Bryan Lunduke ( linux nerd ) argues against commercial electric cars

neptronix

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Bryan Lunduke is a respected youtuber in the open source / linux world.
Recently he did a video about how electric cars tend to be more proprietary and locked down than their gasoline burning counterparts.

I have to say i really agree with this, and wouldn't purchase a commercial electric car based on what i've seen. My first electric car will be one i build with my own two hands.

[youtube]dfeMhMZ4fI8[/youtube]

What's your thoughts?
 
Didn't see it all, only the first part. I think he does not have a point, at all

some examples:
Systems advanced like an autonomous car does not require to be audited by the user.. What can the user contribute with?
No car manufacturer allow even chip trimming for an ICE without voiding the warranty so where's the difference in an electric car?
Legal requirements and especially the stupidity of US laws (where any company can get sued millions for neglect) stop open source functionality of cars.

A driveable/lethal car and a linux computer isn't exactly the same category of risk...
 
larsb said:
Systems advanced like an autonomous car does not require to be audited by the user..
Not true. With out software. Hardware can become garbage. My truck would be in [Limp mode] limited to 5 MPH. Read about it here:
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=95030#p1403256
marty said:
Truck is fixed finally :D
eBay guy? Assume it was guy? Could have been a girl? Got into the laptop with TeamViewer. Installed Isuzu IDSS II software. Bluetooth don't work. USB cable worked.

IDSS is Isuzu Diagnostic Service System

diesel exhaust fluid control module
replace and reprogram controller

Doing the reprogram thing was a bit scary because I had no idea if I was doing something bad?

No more idiot lights. Have not driven truck. Next test will be to go for a ride.
I will buy NOTHING without a service manual. Without a service manual I can't fix it.
From:
List of small hatchback cars
marty said:
Never imagined this would happen. In my lifetime, vehicle service manuals were paper books. Then CDs that you could buy on eBay for $30 or so. Now has the world changed? Subscriptions :(

Chevrolet, acdelcotds.com $1200 Year
FIAT, technicalinformation.fiat.com ?
Ford, motorcraftservice.com $2700 Year
Honda, techinfo.honda.com $350 or $1000 Year
Hyundai, hyundaitechinfo.com $600 Year
Kia, kiatechinfo.snapon.com $1500 Year
Mazda, mazdaserviceinfo.com $2250 Year
Mitsubishi, mitsubishitechinfo.com $1500 Year
Nissan, nissan-techinfo.com $720 Year
Subaru, techinfo.subaru.com $2500 Year
Toyota, techinfo.toyota $480 or $1295 Year
Volkswagen, erwin.vw.com $1500 Year

How to hack into all these web sites?
http://bugmenot.com/
BugMeNot: share logins
Tesla Service and Repair Information ANNUAL SUBSCRIPTION $3000.00
No Tesla for me. Bought a Honda mostly based on the lowest cost for a service manual. If my Honda ever needs some software. Pray that the Honda company will share with me for a few hundred $$$.

I could rant on and on about how hardware needs software. Want to buy some POS equipment? Killed by Toshiba and their failure to supply technical information and SOFTWARE. Read about my POS adventures here.
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=78528
IBM = Good
Toshiba = Bad :(
 
Tesla is extremely anti repair, mirroring a lot of the asshole things Apple does.
Their cars are mostly software controlled apparatuses. Moreso than any other car on the road.
The cars do not need to be locked up and the user shut out to the degree that they are.

One could argue that the ability to audit the software controlling the car is even more necessary than say, a linux computer, because you are trusting your life to the car, and many aspects of the thing you trust your life to are black boxes.

There have been a lot of deadly design flaws in cars over the years. Would be nice if the user could either know about it and/or fix it his/her self. Remember Toyota's throttlegate?

This is why i believe DIY is the best case scenario for a lot of things..
 
I believe that Teslas will be almost impossible to steal by driving them away, and their GPS tracking can find them even if they were dragged onto a flatbed, to be stripped for body parts like fenders, etc.

If someone is running from the police, I suspect that Tesla will be able to slow it down to a crawl and then turn it off.

That being said, I have some deep concerns about this trend...
 
I can only say my knowledge of proprietory components and restrictive self repair policies is what I've seen in regards to Tesla. I watched a few Rich Rebuilds YT video's and its mind blowing how Elon Musk as screwed over the DIY repair people.

I think there will be better motive solutions then elec and gas, hydrogen is good if the infracstructure is easily implemented. Batteries is not the solution for the long term.
 
There are some benefits to things being kept unhacakable and closed. But those are rarely realized.
The most secure systems are actually open, because all the security issues can be easily discovered and fixed.

For example, every aspect of this forum is open source! We run linux, apache, php, sql, and PhpBB on top of that.
From the second that the server boots, it's running code that i can inspect and tweak.

And about 80% of the internet is running everything mentioned above except for PhpBB. Because it's free, a lot of people use it. Because it's open and common, security issues are discovered and patched rapidly.

And boy you can bet i see people trying to hack this forum on the regular.

An electric car that is essentially software and a battery on wheels cannot be inspected, hardened, or modified. You have to place 100% of your trust in a small set of hands. This actually makes it less secure, because someone can find a vulnerability like this and exploit it until someone at Tesla decides to patch it. When i discover a flaw in our open source system, i get to patch it. I even write patches myself.

[youtube]joqjs0SXN0k[/youtube]

Fun note, i owned an acura integra and lived in a high crime area for a moment. I knew that the car was a theft target, but the first time i saw someone literally walking up to the car watching me as i walked away from it, i knew i had to do something about this, otherwise my car was community property.

I rewired the car so that a specific combination of switches had to be engaged for power to flow through the fuel pump. The fun part about this is that the car could start on residual fuel pressure, so if you stole the car, you'd find yourself in an awkward place after it died on you.

I used to leave the car unlocked ( so that nobody smashed the window to get in )... and found the car blocking the path in a parking lot... twice.

Good luck doing something like this with a Tesla. Since it is completely computer operated, you'll need to know details about the computer itself and intercept certain pathways in order to implement some security through obscurity measure, as the car is entirely electronic..

If there is a zero day exploit for your car, and the car doesn't know it's being stolen, you can say goodbye to your shiny toy. Because you trusted a system created by a small number of people that didn't have the benefit of being audited by potentially millions of people.
 
And thank you for your time on keeping Endless Sphere running smoothly. Programming type stuff is Outter Space and Alien to me, even the basic of basic programming language I never liked, what was it 8084 or whatever the DIPS were in early 90's. Then diving into logic circuits, AND, OR, Negate, NAND etc. I've seen YT vids where they say Tesla's are engineered to the extreme, and perhaps that is their downfall to some extent. I know the one engineering firm that tore down the Tesla's said they could have done the physical vehicle assembly in less steps, and more efficient steps. There is the one crowd, like Joe Rogan that absolutely loves his Tesla for the instant from zero torque that pushes you into the back of the seat, then there's the old school boys who think electric is for pansies, like Jesse James of motorcycle chopper fame. His show, Monster Garage did a great episode using tool pack batteries. Awesome series of shows!


neptronix said:
 
For example, every aspect of this forum is open source! We run linux, apache, php, sql, and PhpBB on top of that.
From the second that the server boots, it's running code that i can inspect and tweak.

and still we don't have a wiki due to security issues, eh?

It's another story but what i mean is that when you kill someone in autonomous mode because you only installed only one of two SW patches needed to update your car because you didn't know better then you'd think differently about updating your car yourself.

..and then, in US, the company gets sued millions by the family of the victim for neglect since they let someone update their car themselves with this obvious risk.
 
larsb said:
For example, every aspect of this forum is open source! We run linux, apache, php, sql, and PhpBB on top of that. From the second that the server boots, it's running code that i can inspect and tweak.
and still we don't have a wiki due to security issues, eh?

Oh, you wanna bring that up here? ok. you should understand that i inherited it and was given no instructions about it's history or quirks, and the problem was due to wikimedia foundation's code. A volunteer fixed the crashed database and got it working again, except i knew it was corrupt from work done before i took over this role, and few people used it ( it went missing for months and no comments were made ), so it got abandoned. Could it get fixed? yes - because i have the source code for all the components wikimedia runs on... because open source..

Honestly this forum has been held together from various people's volunteer labor for most of it's life now. We have no ads and no budget. I wouldn't hold this up as a shining example of what a best case scenario for an open source operated site. But i can tell you that without open source and the ability to hack on things, there'd absolutely be no ES.

larsb said:
It's another story but what i mean is that when you kill someone in autonomous mode because you only installed only one of two SW patches needed to update your car because you didn't know better then you'd think differently about updating your car yourself.

..and then, in US, the company gets sued millions by the family of the victim for neglect since they let someone update their car themselves with this obvious risk.

What happens when Tesla messes up and they don't fix it and someone dies ( and no external AI engineer gets to find out why unless he dumps ROMs and reverse engineers the computer(s) )? we haven't figured WHO is liable anyway. But there has to be some liability for an unmanned four thousand pound vehicle. My guess is that it's Tesla anyway, unless the government decides that X number of ran over people per make-model-year-mile is acceptable. That hasn't came up in court just yet, as far as i know.

But i'm not saying the car sucks because you cannot access the most absolute dangerous part of it.

What about being able to like... even get parts for the car to begin with? or maybe. gasp.. replace a computer with a stock one when yours burns out 15 years later? How about upgrading the battery to a new chemistry in 10 years... or let's get real wild and crazy and modify the infotainment system with some new skins... no? if you can't even do basic things like that.. you don't own the car, and that sucks.
 
larsb said:
For example, every aspect of this forum is open source! We run linux, apache, php, sql, and PhpBB on top of that.
From the second that the server boots, it's running code that i can inspect and tweak.

and still we don't have a wiki due to security issues, eh?

It's another story but what i mean is that when you kill someone in autonomous mode because you only installed only one of two SW patches needed to update your car because you didn't know better then you'd think differently about updating your car yourself.

..and then, in US, the company gets sued millions by the family of the victim for neglect since they let someone update their car themselves with this obvious risk.
Recommend ya stop worrying about cars killing people. What if I, or some other halfwit mechanic does a substandard mechanical repair, a wheel falls off and someone dies? Well guess that's why God invented lawyers? Lets all be safe, and keep fighting for our:
Electronics right to repair
 
I actually owned a car that got bricked.
It was a 1998 Suzuki Esteem with about 120k miles on it.
The car suddenly died in the middle of the highway when my wife was driving it. We had it towed to our usual repair shop, and they couldn't figure the car out for the life of them after two weeks.

I went on some forums and found out that the ECUs often blow capacitors and such, so i crawled into the car and pulled out all the computers to inspect the circuit boards. All caps good. No corrosion. No blown components. Put the ECU back into the car and it fired up. OK, i figure maybe some ECU pins got dirty(?). We decide the car is a spare car and nickname it Christine :lol:

Well, the car dies on the road again and i've had it.

I call all Suzuki dealers in my state, and well, the answer is 'nope' if i want a new ECU, because they don't make them anymore. And it gets better... the ECUs are coded to the car's VIN, and none of the dealers have the tool to recode, so i can't get another from the junkyard. I call other dealers in other states and get the same response. I'm out of luck.

So i hauled off an otherwise working car with low mileage off to the junkyard. Admittedly, the car was 20 years old, but with what would be a $50 visit, i imagine that we could have got another 5 years out of the car, as i'd replaced basically everything but the engine and transmission, because both were in stellar shape.

You're probably laughing that i was intent on keeping a 20 year old car, but this ECU failure has happened in much younger Suzukis.

And the excuse is... 'well, we had to lock you out so you didn't tune it to pollute more'.

..except in electric cars, that excuse no longer really applies. And on a Tesla, we have more computers doing more things. Like opening the doors. The car is black box software and batteries on wheels. I suspect that Teslas will be unserviceable down the road, like a lot of our consumer electronics. Which is sad because if a very expensive electric car is unrepairable, we can't say it really helps the environment out at all; it's yet another waste stream.
 
I didn't watch the video. Autonomous vehicles will predominate as soon as they cost 10X less than what we're doing now. A major portion of that 10X will be not having to own the motive part. It follows that 3rd parties will own and maintain/operate-for-hire the motive part, so that will make it cheaper to pay them to assume liability.

Individuals will own the 'party tub' and and pay a service provider to move it around, or take the taxi type option. In order to avoid personal liability, it'll probably be cheaper to drive your personally owned vehicle onto one of these motive platforms and let the service provider assume the liability. Once traffic is automated, we can modify the infrastructure to increase safety and reduce liability expenses. Things are about to change quickly.
 
From a guy with an automobile racing background, I can safely say that everything gets hacked sooner or later. Racing has tons of rules restricting what CAN'T be done to your car. Well, that doesn't really work as if you want to win, you need to cheat. Everybody knows this and everybody cheats. He who cheats the best without getting caught, wins. Usually this means that the guy willing to spend the most is the winner. Us poor guys considered that cheating. :mrgreen:

People always find ways to get what they want. Manufacturers can try their damndest but folks always find a way around the roadblocks. Blocking access to spare parts is troublesome, but like Apple found out, there is a solution to that too.
 
Missed your car blackout originally. Been thru that 3 times.

First was the car where the guy behind me broke his windshield with his celphone when he hit me and pushed me into the van that was stopping (As was I) in front of me. The car was a total loss but I took a payoff and kept it and it took to quitting but then cranking, or blowing a fuse, or insert infuriating behavior here. One of the running lights that had required serious work front and back to drive it again had the positive lead popped off and it would hit the metal.

Then came the car that didn't make it home from the lot, except it did, later that night. Every now and then it went completely dead, eventually the electrical would come back, but it never did it when I took it in. Excellent service writer explained keep coming in and getting another write-up so 'Lemon Law' could kick in. They wound up replacing the wiring harness under warranty and it was fine for 75,000 miles when I had to replace it again. That time made it almost 20,000 miles and the dead car was donated to the Boys Club.

Ah, then there's my restoration job Jaguar I had about the time I registered here. No manuals available. Doing the same thing, since I worked on it and didn't drive it much I wasn't clear on what was going on, but I started realizing some genius had his own ideas about wiring. I learned of people in England who sell CDs with the manual,, ALL service bulletins, other info, DAMN! Heaven, right? I was warned they seem touchy about letting Americans get their hands on this. . . .

(I wish I could remember my phone conversation with 'Monty Python.')

I was a teenage smog mechanic, (NOT tester) used to doing all sorts of work that just kept getting harder. For 3 reasons: The cars getting smaller and smaller and harder to squeeze into, more and more "Accessories" getting cramed into less and less space, and of course SOFTWARE.

I still do my own things like brakes, but recently I discovered ebrakes, which they invented just to piss me off.
 
You need a laptop to diagnose and fix vehicles today. Instead of a $50 mid drive train bearing you need to buy a $500 part. A friend of mine had a mirror on his truck get hit, the quote was $900 for ONE heated ford truck mirror. The government allows it all to happen.
 
During the automotive bankruptcy hearings in 2009 Chrysler was asked about all their transmission problems for their minivans. I guess it was their CEO that started calling it a business decision and saying it was good for the individual dealerships and kept the service people working all over the country. It might have been interesting to know how many of the congressmen present had replaced the transmission on their own minivan.
 
I watched a youtube video with ceo of xpeng ( chinese ev maker), he described the plans for his company, what surprised me is that he said the cars will be for data collection, and the data sold onto third parties i.e. google style business.
I'm just trying to refind the video, will post if I find it. But that is quite a worrying development, there maybe more money to be made in selling the data gathered from the car consumers ( their behaviours I'm guessing, where they go, what they do) than the money made from selling the cars themselves. I think you can in a way see this in tesla, very little of the data gathered is shared, for example battery data. Some limited releases here and there. There are many privacy concerns to consider.
 
What xpeng is doing is the future of cars here in the west. :evil:

General Motors recently announced an insurance company that uses onstar data to rank driver safety. So they are absolutely collecting shit-tons of data from your driving.

It's got me thinking about what i will do with my little economy car when the warranty is out in 7 months.. would like to pull out any antennas and sensors that have nothing to do with safe and reliable operation of the vehicle when i get to lightweighting it. I'll probably be stuck in the garage with an oscilloscope poking and prodding for ways to defeat other nanny type technology in it.

As for my first electric car... i want to build one on a lightweight chassis using battery technology circa 2022-2025.. IE >300 whrs/kg stuff.. putting a 900 pound battery in a 2000lbs car is not appealing today :lol:
 
Ins Co's are currently selling ins where you install an electronic device that plugs into your ODB2 (or whatever) connection so you can get a rebate for your safe driving.

Ins Co's also want no fault insurance which is a total scam. I am dealing right now with a government insurance agent, where that province has no fault ins. The second I heard about no fault ins from their hired adjustor (no offices here) I backed out instantly and said I will probably hire a lawyer now. Alberta does not have no fault insurance. There's another reason I backed out, I do not know how much my accident is worth. They could offer me $20k and I'd be happy as ever but what if its worth $50k or $100k, I have no clue.


neptronix said:
insurance company that uses onstar data to rank driver safety. So they are absolutely collecting shit-tons of data from your driving.
 
I hope we will have a lot more people in the future hacking and opening this proprietary EV technology for recycling parts for conversions and possibly circumventing Tesla style attempts to block the right to repair our own stuff. Damien Maguire is one of those rare people that work towards open solutions:

https://www.youtube.com/c/Evbmw/videos
 
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