Tesla Model 3 - Help please?

[MrBig]

I expected there to be a number of threads on this subject, but I can't find any except the lead time for orders one?!? If I'm wrong, please point me in the right direction and I will gladly abandon this thread!

Can anyone give me a real world kWh per mile figure for the model 3? My google skills are letting me down. Best guess from USA data I've seen is 0.27 kWh per mile, but the USA is a big place and has some serious variant in weather conditions and other such factors!

Secondly, has anyone managed to get a test drive yet? I just keep being told there are no cars available at the moment.

Anyone who has one able to share their thoughts on it so far?

My Golf GTE is due for a change in about 5-6 months and I'm just doing the maths on going full EV. Currently the Model 3 is the only that sits within budget that I don't hate. (I will be looking closely at the VW ID3 when that launches though)

Im doing 27k private miles a year - fully expensed, so the BIK saving on the Model 3 looks very attractive, even paying for half the electricity myself by charging at home.

Anything else I should consider in my calculations. Obviously range anxiety is a consideration and on that basis the forthcoming Skoda Superb estate PHEV looks ideal, but it would come at a price!

[giorgoxxi]

I managed to get a test drive quite easily, that was in Westfield London.

It was a Performance model. The car was stupidly quick, handled pretty well given it was all-wheel drive. Quality of the interior was fine, not up to German premium standards but not bad. The screen tech is pretty cool.

Looks are subjective, looks good from some angles, from others not so much. I think the S looks good from every angle in contrast.

I tried autopilot but the fact you had to grip the steering wheel quite hard made it a bit pointless I thought (I could just steer myself in that case). Also auto lane changing was lame, failed so many times, in the end I changed lanes myself. I thought it needed an HUD because its easy to not realise how fast you are going given the speedo is to the left offset.

Have to say though the test drive was only 20 mins so hard to draw definitive conclusions.

If you are looking for an EV then you won't be disappointed for sure.

[MrBig]

giorgoxxi said:

I managed to get a test drive quite easily, that was in Westfield London.

It was a Performance model. The car was stupidly quick, handled pretty well given it was all-wheel drive. Quality of the interior was fine, not up to German premium standards but not bad. The screen tech is pretty cool.

Looks are subjective, looks good from some angles, from others not so much. I think the S looks good from every angle in contrast.

I tried autopilot but the fact you had to grip the steering wheel quite hard made it a bit pointless I thought (I could just steer myself in that case). Also auto lane changing was lame, failed so many times, in the end I changed lanes myself. I thought it needed an HUD because its easy to not realise how fast you are going given the speedo is to the left offset.

Have to say though the test drive was only 20 mins so hard to draw definitive conclusions.

If you are looking for an EV then you won't be disappointed for sure.

Apologies, I should have said I want to drive the standard car. Long range and performance are both out of budget. I'm not really fussed about autopilot, I have adaptive cruise on the golf and I barely use that.

I didn't realise the speedo is left offset though! You would think that the hole point of everything being on the central screen is that its easy and cheap to code such changes as putting the speedo on the RHD cars!

[David87]

MrBig said:

Apologies, I should have said I want to drive the standard car. Long range and performance are both out of budget. I'm not really fussed about autopilot, I have adaptive cruise on the golf and I barely use that.

I didn't realise the speedo is left offset though! You would think that the hole point of everything being on the central screen is that its easy and cheap to code such changes as putting the speedo on the RHD cars!

It's in the top right of the screen, but obviously to the left of where you would find it in most other cars.

[Dave Hedgehog]

I test drove a standard range+ bluewater, i enjoyed it so much I bought a performance , hopefully musk will enable RWD drift mode in them

I am avg 300wh / mi in my M3Perf on 20" rims

however I do not hypermile it, running at 80+ i mean 70 on mways and using the power pedal frequently

i reckon 250 should be possible hypermiling and running at 50 on mways, even more achievable in the single engined car on 18"s


sign up for one of the EV power companies so you can charge at 5p / kWh overnight

Edited by Dave Hedgehog on Thursday 10th October 16:11

[MrBig]

Dave Hedgehog said:

I am avg 300wh / mi in my M3Perf on 20" rims

~~~~

sign up for one of the EV power companies so you can charge at 5p / kWh overnight

Great info, thank you.

Can you set the Tesla to charge at certain times and then set the heating for your actual departure time? Following your reply I have just looked at some of those tariffs and they seem to operate 12:30-4:30am for example. On my Golf I couldn't do that and then have it heated up ready to leave at 7:30am.

[anonymous-user]

Dave Hedgehog said:

I test drove a standard range+ bluewater, i enjoyed it so much I bought a performance , hopefully musk will enable RWD drift mode in them

I am avg 300wh / mi in my M3Perf on 20" rims

however I do not hypermile it, running at 80+ i mean 70 on mways and using the power pedal frequently

i reckon 250 should be possible hypermiling and running at 50 on mways, even more achievable in the single engined car on 18"s

sign up for one of the EV power companies so you can charge at 5p / kWh overnight

Edited by anonymous-user on Thursday 10th October 16:11

How was the SR+ compared to the P? I have a P but think it might be too fast!

[Zcd1]

MrBig said:

...Can anyone give me a real world kWh per mile figure for the model 3?... Best guess from USA data I've seen is 0.27 kWh per mile, but the USA is a big place and has some serious variant in weather conditions and other such factors!

I'd expect 200-250 wh/mile in an SR+, based on what I've read. For more info on all things Model 3 than you can shake a stick at, try here: https://teslamotorsclub.com/tmc/forums/model-3.137...

[Dave Hedgehog]

Sambucket said:

How was the SR+ compared to the P? I have a P but think it might be too fast!

the performance is stupid if i am honest but in chill mode the performance seams similar to the SR+, the SR+ felt in real world driving faster than my A45 because of the instant torque (no gearbox kickdown delay or turbo to spool up), it should be plenty fast enough for most people

the youtube vids of SR+ cars with the traction control disabled drifting really highlight the potential the SR+ could have for fun driving

[Dave Hedgehog]

MrBig said:

Great info, thank you.

Can you set the Tesla to charge at certain times and then set the heating for your actual departure time? Following your reply I have just looked at some of those tariffs and they seem to operate 12:30-4:30am for example. On my Golf I couldn't do that and then have it heated up ready to leave at 7:30am.

i believe tesla's can schedule charge, and my rolec box also supports schedule charging

[jjwilde]

Check this chart out, it has information for range and battery usage in various circumstances:

https://i.redd.it/fcd1127n4ut11.jpg

[hixster]

Dave Hedgehog said:

MrBig said:

Great info, thank you.

Can you set the Tesla to charge at certain times and then set the heating for your actual departure time? Following your reply I have just looked at some of those tariffs and they seem to operate 12:30-4:30am for example. On my Golf I couldn't do that and then have it heated up ready to leave at 7:30am.

i believe tesla's can schedule charge, and my rolec box also supports schedule charging

You can set it to charge and pre-heat - it can even open the garage door (if programmed) drive itself out and shut the door for you.
I’m not kidding.

[hixster]

This video is pretty good. Covers nearly all the features add and his total cost of ownership / price per mile etc..
really goes into depth.

https://youtu.be/1TWq00U_Pjs

[wfo123]

MrBig said:

Great info, thank you.

Can you set the Tesla to charge at certain times and then set the heating for your actual departure time? Following your reply I have just looked at some of those tariffs and they seem to operate 12:30-4:30am for example. On my Golf I couldn't do that and then have it heated up ready to leave at 7:30am.

You could try https://www.ohme-ev.com/.

(the app alerted me to 0.3p/kWh tonight on my Octopus Agile tariff. Crazy, crazy cheap)

[NorthDave]

hixster said:

This video is pretty good. Covers nearly all the features add and his total cost of ownership / price per mile etc..
really goes into depth.

https://youtu.be/1TWq00U_Pjs

I've just watched this and after initially thinking I need one I'm put off by the auto pilot! It seems really erratic and nearly crashes them a couple of times! The bing bong noises all the time would also drive me insane and some of the features are.just stupid.
Still too soon for me and I really want one!

[g35x]

NorthDave said:

hixster said:

This video is pretty good. Covers nearly all the features add and his total cost of ownership / price per mile etc..
really goes into depth.

https://youtu.be/1TWq00U_Pjs

I've just watched this and after initially thinking I need one I'm put off by the auto pilot! It seems really erratic and nearly crashes them a couple of times! The bing bong noises all the time would also drive me insane and some of the features are.just stupid.
Still too soon for me and I really want one!

Get one ! I have the performance coming out of an e90 m3 and the acceleration is hilarious. Autopilot is good on the motorway, makes the miles drift away.

As a previous poster mentioned the weather does impact range but you just get into the mentality of charging it most nights so its never really a worry 99% of the time.

Interior isn't top notch but its durable and practical, overall it seems like it will last a lot longer than an ICE car .. seems totally unstressed all the time.

[Dave Hedgehog]

NorthDave said:

I've just watched this and after initially thinking I need one I'm put off by the auto pilot! It seems really erratic and nearly crashes them a couple of times! The bing bong noises all the time would also drive me insane and some of the features are.just stupid.
Still too soon for me and I really want one!

Autopilot works brilliantly on m ways and dual carriageways especially in heavy traffic, it’s being updated all the time, v9 could not deal with one lane opening up into two lanes but v10 deals with this pretty well. Avoid autopilot everywhere else

I am addicted to rainbow road lol

[Heres Johnny]

There is no kw per mike figure because it varies in weather, short or long trips, where you drive, how fast you drive etc etc. The car also uses electricity when sitting there doing nothing. in summer you should be as low as 250w/m and in winter 300 odd, maybe as high as 330. Ie between 3 and 4 miles per kWh. Public charging tends to be much more expensive than home charging so your costs will vary more through how you charge. You also need to knock 20% off the range to get a working figure, Tesla don’t recommend regularly charging above 90% and you’d not want to routinely arrive somewhere with less than 10%, it doesn’t take much for that last 10% to disappear, a diversion, held up behind a problem, missing a turning etc

I don’t understand your 25k private miles fully expensed comment as that seems a contradiction.

[gangzoom]

NorthDave said:

I've just watched this and after initially thinking I need one I'm put off by the auto pilot! It seems really erratic and nearly crashes them a couple of times! The bing bong noises all the time would also drive me insane and some of the features are.just stupid.
Still too soon for me and I really want one!

You can simply not use Autopilot.

[Dave Hedgehog]

on my run in to london this morning i drove 'normally' and with the lights on, radio and wipers on low i avg'd 243 wh / mi

so 200 should be possible for a SR+ hypermiling it