Electric carmaker Tesla Motors said all cars it now manufactures will have full self-driving hardware.
All of the company's models including Model S, Model X and Model 3 will be equipped with 8 surround cameras offering 360° visibility up to 250 meters of range.
The cameras will be accompanied by 12 ultrasonic sensors which can pick up both hard and soft objects about twice the distance from the previous system.
A front-facing radar will provide additional view of the world and is claimed to see through heavy rain, fog, dust and even the car ahead.
To process the data generated from the sensors, Tesla said that it has deployed an onboard computer which has 40 times more computing power than its predecessor. This computer will process data from vision, sonar and radar sensors.
The new development comes after a recent update from Tesla in September regarding the use of radar as a primary control sensor without the camera’s visual image confirmation.
According to a prior report by the American electric vehicle company, vision from radar could be counter-intuitive to humans, as radar wavelength can penetrate through thick fog, dust, rain and snow, but metallic objects appear as mirror.
People on radar appear partially translucent and things made from wood or painted plastic, though opaque, can seem transparent as glass on radar.
This is a counter-intuitive problem can give rise to false alarms to hit the brakes. To solve this problem, Tesla is using multiple radar sensors taking snapshots from different angles and also measuring whether or not the object is moving towards the vehicle or not.
Tesla said: “Before activating the features enabled by the new hardware, we will further calibrate the system using millions of miles of real-world driving to ensure significant improvements to safety and convenience.
“While this is occurring, Teslas with new hardware will temporarily lack certain features currently available on Teslas with first-generation Autopilot hardware, including some standard safety features such as automatic emergency braking, collision warning, lane holding and active cruise control. As these features are robustly validated we will enable them over the air, together with a rapidly expanding set of entirely new features.
“As always, our over-the-air software updates will keep customers at the forefront of technology and continue to make every Tesla, including those equipped with first-generation Autopilot and earlier cars, more capable over time.”
