Nothing wrong with a compliance EV if it gets the job done! They're really a different class of car than the big-battery dedicated EVs, so I don't think it's fair to compare them directly when talking about EV behavior, especially if a longer trip is involved.
A couple of things:
There's a CCS1 adapter coming! Price and full details such as maximum charging speed are as yet unknown, but I've seen everything from $150-250 for cost. That would allow the Teslas to use non-Tesla high speed chargers. There may be a reverse adapter coming as well that allows non-Teslas to plug into Superchargers. But what is known is that the latest software update allows you to check to see if your Tesla has the ability to use this charger or if it needs a hardware update. The line is apparently "late 2019" so our car may or may not have it. When we get that update, I'll check.
As noted in another thread, I've discovered the Tesla parts fiches, and they are publicly available. I had a parts fiche already but the online version shows selling restrictions along with a zoomable exploded diagram. I'm going to spend some time exploring because I love exploded diagrams. Also, the vast majority of parts listed are freely available at the parts counter so the net.knowledge that "you can't buy parts" may not be accurate. The only parts I've found so far that are restricted are related to the high voltage battery, possibly to keep random shops from setting themselves on fire by messing with things they don't understand.
The battery section shows part numbers for both new and remanufactured batteries. No prices, alas.
https://epc.tesla.com/en/catalogs
I'm wondering if the switch to Tesla Vision might help these rare scenarios of highways and surface streets in close proximity triggering the speed adjustments. I have had an incident where the car was parked in a garage for a couple of days, think Chicago, and when I retrieved tha car the GPS was off and thought I was driving on city streets while I was bombing down the highway at 80. It eventually fixed itself, but for those few minutes, all autopilot functions were effectively useless.
Keith Tanner said:
There is no equivalent to "dumb cruise". It will adjust speed based on the car in front of you, and you can set the following distance to "inadvisable" if you want to tailgate at 80. It just won't let you bump draft the car in front ): I suspect the vast majority of new vehicles are running "radar cruise" now.
It's weird. I don't actually want to tailgate at 80 I just don't particularly want my car to make the choice for me. I do occasionally want to bump draft. I don't, but I want to.
My wife's car has lane keeping assist as well as the adaptive cruise and I've played with it because I find the tech interesting but I really don't see the point. It's not like it's hard to drive a steady speed and stay in my lane and if I have to be paying enough attention to take over if the car does something stupid I'd just as soon be driving.
I find cruise more useful in the EV than in our other cars because it has fewer cues as to how fast you're going. It actually is difficult to drive a steady speed. You don't realize how much you use the subtle note of the engine to gauge speed until it's not there. Because of that, I have it engaged just about any time I'm on the interstate, whilst most of my other vehicles don't even have cruise.
I know some people also use the adaptive cruise in traffic with varying speeds - you set it to the maximum speed you want to go and your car just follows its friend in front as things speed up and slow down. It'll bring the car right to a stop. I can see it being restful in rush hour traffic, of which we have none. Basically, it paces off the car in front of you which is what most people are doing in traffic instead of driving off the speedo.
I don't use the autosteer lane centering, because the car follows my eyes and I'm looking down the road anyhow. The lane departure warning can be useful if you're temporarily distracted by something to the side and you drift, it's no different than the lane departure warnings found in just about any other car. In the Telsa, it basically shudders the steering wheel like you're driving over Botts dots so you can feel that you've crossed the lines. On my mom's VW, it has this really interesting behavior where the lane markings almost feel glutinous and the car seems to encounter a bit of resistance to getting too close - it's actually pretty effective.
Other than this one incident in a couple of years, I don't need to monitor what the car is doing and try to react to it. I was digging through the menus last night and found that you can set the car's sensitivity to what I'm going to call "incipient rear end collision detection", where the car decides you're about to slam into the car in front and warns you, then takes action if you don't. Ours is set to the middle and false alarms are rare. You can turn it right off if you want. I also found the settings for cruise where you can have it default to "whatever speed I'm going now" or "current speed limit plus desired offset". Ours is set to the former, like a normal cruise.
In another thread, there was mention of trying to equate ICE performance to EV performance. At the SEMA show this year, one of the classic car conversion companies was trying to come up with an equivalency to communicate this. They developed their own "eHP" rating with an undisclosed conversion factor. It's a tricky thing, your butt dyno does not translate numbers well.
According to the numbers, our "dual motor" 3 has about 346 hp and weighs just under 4100 lbs.
The other day, I was following Janel and her Tesla in our E39 M5. That's 400 hp and almost exactly 100 lbs lighter than the Tesla, so performance should be similar minus the 18% power loss from altitude. At one point, we turned from a two lane road on to another two lane, a typical 90* intersection. I had to go to WOT to keep up with her, even though I'd actually carried a decent amount of speed through the corner. Granted, I was probably in 3rd gear so the car wasn't exactly flirting with the redline - but still. I asked her about it later and she wasn't even at full acceleration, she was just being "zippy". The cars might have the same power/weight but they deliver in very different ways and the effective performance is quite a bit different at double digit speeds.
Also, I think I know why we're seeing rapid tire wear :)
Janel is on her first solo overnight road trip with the weird electric car. It's a sign of her comfort level that she never even considered taking anything else while a year ago she thought about taking the old WJ to a town that's an hour and a half away.
So far, so good. It turns out her company-supplied hotel doesn't have destination chargers but it is right near a mall that has a cluster of Superchargers so there's no need for any sort of planning around charging. She stopped at least one more time than the car required on the way to Denver because of biological needs, so the car got a chance to suck down some bonus electrons while she took care of business.
It may not sound like much, but this is a big step. I'm usually the one coordinating stops and charging because I'm usually the one driving (she likes to be chauffeured), so this is the first time she's been in charge (har har). I told her to just trust the car.
In unrelated news, here's a chart of how the Supercharger network has grown during our ownership. The number of Teslas accessing those Superchargers is growing fast as well. Based on the numbers, I think those are Supercharger clusters and not individual plugs - not all networks report the same metrics. There can easily be a dozen plugs at a single cluster.
I don't know what the discontinuity in the Asia numbers is, I'm just looking at North America as I'm unlikely to be driving to Asia anytime soon :)
While Janel is away, the M5 has the garage all to itself. It's like being able to stretch out over the entire bed :)
In reply to Keith Tanner :
I was listening to Jason Cammisa's show on YT and they were talking about EV's: Shocking EV Impressions — The Carmudgeon Show — Ep. 46. Jason was filming a test with the new M5 Competition, CT5 Blackwing and a Model S Plaid with Randy Probst doing laps at Willow Springs.Randy first lapped with the M5 and broke the sedan record, then the Caddy and broke it again. Mr. Probst then broke it again with the Tesla but before he knew the time Randy said that he could go 6 sec a lap faster if the car would stop better. After looking at the data from all three cars laps they found that the Tesla stopped just about as well as the other two, the difference was it was able to accelerate MUCH faster. Jason was saying that EVs can/have changed the dynamics of performance driving because they can excelerate faster than they can brake unlike an ICE vehical.
EVs are a little weird for braking because they don't use the friction brakes much at all in day to day use, but when you work them hard you work them REALLY hard. The amount of work the brakes have to do increases with the square of speed. This means a performance EV has to have massive heat capacity in the brakes for that eventuality, even if they're completely redundant most of the time.
Maximum deceleration is determined by tire traction (as is maximum acceleration), so it's up to the car to not waste any of that traction. I suspect peak acceleration and peak braking are pretty well matched on something like the Plaid, but since we're used to acceleration being more limited by power we think it's accelerating faster than it can brake.
I understand there are some Plaid brake upgrades coming down the pipeline, fancy carbon stuff. A 1000 hp sedan can put some serious hurt on braking hardware.
I don't generally watch YouTube car videos. So, no :) Looks like the M3P does okay in Time Attack, which is basically Pike's Peak without the death.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
I've driven Mid-Ohio, and he really made the sector from Madness to Thunder Valley go by in a rush!
I have no standard of reference there, so I didn't pick up on that. I really hope I'm allowed to take ours to the track someday to let it off the leash for a lap or two.
Update on Janel's Big Road Trip Adventure:
Overall, no problem. She was close to her scheduled charge at Edwards when she got caught in a road closure due to a truck fire. Nobody was hurt, luckily, so it was just 25 minutes of sitting. She got to the charger with about 16% remaining on the battery, and reports that the car was starting to act a little panicky - I think maybe it wasn't the car. The delay didn't really affect her energy usage because the car doesn't use any real power when it's not moving, but it still had her a little freaked to be stopped when the battery was low.
One thing she did notice was that it was down on power at 16% compared to the usual zippiness level. She said it felt "heavier" because she needed to apply more accelerator to get moving. I know they need a full battery to make peak power, but I've never noticed the powering tapering off when it's near empty. I'm not the everyday driver, though.
She'd been at work at the Denver office until she had to leave around 10:00, and she was on a tight schedule to make an appointment back here in GJ. The 25 minute road closure near Edwards ate up most of her margin. The required charging stop (the car does take them into account when calculating arrival times) gave her a chance to eat and she arrived back in town on time and fed. Sort of an unintended bonus there.
Otherwise, everything went well and she didn't have to pay any real attention to charging. She did notice that a hotel next to the Supercharger she used in Denver had a whole bunch of destination chargers so that's where she's going to stay next time. Innkeepers, take note.
I had to shoot a video for work yesterday on brake fluid, and I kept repeating the need to replace it regularly. On the way home, I realized the Tesla was due for its two-year fluid change.
So add $8.99 for a liter of synthetic DOT 4 to the maintenance cost of the car :) Everything in the wheel wells looked okay, and boy are those front calipers sexy. I want to use them on something. Also, bleed screws are either 7/16" or 11mm, which is convenient.
The actual reservoir is hidden under a cover in the frunk, and has a very long shape to get out from under the cowl. (The weirdest car I have with reference to the fluid reservoir is the Vanagon, where it is underneath the gauge cluster cover and up against the inside of the windshield.) The washer reservoir cap is always exposed. And hey, look, the 12v battery!
Someone left a note for Woody. I decided it was probably worthwhile leaving this tag here. I recently learned that EV high voltage wires are actually a specific shade of orange so they can be easily identifed. Sounds like a good idea.
Also, as we all know, Teslas are fancy cars owned by fancy people. And ours will no longer have to suffer the over-processed, mass produced electricity used by lesser electric vehicles. No, from now on it will sip only free range organic electrons. Gwyneth would approve.
In reply to Keith Tanner :
Is there anything unique to the brake bleeding process on the car?
Nope. Brakes is brakes. I couldn't find any reference to a special procedure but there's nothing unusual about the system other than the fact that the booster is an electromechanical one because engine vacuum is weak :)
I didn't do anything to try to cycle the ABS pump, I could probably do that via the OBD port. Or I could just nail the brakes on the gravel driveway and get it to cycle :) Given the history and use of this car, I wasn't too worried about getting every ml flushed out. With a liter of fluid run through the system, I figure I got a pretty high percentage.
I did make one change to my usual behavior. Instead of leaving the door open so I could pump the brake pedal, I dropped the driver's window and used a broom handle. This was partly because the lift post is in the way but also because the car would get all excited and wake up every time I opened the door, like a dog expecting to go for a walk :)
I also waxed the car today. This may not seem like a big deal, but it's the first time. I did not inherit the love of washing and waxing cars from my dad.
I did some studying on my brother-in-law's S over thanksgiving trying to figure out a way to get him more charge amperage at the family farm. His current setup takes him 3 days to get enough charge to make it back home to Charlotte without stopping to charge. We are going to put a 50 amp receptacle in so he can order the 14-50 adapter for his travel charger. That should get him up to 25-30 mph of charge instead of 2-3 mph.
We also helped him change the wiper blades. I noticed that the cables and fire tag on his car are visible as soon as you pop the hood. Two cables and a big tag on the passenger side at the base of the windshield.
Does the car also have an inertial disconnect in the system? That would seem to be fairly easy to engineer and worthwhile.
Charging on a 15A 110V circuit is very much a desperation move! The 14-50 circuit is great for an overnight stay, it's fast enough for a full charge as you sleep.
Modern cars are full of accelerometers so they can pre-tension their seatbelts and fire off a dozen airbags during a crash. I know there's at least one pyro disconnect on the battery cables that I expect would probably go when the airbags go.
There really should be a red circle with a slash across those pliers on the note, but yeah, Orange = Bad Stuff.
I've yet to encounter a wrecked Tesla in the wild, but crashing a Prius seems to be all the rage these days. With those things, you can accomplish a lot simply by disconnecting the 12v battery.
I think the tag is telling you to cut there to disconnect something, but I'll try to find out. It was wrapped around one wire, not both.
Edit: that is the first responder loop, specifically to disable.
https://www.tesla.com/sites/default/files/downloads/Model_3_Emergency_Response_Sheet_en.pdf
Woody, there might be some good info here for you and your coworkers.
https://www.tesla.com/firstresponders
84FSP
UltraDork
12/4/21 11:00 a.m.
Keith Tanner said:
I had to shoot a video for work yesterday on brake fluid, and I kept repeating the need to replace it regularly. On the way home, I realized the Tesla was due for its two-year fluid change.
So add $8.99 for a liter of synthetic DOT 4 to the maintenance cost of the car :) Everything in the wheel wells looked okay, and boy are those front calipers sexy. I want to use them on something. Also, bleed screws are either 7/16" or 11mm, which is convenient.
The actual reservoir is hidden under a cover in the frunk, and has a very long shape to get out from under the cowl. (The weirdest car I have with reference to the fluid reservoir is the Vanagon, where it is underneath the gauge cluster cover and up against the inside of the windshield.) The washer reservoir cap is always exposed. And hey, look, the 12v battery!
Someone left a note for Woody. I decided it was probably worthwhile leaving this tag here. I recently learned that EV high voltage wires are actually a specific shade of orange so they can be easily identifed. Sounds like a good idea.
Also, as we all know, Teslas are fancy cars owned by fancy people. And ours will no longer have to suffer the over-processed, mass produced electricity used by lesser electric vehicles. No, from now on it will sip only free range organic electrons. Gwyneth would approve.
That is a very healthy solar array sir. Have you looked at righing it up tona 12 battery so it can provide power in case of power loss? As Injnderstand it theybneed a teickle of 12v to operate and thus go down when the power does. A setup like you have could likely power the essentials begating the need for storage batteries or a generac.
I don't currently (har har) have any plans to set it up for emergency power generation. It certainly would be interesting to investigate, to figure what I can do without adding a whole bunch of batteries. I have a lot to learn about that aspect of the tech.
Keith Tanner said:
I think the tag is telling you to cut there to disconnect something, but I'll try to find out. It was wrapped around one wire, not both.
Edit: that is the first responder loop, specifically to disable.
https://www.tesla.com/sites/default/files/downloads/Model_3_Emergency_Response_Sheet_en.pdf
Woody, there might be some good info here for you and your coworkers.
https://www.tesla.com/firstresponders
Thank you.
Toyota was pretty proactive with the training info early on, as well as the bus companies that have full EV buses. But as far as I know, Tesla has never sent any info directly our way, though I'm sure that they have made the effort in some jurisdictions.
That being said, why would they make it difficult on everyone by advising us to make a cut, rather than having a fuse or circuit breaker?
There is at least one automatic circuit breaker in the form of the pyro disconnect. The cuttable wire might be the "make 100% sure because this car just had a very bad day" solution.
