales team,

the sales leadership team,

is currently working on the messaging

for the boots on the ground sales team

about how to position it next to the Model X.

So again, fingers crossed that this source is correct,

and I guess we'll know in about a month or so from now.

All right, to get started,

I promised a lot of FSD related stuff.

So here we go, buckle up.

Following up to last week's story

about FSD going subscription only.

Remember when I was talking about not recommending

that anybody buy it before the full $8,000 option

goes away on February 14th?

Because we just don't have any assurances

that FSD transfer would be available long term

when you're ready to trade in that car.

Well, it turns out that we don't have any assurances

that FSD transfer will even be available in the short term.

Our Tesla tipster friend, Sawyer Merritt,

posted on X this week saying, quote,

Tesla has started to inform customers in the US

that free FSD transfer will end on March 31st, 2026,

which of course is the end of the quarter.

And sure enough, Tesla made it very official

by sending out emails to customers about this.

I got one of those emails and you might have too.

Now Tesla has done this many times before

that where they've ended FSD transfer

at the end of a quarter only to turn around

and offer it again a little ways into the next quarter.

And so maybe it is possible that that will happen again here.

And to be clear, I hope it does.

But for the moment, we have to take Tesla at face value

and presume that at least for now

that the FSD transfer option is gone forever

after March 31st.

And then we got a little bit more this week.

Sawyer posted again later the week with quote,

so this is interesting, Tesla is telling US customers

that they must take, they must, excuse me,

must place their order by March 31st

to qualify for free FSD transfer

but can take delivery later.

He says that's different from Tesla's previous policy

which required customers to take delivery

by the end of the quarter to lock it in.

So if that is indeed the actual final said and done policy,

what does that mean?

If I have this correct, it means that the option

to purchase FSD still goes away after February 14th,

but if you already have FSD

and wanna transfer it to a new car,

you have to place the order for that new car by March 31st.

So that is the latest update on this.

We'll see if we get any more clarity on this

over the next couple of weeks as February 14th approaches.

Well, I made this the subject, pardon me,

of this week's Patreon poll,

part of this ongoing FSD strategy change.

And I'll note just real quick here

because it'll make sense in a few minutes

when I get to the next story

that I posted this Patreon poll earlier in the week.

So the question was,

how do you feel about Tesla's move

to subscription only for FSD?

Thank you to the 368 people that kindly took the time

to stop by my Patreon page to vote here.

A reminder that the Patreon polls that I post each week

are free to anybody.

You don't have to be supporting me at all on Patreon.

You don't have to be giving me a dime.

So just swing on by Patreon.com slash Tesla podcast.

The new poll typically goes up on Tuesday evenings.

And the winner of this week's poll, 43%,

it was pretty decisive.

It was more than two to one over the next most voted option.

43% of you voted,

I worry this will open the door to raised prices on FSD

and or a second higher priced tier

when unsupervised FSD arrives.

Again, keep that in the back of your mind

for a couple of minutes.

22%, the next most voted option in the poll

was I'm not bothered by the removal

of the purchase option for FSD.

14% of you said I would have preferred to buy FSD

on my next Tesla, so this stinks.

9% of you said I wasn't planning to buy FSD

but removing choices isn't great for customers.

And then just 4% said I think this will lead

to lower monthly FSD prices.

And it's hold that thought for a second as well.

Thanks again to everybody that kindly took the time

to stop by and vote in this week's Patreon poll.

So as teased there on a related note,

sure enough towards the end of the week,

Tesla dropped basic autopilot.

The aforementioned Sawyer Merritt

caught the change on the Tesla Design Studio and posted,

quote, Tesla has officially discontinued autopilot

in the US and Canada.

All new car purchases now come standard

with traffic aware cruise control.

The online configurator has now been updated

to allow buyers to choose the $99 per month FSD subscription

while still offering the option to purchase FSD outright

for $8,000 until February 14th.

New Tesla vehicles, pardon me,

new Tesla vehicle purchases still come

with a 30 day free trial of FSD supervised, end quote.

And of course, as a footnote to this,

Model S, Model X and CyberBeast specifically

have FSD included with those cars

because those cars have the Luxe packaged,

at least for now, still force bundled on those cars.

I have often said that I think Tesla typically does

the right thing for customers and well,

let's just be clear here,

I don't think this is the right thing for customers.

In fact, the discontinuing of basic autopilot

has seen a wave of negativity through the Tesla community

as a whole that I have not seen in quite a while.

Because there's a swath of people out there

that will defend a lot.

They're just, whether they're super invested in the stock

or they just are willing to ride or die with Elon

no matter what, whatever it is,

there are usually people that will just defend

anything the company does.

And again, as I've said many times on this podcast,

I do feel like historically Tesla has usually done right

by their customers, but this discontinuing autopilot,

this ain't it.

Well, Elon Musk did respond to Sawyer's post saying quote,

I should also mention that the $99 per month

for FSD supervised will rise

as FSD's capabilities improve.

The massive value jump is when you can be on your phone

or sleeping for the entire ride in unsupervised FSD.

Now in fairness, this is not the first time

that Elon has said this.

He's said before that the price will go up

as functionality improves and builds up.

So it's not shocking in that regard,

but that said for right now, or I guess rather

after February 14th, not only are fears

about price increases very valid,

but on top of that, check out this sad but true statement

that dawned on me about all of this.

I can't believe I'm about to say this, but here we go.

A 2019 Tesla has more standard safety features

than a 2026 Tesla.

Or if you wanna frame it another way, here you go.

A 2026 Toyota Corolla comes with more standard autopilot

equivalent features, meaning lane keeping,

than a 2026 Tesla does.

And again, the reaction in the Tesla community online

has been overwhelmingly negative on this so far.

And understandably so, understandably so.

There is no defending this as far as I'm concerned.

Now, regarding Elon's stated intention to raise the price

as we get towards unsupervised,

I think it's highly likely that we do indeed end up

with two tiers of FSD, as was mentioned

and voted on by a lot of you in this week's Patreon poll,

which again, I put up before this piece happened.

So I think we're probably looking

at a fairly likely scenario of having two tiers

of pricing for FSD, supervised and unsupervised.

My hope, which I admit is probably a naive one,

but not completely unrealistic,

is that when unsupervised is finally rolled out,

that it stays at $99 per month,

and that supervised FSD drops to $49 per month.

Because after all, part of Elon's new pay package

is to get to 10 million active FSD subscribers.

And obviously you'll get there a heck of a lot quicker

with two tiers and one of those tiers being fairly affordable,

even if that tier is a supervised tier.

And I will say that's assuming that supervised

would count towards his pay package milestone.

We don't know if there's specific wording in that deal

that says it's gotta be unsupervised

or that supervised would be acceptable.

But so that I admit, I can't know, right?

We're not gonna know the answer to that.

Finally, and certainly anybody who's paid in full for FSD,

dang well, better get unsupervised for paying the money,

whether it was 8,000, 10,000, 12,000, or $15,000.

Because if not, I suspect there will be a whole lot

of dissatisfied or dare I say even angry customers

and probably a class action lawsuit to go with it.

I will say I'm honestly not worried about it.

I don't think Tesla would be so bold as to try

and make the people that already paid pay again for that.

I could be wrong, maybe I'm being naive here.

Maybe, I don't know, I hope not,

but I have to believe in my heart of hearts

that the, I think it's fair to call us early adopters

that spent the full money, again, 8,000, 10,000, 12,000, 15,000,

that that is going to be honored as full payment

for unsupervised FSD when it finally arrives.

All right, in better news, Tesla has taken another

meaningful step towards fully autonomous robot taxis

as the first couple of cars in Austin

have the safety monitor moved out of the car

and for full transparency into a chase car.

So there is still a safety monitor,

but no longer in the car.

X user TSLA99T posted a video on X

of himself riding in the back of a robot taxi in Austin

with no one else in the car.

Tesla's AI boss, Oshoak Eliswamy,

responded to that post on X and said, quote,

''Robot taxi rides without any safety monitors

''are now publicly available in Austin,

''starting with a few unsupervised vehicles

''mixed in with the broader robot taxi fleet

''with safety monitors and the ratio will increase over time.''

So it has, again, despite what Oshoak said there,

it has been confirmed that there is a safety monitor

in a chase car for the time being as, again,

this is not me, I'm not mad or upset or attacking Tesla here,

Tesla is moving through this,

taking each step extremely cautiously as they should,

as they absolutely should here.

So while, again, the safety monitor monitors,

mooniners, what was that word gonna be?

I don't know.

So while the safety monitors have been removed

from the actual robot taxi itself,

they're not removed from the equation entirely.

But still, this is pretty awesome.

This is pretty awesome.

I mean, the robot taxi launched in Austin in,

I believe it was late June last year of Memory Serbs,

so it's only about almost exactly seven months ago.

And in just seven months, Tesla has already gotten this far.

I mean, we are watching,

this is gonna sound hyperbolic,

but we are watching historic progress in real time here.

Now, I say that, I'm grounding myself back down to Earth

by noting that yes, Waymo deserves a ton of credit

for building their network and operating fully autonomously

in a number of markets, including in Austin,

but it is a taxi-only service.

What makes this historic progress for Tesla

is that you can't own a Waymo

or turn your own car into a Waymo.

That's what makes the ceiling of Tesla's robot taxi network

so much higher in terms of its benefit to customers.

So that's what I mean here

when I say that we're watching historic progress

in real time, and it's really cool.

And you know, it's funny,

I was just talking to somebody about this the other day

because I remembered that we had been told,

Elon had posted, we'd been led to expect

that around the beginning of the year

that the safety monitor would be removed

from the robot taxi, and I was talking to somebody,

it was saying, yeah, what happened to that?

What's going on with that?

We haven't had any update there in a while,

and well, sure enough, now we've got one,

and in fairness, we are still technically

in the beginning of the year.

It's January 23rd as I record this.

So, now, it does, I don't know about any of you,

but to me, it really, the beginning of the year,

officially, like New Year's, was only a few weeks ago,

but to me, it feels like a few months ago.

It's been a strangely long start of the year so far.

But anyway, I do wanna say congratulations

and all sincerity to the Tesla AI team

on this significant next step

towards fully autonomous robot taxi fleets,

and thus, fully autonomous cars that we own right now.

So, and by the way, as a bonus for Tesla,

it's also fairly serendipitous timing

for the earnings call coming up this week.

You can expect to hear Tesla champion this

within the shareholder letter,

and I'm sure Elon will mention it

in his opening statement on the earnings call

that they have achieved this,

and they should celebrate it, they deserve to.

Next this week, Tesla full self-driving

is getting something of an outrageous insurance offer,

but outrageous in a good way for once,

with insanely cheap rates that will slash

the cost of coverage by up to 50%.

I saw this story on Tesla Roddy,

though it was picked up pretty much everywhere.

This made news all over the place.

Tesla Roddy says,

Lemonade, a digital insurance company,

has launched its first of a kind product

known as Lemonade Autonomous Car Insurance,

and it is starting with an exclusive offer to FSD customers.

The new offer will cut rates for FSD-engaged driving

by quote, approximately 50%,

highlighting the data that shows a significant,

safer driving environment

when the suite is activated and engaged.

The company also said it plans to introduce

even cheaper rates as Tesla continues to release

more advanced FSD versions through software updates.

Tesla's been releasing new FSD versions every few weeks.

I don't know if it's quite that frequent, but anyway.

Highlighting vast improvements

for those who have the latest AI for chipset.

The announcement comes just a few months

after Lemonade co-founder and president, Shai Winninger,

said that he wanted to ensure FSD vehicles

for quote, almost free, end quote.

He said that Tesla's API

complimented Lemonade's AI-based platform

because it provides quote,

richer and more accurate driving behavior data

than traditional UBI devices, end quote.

In mid-December, Lemonade then offered Tesla owners

in California, Oregon and Arizona

the opportunity to connect their vehicles

directly to the company's app,

which would provide a direct connection

and would require a separate telematics device

which is required with other insurance providers

who offer rates based on driving behaviors.

This latest development between Lemonade and Tesla

is something that Winninger believes will be different

because of the advanced nature of FSD, quote.

Traditional insurers treat a Tesla like any other car

and AI like any other driver,

but a car that sees 360 degrees,

never gets drowsy and reacts in milliseconds

can't be compared to a human, end quote.

Don't disagree with any of that.

He went on to say that the existing pay per mile product

has given the company something

that no traditional insurer has been able to offer.

This comes through Lemonade's quote,

unique tech stack designed to collect massive amounts

of real driving data for precise dynamic pricing, end quote.

The reputation that FSD has gathered

over the past few years is really impressive.

Winninger backed this with some more compliments

saying quote, Tesla's driven with FSD

are involved in far fewer accidents

by connecting to the Tesla onboard computer.

Our models are able to ingest

incredibly nuanced sensor data

that lets us price our insurance

with higher precision than ever before, end quote.

The product will begin its official rollout in Arizona

on January 26th, Oregon will get it a month later.

Thank you to Tesla Roddy for that one.

Now, before I comment further,

I just do wanna just clarify

not that any of you would question me here, I don't think,

but I don't have any affiliation with Lemonade,

nor for that matter do I even know if they're any good.

I mean, they might be a terrible

fly-by-night insurance company for all I know.

So when I'm talking about this,

it's not with endorsement or the opposite of endorsement,

but I bring this up, I read the story to you

because I do think what they're doing here

is a relevant Tesla news story

because this company is getting access

to basically FSD data right at the source of the car.

And if more insurance companies start to do this,

it will give those companies the same data

that Lemonade is gathering

and lead them to the same conclusion

that Lemonade came to.

That being that driving with FSD

is definitively safer than driving without it,

and thus you get significantly lower rates when using it.

Because the big brain move here,

whether you end up giving Lemonade a try

and or other insurance companies end up jumping in on this,

is that FSD could end up paying for itself

via your lower monthly insurance premiums, right?

That's the potential economic case to be made here

and that's pretty cool.

So if any of you in Arizona or Oregon

decide to try this out,

I would love to hear from you,

maybe like after your first month,

after your first bill arrives

and after you kind of get a sense

for how the service goes

and how the billing is handled.

Before I get to the rest of this week's Tesla news,

and yes, it's more FSD related stuff,

I wanted to mention another sort of follow-up

from last week.

So remember on last week's podcast,

I talked about the Euro NCAP crash test ratings

on the Model 3 and the Model Y and how awesome they were.

Well, this week, same cars,

different regional ratings board, same result.

Tesla scored super well down in Australia and New Zealand.

Another tip of the cap to Tesla Roddy,

which is where I saw this story and they said,

according to NCAP in a press release,

that's the Australia and New Zealand version

of the crash test ratings organization or regulator,

the in a press release,

the Model Y achieved the highest overall weighted score

of any vehicle assessed in 2025.

NCAP's 2025 tests evaluated vehicles

across four key pillars,

adult occupant protection,

child occupant protection,

vulnerable road user protection

and safety assist technologies.

The Model Y posted consistently strong results

in all four categories,

distinguishing itself through a system-based safety approach

that combines structural crash protection

with advanced driver assistance features

such as autonomous emergency braking,

lane support and driver monitoring.

This marked the second time the Model Y

has topped NCAP's annual safety ratings.

The Model Y's previous version,

meaning the Gen 1 Model Y,

was also NCAP's top performer in 2022.

The Tesla Model 3 also delivered a strong performance

in NCAP's 2025 tests,

contributing to Tesla's broader safety presence

across segments.

Similar to the Model Y,

the Model 3 also earned impressive scores

across the NCAP's four pillars.

This made the vehicle the top performer

in the medium car category.

Well, I have nothing to add here

to what I already said last week,

except I'm not surprised

and you're not surprised either.

We know, right?

We know how safe these cars are.

That said, while we're kind of on this subject,

in the interest of fairness,

this does kind of tie in nicely to something

that listener Steve W sent me this week,

which was kind of a surprising story

until I really started reading all the way down into it.

And then I think it started to make sense

and I think it'll make sense for you too.

So get this, Steve sent me this story

that says that the fatality rate,

meaning the worst case scenario of any accident.

So not accident rate,

but actual fatality rate

is much higher in Teslas than any other brands.

So here's the information from a brand ranking table

based on a study by iccars.com,

analyzing US fatality analysis reporting system data

from 2017 to 2022.

It shows the brands

with the highest occupant fatality rates

per billion miles driven.

And unfortunately, Tesla leads the list

with 5.6 fatal accidents per billion miles,

which they note is nearly, not nearly, it is,

double the industry average of 2.8.

Other brands in the top five include Kia,

right neck and neck with Tesla at 5.5,

fatal accidents per billion miles,

Buick at 4.8, Dodge at 4.4 and Hyundai at 3.9.

Now the study says experts suggest

that these high fatality rates may reflect driver behavior

as much or more than the vehicle safety design.

And also that despite Tesla's high crash test safety ratings,

on-road safety outcomes for the brand are among the worst.

So looking at this list, again,

I wanted to bring this up in all fairness

because yes, I'm an enthusiast of this stuff,

but we gotta be fair here.

Looking at this list, I have to imagine

that as the experts themselves noted in this study,

that driver behavior is playing a huge part here.

Because after all, all of you know

that these cars are very powerful,

even the quote unquote vanilla versions,

the non-performance versions of Teslas.

They're all really powerful cars

and that the instant acceleration

can no doubt cause poor decision-making at times.

And that really, that argument could also explain

why Kia and Hyundai are on this list too,

since both of those companies make a ton of EVs.

In fact, I would argue that both of those companies

are known more today for their EVs

than for their internal combustion engine cars.

And thus, what I just said about Tesla

and driver behavior would apply to them as well.

Dodge, they don't make EVs, or at least hardly any EVs,

but Dodge definitely has a reputation

for being the brand that let's just say

a lot of dumb things happen in.

And what I mean by that, and I did look this up,

I wasn't just going off of memory

of anecdotes I've heard or what have you,

I look this up and sure enough,

this was the most recent data I can find,

but it's still relatively recent.

Back in 2020, so still this decade,

I found a study that showed that Dodge Ram 2500 drivers,

so specifically the Dodge Ram 2500,

those drivers have the most DUIs,

and it's of any other car,

and it's more than twice the national average.

So all of that is to say I'm not trying to pick on Dodge

or Dodge owners, but just I'm making the point here

of saying that it sure does look like driver behavior

does play an outsized, significant role

in these fatality numbers.

It's still not a great statistic, don't get me wrong.

This is not a list that you wanna be on at all,

let alone be at the top of.

And more constructively, I wonder what,

if anything, Tesla can do to address it.

I mean, the cars are already engineered

to be as safe as they can be,

but they're also capable of going pretty fast

and accelerating very quickly as well.

So the one thing that comes to mind,

which Tesla is very much already doing,

is continuing to push autonomy, right?

If autonomy is safer than human driving,

Tesla keeps pushing that.

Of course, getting rid of basic autopilot

isn't an awesome way to continue down that road,

but we've already covered that.

I'm not gonna go back to that.

But anyway, I thought that was worth bringing up

while we were talking about the awesome crash ratings.

There's the sort of other darker side to that

for when humans are actually operating these cars.

Before I get back to this week's Tesla news,

again, yes, more FSD, Robotaxi related stuff,

I hope all of you who are kindly supporting me on Patreon

at that $10 per month tier or higher

enjoyed this week's Lightning Round mini episode,

which was a conversation with listener Jonathan from the UK

who shared his really fun story

about being an early Model X owner in the UK

and driving his car right up through now.

He still has it all over Europe.

He had a really interesting story to tell.

I've been trying to chat with one listener per month

on the Lightning Rounds,

because I enjoy hearing people's Tesla stories

and their EV stories.

And I think I've now done four or five of these,

something like that.

I'm having fun with them.

I hope you guys are enjoying listening to them.

And I'll note that this week's Lightning Round,

I'll tell you right now what it is,

because I haven't recorded it yet.

I'm gonna do it this weekend,

but I'm gonna get it up early,

super early for those folks on Patreon,

because I'm gonna do the thing I've been doing

the last few quarters,

which is the five questions that I would ask

on the quarterly earnings call

that's coming up this week.

So I haven't looked at what's been upvoted the most so far.

So what I'm gonna do on that Lightning Round

is come up with my five,

and then on that Lightning Round,

take a look at what the five currently

most upvoted ones are,

and we'll kind of compare and take a look,

and then we'll have an idea

of what's gonna be asked of Elon

and the Tesla executive team

at this week's upcoming earnings call.

So again, you can join me on Patreon

if you'd like to hear those.

There's, you know, it's upwards of 200 Lightning Rounds now.

How goodness knows how many hours of extra content that is.

If you'd like to support the podcast,

I'd be so humbled and grateful.

You can go to my Patreon page

at patreon.com slash Tesla podcast to learn more.

If 10 bucks a month, if you don't think I'm worth that,

hey, no worries, there's also a base $5 per month tier

and for the five bucks a month,

you get an ad-free episode every week

and you get early access to that ad-free episode.

As soon as I'm done making it tonight,

it gets uploaded and you can listen to it right away.

So join me over on Patreon if you can.

I'm at patreon.com slash Tesla podcast.

Also, again, wanted to repeat what I was talking about

last week for my Rivian friends out there,

a word from my friends at Accelerate Auto

and their Xcare extended warranty option.

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including Rivian.

I'm on my second policy now on our 2020, excuse me,

my 2018 Model 3 performance.

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So right now, Rivian owners can get $200 off of coverage

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avoid surprises later with one of the most trusted

EV protection options in the industry.

All right, getting back to what is clearly

the running theme of this week's episode,

FSD and Robotaxi stuff,

Tesla has introduced a rear camera washer system

for the CyberCab, thus fixing one of the most

frequently cited complaints from owners.

Saw this one on Drive Tesla Canada who wrote,

this is the first time Tesla has equipped a vehicle

with a dedicated washer for its rear camera,

a feature many believe should have been included years ago,

which means Tesla may be planning to bring similar

improvements to the rest of its lineup.

While we have yet to see it in action,

evidence of the new feature was spotted on a CyberCab

undergoing cold weather testing in Chicago

by an Instagram user where road salt, slush and grime

had apparently coated the rear camera

and made it nearly unusable.

However, this was no problem for CyberCab

as you can clearly see in the image,

washer fluid runoff cascading from the camera

down the rear bumper.

Now, this does make perfect sense for a vehicle

that will have to be operated fully autonomously, right?

It relies exclusively on its camera array.

You just can't have dirt, mud, snow,

or any other grime obscuring the rear camera view

for the CyberCab.

And so yes, as the Drive Tesla Canada folks

started to get at there, the natural next question is,

will this rear camera washer come to the rest of the fleet?

We all know that Tesla prefers not to add parts

whenever possible.

They of course have a long history of doing the opposite

and deleting them instead.

But hey, if full autonomy is what this company is all in on,

as they have repeatedly stated,

then they have got to add the washer

if it's gonna mean the difference between autonomous driving

being degraded in certain weather conditions

or even potentially interrupted altogether.

And so I think, and history certainly suggests,

that yes, the other vehicles in the lineup

will get this camera washer.

At the very, very least, I hope the Cybertruck does.

Even though yes, it's a lower volume vehicle

for Tesla right now,

but it's the off-road capable vehicle

and you shouldn't have to go wipe off your camera

before getting back on the road after doing some off-roading

and thus wanting, you know, you wanna let FSD take you home

in your Cybertruck after your day of off-roading is done.

But I do think that the odds are good

that it comes to the entire rest of the fleet as well.

When is anybody's guess?

But odds are with the CyberCab

due to go into production soon,

it'll probably be sooner than later,

at least with the CyberCab, with the CyberCab,

because again, it's due to go into production in April.

So it's quite likely that every production CyberCab

will have that rear camera washer on it.

So hopefully that's around the time

we can start looking for it to show up

on the rest of the fleet as well.

In other words, sometime in Q2.

Cause, you know, it might not be an all at once thing.

Like it might not suddenly be that all five,

well, I guess six with the CyberCab,

that all six production vehicles

have the rear camera washer.

You know, it could be a situation where the supplier

of that rear camera washer assembly

has to ramp up a bit to meet Tesla's demand.

So it could be the CyberCab first,

which we already know is gonna be super low volume

in the beginning.

And then maybe it goes to Cybertruck next,

SNX, the lower volume vehicles,

before ultimately, hopefully,

coming to the Model 3 and the Model Y as well.

Next up this week,

I have one more FSD related story for you this week.

And it's an interesting one.

It's that Tesla just revealed a breakthrough

that could extend the life of hardware three cars,

meaning extend the autonomous capable life of the FSD,

of the hardware three cars.

Another tip of the cap to drive Tesla Canada,

who wrote, a newly published Tesla patent

suggests the company may have found a way

to stretch the life of its hardware three computers

without swapping out a single chip.

On January 15th, 2026, Tesla published a patent

and there's a big long alphanumeric code for it,

titled Bit Augmented Arithmetic Convolution,

first shared and explained by ex-user TSLA-MING,

Tesla Ming, I guess.

While the name sounds intimidating

and like it has nothing to do with FSD,

the goal is simple,

let modern high precision AI models

run on older, lower precision hardware

using clever math and software

instead of requiring brand new silicon.

This creates a realistic upgrade path

where AI three can be pushed toward AI four class capability

using software alone.

Rather than forcing Tesla to abandon

millions of older vehicles

or hold back its newest neural networks,

the same advanced FSD software can scale across AI three,

AI four and future AI five systems

just with different efficiency levels.

This approach means Tesla doesn't have to choose

between abandoning older cars

or holding back its newest AI models.

The same sophisticated software stack

can evolve forward while still running on AI three,

preserving a meaningful upgrade path

for existing owners without upgrading the computer.

Now I should clarify that that was all

the speculation of Drive Tesla Canada.

The actual factual story is just the patent

on Bit Augmented Arithmetic Convolution.

It does not specifically go into AI three, AI four, et cetera.

And so on that note,

I can't help but think that given the timing of this,

I could easily see this being the result

of the Tesla AI team perhaps

and probably quite likely at Elon's insistence

taking up first principles approach

to trying to solve the AI three bottleneck issue.

Now whether this actually results in AI three cars

being able to run unsupervised FSD

certainly remains to be seen.

And thus it still remains to be seen

whether or not the AI three cars

will still need to be physically upgraded

as Elon has previously suggested

that they would need to be.

However, before anybody out there gets too excited

and believe me, I'm one of them.

I have an AI three car with FSD paid in full on it.

I would love for this to be a magic bullet solution.

But I do think we gotta remember

that without Tesla specifically telling us,

it is very possible that this might be more

about future AI hardware revisions and compatibility,

more so than AI three specifically.

And the reason I say that is because Elon

has made comments very recently

that Tesla plans to be on a nine month,

yes nine month hardware upgrade cycle for AI chipsets

meaning five to six, six to seven, seven to eight.

They wanna move super fast on this.

And so that to me, that's where I could see

this patent coming into play

and just helping bridge those gaps

so that Tesla doesn't have to kind of go pencils down

on one hardware just a few months

after they've started working with it, right?

They'll be able to continue to scale across all of it.

So it remains to be seen whether or not

this is going to be a magic bullet of sorts

for the AI three cars or whether this patent

is more about the future AI chipset revisions.

But either way, this is good news

because good things should come of this for Tesla owners.

Again, maybe just future Tesla owners on again,

AI five, AI six, AI seven, et cetera,

versus existing Tesla owners like myself

with AI three, AI four cars.

But this is still a good thing, good news.

Good things should come of this for Tesla owners.

And my hope is that this is going to get asked about

and or brought up and addressed

on the earnings call coming up this week

so that we can find out exactly

what Tesla's plans for this are.

And finally this week in other EV news,

this is significant.

Canada has dropped its 100% tariff on Chinese EVs.

One last tip of the cap to Drive Tesla Canada

along with a thank you to listener Andrew Hodson

for sending this to me.

And Drive Tesla Canada wrote,

Canada is shifting gears on its approach to Chinese EVs

moving away from a 100% tariff

that's been in place over the last two years.

Following talks in Beijing,

Ottawa has agreed to a tariff quota system

that reopens limited access to Chinese built EVs,

lowering duties dramatically,

but while still keeping overall volumes capped.

Under the agreement,

Canada will allow up to 49,000 Chinese made EVs per year

to enter the country at a 6.1% tariff

matching the standard duty

that applied to vehicles imported from China

prior to the implementation of the 100% tariff.

The annual import cap would rise to 70,000 vehicles

by the fifth year of the agreement.

The federal government also said

that as part of the deal it anticipates in quotes

that 50% of these 70,000 vehicles quote,

will be affordable EVs with an import price

of less than $35,000 end quote.

According to Prime Minister Mark Carney,

this quota based structure is designed to reopen the market

without triggering a sudden surge of imports

emphasizing that the cap represents less than 3%

of Canada's annual auto sales.

Well, Tesla might be an American company

and Gigatexus and the Fremont factory here in California

are a heck of a lot closer to Canada than Gigashanghai is,

but this absolutely opens the door for Tesla

to take advantage of this

by importing a bunch of Shanghai built cars to Canada.

And why would Tesla do that?

Well, because the tariff for US built cars is 25%,

meaning if Tesla wanted to send cars to Canada

for sale from Fremont and Texas,

it's a 25% tariff versus this 6.1% tariff

on the Chinese built vehicles.

So four times difference on that tariff for Tesla

if they bring over Shanghai built cars to Canada

versus US built cars.

Now, here's some good extra context

from Drive Tesla Canada,

who notes official government communications

indicate that 49,000 vehicles can be imported in year one

rising to 70,000 by year five.

The agreement also states that by year five,

50% of imported vehicles will have an import price

below $35,000.

Based on what's been released so far,

this appears to be a phased in agreement,

meaning that in years one and two,

the share of sub $35,000 vehicles

will likely be significantly lower,

gradually increasing to year fives 50%.

And finally, even under these limits,

Tesla would still have room

to import a meaningful number of Model 3s,

at least 24,500 and potentially far more

in the early years.

And so as you can tell there,

that is good news for Tesla.

The bad news for Tesla,

but good news for Canadian consumers

who will have more choices in the marketplace,

is that this obviously opens the door for BYD

and other Chinese EV makers

to enter the Canadian market.

As I talked about in the podcast recently,

Tesla's sales in Europe are down.

Do no doubt in large part to BYD

and other Chinese EVs coming into that market.

But hey, competition's good.

It pushes all the companies involved in that competition

to make their products better

and price them more competitively.

So even if Canada isn't a huge auto market overall,

and I had to look it up,

they're certainly not huge compared to the US or Europe.

And Canada ranks between eighth and 13th worldwide

in auto sales in a given year.

This is still going to be a very interesting situation

to see how it plays out for Tesla

in terms of increasing their sales there,

but also Chinese EVs coming into Canada

and seeing what kind of foothold those can get.

All right, that is everything

in an incredibly busy week of Tesla news and other EV news.

And now we move next to the ride the lightning hotline

where you get a chance to call in

and potentially be featured here on the podcast.

If you've got a question, comment,

or discussion topic for the podcast,

give me a call on the ride the lightning hotline.

There are two ways to do it.

Neither one costs you a dime.

Either use your smartphone's built-in voice recording

software, just record your question,

and I kindly ask that you keep it to 90 seconds or less

so I can get to as many calls each week as possible.

And then email that file to me at teslapodcastatgmail.com.

Or you can take that same 90-second or less question

and give me a call anytime toll-free at 1-888-989-8752,

that number again, 1-888-989-TSLA.

And by the way, the ride the lightning hotline

is kindly provided by my friends at lifeonrecord.com.

If you know someone special out there

with an upcoming birthday, anniversary, graduation,

or some other special occasion,

you can give them a unique gift of recorded voices

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or put onto a keepsake.

Visit lifeonrecord.com to learn more.

And I've got five excellent calls lined up

and ready to go for you in this week's

Ride the Lightning Hotline.

Let's get it started with Tyler

from the Greater Boston Area commenting

on FSD going subscription only.

Hi, Ryan Tyler calling from Greater Boston.

I have your thorough segment on the seizing

of FSD outright purchases last week.

You touched on unsupervised versus supervised

briefly towards the end.

And as you know, Tesla changed their FSD sales

to be just supervised a couple of years ago.

Prior to that, I think it's safe to assume

they were selling unsupervised FSD.

I wanna get your thoughts on how this difference

will play out.

Personally, I think there's a huge difference.

I agree with you that both groups

deserve a one-time transfer anytime to a newer

capable hardware to get the full functionality

that they purchased.

Although I don't think Tesla's gonna give lifetime

unsupervised access to the recent supervised FSD buyers.

I think this difference in value will actually cause

two tiers of subscriptions in the near future.

And this will be kind of a similar transition

to enhanced autopilot to FSD.

Potentially just for a short time,

and in order to honor the functionality

that people have bought in recent years of supervised FSD.

I think they'll need a very clear tier

of what that is.

And the key difference, of course, would be, you know,

paying attention in the driver's seat.

That will be the core difference

between supervised and unsupervised.

So yeah, I'm curious your thoughts.

Do you think they'll have these multiple subscriptions

or do you think it's just gonna be a single FSD subscription

which will eventually transition to be unsupervised?

And no matter when you bought it outright,

you get that for the lifetime of your vehicle

or transferred vehicle.

Yeah, as always, keep up the great work

and appreciate your shows.

Tyler, thank you for your call.

I've seen this question pop up a lot over the past week.

And as I was talking about earlier in the podcast,

I think it's a very valid one.

To anybody that's already purchased FSD outright

at whatever price, like I was saying earlier,

I think those people have to get unsupervised FSD

because that's what was promised when they bought it.

Tesla only recently added the supervised tag

and parentheses to the design studio language.

As I said, I think Tesla would probably have

a big lawsuit on their hands if they tried to make

the people who bought FSD pay an additional monthly fee

for unsupervised FSD access.

I mean, heck, on a somewhat funny related note,

Elon's tweet about being able to summon your car

from anywhere that isn't separated by a body of water.

Well, that tweet was going around again this week

to, you know, in a tongue-in-cheek way

because it was the 10th anniversary of that tweet.

Yes, it was from 2016.

And the reason I say that is just to remind you

how far back these promises go.

And thus why it's important for people

that have already paid for FSD to get unsupervised

once it's finally ready.

But more to your immediate question

of whether or not this move to subscription only

opens the door to a more expensive unsupervised tier.

Again, I kind of covered it earlier,

but yes, it absolutely does.

Do I hope Tesla does it?

No, like I was saying, 100 bucks a month,

still a lot of money for most people.

I hope it's 100 for unsupervised, 50 for supervised,

and that's where it sticks.

That said, the market has not been set for this yet

since there's no one that's achieved it in a car

that you can purchase and own.

So if Tesla is the first company to get there

as it seems like they will be,

it remains to be seen what the market

will be willing to pay for it.

Maybe Tesla will make a killing selling unsupervised

at 200 bucks a month and supervised at 100 bucks a month.

Maybe unsupervised will be 150,

or maybe, as I was saying,

maybe there won't be a market above 100 bucks a month,

and maybe just maybe it leads to the outcome

I'm hoping for.

Unsupervised for the same 100 bucks a month

and supervised goes down to 50 bucks a month.

We shall see.

And in fact, the very next hotline call

that I listened to after this one this week,

I'll give them a shout out Marshall in Atlanta

who suggested this very thing

and also made the good point that one of the tranches,

as I was talking about earlier in the podcast,

one of those tranches in Elon's big new pay package

includes fulfilling the objective

of Tesla getting 10 million active FSD subs.

So that would seemingly be another incentive for Elon

to add another tier.

And again, optimistically,

maybe even an incentive to lower the price of supervised.

But yeah, I think the elimination of the FSD purchase option,

100% opens the door to another tier of FSD subscriptions.

It's gonna be interesting to see how all this plays out.

Take care, Tyler.

Thank you again for your call.

Let me go next to Daniel from Peterborough in the UK.

Hi there, it's Daniel here from Peterborough in the UK.

I just wanna say a massive thank you

Ryan to your podcast every week.

Absolutely love listening to it from the UK

and learn lots of new things

and just great to be part of the community.

One very quick, couple of quick questions.

The first one is to do with the FSD.

So full self-driving,

we appreciate there's gonna be going

in the US to subscription only.

And I just wanna find out if there's any news at all

about it going to subscription only for the UK,

even though we can't actually physically use it in the UK yet.

But more importantly,

I wanna find out if EAP, so advanced autopilot,

will that be coming to the UK as well as a subscription.

And then the second one is just wanna relate back

to your guy that was mentioning about the knocking noise

on his Model Y.

I have the same thing.

I've been back to Tesla four times,

had the guy that comes out to the Ranger

to come out and try and fix the car,

had no luck at all, I'm afraid,

still having this knocking noise issue

and is still being investigated.

So anybody got any hints and tips,

I really would appreciate it.

And that's it.

But just let me know what your thoughts are around EAP,

subscription for the UK.

We really appreciate it.

And thanks again for all your support

and guidance with the Tesla world.

All the best, bye-bye.

Daniel, thank you for the call and the kind words.

You've brought up another good question

that Tesla has yet to answer.

And again, this is why announcing policy changes

in two sentence tweets in the middle of the night

on the CEO's personal account

isn't necessarily the best way to do things

because it leaves a lot of customers confused

and or leaves them with valid unanswered questions.

But anyway, Daniel, I'm afraid that the answer

is unfortunately no.

I don't have any news about whether or not the UK

or any other regions will see pricing structure changes

to FSD or enhanced autopilot.

We need the company to clarify this for all of us.

Hopefully they will do that on this week's earnings call.

Appreciate you calling in.

Next up, we go to Jojo the Otter from Seattle

responding to Officer Greg from last week.

Hi, Ryan, this is Jojo the Otter,

South of Seattle, Washington.

I just listened to the podcast.

You may have gotten a few calls about this already

and maybe it's helpful, maybe it's not.

And I heard the call in from the law enforcement officer

about the dash cam situation.

And this is kind of a,

it's not the most practical solution.

Obviously there should be a better solution

that's implemented from Tesla.

But I think if you actually just tap the icon

of the camera on your dashboard on the main screen,

if you have it there,

I think it actually will save like the last 10 minutes

or something like that automatically when you press that.

Or if you have it set to record after honking the horn

that will also record, I think it's the last 10 minutes.

Now, obviously if you've been in an accident,

especially a very serious accident,

you're not gonna just be like,

oh, hold on, I gotta honk the horn

and record the last 10 minutes

so I have some footage about this accident.

But it sounded like that this accident

wasn't too detrimental in the fact that,

the airbags didn't go off,

so it might not have been quite the worst accident.

But, and obviously if you've just been in an accident,

it might not be the first thing to occur to you

to pop up in your mind to honk the horn

or press the button or whatever.

But in the event that something like this happens

and you are right of mind and wish to be sure,

those are some options for you.

Hope this helps.

Thank you for the podcast.

Thank you for your work at IGN.

I appreciate all that you do for us.

Obviously give some pets and kisses to the puppy dogs

and take care of yourself.

Thank you, have a new year.

Thank you for mentioning this.

You're absolutely right, of course.

This is one of those times

where my brain just got ahead of me.

When I was responding to Officer Greg's call,

I was thinking about it being well after the fact

that it should have just had the last 10 plus minutes,

might even be more on the thumb drive

or SSD drive, whatever you got in there.

But you're right, it's a good reminder that if you can,

if you think to, because I can imagine

there's probably a lot going through your mind

if you've just been in an accident, even a minor one,

to tap that dash cam icon on your screen

to save the last 10 minutes of footage

to your thumb drive or SSD for your insurance company

and for the police.

Cheers, thank you so much.

Next up is Steve from Austin.

Hi Ryan, this is Steve from Austin.

I've been a listener and an occasional contributor

since episode 200.

I look forward to Sunday mornings

when you post the next episode.

Keep up the great work.

There's a couple of things I wanted to share with you.

First, I haven't heard this mentioned

on any other EV media outlets,

but this keeps popping up here in Austin.

There's a Texas state law that requires all vehicles

to come to a complete stop

when a school bus turns on their flashing lights

and puts out the stop signs.

Waymo taxis keep ignoring this at $200 per violation.

The Austin Independent School District

keeps asking Waymo to limit their activities

during hours when the buses run

and Waymo's response has been to recall the fleet

and apply a software update.

Yet this keeps happening.

Here's a link to the report

from one of the local TV stations,

although this story has been in the local paper as well.

Also, we picked up a new Model Y in September.

I was told that if I specified my desire

to pick it up at the Austin Gigafactory,

I would get a factory tour.

What I actually got was a typical delivery experience.

I know that because I bought a Model 3 a month earlier.

The only difference is that

it was at the Gigafactory's delivery center.

If I knew that in advance,

I would have picked up a delivery,

I would have picked a delivery center closer to me.

Thanks for the great podcast, Ryan.

I'm looking forward to next Sunday.

I appreciate your kind words, Steve.

Thank you so much.

Let me start with the second thing.

It is a bummer that you're not getting a factory tour.

You should.

It would cost Tesla very little to do that,

and it would be a great way for the company

to better connect with the local community in the city,

where, by the way, as we all know,

their corporate headquarters is.

They moved it to Austin,

so that's their corporate headquarters.

So I'm with you.

Congrats on the two new Teslas, though.

That's awesome.

Now, to your comment about Waymo's

violating Texas state law,

I will confess that I had not heard about this

until hearing your call and reading your email,

and so here is a report for the benefit of me

and everybody listening on this topic

from the local NBC affiliate in Austin.

Video this evening from this week

showing Waymo driverless cars

still failing to properly stop

for Austin school buses as they load students.

Greg St. Investigator Kelly Wiley

sits down with the district's police force

as they renew calls for Waymo

to temporarily stop operating for large parts of the day.

In the new year,

video shows Waymo autonomous vehicles

still failing to properly stop for school buses

weeks after the company voluntarily recalled

an updated software following our reporting.

In this video from December 19th,

a Waymo vehicle rolls past the stop school bus,

picking up students

at a Southeast Austin apartment complex.

The bus stop arm is out

and kids are here on the sidewalk

preparing to cross the street.

The same clip also shows the Waymo

just before passing the bus.

Also failed to stop for an adult and child

trying to cross the street to get on the bus.

The bus is approaching.

Austin ISD Assistant Chief Travis Pickford

is leading the district's effort

to resolve the issues with Waymo.

Regardless of what Waymo says

is their safety record,

I believe and the district believes

that our students are less safe

when a Waymo vehicle is around one of our buses.

In a statement,

a Waymo spokesperson told us

the company has seen material improvements in performance

since its software updates

and that it's reviewing what it learned

after meeting and collaborating with Austin ISD.

The company went on to say

its vehicles have 12 times fewer crashes

involving injuries to pedestrians

compared to human benchmarks.

Just last semester,

Austin ISD said it issued more than 7,000 citations

to drivers.

23 citations went to Waymo.

Videos showing Waymo's most recent infractions

also show multiple other cars

illegally passing school buses.

Earlier this year,

district police arrested the man

they believe was driving this truck

that nearly hit a small child

as they tried to get off the bus.

Why the concern about Waymo specifically?

The data that we collected

from the beginning of the school year

until the end of the semester

shows that about 98% of people

who receive one violation do not receive another.

And that tells us that the person is learning,

but it does not appear as though

the Waymo automated driver system is learning

through its software updates,

through its recalls or what have you

because we're still having violations

all the way up until last Monday.

What's the ask from AIC?

We're staying by our original ask

and that's for them to stop operating

Waymo vehicles four hour block in the morning

and a four hour block in the afternoon

when our buses are out there

dropping off and picking up our students.

We also reached out to Atlanta Public Schools

where Waymo also operates.

The Georgia School District told us

it's issued just six violations to Waymo

over passing school buses since last May.

In Austin, Kelly Wiley, KXN Investigates.

So yeah, that's pretty not great for Waymo.

They need to fix it.

I mean, it's an evolving thing.

It's not gonna be perfect right away.

Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good,

but they do need to fix it.

Their response being, well, our vehicles

are 12 times less likely to get an accident or whatever.

That's dodging the issue.

The cars are not following the law.

On the other hand, the school district's

police department's request for Waymo

to just not operate for eight hours a day.

Come on, that's unrealistic.

The more realistic request is for Waymo to fix the issue.

And Tesla, by the way, well,

they need to be paying attention to this

if they're not already

because once the safety monitors come out

of all of the robot taxis in Austin,

they're gonna get scrutiny if they mess this up too.

So Waymo, your service rocks.

I've used it many times.

I love it, but this is a problem that needs fixing.

I'm sure they're on it,

but hopefully they're gonna be resolving this soon.

Thank you, Steve, for bringing this to my attention.

I've got time for one more call this week.

It comes from Adam in Southern Maryland.

Hello, Ryan.

This is Adam from Southern Maryland

with a feature request.

I still like to be a gentleman

and open the passenger door for my wife,

but by the time I get around to the driver's door,

just before I go to grab the handle,

the car will relock itself,

which of course folds the mirrors,

which then they have to unfold

as soon as I grab the driver's door handle

to unlock the car again.

That's creating a lot of unnecessary wear and tear

on that mechanical component.

So what I'd like to request is something akin to the Joe mode,

a toggle button, let's call it the gentlemen mode,

or it gives me three more seconds at a time

to allow me to close the passenger door

and still get around to the driver's door

without the car locking,

thus avoiding that unnecessary wear and tear.

Love what you do with the podcast,

keep up the great work

and give the pups a scratch for me.

Adam, I am so glad that you called in about this

because I have this happen to me all the time as well.

I always do the same for my wife.

Chivalry's not dead.

And it's really, it is mildly annoying.

Like I realized there are far, far more annoying things

in life and this is such an incredibly minor annoyance,

but it does seem like an avoidable one nevertheless.

And I was curious, I followed back up with Adam on email

to ask him what Tesla he has.

And he came back to me and said that he's got a 2024 Model 3.

And that made a lot of sense because in my two cars,

the Gen 1 Model 3 and the Gen 2 Model 3,

one of them has this same issue and the other one doesn't.

And it is like Adam's, it's the 2024,

it's the new one, it's the Highland,

which has ultra wide band support

so that it can more precisely track

the phone keys location.

So I suspect, I don't know,

I suspect that's what's causing this quote unquote problem

where we open the door for our spouse on the passenger side

and then walk around the car.

And but by the time we get around the car,

the ultra wide band has sensed that the key

has moved far enough away where it locks the car.

So I think that's probably what's happening.

So Adam, I would respectfully and politely say

that I don't think we really need gentlemen mode.

We just need Tesla to just give us a little bit

more grace period on locking down the car

after opening the passenger door.

Like just give us like five more seconds or something

or 10 more feet, you know, whatever,

whether it's a distance thing or a time thing.

That to me seems like the solve here.

Cause I do agree, it's unnecessary wear and tear

on the folding of the mirrors and shutting the car down.

And then so yeah, I'm with you all the way on this Adam.

Thank you so much for calling in about it.

Hopefully somebody from Tesla is listening to this episode

and they can address this in a future software update.

Thank you to everybody that kindly took the time

to call in this week.

I will get to more of the ride the lightning hotline calls

of course in upcoming episodes.

And if you'd like to call in,

maybe you want to respond to something I said,

something that one of the other callers said,

I gave you the two call in methods and the instructions

for those at the top of this segment.

So refer back to that.

And now we come towards the end of the podcast.

We come to the part where I tell you about

what's going on with me and my car.

Well, I am happy to say that in the soul of adventure,

my AI four car, I managed to round up.

I am now at 98% FSD usage since version 14.2.

And again, to kind of do the Ryan thing of zooming out

to the 10,000 foot view, if you told me two, three years ago

that I would be using FSD 98% of the time,

given the fact that I've lived in San Francisco

and I've talked a lot about how San Francisco is not

an easy place for FSD.

I probably would have, maybe it's not that I wouldn't

have believed you, but I would have been really impressed

that like, wow, it's gotten that good

that it works reliably in San Francisco.

That's awesome.

And sure enough, that is pretty well where we are.

Not that there aren't problems, there's actually,

I'm still having, I have one that on-ramp light

I think I was talking about last week.

It's repeatable.

If I'm car number one, the light for this on-ramp

for the freeway goes green, the car goes for like,

half a second and then sticks the brakes and just stops.

It's not great and I've been reporting it

with the voice thing every single time.

But anyway, FSD has gotten super good

and it's pretty crazy that I'm up to 98%.

I know there are people with higher,

I know that I'm not trying to brag or flex

or anything like that, I'm just pretty impressed

at the software that I'm at 98%.

That's cool.

Entertainment recommendation for you this week.

There's a new Game of Thrones show on the air.

The first episode has aired as of this recording.

It's called A Night of the Seven Kingdoms

and it's clearly kind of more of a comedy.

It's not like an outright comedy,

but it's leaning more into humor and I'm intrigued so far.

So I would, if you enjoy, obviously,

if you enjoy Game of Thrones, if you don't,

I don't know, you're probably not gonna get anything

out of this, but if you enjoyed any of the Game of Thrones

stuff that's been on HBO so far, give it a look.

It's definitely different.

I'll give it that.

Time for your pro tip of the week.

It comes from Brett in Washington State.

Hi Ryan, this is Brett from Washington State.

I think this is like a little PSA for people.

There's been a lot of different information out in the media

about some different accidents

involving different Tesla cars.

One of the things that came up in those accidents

that many times the accident may or may not be severe enough

that the low voltage battery clicks out,

which means your normal way to get out of a car

by pushing the button clearly doesn't work.

I think many people know that if you're in most of our cars,

there's an emergency handle in the front.

It's pretty obvious because you have to tell people

not to do it because they do it by accident.

But in the rear seat, it's not as obvious

and I have a Model S and I went back

and tried to look where mine was

and it wouldn't have been for a YouTube video.

I couldn't find it because it was clear underneath my seat.

I realized this is not a 22 Model S.

My 17 Model S, I think it was all mechanical

so it wasn't an issue.

I see the Model Y is yet another place

and these all could very well be year dependent,

year model year of the car as much as the type of the car.

So I really want to make sure people realize where that is

and make sure that their passengers know where they are

and they want to do something to make it more obvious

because in a couple of these accidents

that have been pretty severe, they were serious fire

and because of that fire, people couldn't exit the car

because they couldn't figure out how to exit the car.

So the bottom line is you have the safest car in the world.

You survived the accident but can't get out of the car.

It's kind of like what's the point.

So I'm hoping people really take a look at that

and make sure you know where these emergency releases are.

Thanks a lot, Ryan.

Thanks, Brett.

This is good to point out.

So yes, this is a good PSA,

which I'm going to count as a pro tip.

I'm going to count it.

Tesla is supposedly redesigning this now

but that doesn't affect all of us with Teslas already.

In the Model 3, for instance, the new one and the old one,

the back door manual releases

are at the bottom of the door pocket.

In the case of my 2018,

that car came with rubber door pocket inserts,

like if you're putting a drink or something in there.

So you have to pull out that insert.

Now it does just come right out easily.

It's not adhered or fastened in at all.

And then pull the manual release.

In the new Model 3,

it's all carpeted in that door pocket

and Tesla doesn't put those rubber door pocket inserts

in there from the factory anymore.

So you can just reach right in

and pull the manual release lever.

I appreciate you calling in with this.

And if anybody else out there

has a good Tesla or EV pro tip of the week,

please call in with it.

I'd love to hear it

because I love sharing the information with everybody.

I love adding to my own Tesla and EV knowledge base

because we as a community,

we collectively know a lot of stuff

and it's nice to share that information

so we can all learn

and all just enjoy our cars a little bit more.

I gave you the call and instructions earlier on.

So if you're sending in a pro tip,

you just send it in the same way

that you send in a regular ride the lightning hotline call.

Before I go,

I wanna mention a few friends of ride the lightning

starting with a new friend, RPM Tesla.

They've been around longer than this podcast has been,

which I think on its own is pretty impressive.

RPM Tesla specializes in OEM style Tesla upgrades,

focusing on carbon fiber, interior enhancements

and functional accessories

that integrate seamlessly with factory designs.

And in turn, they're all about compatibility,

meaning that their accessories

don't compromise Tesla's design language,

safety systems or functionality.

They design lots of stuff in-house

like all of their steering wheel upgrades

for the yoke and round grip.

They prioritize quality over speed

so you're not getting cheap junk.

Speaking of cheap though,

you can buy with confidence

as RPM Tesla offers free returns,

no restocking fees and lifetime warranties.

They feature over 500 DIY installation videos

to make installation quick.

Many companies sell lower quality products

and charge a 25% restocking fee if you don't like something.

RPM does not do that as they only sell

the best high quality accessories,

over 1500 of them since 2013.

They're family owned, located in Southern California.

They also continually refine their designs

based on actual customer feedback.

In all RPM Tesla is about enhancing

your Tesla ownership experience,

elevating what's already awesome about your car.

Check them out at RPMTesla.com

and use the promo code RTL10Plus.

And that's the literal symbol plus, RTL10Plus

for 10% extra off of your next order.

Yes, 10% extra that's combined

with their current discounted sales prices.

This is an exclusive promotion

only here on Ride the Lightning.

That's RPMTesla.com.

Check them out.

Don't forget about my friends at abstractocean.com

which I would basically equate

to the Amazon of Tesla after market accessories.

They've got so much stuff,

you are bound to find useful things.

From sometimes at this point of the show,

I'll go on abstractocean.com

and just click around and see what they've got.

This time I'll mention some of their most popular stuff,

the interior lighting kits in various colors I might add.

The exterior lighting kits like puddle lights

with the TESLA logo or the Tesla T logo,

stuff like that, the tempered glass screen protectors

that are custom fit for the Tesla screens,

those are super great.

Just, there's so much great stuff.

A lot of Cybertruck specific accessories

for you Cybertruck owners out there.

You gotta just check them out abstractocean.com

and use the coupon code RTLPodcast,

all one word, no spaces,

at checkout to get 15% off of your first order.

How about the snap plate?

They offer a discount for Ride the Lightning listeners

as well which is super nice of them.

Go to their website at everyamp.com slash RTL.

And then, once you've picked out everything you like

and have it in your online shopping cart,

use the coupon code RTL for a discount

and you might be asking,

well, what am I getting a discount on?

It's the front license plate bracket

that I prefer it's called the snap plate

or the newer, stronger snap plate plus.

They're available on all the Teslas

plus lots of other EVs as well.

So if you've got a Rivian, you've got a Bolt,

whatever you got, you got a Cadillac Lyric maybe,

check them out, check out the snap plate.

It's a nice, again, just nice minimal design.

Doesn't get in the way of the front bumper camera

on any of the Teslas, anything like that.

And if you wanna take it off for whatever reason,

maybe you're detailing the car,

maybe you're, you just don't want it on there

for at a time for whatever reason,

it's not gonna leave any unsightly hardware behind

versus the front license plate mounting bracket

that Tesla gives you with your car

that sticks to the front of your car with automotive tape.

Yikes, not good.

Don't put that on, use a snap plate

or the newer, stronger snap plate plus.

Again, get yours at everyamp.com slash RTL

and use the coupon code RTL as well for a discount.

Immaculate reflections.

If you're in or going to be in

the greater San Francisco Bay area

with your Tesla, other EV or other car that you love,

make an appointment ahead of time,

cause he does book up, he gets busy,

make an appointment ahead of time at Immaculate Reflections

to get some professional detailing work done on your car,

whether that's ceramic coating that'll keep your car

protected from the sun's UV rays,

keep that surface nice and slick

for the next five plus years.

In my case on the 2018, it was seven years.

I've got an appointment coming up in just a couple weeks

to go get the next seven years worth of ceramic coating

on that car, Immaculate Reflections.

Maybe you want paint protection film on the front of the car

or the sort of key impact areas

like the bumpers, the rocker panels,

maybe even all of the car, which is what I did

cause I'm crazy, but I don't regret it at all.

I am thrilled to have every inch of my both cars

covered in PPF, applied by a professional detailer,

Immaculate Reflections, which means

you literally cannot tell it's there.

You will not tell unless I tell you,

which I've just told you, you wouldn't know it's there.

Or maybe you want to do paint correction

and get all the little micro scratches and flaws

and the clear coat, get all that taken out,

get your paint surface looking as good as it possibly can.

Any of that, all of that,

get it done at Immaculate Reflections.

Again, if you're in or gonna be in

the Greater San Francisco Bay Area,

reach out through the website, which is irdetailing.com.

You'll see the contact buttons in right in the middle

of the page, also the upper left corner of the page.

And when you reach out to discuss

what you want to do with your car,

make sure to mention that you're a ride the lightning

listener and any service that you have done,

you will be kindly extended

the ride the lightning listener discount,

which I'm gonna be taking advantage of in a couple weeks.

Finally, my Patreon, I talked about it a bit earlier,

but I'll mention it again here,

patreon.com slash Tesla podcast.

That is the primary way through which you can choose

to support this podcast, if you like.

And my hope is that I do earn your support sooner or later.

Maybe the time has come, maybe this is the week

where you're like, you know what, Ryan, yes.

Put me down for five bucks a month,

and I'll take that early access, I'll take that ad free.

Maybe you go, you know what, put me down

for the 10 bucks a month, which is the most popular tier,

because then you'll get the ad free, the early access,

and all of those weekly lightning round mini episodes

that I post exclusively on Patreon.

All the information can be found at patreon.com

slash Tesla podcast.

There's a seven day free trial,

specifically on that most popular $10 per month tier,

and there's also an annual pledge option.

If you don't wanna do a monthly thing,

but you're willing to just, you know what, Ryan, yes,

I wanna support you, but I just wanna support once,

just pay once.

There's an annual pledge option at any tier,

and if you do that, I give you a 10% discount

on that annual pledge as my way of thanking you

for your year of support.

Finally, if you are not already following this podcast

on one of the major podcast services,

I encourage you to do so, it's free,

and it just means that you'll get a push notification

on your device anytime there's a new episode,

which, of course, for this podcast,

is every Sunday at 9 a.m. Eastern, 6 a.m. Pacific,

so just search, ride the lightning Tesla

on any of the big ones, Apple podcasts, Spotify,

tune in, YouTube podcasts, et cetera.

You should see this podcast pop right up

and just click that follow button, and that's it, you're done.

Finally, you can follow me

on a couple of different social media platforms.

I'm on X and I'm on Instagram.

I have the same username on both,

so I am found at DMC underscore Ryan,

if you'd like to follow me on either of those.

You can email me anytime about Tesla or EV related things

at teslapodcastatgmail.com.

Last but certainly not least this week

is giving the shout out and hello

to the top tier Patreon backers.

I'm so grateful to these folks

for their very, very generous and continued support

in helping keep this podcast going.

I'll start with the Roadster in Space tier backers,

the tippy top tier, big thanks to Pete White,

Lyle Austin, Steve Radspinner, Fernando Cordero,

Lawton from Chicago, Sean Nightig, Neil Weaver,

Jackson Wallace, Rolf and Jennifer Evers,

Howard Anthony Smith, Victoria Aya Caveto,

Tesla Hitchhiker 42, Carol Weston,

Robert from near Philly, American Home Contractors,

Doug Carey, Michael Gallo and Tony Figueroa.

Next up, the Maximum Plaid Backers.

Thank you and hello to Jonathan Wales,

Cameron Clark, Daniel Grummer, Seth Capello,

Nick and Tony, the Galpin family,

Ryan from New York City, Darren Nickel,

Cos Barnes, Patrick Wisnesky, Gil Cabrera,

Todd Badger, Joe Edgel, Kevin Yank,

the Tesla Owners Club of San Joaquin Valley,

Will Steadman, Jeremy Harris, Chris Beech,

Tom Mills, Corey O'Donnell, Aaron,

John Cody, Joel Sap, Paul Casarino,

Chris Osborn, KB, Adam Lavoie, Jason Chalukis,

Travis Krenzel, Bruce Otterstein,

Tom Behann, Josh Pennington,

John from Creamridge, New Jersey,

Dustin Hart, Derek Finley, Charles Clement,

Damon Klein, Jeff Brown, Jerry Slinger,

Kenneth Corbett, Brian Bertoglio, Kim Bae,

Troy Sievers, Chip Hooper, Matt Chinander,

Robert Moran, Rav, Christopher Mann,

Michael Williams, and Eric Harbert.

And last but certainly, certainly not least,

the grandfathered and plaid level supporters,

thank you and hello too, George Casiopo,

Logan Willis, Peter Chalet, Eric Randolph,

Dory and Steve Guberman, the Tesla Owners Club of Taiwan,

Ron Lee, Charlie Gillespie, Jeff Angwin,

Chase Cabaneas, the Lydia family, Aaron Alchool,

Jared Brown, Jerome Strack, Jamie Dalton,

Mike and Barbara from Louisville, Matt Nixon,

the Tesla Owners Club of Wisconsin, Ish,

not Elon Musk in quotes,

Peter and the Bear Boys of Colorado.

And that will wrap it up for another long episode,

man, we cleared 90 minutes this week,

there was so much to talk about,

and next week's gonna be a big one too,

with the earnings call,

those earnings call recap and highlights episodes

are always big ones,

so it'll be a sprint for me, it always is,

it's a little bit of a crunch,

but it's always fun in the end.

So I'm looking forward to doing that,

seeing what we hear from Tesla,

from the executive team,

about what's going on with the company,

what's coming up, and that'll do it.

This was Ride the Lightning episode 547

for Lily the Silly Labrador puppy,

and a snoozing Daisy the Boxer.

My name of course is Ryan McCaffrey,

happy electric motoring my friends,

and I'll see you back here next week.

The Big League.

["The Big League"]

Elon Musk, people don't like Elon Musk.

The guy found a PayPal and Tesla,

and people were like,

yeah, but he's a troll and a bad dad,

I'm like, so is mine,

he did nothing to fight climate change.

Also, have you been in a Tesla?

Have you been in a Tesla?

My buddy let me drive his Tesla,

I laughed out loud at how fast it went,

been clinically depressed my entire life

on dozens of medications in a Tesla

for 13 seconds cured forever.

I mean, I think a Tesla is the most fun thing

you could possibly buy ever.

That's what it's meant to be.

Our goal is to make,

it's not exactly a car,

it's actually a thing to maximize enjoyment.

It's maximum fun.

About this episode

A whirlwind of updates on Tesla's Full Self-Driving (FSD) program takes center stage, including the discontinuation of basic autopilot, the introduction of subscription-only FSD, and the arrival of unsupervised driving in Austin. The episode also discusses a new insurance offering that could cut rates for FSD users by up to 50%. Notable advancements include a rear camera washer for the CyberCab and a patent that could extend the life of FSD hardware. The episode wraps up with insights on Tesla's performance in crash tests and the implications of recent tariff changes for Chinese EVs in Canada.

Abstract Ocean Accelerate Auto aftermarket accessories autopilot Chinese EVs crash ratings electric vehicles (EVs) Euro NCAP extended warranty FSD

Dodge Ram Ford Ranger Tesla Cybercab Tesla Cybertruck Tesla Model 3 Tesla Model S Tesla Model X Tesla Model Y Toyota Corolla

Original notes

It's been a wild week of FSD news, from Tesla discontinuing basic Autopilot on new car purchases to Tesla's CEO saying the price of FSD will go up as unsupervised arrives to unsupervised actually arriving – for the first couple of test cars in the Austin robotaxi fleet, at least. Plus: one insurance company wants to drastically lower the rates of Tesla owners who make frequent use of FSD, the Cybercab gets a camera-related upgrade that Tesla customers have wanted for a while now, and more!

If you enjoy the podcast and would like to support my efforts, please check out my Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/teslapodcast and consider a monthly or (10% discounted!) annual pledge. Every little bit helps, and you can support for just $5 per month. And there are stacking bonuses in it for you at each pledge level, like early access to each episode at the $5 tier and the weekly Lightning Round bonus mini-episode (AND the early access!) at the $10 tier! And NO ADS at every Patreon tier!

Also, don't forget to leave a message on the Ride the Lightning hotline anytime with a question, comment, or discussion topic for next week's show! The toll-free number to call is 1-888-989-8752.

INTERESTED IN A FLEXIBLE EXTENDED WARRANTY FOR YOUR TESLA? Be a part of the future of transportation with XCare, the first extended warranty designed & built exclusively for EV owners, by EV owners. Use the code Lightning to get $100 off their "One-time Payment" option! Go to www.xcelerateauto.com/xcare to find the extended warranty policy that's right for you and your Tesla.

P.S. Get 15% off your first order of awesome aftermarket Tesla accessories at AbstractOcean.com by using the code RTLpodcast at checkout. Grab the SnapPlate front license plate bracket for any Tesla at https://everyamp.com/RTL/ (don't forget the coupon code RTL too!). And enhance your car with cool carbon-fiber upgrades from RPMTesla.com and use the promo code RTL10+ for 10% off your next purchase.

Ride the Lightning: Tesla and EV Podcast

Ryan McCaffrey

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