Tesla Model 3 - Finally.

The refreshed Model 3 is now available in the US. Went up on the website today. Delivery this month or next.
What’s your opinion on the Highland? Personally I still prefer the looks of the old Model 3 but from what I’ve heard, the improvements in ride, comfort, sound proofing etc., are substantial.
 
What’s your opinion on the Highland? Personally I still prefer the looks of the old Model 3 but from what I’ve heard, the improvements in ride, comfort, sound proofing etc., are substantial.
I really like the exterior styling changes. That's completely subjective, though.

Good interior upgrades, including vented front seats for cooling, improved noise reduction, and the back seat screen for entertainment and some controls.

Not sure how I feel about the stalk-less design which moves all of those controls to the steering wheel. Wouldn't be a deal breaker.

Yes, but only the Model 3 Performance qualifies for the credit.
No refreshed M3P yet, though. Just the RWD and LR. Only new M3Ps will be from existing inventory for now.
 
What’s your opinion on the Highland? Personally I still prefer the looks of the old Model 3 but from what I’ve heard, the improvements in ride, comfort, sound proofing etc., are substantial.
The vented seats are enough to sell me. That is my only complaint with my current model 3.
 
The vented seats are enough to sell me. That is my only complaint with my current model 3.
Well they say the seats themselves are more comfortable as well. I’ve driven a couple Model 3s and I didn’t have any issues with the old ones. They were much more comfortable than my Gen 1 Model S seats.

The mood lighting looks interesting. Think that’s starting to become a standard thing. Not sure I’d care for the turn buttons over stalks though. Was watching a Brit review one going through some roundabouts and he found it awkward. Fortunately we don’t have as many roundabouts in the states.
 
Fortunately we don’t have as many roundabouts in the states.
I think that is changing though.
Florida DOT tried to install a bunch of them on the coastal highway but locals finally squashed that idea. Too many 70somethings driving 20 on the same roads as 20something driving 70, Even the DOT saw that was a bad idea.

Florida: God's waiting Room.
and
Daytona Beach: Home of Spring Break: No wait necessary.
 
I think that is changing though.
Florida DOT tried to install a bunch of them on the coastal highway but locals finally squashed that idea. Too many 70somethings driving 20 on the same roads as 20something driving 70, Even the DOT saw that was a bad idea.

Florida: God's waiting Room.
and
Daytona Beach: Home of Spring Break: No wait necessary.
Yeah they’ve been doing that up in GA as well. More and more being built up here.
 
Well they say the seats themselves are more comfortable as well. I’ve driven a couple Model 3s and I didn’t have any issues with the old ones.
The seats are ok, my issue is the pleather. Doesn't breathe well. Not something you notice til you go on a long trip. Others must have had the same issue, since they fixed it with the refresh.
Fortunately we don’t have as many roundabouts in the states.
Just got back from Colorado and they are common in the mountain towns along I-70. They work pretty well in that environment.
 
Rotaries are a disaster in the Boston ma area - way too many drivers don’t follow the right-of-way rules
 
Anyone ever driven the big roundabouts in Doha, Qatar? Those things are insane, like a mad max movie. 3 to 5 lanes wide and full of extra large SUVs going 90mph.
 
Anyone ever driven the big roundabouts in Doha, Qatar? Those things are insane, like a mad max movie. 3 to 5 lanes wide and full of extra large SUVs going 90mph.
I hope it's not worse than the Arc De Triomphe roundabout in Paris. Driving that was among the scariest things I have ever done.

 
Yeah they’ve been doing that up in GA as well. More and more being built up here.
E TN around Knoxville as well. Overall, they seem to work pretty well.

Coming up on 2 years with my Model 3LR next month and I’ll do a report on it then.

Not worthy of its own thread, we’ve started questioning whether the CyberTruck is right for us, mainly due to disappointing range, especially when towing, and awkwardness in charging when towing. But I think I mentioned our 2011 Ford Flex, used to tow our travel trailer, was starting to need expensive repairs, mainly needing a new transmission. So last week we traded it in on a 2022 Toyota Tundra SR5 to tow with.

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When our CyberTruck reservation comes up, we’ll have to take a long, hard look at the practicality of such a vehicle. Still somewhat enamored by it, though.
 
Anyone ever driven the big roundabouts in Doha, Qatar? Those things are insane, like a mad max movie. 3 to 5 lanes wide and full of extra large SUVs going 90mph.

I don’t drive on the Arabian peninsula or Bahrain, Insha’Allah. Istanbul made Naples look serene though.
 
Anyone ever driven the big roundabouts in Doha, Qatar? Those things are insane, like a mad max movie. 3 to 5 lanes wide and full of extra large SUVs going 90mph.

I don’t drive on the Arabian peninsula or Bahrain, Insha’Allah. Istanbul made Naples look serene though.
 
E TN around Knoxville as well. Overall, they seem to work pretty well.

Coming up on 2 years with my Model 3LR next month and I’ll do a report on it then.

Not worthy of its own thread, we’ve started questioning whether the CyberTruck is right for us, mainly due to disappointing range, especially when towing, and awkwardness in charging when towing. But I think I mentioned our 2011 Ford Flex, used to tow our travel trailer, was starting to need expensive repairs, mainly needing a new transmission. So last week we traded it in on a 2022 Toyota Tundra SR5 to tow with.

53445553525_c9fac35412_z.jpg


When our CyberTruck reservation comes up, we’ll have to take a long, hard look at the practicality of such a vehicle. Still somewhat enamored by it, though.

I'm curious to hear your feedback on the Tundra. I sat in a 2023 model at an Overlanding show in VA back in October. It didn't feel as 'roomy' as the old body style and from what I saw, the old body style was still a little doggy despite having a lot of displacement under the hood, so curious how the new one behaves. I'm about 3-4 years away from likely handing down my current truck to a kid, and have been keeping my eye on the Tundras as a replacement for myself.
 
Not sure I’d care for the turn buttons over stalks though. Was watching a Brit review one going through some roundabouts and he found it awkward. Fortunately we don’t have as many roundabouts in the states.
I would have to drive it to see how much of an issue that becomes. It think they will work a lot better with the steer-by-wire system in the Cybertruck as the wheel only turn 170° each way from neutral. No need to move your hands from their normal positions.

As to round-a-bouts... The reason why have issues in the US is because US drivers do see them often enough to be comfortable with them. They are a better design, for many intersections, than are four-way, or two-way, stops. They can reduce fatal accidents by over 90%. They're not right for every intersection, however.

Here's a video about them. The guy is a trained traffic engineer. He's a bit silly, at times, but he knows his stuff and presents it in an approachable manner.

 
I hope it's not worse than the Arc De Triomphe roundabout in Paris. Driving that was among the scariest things I have ever done.

Did that years ago. yep - it was a thrill. I made the mistake of getting in the inside lane - and round and round I went. Took much maneuvering to extricate myself.
Another time I noted that they had installed barricades to limit the number of lanes. Not sure if it helped or not.

Dave
 
There is a London area roundabout with 4 feeder roundabouts. Working for a map company, that was the final exam for new geocoders. iI they could map it correctly, they got the job.
 
Anyone ever driven the big roundabouts in Doha, Qatar? Those things are insane, like a mad max movie. 3 to 5 lanes wide and full of extra large SUVs going 90mph.
Never driven in Qatar, but UAE, Oman and Jordan all had some really interesting roundabouts and roads. Vietnam too, but lower speed and almost everyones on motor bikes.
In UAE and Qatar it's pretty incredible how bad they're designed. UAE for instance pretty much didn't exist before the 70s. They have hundreds of billions if not trillions of dollars to spend on infra, and they got the worst people in the world to design roads. Just an absolute cluster. And people driving 1/2" behind your bumper at 80mph while flashing their brights at you b/c they want to go 82mph -- that doesn't do much to help improve driving conditions :oops:. I do wonder how well self driving cars will do in some of those countries!

EDIT: oh yeah, and their street names are 8 miles long because every street is "Sheikh <something or other>". Google Maps navigator taking 3 minutes to pronounce the name of the street. Driving 70 and trying to read this on the fly. Super fun.
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Never driven in Qatar, but UAE, Oman and Jordan all had some really interesting roundabouts and roads.

Yeah, I did a fun one in Amman, Jordan back in the day.

But at least you don't have to watch out for herds of goats tended by dudes with big curved knives and AK-47's, like Yemen. That place is a time machine.
 
Yeah, I did a fun one in Amman, Jordan back in the day.

But at least you didn't have to watch out for herds of goats tended by dudes with big curved knives and AK-47's, like Yemen. That place is a time machine.
I was last in Amman in 2017 and can confirm they still lack AK47s and machetes :)
But those roundabouts... There is no such thing as rules. It's just kind of "if you can somehow perform the maneuver and not hit someone... OK".
And you're going to get honked at anyways, so you just go ahead and do what you need to do :cool:
 
$14,000 (after tax credit). I want a yellow one!

 
....

We’ll go ahead and install it while we watch the Grammy’s.

A hardship, I know. But we’ll wake up tomorrow feeling so much safer with the larger fonts!

what's the hardship? installing the modification or watching the Grammy's?
 
what's the hardship? installing the modification or watching the Grammy's?
After too, too many cringingly bad awards shows, this year’s Grammy’s was quite good.

High points for us so were Tracey Chapman and Luke Combs doing “Fast Car”, and great performances by Miley Cyrus, Annie Lennox and Joni Mitchell and many others. The tribute to artists we lost over the last year was also touching. Not all of the music was to our tastes, but that’s to be expected. But good show overall.
 
2 million Tesla’s recalled. What the hell?

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We’ll go ahead and install it while we watch the Grammy’s.

A hardship, I know. But we’ll wake up tomorrow feeling so much safer with the larger fonts!

First, recall is the legal term. There really is nothing else to call it.

Tesla effed up; and my take is either Tesla ignored NHTSA, or ignored NHTSA so many times NHTSA no longer consults much with Tesla before issuing a recall.
This article has the requisite regulation that Tesla violated, and an interesting comment from an older Tesla owner.

Tim
 
I hope it's not worse than the Arc De Triomphe roundabout in Paris. Driving that was among the scariest things I have ever done.


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Here’s the view going around the arc, in a 7 passenger golf cart, facing backwards! Heck of a ride.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Today marks 3 years since taking delivery of our 2022 Model 3 Long Range from the Knoxville, TN Delivery Center.

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We’re coming up on 71,000 miles - it’s our daily driver and has taken us on maybe a dozen trips to Florida, as far as Key West, and numerous other trips to Indiana (several times), D.C., and one Canadian trip including Toronto and Ottawa.

To date, we’ve never had to wait for a Supercharger, and had only one that was performing sub-par. The vast majority of our charging is at home, using the Mobile Charger and a 240v 30a circuit that provides about 22 miles of range per hour.

There’s some popular opinion that Teslas are poorly made. Ours seems very well built and has only needed one repair: the rear defroster stopped working and it was repaired under warranty. The only maintenance beyond that was tires at 42,000 miles, washer fluid, and a cabin air filter. I also preemptively replaced the 12v battery 6 months ago, pleased that it was only $85 plus a little more for Tesla Mobile Service to come to the house to do the swap.

Battery degradation has been minimal. I can’t quantify it, but I don’t think we’ve lost more than 10%. We typically charge to 80%, giving about 260 miles of range. On the rare occasion we take it to 100% for a trip, it still shows a bit over 300 miles of range.

We’re both still loving the car and have no plans to replace it. The only downside is rather loud road noise on other-than-perfect road surfaces, though I hear newer models are improved in that area. And the depreciation has been brutal, though more power to Tesla for making their cars more affordable over time, and the longer we keep the car the less the depreciation will hurt.

And she still looks good to us!
 

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Today marks 3 years since taking delivery of our 2022 Model 3 Long Range from the Knoxville, TN Delivery Center.

51862539346_d82fa4e1e2_z.jpg


We’re coming up on 71,000 miles - it’s our daily driver and has taken us on maybe a dozen trips to Florida, as far as Key West, and numerous other trips to Indiana (several times), D.C., and one Canadian trip including Toronto and Ottawa.

To date, we’ve never had to wait for a Supercharger, and had only one that was performing sub-par. The vast majority of our charging is at home, using the Mobile Charger and a 240v 30a circuit that provides about 22 miles of range per hour.

There’s some popular opinion that Teslas are poorly made. Ours seems very well built and has only needed one repair: the rear defroster stopped working and it was repaired under warranty. The only maintenance beyond that was tires at 42,000 miles, washer fluid, and a cabin air filter. I also preemptively replaced the 12v battery 6 months ago, pleased that it was only $85 plus a little more for Tesla Mobile Service to come to the house to do the swap.

Battery degradation has been minimal. I can’t quantify it, but I don’t think we’ve lost more than 10%. We typically charge to 80%, giving about 260 miles of range. On the rare occasion we take it to 100% for a trip, it still shows a bit over 300 miles of range.

We’re both still loving the car and have no plans to replace it. The only downside is rather loud road noise on other-than-perfect road surfaces, though I hear newer models are improved in that area. And the depreciation has been brutal, though more power to Tesla for making their cars more affordable over time, and the longer we keep the car the less the depreciation will hurt.

And she still looks good to us!
We have far fewer miles on our 2019 LR, but have similar experiences. I think we're just shy of 40k miles, mostly due to it getting used as a grocery-getter. We're currently renting in NC until our home is built and can only charge on a 15 amp circuit, but even with that limitation we typically start each day with a "full" tank. There's two superchargers nearby that we've used all of one time in the year we've been here when we ran low while running errands.

The Tesla mobile service and supercharging are honestly some of the best selling points. We've used the service for some wiring harness recalls (we had no issues, preemptively done) and replacing the 12v battery for far cheaper than we could've bought one for.

The longer trips we've taken ours on are considerably shorter (Nashville to Destin, FL, central Arkansas twice, and Nashville to Charlotte area twice). If you can find a Buc-ees you're usually ready to leave by the time you can get in, grab some food, and get back to the car. :)

I've gotten a recent itch to get something else, but honestly we still enjoy driving ours. I suspect once ours approaches 10 years old we'll give a long look at something like the Hyundai Ioniq 5 or something else out there just for variety. I'm still not super fond of missing tactile controls and lack of Apple Carplay, and other manufacturers have that and a few other less-important interior niceties that Tesla still lacks.
 
We’re coming up on 71,000 miles
Hah... I'm at 70,742, right behind you!
To date, we’ve never had to wait for a Supercharger, and had only one that was performing sub-par. The vast majority of our charging is at home, using the Mobile Charger and a 240v 30a circuit that provides about 22 miles of range per hour.
I haven't even had a sub-par one. And like you, of course, almost all charging is at home.
There’s some popular opinion that Teslas are poorly made. Ours seems very well built and has only needed one repair: the rear defroster stopped working and it was repaired under warranty. The only maintenance beyond that was tires at 42,000 miles, washer fluid, and a cabin air filter. I also preemptively replaced the 12v battery 6 months ago, pleased that it was only $85 plus a little more for Tesla Mobile Service to come to the house to do the swap.
I've done a single tire when it was only about a month old because I ran over a screw on the highway, rotated the tires once, replaced a full set of tires recently, washer fluid, and two cabin air filters. I've also caused some minor trim/adjustment issues banging stuff into the trunk, trying to overfill the trunk, and had to replace the windshield due to two big stone chips within a week of each other that I had fixed.
Battery degradation has been minimal. I can’t quantify it, but I don’t think we’ve lost more than 10%. We typically charge to 80%, giving about 260 miles of range. On the rare occasion we take it to 100% for a trip, it still shows a bit over 300 miles of range.
I subscribe to a service that uses the Tesla API to give me access to all kinds of data, among which is battery degradation. I'm also somewhere 5-10% last I looked.
We’re both still loving the car and have no plans to replace it. The only downside is rather loud road noise on other-than-perfect road surfaces, though I hear newer models are improved in that area.
Tires matter a lot more on an EV! My newer set is the Goodyear ElectricDrive 2, which were noticeably quieter than the factory tires right away.
And the depreciation has been brutal, though more power to Tesla for making their cars more affordable over time, and the longer we keep the car the less the depreciation will hurt.
Depends when you bought it. I lucked out and got mine *right* before the Covid supply chain price increases started, so I don't think I've done too badly, but in the grand scheme of things I'm gonna have this car for a long time (I'll probably give it to my 8-year-old when/if he learns to drive) so I don't much care.
 
Tires matter a lot more on an EV! My newer set is the Goodyear ElectricDrive 2, which were noticeably quieter than the factory tires right away.

Several years ago I was doing some work in a Michelin warehouse when I noticed a batch of lower profile tires coming down the line that had about 1 - 1.5" of foam - like the packing foam in a camera or gun case - stuck along the tread part of the inside of the tire. I asked what that was all about and they said it was extra noise deadening for electric vehicles.
 
Several years ago I was doing some work in a Michelin warehouse when I noticed a batch of lower profile tires coming down the line that had about 1 - 1.5" of foam - like the packing foam in a camera or gun case - stuck along the tread part of the inside of the tire. I asked what that was all about and they said it was extra noise deadening for electric vehicles.

What I find interesting is that EVs are so quiet, that you notice the road and wind noise so much more. After driving in an EV, then driving pretty much any ICE, the difference in noise levels is just astounding.

Tim
 
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