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Cars, the chip shortage and old tech

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MT:

--- Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on October 12, 2021, 10:57:06 am ---
--- Quote from: bitwelder on October 12, 2021, 08:57:54 am ---Recently Elon Musk said about how Tesla might got less affected by the chip shortage: "We were able to substitute alternative chips, and then write the firmware in a matter of weeks," and "It’s not just a matter of swapping out a chip; you also have to rewrite the software."
https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/26/22595060/tesla-chip-shortage-software-rewriting-ev-processor

As any word from Musk has to be taken with a grain of salt, how would you say such a statement can be true? If he's talking of some accessory system, maybe ok, but if it's about some primary circuits related to the actual car driving system, wouldn't any change require a lengthy safety re-certification process?

--- End quote ---
Totally plausible.IMO Tesla is more vertically integrated than other automakers. There are hundreds of mcus and peripherals in a car, many not safety related

--- End quote ---

For a luxury car , but for average  working class Manchester John's 2019 Ford Fiesta?

Miyuki:

--- Quote from: MT on October 12, 2021, 01:03:28 pm ---
--- Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on October 12, 2021, 10:57:06 am ---
--- Quote from: bitwelder on October 12, 2021, 08:57:54 am ---Recently Elon Musk said about how Tesla might got less affected by the chip shortage: "We were able to substitute alternative chips, and then write the firmware in a matter of weeks," and "It’s not just a matter of swapping out a chip; you also have to rewrite the software."
https://www.theverge.com/2021/7/26/22595060/tesla-chip-shortage-software-rewriting-ev-processor

As any word from Musk has to be taken with a grain of salt, how would you say such a statement can be true? If he's talking of some accessory system, maybe ok, but if it's about some primary circuits related to the actual car driving system, wouldn't any change require a lengthy safety re-certification process?

--- End quote ---
Totally plausible.IMO Tesla is more vertically integrated than other automakers. There are hundreds of mcus and peripherals in a car, many not safety related

--- End quote ---

For a luxury car , but for average  working class Manchester John's 2019 Ford Fiesta?

--- End quote ---
In cars are plentiful off small controllers to limit the huge amount of wires (silicon is cheaper than copper) and to reduce weight and get better gas mileage
Tesla is one example of using cheaper chips/designs in things like doors and resulting in the door handle malfunction and similar issues.
Other manufacturers have it also, for example, Renault had "faulty" dashboards that will die after about 3-5 years. Microcontroller memory issue. That is something not making a good record and people will tell it to others. I think now they check better what controller they use.
Plus today even cheap cars have things what you dont think about but are to make driving easier and safer. (if we do not count things like ABS) Automatic lights and wipers for example.
It can be fun to drive a car from past times, but you really do not want it as a daily driver. And I have some with an ancient engine with a mechanical distributor ignition and purely mechanical automatic transmission  ::)

MT:
Plentiful is "some" but surely a Ford Fiesta dont have "hundreds" of MCU's!
https://www.bloombergquint.com/business/chip-shortage-forces-carmakers-to-strip-out-high-tech-features
From article:
Peugeot is going back to old-fashioned analog speedometers for its 308 hatchbacks, rather than use digital versions that need hard-to-find chips. General Motors Co. said it built some Chevrolet Silverado pickup trucks without a certain fuel-economy module, costing drivers about 1 mile per gallon. Nissan is cutting the number of vehicles with pre-installed navigation systems by about a third.

In at least one case, carmakers are asking a major chipmaker to send microcontrollers that don’t meet standard specifications, a person familiar with the matter said. Those sub-standard chips wouldn’t jeopardize safety essentials, like brakes, the person said, but they could mean in-car entertainment or emissions monitoring systems are more likely to malfunction in extreme weather.

Miyuki:

--- Quote from: MT on October 12, 2021, 06:21:14 pm ---Peugeot is going back to old-fashioned analog speedometers for its 308 hatchbacks, rather than use digital versions that need hard-to-find chips.

--- End quote ---
"analog speedometer" does not need much fewer chips than a fancy display, it all goes over canbus 
and mechanical gauges are abandoned three decades ago
but it is easy today, you can shove any dashboard into a modern car with just a minor firmware tweak, they might have some stocks from other model

VK3DRB:

--- Quote from: nctnico on September 23, 2021, 11:41:18 am ---
--- Quote from: cortex_m0 on September 21, 2021, 12:48:47 am ---The fact that Intel was Johnny-come-lately to the MCU world didn't help.

--- End quote ---
If you mean that Intel has missed the 16 bit and 32 bit microcontroller market, then you are very right though.

--- End quote ---

Maybe today, but certainly not historically. Intel microprocessors were the only game in town for many years since IBM adopted the 8086/8088, until AMD and a few others got into the business. Intel made a fortune out of the IBMPC and IBM clones.

I remember when an Intel Pentium In-Circuit Emulator cost around $30K in today's money. Today, I can get a decent real-time debug tool with break-point control for the cost of some take-away food from the local Fish 'n Chip shop.

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