Albert Posted August 9, 2019 Share Posted August 9, 2019 I was driving north on I-35 after dropping off some Commodore 1702 monitors at the ATX Hackers space for the Fest 99/4ATX taking place this weekend. As I'm taking my exit and going down the off ramp, some asshole in a black Corolla decides he wants to go around a slow truck in the right lane. So he pulls out right in front of me, going across the white line, nearly hitting me. I had to slam on my brakes hard and swerve to the left (as much as I could, as there was guardrail there) to avoid hitting him. Had I not slammed on my brakes (as hard as I could) and swerved he definitely would have hit me. Or had I been going just a bit faster, he would have slammed right into my side... I was on the horn as soon as I saw what he was doing, but undeterred this idiot fully moved into my lane and kept going. It's too bad there's no audio as you can't hear me swearing like a sailor at this asshole. ..Al 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted August 9, 2019 Share Posted August 9, 2019 One can read the number plate, so you could take actions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted August 9, 2019 Author Share Posted August 9, 2019 Just now, Thomas Jentzsch said: One can read the number plate, so you could take actions. There's not much I can do, the police won't care, even with the plate fully legible. Unless you can clearly see the driver, they cannot just blindly issue a ticket to whomever the car is registered to. If I hit him or her, though, the video would certainly have saved my ass from being at fault. Going across the solid white line is illegal, and this idiot clearly didn't even look behind him or to his side before making the lane change. I was certain I was going to hit the car, fortunately the brakes in the P3D are quite good. That's probably the first time I've had to use them in an emergency braking maneuver like that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thomas Jentzsch Posted August 9, 2019 Share Posted August 9, 2019 Maybe that car has a record already. In Germany, if they cannot identify a driver multiple times, the owner has to maintain a vehicle log. If not, the police can assume he or she was the driver. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted August 9, 2019 Author Share Posted August 9, 2019 Possibly, but here, unless there's an accident, the police won't care at all. Any idiot can get a license trivially and inexpensively in the US, it's nothing like it is in Germany. ..Al Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flojomojo Posted August 9, 2019 Share Posted August 9, 2019 Stuff like this makes me think I might want a dash cam, too. I was recently subpoenaed as a witness to a hit and run, and being able to show video of the incident would make things so much clearer. I have a gadget called Garmin Drive that provides Alexa to my car in addition to some navigation stuff I'm not using like I thought I would. The new version has a camera on it, too. One more thing like this "in my circle" and I'm going to do the upgrade. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted August 9, 2019 Author Share Posted August 9, 2019 2 minutes ago, Flojomojo said: Stuff like this makes me think I might want a dash cam, too. I was recently subpoenaed as a witness to a hit and run, and being able to show video of the incident would make things so much clearer. While the built-in TeslaCam is nice, I need to get proper high-resolution, high-quality dashcams installed front and rear. The cameras being used for the TeslaCam (front and the two side repeaters) are primarily used for Auto Pilot and Tesla added the dashcam functionality later. There are just too many stupid people on the road, and having video evidence of a crash can definitely save your ass when it comes to determining who's at fault for an accident. Especially since I've read story after story about idiots who are at fault trying to weasel their way out of it. Hard to refute video evidence, compared to "he said, she said". ..Al Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flojomojo Posted August 9, 2019 Share Posted August 9, 2019 While I agree that more data is better than less, seems to me that a nice front cam would provide the biggest bang for the buck -- it's mirroring the driver's view, and seems sufficient for proving what happened even if you're hit from the side or rear. I hope none of us ever has to rely on these things to tell a story. Nice defensive driving when the jerk in the corolla did his awesome maneuver, by the way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted August 9, 2019 Author Share Posted August 9, 2019 3 minutes ago, Flojomojo said: While I agree that more data is better than less, seems to me that a nice front cam would provide the biggest bang for the buck -- it's mirroring the driver's view, and seems sufficient for proving what happened even if you're hit from the side or rear. I hope none of us ever has to rely on these things to tell a story. Having a rear camera would be good as well in case someone hits you from behind. That, teamed up with the front camera, should provide damning evidence that whoever hit you from behind is at fault, even thought that is generally the case by default. But always good to have more evidence. The cameras themselves aren't too expensive, but paying someone to cleanly install them will probably cost more than the cameras. 3 minutes ago, Flojomojo said: Nice defensive driving when the jerk in the corolla did his awesome maneuver, by the way. Thanks, I was originally going to go around that pickup before the turn that I made at the end of the video, as the truck was going quite slow relative to my speed coming off the highway. I probably went from 50 mph (the frontage road speed limits are usually 50-60mph, the highway I was on has a 70mph speed limit) to about 20mph in a split second.. ..Al Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
+SpiceWare Posted August 9, 2019 Share Posted August 9, 2019 Glad you're OK! I wonder if they'll update the recordings to keep more detail once the computers are updated since the new hardware supports HEVC H.265 instead of H.264. That'll give us either smaller files, or more detail with current file sizes (which I'd prefer). I'd definitely like the backup camera to be used for dashcam and sentry. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jaybird3rd Posted August 9, 2019 Share Posted August 9, 2019 I'm glad that you and your car escaped unharmed! When I finally upgrade my car (for the first time in 20+ years!), I definitely need to look into adding dash cams. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Albert Posted August 9, 2019 Author Share Posted August 9, 2019 2 hours ago, SpiceWare said: Glad you're OK! I wonder if they'll update the recordings to keep more detail once the computers are updated since the new hardware supports HEVC H.265 instead of H.264. That'll give us either smaller files, or more detail with current file sizes (which I'd prefer). I'd definitely like the backup camera to be used for dashcam and sentry. Yes, I'm hoping with the version 3 AP hardware Tesla will be able to add the rear camera to the dashcam and sentry apps. I'd also like to see less compression, as the video looks pretty terrible sometimes. I'd certainly like more detail, I don't care about the file size nearly as much. ..Al Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrekMD Posted August 10, 2019 Share Posted August 10, 2019 It's good you were able to avoid the accident. That is some idiot driver! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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