JemmyInfamous $30 Logitech F710 called out in $50M lawsuit over Titan sub implosion
submitted a month ago by Mrkawfee
arstechnica.com/culture/2024/08/infamous-30-log…
submitted a month ago by Mrkawfee
arstechnica.com/culture/2024/08/infamous-30-log…
Since the story came out people fixated on "lol he used a shitty gaming controller" but really that is one of the least sketchy design choices in the entire rig. Why reinvent the wheel and make a custom set of controls that are realistically another huge expense and potential failure point, when off the shelf solutions exist for that component?
The corners that were cut are the ones involving the viewport/nose adhesion to the ships frame, and the structural integrity of the carbon fiber hull itself. They had test data suggesting it was a bad idea to engage in repeated dives with their design, and an even worse idea to operate at the depths they chose. They decided to ignore that.
From what I can tell the lawsuit (which is against Ocean Gate, not Logitech) is really just calling out the controller as another example of willfully negligent behaviour.
You're certainly correct that the actual cause of the failure was the carbon fibre hull. Just a terrible idea on so many levels. Carbon fibre, by its nature, is good under tension, not compression. It was never going to function well as a pressure vessel underwater.
There were a litany of terrible decisions made by Ocean Gate, such as not tethering the sub, because it was cheaper to launch it from a towed raft, but none of those bad decisions ultimately mattered once that pressure vessel failed. Those people were dead so fast that, to quote Scott Manley, "You go from being biology to being physics."
You can always bring a second controller for redundancy. I would bet money the game controller had zero impact on the failure and I hate all the shade being thrown on this innocent controller.
That game controller has terrible range, zero compatibility with any other device, and randomly adds inputs when the controller is more than 2 feet away from the receiver. It is reasonable to consider if uncontrolled movement contributed to the implosion, or a loss of control at a critical moment preventing return to the surface.
Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly.
In the context of the lawsuit it's definitely a valid thing to bring up, mostly because it helps you tell the story to the jury. But yeah, in practice it probably didn't represent much of a hazard on its own (though it almost certainly wasn't fire rated)
That doesn't explain why they used the wireless version of that Logitech instead of wired to control the thing they were literally inside.
To be fair, they're under water and sharks have been known to chew through electrical cables
I suspect the wired cabling would be to control components inside the sub, not outside. And I say that only because it's unlikely that wireless signals would penetrate the sub walls.
Yes but with this sub the water was on the inside too
Lol
Too dense to pick up on the obvious sarcasm, I see.
i think you’re supposed to say wooosh or something like that
*"That doesn't explain why they used the wireless version of that Logitech instead of wired to control the thing they were literally inside."*
Yes, that sarcasm is profound and deep.
In case my implied message is unclear, go fuck yourself.
Electrical cables inside submarines?
That's hardcore.
Have you *seen* pictures of the sub? What makes you think the wiring was all hidden?
It looked worse than cheapest capsule hotel ever built...
I'm mildly claustrophobic and I would have troubles going in that tube even on mainland.
they were building for billionaire pleasure trips, they'd HAVE to go with the no-wires aesthetic.
The same reason you use the wireless version of any controller.
If you run into issues you can simply plug in any wireless controller.
Having tried to use those, my main issue was the 710 is an unreliable 2.4ghz wireless, when bluetooth controllers all worked much better for me. I couldn't get the 710 to have reliable button presses from more than like 4 feet from my pc, so I ended up just using the 310 wired. Maybe there isn't enough interference on the sub for that to be an issue.
There's going to be no external interference when you're under water. Sea water makes an excellent em shield
True, but that’s hardly an endorsement for their safety. Wireless should never be used for critical life support equipment. It is mind bogglingly stupid they did this.
Wasnt the carbon fiber body rated for like, 1/3rd the depth that they dove to?
It was very NASA O-Ring vibes. "We did it once, so we can do it every time" at least until they *cant* anymore, and that cant is usually accompanied by regret and poor innocent people being salsafied.
Carbon fiber wasn't rated for any depth. It's shit for compression and you don't need light materials for a submersible.
No, you're right.. I think it was the winshield bubble that was rated for 1/3rd the depth? I know something was rated for a far shallower depth than what the dumbass CEO made the sub repeatedly go to.
Also, these materials compress at different rates.
An off the shelf controller wasn't a terrible idea, but of course it was blue tooth and had pairing issues on previous trips
F710 does not support bluetooth
Using off the shelve components is not an issue, even NASA does it but they have very precise procedures on how to select them.
https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/cots.pdf
This particular model of controller is notoriously terrible, unreliable, and prone to contact failure. Anyone reading the amazon reviews would know it wasn't even a good choice as a player2 little brother controller.
Dude, the F710 is legitimately a terrible controller with a tiny range and a manufacture flawed nano receiver. I mean it's not the steepest corner they cut but you can get a rock solid drone remote with ridiculous range for barely twice the price of an f710.
It was a stupid choice that they actively ignored the results. Like i said, ANYONE who uses this controller for more than an hour will directly experience how terrible it is.
Using commercial off the shelf technology without proper testing and certification is absolutely cutting corners. See: Kaprun disaster.
What kind of fire rating did those COTS parts throughout the interior of the vessel have? What kind of redundancy existed? Would you use a Logitech controller for a spacecraft? The requirements of deep sea submersibles and spacecraft are quite similar. Would any of the submersible certification agencies approved this? I think not.
I see the Logitech controller, the carbon fiber hull, and so many other decisions he made as symptoms of the same corner cutting, “move fast and break things” mentality he had.
I just read the wikipedia article; thanks for mentioning it.
I'm not sure it's a good example of your point, though. Notably:
The fan heater is the only off-the-shelf technology listed here, and there's no suggestion that it was part of the train's design. It seems likely that a train conductor brought it on board to keep the compartment warm through the workday. Still a bad idea in a train, especially on a 30° slope, but not an example of the designers cutting corners.
Edit:
Thanks to others for linking photos and a report (in German) that show how the heater was installed. It was clearly not a case of a conductor just setting the heater on the floor, but the installation still looks very much out of place. Perhaps corner-cutting was involved, but this doesn't look like something done by the train designers. Even an expensive industrial heater seems like it would be an extraordinarily bad idea in that location, right up against high-pressure hydraulic oil lines. Does someone have the details behind it? It looks more likely a (very foolish) modification made by someone else, like maybe the train operators.
For anyone else following this, those hydraulic oil lines that the heater was nearly touching were apparently pressurized at 190 bar, which I think is about 2700 pounds per square inch.
It was not a train conductor that brought it with him, it was build into the train by the train manufacturer. See this page: https://155.at/der-heizluefter/
What makes you think the train manufacturer did it? Is that on record someplace? Because the installation and materials don't look at all like the surrounding work. Looks more like a handyman hack job. Now that I've seen the photos, I'm curious about what actually happened there.
It was not the train manufacturer, but a body shop (Swoboda Karosserie- und Stahlbau GesmbH, now Carvatech), which was recruited by the Gletscherbahn Kaprun (GBK) for renovations. It might have not had so large repercussions if anyone of the actors during those renovations had done his job correctly tho:
On top of all that, because the cable cars were made of aluminium, they were deemed inflammable. This did not take into account that any installed equipment or passengers and their luggage might NOT be fireproof.
This lead to: no fire exits, no emergency signage, no training for employees how to react in case of fire. (which might have saved a lot of people: the 12 survivors were the people who went downwards, passing the fire, because they listened to a fireman onboard the cable car.)
it was a single malfunctioning heater, but the Kaprun disaster had many fathers.
I found a nice paper regarding the different actors written by a student of the University of Virginia here, well sourced.
I need to cite the German Wikipedia article, which I’ve read. It’s a good read and very long.
It’s an example of uncertified consumer grade equipment used in a commercial environment to disastrous results, outside of its original designed purpose. It’s one of the most well known examples of why you don’t use consumer grade hardware in a commercial/industrial setting.
It was not brought on board by the conductor or someone else, it was permanently installed in the train in place of commercial grade heaters they couldn’t source. It was installed in the wall during assembly.
I’d argue it is an example of cutting corners, they didn’t want to find / pay more for commercial grade heaters. It was not compliant with the original design nor fire safety standards.
Wow. That's creepy in a fascinating way. Cutting corners costs lives, and this is a perfect example.
Exactly this. When you procure custom hardware, you’re paying (a lot) for the vendor to ensure that each unit meets the specifications you provide. If you validate off the shelf hardware like this, there is no guarantee that another batch of the same sku will also meet your requirements. Imagine training on these controllers then a certain batch of them has wildly different sensitivity.
Add to that that the carbon fiber and metal nose shrink at different rates under pressure. That adhesive litteraly was being torn apart at depth
using a wireless controller to manage life critical functions is the acme of stupidity.
The game controller is not managing life critical functions, that's called a computer. The game controller plugs into the computer. The great thing about that is that you can bring a second (or even a third) game controller for redundancy.
It's just that the engineering choices that caused the failure are difficult to understand or communicate in sentence so the game controller is something any idiot can harp on about and sound smart.
oh, it doesn't control ascent and descent, angle of attack, etc? it's not used to turn or operate the craft, that's all 'done by computer'?
pfft.
bluetooth and other wireless interface protocols aren't meant for life critical applications. give me a hardwired input - even a game controller - any day when it comes to life or death shit.
Weren't they using it wirelessly too?
At the very least, maybe use a Xbox elite controller
🤦♂️
If anything that controller was the most solidly built thing on that entire sub.
I think Logitech should take responsibility and give them a $30 voucher
“best we can offer is a replacement. but you will need to return the original”
Brilliant!
I laughed way too hard at that. Bravo.
Maybe a $10 Uber Eats gift card?
Expires on August 1st, 2024
Question. Who are they actually suing? Didn't the bozo die along with everyone else? So who would hold responsibility?
The company itself (oceangate) still exists. The estate of Stockton Rush is also named in the suit.
It appears they are suing OceanGate, the company that made the submarine. The use of cheap, consumer grade hardware for critical functions (literally controlling the sub) is one of their criticisms.
I don't see why the controller is a problem.
If you go out and custom-make a controller, it's not likely going to be more reliable than anything that Logitech makes.
https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/19/16333376/us-navy-military-xbox-360-controller
US Army used to spend $38,000 per controller until they found out Xbox controllers were better
That sounds like a great way to get malware!
Do you regularly get malware from xbox controllers?
Logitech... the company whose 150 dollar mouse have double click issues months into the purchase?
iirc they mentioned the f710 constantly disconnected.
Sounds about right from my experience with the F710.
Even if it is the best built controller ever. It was wireless and should not have been used. In terms of safety it's not something you want to solely rely on. As the article says: "every sub in the world has hardwired controls for a reason". Logitech is not blamed for anything. It's about OceanGate using this controller among many other questionable choices.
Yeah, but if you're going to use a wireless controller, don't fucking skimp and get some cheapo device, at least buy a goddamned 1st party controller. Not that MS/Sony don't have lemons too, but Logitech controllers are like a half step from the crappy MadKatz controllers from my childhood.
This had to be a project costing somewhere in the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars, and they're trying to save $30 on an aftermarket controller?!? That's the literal embodiment of Penny Wise, pound foolish.
That's only assuming the sub was running windows, where Xbox controllers work out of the box. On Linux there are no first party drivers, and Bluetooth support on the 1/S controllers simply didn't exist at the time this happened. If it was an embedded system there would be no support whatsoever.
Huh what? Dual Shock 4 controllers are supported OOTB. With additional support via Userland software. In fact Sony published drivers for DS5. XBox original controllers just work. Therws plenty of first party support.
Estate, insurance companies
This controller kept me in rocket league gold for months. I put it on eBay and some shmuck said they need it in a submarine but are on a budget so max can do is three fiddy. I just wanted to get rid of the thing
Goddamn Loch Ness monster!
Titan was an implosion, so the pressure hull failed at some point, we just don't know what. While the Logitech controller is indicative of the decision making process, it's one component we can comprehensively rule out as causing the failure.
Shouldn't have put the 'implode' action on the shoulder button. It was only a matter of time before he triggered it on accident.
we cant rule that out yet! maybe someone played CoD on the way down, but the high latency made them ragequit, causing a high-quality, robust controller to be accelerated fiercly, piercing the crappy hull.
This is such a frivolous lawsuit. Logitech is going to crush them if they even have to go to trial.
The article doesn't say they're suing Logitech.
It's using the fact that it was a wireless controller used over Bluetooth as part of the evidence that they created a bunch of unnecessary points of failure.
It's the submarine company/estate of the owner that are being sued for wrongful death
There. Fixed it for you.
It's probably in the user guide or manual: "can only be used with video games". It it's used for anything else it's not Logitech's problem.
"Yes, we built the sub wrong, but it's still your fault for not anticipating someone to try to use these in a poorly built submarine."
It's true, I bought one thinking it was cheaper and easier than a PS5 controller, and my couch imploded.
Yeah but was JD Vance piloting the couch? Because that's basically a mercy suicide imho.
Oh yeah, the controller is clearly the one a fault here......
I mean, they clearly made this for an submersible, one made of carbon fibre specifically.
Just taking a guess here but the controller was probably brought up as evidence for how much they were cutting corners and disregarding safety and good sense, not as the cause of the failure
That controller is known for just forgetting it's tethered to anything or suddenly veering off for no reason. I know because I have had one for years.
"Rush, who saw himself as an innovator like "Steve Jobs or Elon Musk," the complaint says, once told Pogue, "At some point, safety just is pure waste." Rush thought he had found a lighter way to build subs."
This really summarizes the mindset of most second+ generation rich people. Because this guy lived with a lot of inherited money and power all his life, he assumed that everything that comes out of his brain must be the ultimate truth. So much so that without even a single reservation he happily took his son with him to that journey knowing full well that the submarine was probably violating several critical safety requirements that he deemed unnecessary. We are basically being ruled by such people folks.
I've worked with plenty poor people who thought the exact same thing.
The only difference is that he actually had the resources to realize his stupid ideas
you should really consider frequency among non billionaires and among second+ generation billionaires. not that I have data on it but I really do think growing up in such an environment does inflate your sense of self idea worth and therefore such a person is more likely to act in this way (but not claiming at all that they are the only ones)
Super accurate comment.
I wouldn't use a wireless controller playing subnautica. This is on the company for using sub par tech. Next time use first party wired!
Nice pun
Is it because everything else on the sub was ordered from aliexpress and pieced together? This was the only part from a legitimate manufacturer?
Could be worse. Could have used a left Joy-con.
Srsly, it's clear these guys didnt play video games with controllers growing up. Could you imagine getting left drift down there!?
They should have had an entirely redundant system on there; the controller being the first item on the list and from there to the motors.
You joke, but watch this:
https://archive.org/details/take-me-to-titanic
from 29 minutes in. A last-minute adjustment before launch plugged in a thruster backwards; no protocol to check the behaviour prelaunch. They doscovered it when they got to the bottom.
Jebus, I cant believe the engineers would allow them to be plugged wrong. It's so easy to design that mistake away
tbf, the idiots getting sold the ride arent the ones supposed to be experts,
TBF, they should at least have a reasonable reason to believe the seller is an expert.
Honestly. I can't afford deep sea submarine dive. I can afford a train ticket though. Do I question every train company, every train driver and coductor whether their train is real, fully functional train? No, I simply assume it is, because how else would it be even possible for them to operate it in this day and age?
And I believe these rich people did the exact same thing, jist with a different machine...
Sure, but you're talking about routine things, not a maiden voyage of some brand new service. Deep sea voyages just aren't a thing available for the average person, so I'd hold off and not be the first to try it out until it's proven. I guess there's some FOMO there, but there are always kinks to work out with any new service.
Yeah, I wouldn't get in such a death trap ever, but who am I? Imagining I have infinite money and the world is a sandbox for me, would this feel like "just another thing to keep me interested" like space jumps or formula rental or similar adrenaline gigs? Most likely yes. Everyone in my multi-billionaire social bubble would probably do similar things, so... Why not deep dive? I have paid lot of money, what could go wrong.
Behind the Bastards did a pretty great two-parter on Stockton Rush, and how a) he completely shit the bed while ignoring all the super-deep-exploration experts, and b) how nature was totally telegraphing to Rush and OceanGate that this submersible is totally not doing it and will end in a spectacular tragedy, only no one else will be down there to watch but the fishes.
The controller wasn't a particularly weak link, though for safety's sake I'd want there to be a redundant spare, and it set up for plug and play. But higher on my priority list would be things like integrity monitors and an emergency way to open the sub from the inside (the hatch was bolted from the outside, and there were no emergency exit measures.
To be fair, they all exited the vehicle pretty quickly at the time without it needing to be unbolted from the outside. Experts... pfft.
The sound made as they exited, spaghettified.
Extruded?
Nonsense, "spaghettified" is a perfectly cromulent word
Such bad taste, sir. Have a reluctant upvote for that absolutely crushing wit.
Are you hoping to get upvotes for “crushing”?
How dare you. I would never go so low
Fr srious tho, it is really tragic. The young man especially; he was completely innocent and deserved better
Emphatically agreed
... How do you propose to emergency exit that sub at 1000 meters depth?
I'd say the bigger issue is that he used a carbon fibre body, a material which has great tensile Strength but sucks for this.
They way bigger issue than that is that he glued the metal rear section to the carbon fiber body. Both materials expand and contract differently under pressure, which is not what you want at 3 kilometer deep pressures, especially with multiple descends and ascends. That glue could never keep those materials together, that alone was a disaster waiting to happen
And people usually consider this when building a barn, doing plumbing in a house. The scariest thing is how can someone who doesn't understand this make a submarine. Real Crassus vibes.
The problem was that if they surfaced away from the support vessel, there was no way to open it to get fresh air. So you could still run out of oxygen and die while floating around on the surface waiting to be found.
Yeah that sounds like less of an issue to me, honestly. That support vessel van be there quick enough, send in airplanes, whatever. You can make a more intricate inside and outside locking mechanism but that'll make your entire submarine a whole lot more expensive
Why are people still discussing this as if something wrong had happened?
They fucked around and found out.
These people thought they can make a life size toy sub and use that instead of a normal one, and that people with actual expertise are below them.
Anyone who uses the F710 more than an hour will have it randomly disconnect like twice. No idea who okayed that part but it wasn't even the affordable option at the time as it was ALREADY years out of production when they built the sub.
I have that exact controller. It sometimes randomly disconnects forma few seconds. It is a weak link.
Everyone's joking here but I've owned and used an F710 since 2009 and they are ABSOLUTE CRAP.
I'm not even joking but their range is like 3 feet in the BEST conditions and their USB controller is proprietary and doesn't even work with OTHER F710s.
Anyone who's used one for more than a few hours knows this.
Why do I still use mine? Well the hand feel is amazing and the weight is perfect, but everything else is terrible and shouldn't even be used for gaming.
To be fair it wasn’t used for gaming lol
Just get the F310, like me, and you can enjoy that three foot range without batteries.
Also, WHY DID THE SUB USE THE WIRELESS VERSION WHEN THE WIRED IS CHEAPER AND WIRED?
I think mainly the wireless choice was for aesthetics, they were building experiences for billionaires and those assholes put way to much score in appearance.
Then at least use something fancy like a flight stick! The F710 makes... anything newer than the Gravis Gamepad look like luxury!
Love it
Pretty sure the fly by wire system isn't why the beer can imploded.
The vast majority of the cause of the 3 mile island nuclear meltdown was a moisture soaked compressor pump completely unrelated to any of the safety or emergency systems. With complicated failures, the actual fault is not always easy to detect.
It's reasonable to think that the controller might have contributed to unexpected descent past safety levels, or prevented them from recovering when warnings appeared.
Three mile island did not have a meltdown, ffs. Not even close.
"The Three Mile Island accident was a partial nuclear meltdown"
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Mile_Island_accident
You are technically correct, and that is the best kind of correct. I spoke from frustration, having grown up there. What i should have said was that there was no danger to the public, it was fully contained behind multiple redundant safety containments. Its frustrating because i feel like that incident stalled nuclear energy in this country since then.
I wouldn't say no danger, but the danger was averted. It did even release radioactive material, but not enough to be dangerous.
It could have gone much worse, but it didn't.
I've got two F710s and they're reliable enough. I wouldn't trust them in pro gaming though.
If I got in the sub and saw one of these used to steer it, I'd be very concerned. I know they're not really blaming Logitech; just taking one of these out of the plastic packaging and saying 'OK, now we've got steering and propulsion!' is not really a safety culture to get behind.
The classic little brother defence flipped as prosecution. It was the controller all along.
At this point filing a multi-million dollar lawsuit against OceanGate will be like trying to extract blood from a stone.
What tangible assets do OceanGate really have left to pay Nargeolet's estate? Their CEO (the maverick aerospace engineer who thought he was 'revolutionizing' the submarine industry by cutting corners) is dead, their only active submersible imploded, their reputation has been tainted by the fact that they've been selling billionaires what is effectively a carbon fiber coffin waiting to implode, and any angel investors have probably pulled out harder than a porn star on the verge of climax.
Even then, they may not even have a case. IANAL but in an age where every single tech and gaming company has been pushing through class action waivers and forced arbitration clauses in their Terms of Service, I get the feeling that any attempts at suing OceanGate will be thrown out of court by the waivers each passenger had to sign.
There is a sense of irony in people celebrating this disaster on social media because it means "five less billionaires in the world." No, this is potentially a massive L for us commoners, because it shows just how much corporate greed can destroy lives. If the rich can be screwed this badly by an unregulated corporation, imagine what corporate giants can do to people who can't afford lawyers.
Movie pitch - to pay all its lawsuits, OceanGate launches one final desperate mission to the wreck of the San José.
I own 3 of those. They are not for PS or XBox but for mostly for PC gaming. They are not Bluetooth, they come with their dedicated USB nano receiver. I don't even trust them to win a championship in "F1 race stars", the arcade F1 game. The wireless is not reliable enough. They eat AA batteries like candy.
Absolutely agreed and I've had to replace the shoulder bumpers on mine twice now. ALSO the trigger traverse is RIDICULOUSLY LONG! Like I can fire an actual semi pistol faster and those have a five lb draw.
But man do they feel nice in the hand. No controller since the ps2 has felt like this to me.
They couldn't have splurged for an Xbox controller at least?
I've owned this controller for years. Can confirm it sucks.
What a stupid waste of time and resources.
Logitech has great lawyers. It's almost guaranteed that there a "this controller's intended use is only for __" in their purchase agreement paperwork.
No way is this lawsuit going anywhere
They are not suing Logitech. They're suing OceanGate and using the controller as an example of poor design and decision making.
This is what happens from only reading the title and making assumptions...
IMO that argument weakens their case. The controller was one of the least problematic things they did. Mechanical controls would have compromised the hull even more, so it was always going to be controlled electronically. I hope the complaint at least offers examples of better options and how those would have had any effect at all on hull integrity.