Tesla Vehicles are Unsafe for Unsupervised FSD Without Front Facing Camera Changes

Front-facing cameras on autonomous vehicles can be blinded by small obstructions like a bug strike, bird droppings, a wet leaf, or splashed dirt or slush. When they happen, the wipers can smear rather than clear obstructions and the Full Self-Driving (FSD) system requires the driver to immediately take over. If the vehicle stops on a highway or busy road, there’s a real risk of getting rear-ended, like the bay bridge pileup. There is an issue that can occur in every season, time of day, and region. Without a change, unsupervised FSD will not be safe.

FSD v13 is truly incredible! Most drives and miles are now completely autonomous, not needing any driver intervention. The significant progress from FSD v11 to v12 and now v13 clearly demonstrates the Tesla AI team is rapidly advancing the capability and safety. Unfortunately, AI improvement alone will not overcome the limitations of the front-facing camera positioning too close to the windshield.

On a recent 800 mile business trip, there were many times FSD would suddenly give up and require me to take over immediately.

These disengagements happened when FSD was following other vehicles or passing trucks which were splashing up lots of dirty spray. Sitting back from the windshield I could easily see to drive safely. Unfortunately, the wipers often do not start soon enough and they do not automatically spray. The initial wipes often smeared the dirt which blinded the cameras. The FSD would not reengage until the wiper spray button was manually held for many wipes eventually clearing the camera area. The wipers are often not very good at cleaning at the far edge of the wiper and windshield without lots of washer fluid and wiping time. This issue could be improved if AI recognized the conditions and impending vehicle road spray and turned on the wipers and spray in advance. But wait, there’s more.

This recent trip experience got me thinking back to FSD v11 issues encountered on a 2300 mile FSD drive from NY to AZ, July of 2023. FSD v11 was not as good, but it still completed over 90% of the driving. During that long drive, there were many swarms of bug strikes that created large bug splats. They often turned into bug smears until quite a bit of washer fluid and wiper action. Sometimes it even required stopping and manually cleaning them off, see below. Sitting back from the windshield, I could always see clearly to safely drive. I had assumed some of the FSD issues encountered were a result of those bug splats, but at the time did not realize the magnitude and implications for unsupervised FSD.

In recent days, I’ve had multiple FSD failures around town due to dirty spray from other vehicles, and again, I could easily see to drive safely. This got me thinking and I suspected the issue may be due to the camera proximity to the windshield. I wondered:

• How large an obstruction would be required to blind FSD?
• Why could I see to drive safely but FSD could not?
• What would resolve the issue so unsupervised FSD could be achieved?

I opened the vehicle service camera preview screen to view what each front camera could see. The camera display, dash-cam, and mobile app sentry mode live camera views do not have options to view both front cameras.

I started by just placing my finger on the windshield over each camera to see if it would blind the camera. To my surprise, even just the tip of my little finger was large enough to significantly blind either the main or wide angle front camera.

I then placed a couple of my cars on the road and placed small clay balls over the camera to demonstrate just how small the obstructions needed to be.

Bug strikes, bird poop, dirt/slush splash, or single piece of wet trash or leaf could stick to the windshield and cover both cameras, however, these would never completely block a persons ability to see.

To resolve the issue, the front facing cameras could be moved back from the window. Moving them back makes the obstruction smaller and covers less area in the cameras field of view. The cameras will be able to better see around the farther and smaller obstruction, instead of it significantly blinding them.

A person with two eyes spaced inches apart and seated far from the windshield has no issue seeing around even extremely large obstructions. The left and right pictures were taken by shifting the camera slightly left to simulate each eye viewing the same scene. From a drivers perspective it’s easy to see that a fingernail size obstruction would barely be noticeable and not block anything from view of two eyes.

Spacing the front facing cameras farther apart would aide in one of them seeing around larger obstructions on the windshield. They are currently too close to not be blocked by trash or normal fall wet leaves falling from the trees onto the windshield.

The model S, 3, X, Y, Cybertruck, and Cybercab all appear to have similar front camera positioning and would likely suffer from the same risks. The semi may have more front facing cameras but it’s unclear if they are farther back.

I am a long term investor and I currently own three Teslas with FSD including a 2024 Model 3, 2025 model 3 refresh/highland, and a 2025 Model Y. I’ve also driven the Cybertruck for a few hours. I’m a believer in the mission and future. It pains me to report these issues, but sunlight is the best disinfectant and I’ve not seen these issues reported or covered adequately by any of the vloggers or bloggers I regularly follow on YouTube and X. By bringing these concerns to light, the hope is they will be addressed sooner than later. I just hope we do not have to buy an Optimus to have cameras back from the windshield as a backup so that we can safely work or sleep.

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P.S.

Aside from the rear facing camera, I've not had to clean any other cameras. The right side camera does get dirty from spray as you pass, but it self-cleans well. Hydrophobic or nano-ceramic coatings on the windshield would help reduce the problem, but it still wont be enough for corner cases like physical windshield damage from rocks or the following.

Back in the 70s, I was riding on a bus whose windshield was smashed by a pheasant and a car whose windshield was smashed by a deer. The bus finished the route. FSD front facing cameras might have been blinded in both those events.

P.P.S.

While unlikely to occur, existing vehicles might be able to have the display screens replaced with cameras at the top corners or protruding above them and the wiring could routed behind down to the computer. Another option is that the existing camera housing could be replaced with one that protrudes lower into the cabin so the cameras will be farther back. The advantage of the latter is that it could use the existing wiring with extensions. Any position change will require a new model. A disadvantage of lower the cameras is that they won’t be able to obstructions or curbs as close to the front bumper for parking or starting, so a high camera will still be needed.

Camera bumpers are being added to newer vehicles, but the spay cleaner won’t help with rock strikes or clear many of the obstructions wipers already have issues with.