[ejo3rd]

Henrik Fisker is indeed calling early purchasers, I just got off of the phone with him. He had a list of the specific issues I had with my car, not just a the usual items we are all talking about. We had a good conversation and he said Fisker is committed to resolving the problems, and good customer service is important to them. I'm glad to know the dealer is passing along the information to the upper management and they do seem to be listening.
All in all a nice gesture.

 

[Fabulist]

Henrik Fisker is indeed calling early purchasers, I just got off of the phone with him. He had a list of the specific issues I had with my car, not just a the usual items we are all talking about. We had a good conversation and he said Fisker is committed to resolving the problems, and good customer service is important to them. I'm glad to know the dealer is passing along the information to the upper management and they do seem to be listening.
All in all a nice gesture.

If you don't mind sharing, what did you tell him about your car and was there specific commitment on his part about the solutions?

-- Fab.

 

[ejo3rd]

Henrik Fisker is indeed calling early purchasers, I just got off of the phone with him. He had a list of the specific issues I had with my car, not just a the usual items we are all talking about. We had a good conversation and he said Fisker is committed to resolving the problems, and good customer service is important to them. I'm glad to know the dealer is passing along the information to the upper management and they do seem to be listening.
All in all a nice gesture.

If you don't mind sharing, what did you tell him about your car and was there specific commitment on his part about the solutions?

-- Fab.

When I originally picked up my car I brought it home and went over it very thoroughly inside and out. I found some cosmetic issues besides the electronic ones and put together a list for my dealer. My dealer evidently passed the list up to headquarters because Henrik Fisker knew each item I had a problem with. He brought them up in the discussion and said they would resolve each item to my satisfaction. He also discussed the complexity of the systems in the car and how they are working hard to solve the software issues. He said I should have my car back this week with updated software.

 

[SoCalGuy]

I got a call today from Henrik as well... Funny enough it happened when I was driving in the Karma. Appreciate the sentiment, but no groundbreakingly new info. I'm boarding a plane now but will post my thoughts and also a summary of my first weekend with Patience (my Karma's name).

PS The folks at Fisker (corporate and dealer) now know my real identity and screen name, given the specificity of my posts. Shout out to Arun and Josh!

 

[ringme]

I got a call today from Henrik as well... Funny enough it happened when I was driving in the Karma. Appreciate the sentiment, but no groundbreakingly new info. I'm boarding a plane now but will post my thoughts and also a summary of my first weekend with Patience (my Karma's name).

PS The folks at Fisker (corporate and dealer) now know my real identity and screen name, given the specificity of my posts. Shout out to Arun and Josh!

Did Brian get a call from Henrik?

I'd love a recording of that call.

 

[SoCalGuy]

I did learn that the updates to the Command Center will fix the main bugs associated with it, but it will not fix the sluggishness/responsiveness of the Command Center. Henrik said they're working on that and hope to have an updated version "by the end of the year." He said it typically takes about 6 months to fully test out new engineering/software.

 

[Fabulist]

I did learn that the updates to the Command Center will fix the main bugs associated with it, but it will not fix the sluggishness/responsiveness of the Command Center. Henrik said they're working on that and hope to have an updated version "by the end of the year." He said it typically takes about 6 months to fully test out new engineering/software.

That sounds more like a software+hardware solution or a major redesign of the system. It should not take 6 months to test a pure software solution for such a specific problem.

Do the controls on the steering wheel (volume, Phone system, voice, etc.) also display the same sluggishness or is the delay limited to the touchscreen controls? If the hardwired controls react instantly but the touch screen is sluggish, the real problem may be the touch detection circuits in the display.

-- Fab.

 

[ct-fiskerbuzz]

That sounds more like a software+hardware solution or a major redesign of the system. It should not take 6 months to test a pure software solution for such a specific problem.

Even small tweaks can take a lot of testing time if you have a bunch of different countries' regulations you have to pass. I don't do any of the ARINC 653 / DO-178B stuff for our company but the guys who do, sure are cautious.

(I did work on some software that went to a supplier of a supplier of, etc., that is apparently somewhere in the Boeing 787. I have no idea where though. Probably something to do with the in-flight infotainment. )

 

[kabalah70]

Touchscreen may be the issue, as I remember reading elsewhere here that people did not have the issue with the steering column controls, if I remember correctly. I also said elsewhere that David Harris specifically told me there was plenty of computing power on board. I would hope he was referring to the capability of the Command Center and not the fact, as Henrik states in the Jay Leno video, that the car has 31 ECUs instead of the typical 5 in the past.

 

[SoCalGuy]

I did learn that the updates to the Command Center will fix the main bugs associated with it, but it will not fix the sluggishness/responsiveness of the Command Center. Henrik said they're working on that and hope to have an updated version "by the end of the year." He said it typically takes about 6 months to fully test out new engineering/software.

That sounds more like a software+hardware solution or a major redesign of the system. It should not take 6 months to test a pure software solution for such a specific problem.

Do the controls on the steering wheel (volume, Phone system, voice, etc.) also display the same sluggishness or is the delay limited to the touchscreen controls? If the hardwired controls react instantly but the touch screen is sluggish, the real problem may be the touch detection circuits in the display.

-- Fab.

The controls on the steering are generally responsive (its too bad they aren't backlit, since its nearly impossible to find them at night!)...

 

[Fabulist]

Touchscreen may be the issue, as I remember reading elsewhere here that people did not have the issue with the steering column controls, if I remember correctly. I also said elsewhere that David Harris specifically told me there was plenty of computing power on board. I would hope he was referring to the capability of the Command Center and not the fact, as Henrik states in the Jay Leno video, that the car has 31 ECUs instead of the typical 5 in the past.

The ECUs are dedicated controllers and have very limited and specific functions, similar to the bus and I/O controllers on your PC which are not counted as part of the CPU's computing power. Like the controllers on a PC, the best the ECUs can do is not to create a bottleneck or slow things down, but they can't really run any code other than their own firmware. The only computational power that matters for the infotainment system is whatever processor is running that software, which I would think was what Mr. Harris would have been referring to since the engine management computer for the ICE would not be able to help with the NAV system, for example.

Regarding the touchscreen, it would be interesting to hear about first hand (no pun intended) experience from Brian, Dutch, and others who have had some experience with the cars so far.

-- Fab.

[hr]

Even small tweaks can take a lot of testing time if you have a bunch of different countries' regulations you have to pass. I don't do any of the ARINC 653 / DO-178B stuff for our company but the guys who do, sure are cautious.

No question about that and in general, anything going into an airplane is going to get a lot more closer scrutiny than a system going into a car. But I would be surprised if there are any standards governing touchscreen reaction time in cars, plus the reaction time of the UI is a very specific and easily testable metric which would not require a whole lot of testing. Of course, if speeding up the UI requires tweaking all the underlying systems and possibly upgrading hardware (screen controller for example), that could definitely take 6 months or more to develop and implement.

-- Fab.

 

[Richard Carnes]

Did Brian get a call from Henrik?

I'd love a recording of that call.
[/quote]

Call, my ass, Henrik should show up at Brian's front door with a case of Carlsberg for him and a dozen roses for his girlfriend, and THEN do whatever it takes to fix his Karma...

 

[brian]

No, I haven't gotten a call yet. I'm sure he's got a lot of people, so it'll happen eventually.

-Brian

 

[LonePalmBJ]

Call, my ass, Henrik should show up at Brian's front door with a brand new Karma and a case of Carlsberg for him and a dozen roses for his girlfriend...

Fixed that for you.

 

[brian]

Oh, by the way, I did send my current "bug list" to David and Company over there. I won't post it here again, but if you want to see the latest updated list here it is:

http://briangreenstone.com/temp/Karma%20Issues%20%26%20Suggestions.pdf

-Brian

 

[Dutch]

Did anyone have the chance to ask Henrik if they were experiencing problems with the command center during the test drives?

 

[Michael]

If the touchscreen need to be replaced to get better response it would be nice to hear if they would do this on the early cars or you just have to live with it

 

[karma1]

Did anyone have the chance to ask Henrik if they were experiencing problems with the command center during the test drives?

My first thought was, "Which test drives is Dutch talking about?"

My second was, "In what universe would this thing's performance have been acceptable?"

I am sure that they knew it was not working. How could they not?

 

[Fnorrod]

Posted by karma1 - Today 10:27 PM
(Today 09:14 PM)Dutch Wrote:
Did anyone have the chance to ask Henrik if they were experiencing problems with the command center during the test drives?

My first thought was, "Which test drives is Dutch talking about?"

My second was, "In what universe would this thing's performance have been acceptable?"

I am sure that they knew it was not working. How could they not?
------------------------

They may well have known and chosen to ship anyway, but I'd turn for an explanation instead to Hanlon's Razor, slightly modified: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by wishful thinking."

After way too many years of product development, my belief is that at least a few things were at play: Limited testing by a few people who got used to where the "weak" areas of functionality were and steered away from them during testing, perhaps even unconsciously. Bugs that were reported and could not be trivially reproduced by the development team - who may not have had any/enough representative HW - were 'dispositioned' as "Can not Duplicate" or the like. A "CND" should be the bane of a development team and something they really focus on: it should take way more effort and diligence to demonstrate it was indeed a fluke/can not duplicate than fixing any bug that can be reproduced.

This is purely my guess, but those two behaviors, along with too little HW and a rev 1.0 product would explain why we are here without resorting to "they knowingly shipped a crappy command center" or they are overtly incompetent.

 

[karma1]

I'm sorry, but the functionality of my 6.10 system was sooooo bad, that I am convinced they knew. In fact, my system was so bad that I honestly believe it was dishonest to sell a product that was that poorly developed.