Tesla

I used to watch these Tesla videos before owning one and every comment was about how much of a tool the guy was for being so excited about his Tesla. I am that guy now, no shame. 1 month into ownership and I am still finding any excuses I can to drive the car.

We just road-tripped 1000miles from Florida to Texas without a single problem at all. FSD was on about 90% of the time and not a single instance of Phantom breaking or any other issue other than some unnecessary lane changes. Supercharging was done FAR before my wife and I were done using the restroom and letting the dogs out.

Useless post, just needed to say how flipping amazing this car is.

Side note, we bought the car used from Carvana and they do NOT check for FSD before selling the car. We paid base price with zero markup for FSD having already been bought on the car

So we have a salary sacrifice EV scheme at work and my wife needs a new car as her Hyundai i30 is on its last legs. I can get a Tesla Model 3 for £565 a month, and can afford that. Obviously many other EVs are available but they all get compared to a Tesla anyway and the technology and charging network for them seems to be considered the best.

I know there’s a bit of hate for Tesla due to Elon being an assclown, fair enough, but I’d like to hear from anyone on this sub who actually owns one about the pros and cons. Regarding the Model 3 in particular, taking into account the facelift version that’s just come out apparently has much better build quality and that’s the one that would turn up on my drive if I went ahead. Thanks in advance!

Hi all,

3 years ago we purchased an MYLR. Since our retirement we've dedicated ourselves to trying to use a little petrochemicals as possible, we invested in solar panels, and then went EV on the car. At the time, the Tesla seemed like the right choice. I was never a fanboi, but our experience, counter to others on this sub, has been fairly good. I have no horror stories to tell.

- Our local service center (Palm Springs CA) has been responsive. Our MY had none of the obvious defects people talk about. Due to my wife's "driving" we've had a few nasty flat tires, but that's absolutely not the car's fault. In all 3 cases the service center dispatched a tow truck, hauled the car there and replaced the tire. The tire costs were high, but for the brand, etc. it wasn't too far out of line. My one complaint there is that if they just carried one f'ing spare tire/wheel, we could have driven ourselves, but that's a cost on Tesla. We had 1 warranty claim in 3 years, which was about a month ago when we got a warning pop-up regarding the 12-volt battery. Service was dispatched to our house and it was fixed in a few minutes at no cost.

- in the early going we did have the "smell" problem with the hvac. I changed the filter myself and it never returned. We live in the desert and run the A/C all the time - but it's also very dry here most of the time so it seemed fixed. But jeebus, that's a design problem that I've never seen before.

- Tires wear incredibly fast. It seems like 20-25k is about the limit. Ouch.

- SO anyway, our ownership experience was mostly positive. It was my wife's car and she really liked it.

- A big issue is that she had a lot of little accidents. All bumping into something. The damages were minor but the expense was not. One time we had to wait 3 months for a part. We were always able to drive the car, but a little more damage in one case and we'd have been SOL for 3+ months. After a lot of discussion and thinking we just determined that the way the car operated just wasn't clicking with her. The center screen was distracting her away from driving at times and the lack of a driver centered dashboard just added to that.

- I tried Fake Self Driving for a one-month trial, when we did a longer trip. I turned it off after 24 hours and never tried it again. You know all the reasons. Criminal. I purchase the car with the idea that as FSD became real (haha) it would sort of coincide with our declining years and having a car that took more-and-more of the burden of driving away seemed like a good idea. Ugh.

- So with FSD off the table (probably for a long-long time) and that being one of the primary reasons for buying the MY, and my wife's seeming issues with the car, we started thinking about an alternative... She test drove all the Hyundai and Kia products and really liked the EV6... but for completeness tried the Genesis GV60. She bought it on the spot. It's like a real car. I drove it for the first time tonight and it was like being back on familiar ground, but with a ton of fun/funky/quirky features. The base 2WD was $52k, and everything about seems better than the tesla, so far. Nice seats, all the tech, heads-up display, cool interior lighting. A magic glowing orb that rotates when you start the car to reveal the gear shift knob... sort of goofy, but in a fun way that fart noises are not.

- the GV60 has all the nice features like overhead view and such to help her not bump into things... some of which most other more expensive cars have but the Tesla lacks for "reasons." As one gets older those assists really come in handy. The facial recognition to unlock the doors (if you forget keys and phone) and fingerprint recognition to start the car are really nice. She's been out and about in the past and forgets to charge her phone - I've had her call me from a stranger's phone to ask me to unlock the Tesla remotely so she can get into it at all and charge her phone to the point where she can drive it... (Key card in purse in car... so no help ). The door handles are much better designs than the Tesla. I call it bad design when you have to teach your passengers how to get in your car. :)

- I feel a bit relieved to be done with the Tesla, TBH. It feels more like a "platform" and less like a car. I can't really say we were unhappy with it. But the GV60 seems better in every way except cargo space.But it's a much smaller (9" in length and 4 in width) car.

The dashboard is pretty nice - I so missed having a nice dash in front of the driver. I hated driving the Tesla at night with that big expanse of darkness directly in front of me... that might have been my single biggest complaint about the driving experience (other than FSD).

I was initially thinking the performance of the 2WD base GV60 would be really sad compared to the Y, but in sport mode the GV60 is peppy enough (my wife doesn't care at all).

I'm not sorry we tried the Tesla, but I'm happy we're done trying it.

Should I expect some kind of paperwork from Tesla after my car is delivered?

Worst thing in Dutch traffic jams is not just cocky behaviour but also having a Tesla driving behind you. Especially this season where rush hour is basically always during darkness. Oftentimes the headlights are tilted so far up I can see my own shadow on the car ceiling and so bright my retinas are burnt for a long time.

Did you change light tilt settings on your Tesla when you bought it? Please check it.

Obviously the biggest difference is that it's a truck.

Beyond that, about the overall experience, I'm super impressed so far.

Highway assist is sooooo much better than autopilot. Like insanely better. For those unfamiliar with tesla autopilot, it has had an issue forever where it swerves towards unprotected onramps. It's so annoying. My friend has an electric Ford and they told me the Ford system struggles as well, disengaging lane keep entirely when you pass one of these onramps. I was pleasently surprised to find out my Rivian has zero problems with this. Just keeps going straight. It's almost as if it's not stupid! Also absolutely love the automatic re-engagement after a lane change. Even the steering wheel sensor is better. Just better in every way.

One possible downside... I think I'm noticing the lack of a heat pump already. I know it's a much bigger cabin but it takes way longer to heat up than my model Y did.

Loving having the HUD in addition to the main screen. I had just gotten used to looking right to see my speed and nav info. Really awesome to have that right in front of me.

Love having the ability to permanently disable auto high beams. I hate that feature and Tesla forces it on you. You can turn it off but it turns back on the next drive.

One other thing I don't understand - it seems like there should be an option to automatically change to Conserve mode when I engage highway assist. I can't think of a scenario in which I'd need to keep AWD on if I'm using highway assist. But who knows, maybe there's a situation I haven't encountered yet. I don't love having to switch to another screen a bunch of times to change drive modes.

Also wish there was a way to set seat & steering wheel heating to "auto" like in a tesla. Seems like I have to manually turn it on every time.

It just seems like the Rivian comes with all the features of the car available to me. With a tesla it really feels like they nickel and dime you. Even your acceleration is nerfed if you have a non-performance model unless you pay them a huge fee to unlock it. I really like the feeling that the truck fully belongs to me.

That's about it so far. Anybody else come from a tesla and notice something I haven't yet?

New article on Electrek today - Was just happy to see that this article does NOT include what I previously saw on some reddit posts as well as speculation news articles that Tesla would be removing non highway side road access for basic autopilot. Hopefully this confirms we wont lose accessibility to the roads we know work well for autopilot once car updates OTA.

In accordance with a recent recall (campaign #23V-838 for US and #2023-657 for Canada), Tesla is making the following improvements to Autosteer:

– Improved visibility of driver monitoring warning alerts on the touchscreen by increasing the text size and moving the notifications to a more prominent position (Model 3 and Model Y only).

– Added option to activate Autopilot features with a single stalk depression, instead of two, to help simplify activation and disengagement.

– Increased the strictness of driver attentiveness requirements when using Autosteer and approaching traffic lights and stops signs off-highway.

– Introduced a Suspension Policy that will restrict Autosteer usage for one week if improper usage is detected. Improper usage is when you, or another driver of your vehicle, receive five “Forced Autopilot Disengagements.”

You are the driver. As the driver, you must be vigilant to the road, keep your hands on the wheel, and be ready to intervene to maintain safety.

I'm interested to know if there are any technical constraints, either hardware or software, that are preventing Tesla from implementing the Matrix headlights functionality on their cars, considering they are already available on the existing Teslas