Tesla FSD Confused By Toyota w/ Bright LED Lights - Here's What Happened

Added: 2026-06-04

[00:00:04]Hello.

[00:00:05]>> Hello, viewers.

[00:00:06]>> Hello, viewers.

[00:00:07]>> Hello, Scott.

[00:00:09]Uh, we recently went on a road trip in a 2026 Tesla Model Y. My mom's Tesla Model Y >> summer.

[00:00:16]>> And we road tripped up because I bought a car and I haven't even filmed the full video on the car yet. I knew there was something I was forgetting. Yes.

[00:00:23]>> No, you've not done a full video on it.

[00:00:25]>> Coming soon. I bought one of the very first Tesla Model S's ever made. But we decided to take, you know, sort of Tesla's most recent really great product, the Model Y, on a big road trip. And you'll see that full road trip coming on out of spec motoring within a few weeks after we post our Bolt cross country trip.

[00:00:44]>> So many trips.

[00:00:45]>> So many road trips. Um, FSD did something really interesting and I don't think I've seen this problem before.

[00:00:54]>> You've not seen it? Okay.

[00:00:55]>> But I've heard about it from my buddy Andy.

[00:00:58]>> There's my buddy Andy on X and YouTube.

[00:01:01]He's called Andy the German, was telling me his car randomly dipped into the shoulder the other day, >> his Cyber Truck, because he there was a car with a loose beam in the headlight housing.

[00:01:13]>> And that was 2 days prior to our trip is when he told you about that.

[00:01:16]>> Yeah. And I'm like, "Oh, that probably thought it was a police car." And I'm like, "How would it Yeah. Anyway, cuz now FSD reacts to police cars and we've shown that when Chris from Dirty Tesla came down to the track. Um, we put police cars behind it and it like dodged out of the way and we definitely know that it responds to emergency vehicles.

[00:01:35]I've seen it with ambulances on the road and really it does a great job at responding to emergency vehicles.

[00:01:42]>> It scooches over, it slows down, it drives better than most people.

[00:01:46]>> So, we have a Model Y with FSD uh 14.2.

[00:01:51]2.3.

[00:01:53]I don't think we're on 14.3 yet.

[00:01:55]>> It's like one software version old, but I think this will go for any software version.

[00:01:59]>> Yes.

[00:02:00]>> Um, and as of right now, >> we're driving up the road in uh Ohio when this happened on the Ohio Turbike and we're just cruising, you know, minding our own business, sitting in the right lane. I think we had FSD on chill mode. We we had all the time in the world. We're just mosying down the road.

[00:02:17]And all of a sudden I feel it's us like slow way down and get pushed into the shoulder.

[00:02:21]>> Violently pushed into the shoulder.

[00:02:24]>> We were kind of like, "Huh, that was weird."

[00:02:25]>> Yeah, that was weird. And like FSD doesn't really do weird stuff like that anymore. There's almost no phantom braking. Not that I can remember recently. Like it's just a top top system. A mindblowingly amazing system.

[00:02:40]And no one else in the Western world is close.

[00:02:42]>> But I was like, why did it just throw us in the shoulder? That's weird. And I've never seen it make this weird, you know, situation before.

[00:02:50]>> And a Toyota Sienna was behind us and they went by and I'm looking in the mirror and I'm not noticing anything weird about this Sienna. Um, other than maybe a little twinkle from the headlight >> occasionally, but like to the naked eye, you're kind of like >> it almost looked like the light was slightly loose in the housing. And then and I kind of thought, well, maybe maybe it was flashing just enough to make FSD think it was a police car. And that was from looking in the mirrors and the Yeah, just in the mirror.

[00:03:16]>> Just in the mirror.

[00:03:17]>> Back at it.

[00:03:18]>> So, we decided we've got to test that again with that same car. So, I went full rip and got in front of him, you know, came up on him, moved him out of the way, got in front of him, and then we pulled back and the same thing happened.

[00:03:33]>> Yeah, >> that's actually not true. That was the third time. The second time we took the easy pass, they got stuck in the toll lane.

[00:03:39]>> Oh, right. And then they came up behind us.

[00:03:41]>> They came up because we were again in chill mode. about that and >> they came cruising up and we get thrown into the shoulder and I filmed it this time. So, let's insert that clip of what's happening that second time it happened.

[00:03:54]>> Out of the way if you want.

[00:03:55]>> That's fine.

[00:03:56]>> It's got to be unobstructed highways and we've got super cruise merry bars driving. Exactly. Thank you.

[00:04:03]>> The second time it happens FSD puts us in the shoulder again.

[00:04:08]>> Indeed it does. And it was like full over 30 mph or felt slow. you know, really slowed down. The sienna goes by and we are back into it. And then I'm like, we've got to really experiment here.

[00:04:20]>> Yes.

[00:04:20]>> And I was thinking up to this point, it's got to be that little twinkle in the LED headlight that it might be slightly loose in the housing. Now, I'm not sure if those LED headlights are standard for that model year Sienna >> or an upgrade. We were not sure.

[00:04:34]>> I see a lot of Toyota Corollas and Siennas from that generation that seem to have aftermarket LED running lights or marker lights. that are very bright >> and and that's like a common thing you see on those cars.

[00:04:48]>> I would think if it's common then people aren't replacing the lights after market.

[00:04:52]>> Well, that's where I was thinking maybe it's factory or it's the cheapest like Amazon retrofit, you know, something like that. Um, so we got in front of the car and we started to record what the lights looked like on my iPhone. And I noticed that on my iPhone it wasn't viewing it as a normal light. It was flickering in and out, >> but to our eyes, it looked normal.

[00:05:16]>> So, it was the refresh rate of the LED that was messing with the frame rate of the camera that made it look like it was a blinking blue or bright white light. Y >> uh when I would switch between cameras, the frame rate would change >> and it would sometimes look steady and then sometimes it wouldn't. So, we pulled up the cameras on the Tesla and there you could clearly see it blinking on the Tesla side and that's totally what was happening was it looked like the car to the Tesla >> was blinking at us.

[00:05:46]>> Yeah. And regardless of the FSD software you're on, the cameras are are, you know, the same. And so it's going to look blinking to the Tesla. We also aren't sure if it was the light that we were in because it was kind of like an overcast day and so it wasn't super sunny and it wasn't late at night. It was kind of like gray.

[00:06:07]>> Yeah. And I think that gray light meant that the frame rate of the Tesla cameras were, you know, obviously getting out of sync with those LED lights that made it look like it was flashing and made it look probably like a police car behind the Model Y. Uh, let's insert those clips there and then let me think about what Tesla could do to solve this.

[00:06:26]>> Okay, >> viewers, we are pulling up to the Sienna in front of us. Take a look. Um, and this car either has I don't know if they're aftermarket. I see so many Toyotas with these really bright LED running lights. And twice now, this car has come up behind us and it's forced uh the Model Y into the shoulder. So, we're going to see if we can replicate it a third time on camera. So, we're going to blast ahead of them, pick up the pace, uh, put it on FSD, and see if it puts us in the shoulder again.

[00:06:56]>> But, do you want to tell everyone how you think that you figured it out? Cuz we took a video of the car in our side mirror.

[00:07:03]>> Yeah, ideally, if this video goes to plan, I will have already shown that.

[00:07:06]>> Okay.

[00:07:07]>> So, show the plinking. Okay, they're pulling over now. Take a look, Scott.

[00:07:10]So, you'll see them here. I'm really curious to see what the Tesla cameras show.

[00:07:16]>> Oh, look at this. here in the just camera. It does look like it's blinking.

[00:07:21]>> It looks like the refresh rate if you film them in wide view on the phone.

[00:07:27]>> See how it's just a solid white light blinking at all?

[00:07:31]>> Oh, but I can see that it looks like it's blinking. So this it doesn't look bad, >> right? But then >> on the cameras it looks really bad, >> right? So >> are you an FSD?

[00:07:42]>> Not yet cuz there was just a cop over there in the median. Oh, >> that was not on ways.

[00:07:47]>> If you back up a little bit just to show the whole picture, I'm going to engage FSD.

[00:07:54]I've got it in just standard FSD. It says, "Please pay attention to the road." I was looking at me. So, now we're locked in. We've got the blinking lights behind us.

[00:08:05]>> Let's see how long it takes or what happens if it will put us in the shoulder again. Clearly, it thinks there's an emergency car based off of the refresh rate of these LEDs.

[00:08:15]>> What happens if you slow it down to slow?

[00:08:18]>> I'm just going to keep it in standard cuz this is how we have been driving it, right?

[00:08:22]>> Okay.

[00:08:22]>> And they've come up behind us each time.

[00:08:26]>> So, now they're coming over on the side.

[00:08:32]>> Of course, it's not going to do it.

[00:08:34]>> Now, it's not going to do it. Well, I mean, we showed it before and clearly it makes sense why it happened, but it doesn't seem to be a repeated offense.

[00:08:42]Tail lights are not flashing at all.

[00:08:44]>> Yeah, >> but that is a wild situation that we are right at our supercharger, so we ran out of testing time. Okay, >> cuz we're at 5%.

[00:08:53]>> Uh, interesting. So, there you can see the Tesla really views the Sienna as having a blinking light. Now, what are some things Tesla can do to check for this so that you don't get unnecessary pullovers? I guess the first would be to just train off of enough of these LED retrofits to know that that style of blink is not an emergency vehicle and it's the refresh of the LED. Or it could do a quick frame rate change in the camera. Uh potentially like go 60 fps, 30 fps, >> like to check >> to check to just see if you can before it starts an emergency maneuver.

[00:09:30]>> Seeing like if it would recognize color.

[00:09:33]>> Um yeah, it it definitely could recognize color, but I think it's so close to police blue.

[00:09:39]>> Yeah, but police light blue also has blue, >> right? It's real blue.

[00:09:43]>> Yeah. If somebody with just white was pulling me over, I would not be stopping. But, you know, that brings up the question, if someone's just sitting there flashing behind you, >> I don't want my car to pull over. That's a safety thing. That's what I'm thinking about.

[00:09:55]>> That's a preference point >> because some people might, some people might not.

[00:09:59]>> Legally, you don't have to pull over when somebody's just flashing at you.

[00:10:03]>> No. And and probably safer not to. I mean, unless you're being an idiot holding up traffic, then yeah, definitely pull over. But if you're doing everything normally and someone's just flashing you, like, you know, >> do not pull over and don't let FSD pull you over.

[00:10:16]Um, so I'm really curious to see what you guys think of this situation. You know, edge cases are interesting as cars are getting way closer to autonomy. Um, I think we went that whole trip, the whole way up without having to do anything except for this unique situation.

[00:10:30]>> Yes. And the whole way down except 9 minutes before I got home.

[00:10:34]>> Yeah, it's really FSD is getting so good. And I know we're bringing up a fault in this, but this is a really interesting one that I think there could be. Sorry, the dog is trying to get up with Scott. Um, I really think uh there's a possibility that Tesla could fix this pretty easily.

[00:10:51]>> Mhm.

[00:10:52]>> So, I'm curious to see what you guys think in the comments. That was just an interesting edge case that we ran into on our trip. You'll hear us talk about it in the motoring video when it goes up, but I thought we'd post it online sooner rather than later.

[00:11:04]>> Yeah.

[00:11:04]>> So, there you go. FSD responds to LED flicker by thinking it's an emergency vehicle and pulls off the side of the road. Curious to hear your comments. Any final thoughts, Scott?

[00:11:16]>> I'm just curious to see how Tesla will fix it cuz you know they will, but how?

[00:11:21]>> If there's any viewers with like a 2009 Sienna with the aftermarket LED running light option >> in the North Carolina or Virginia area, >> bring it by the track. We'll try it out.

[00:11:29]>> Please.

[00:11:31]>> Thanks for watching. See you on another one again soon.