R Crashes when training using caret and method = gamLoess - r

Question

When I run the code below, R crashes. If I comment out the tuneGrid line in the call to train, there is no crash. I've tried this with another dataset, and still crash R. Crash message is
R Session Aborted
R encountered a fatal error
The session was terminated
Start new session.
The code is:
library(splines)
library(foreach)
library(gam)
library(lattice)
library(ggplot2)
library(caret)
# crashes when I uncomment the tuneGrid = tuneGrid line
Set_seed_seed <- 100
data_set <- diamonds[, c(1, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)]
data_set <- data_set[1:1000,]
formula <- price ~ carat + depth + table + x + y + z
training_control <- trainControl(method = "cv", allowParallel = FALSE)
tune_grid <- expand.grid(span = seq(0.1, 0.9, length = 9), degree = seq(1, 2, length = 2))
set.seed(Set_seed_seed)
GAM_model <- train(formula,
data = data_set,
method = "gamLoess",
tuneGrid = tune_grid,
trControl = training_control
)
This occurred in R3.2.1 and 3.2.2 using R Studio.
In R gui, also get crashes.

Answer 1

It is a bug in the gam package. I alerted Trevor Hastie on March 3, 2014 about it:
library(gam)
set.seed(1)
x <- rnorm(1000)
y <- x^2+0.1*rnorm(1000)
tdat <- data.frame(y = y, x = x)
m1 <- gam(y ~ lo(x, span = .5, degree = 2), data = tdat)
That works fine but as I fit multiple models a seg fault occurs (but only
with loess and degree = 2).
This will produce it for me:
for(i in 1:10) m1 <- gam(y ~ lo(x, span = .5, degree = 2), data = tdat)

Answer 2

I verified that the problem exists. I debugged the program and found that the program gets stuck as shown. This is a bug with the foreach package
train(formula, data=data_set, ...)
useMethod("train") # train(); namespace:caret
train(x, y, weight = w, ...) train.formula(); # namespace:caret
useMethod("train") # train(); namespace:caret
nominalTrainWorkflow(x = x, ...) # train.default(); namespace:caret
result <- foreach(iter = , ...) # nominalTrainWorkflow(); namespace:caret
e <- getDoSeq() # %op%; namespace:foreach
list(fun = doSeq, data=NULL) # getDoSeq(); namespace:foreach
e$fun(obj, substitute(ex), parent.frame(), e$data) # %op%; namespace:foreach
tryCatch(accumulator(list(r), i) # e$fun; namespace:foreach