Model S & Model X quick review

[Kaido]

I had the opportunity to play around with some Tesla vehicles this week. I have a lot of friends with EV's & hybrids (Leafs, i3's, Honda Fit EV's, EV conversions, etc.), so I had a pretty good baseline of what to expect going in as far as electric car behavior goes.

Model S:

1. Very pretty car. New nose is great. The pearl red is amazing IRL. It's also probably the first car I have ever liked in white, too.
2. Trunk is enormous. Frunk is...smaller than expected, but nice to have. Also, the front trunk requires a special technique to shut (close then push instead of just slam it shut).
3. 6' tall here, did not care for backseat, would not want to go on anything remote near a long trip in the back.
4. Front was...snug. It's a very wide car, but cozy on the inside. My left leg did okay (I typically bang my left knee in most cars due to long legs), but my right knee kept hitting the corner of the LCD screen's leather wrap edge. Livable but a tad annoying.
5. To be honest, it felt a lot like a Honda EV. Faster, sure, but aside from the frickin' huge touchscreen, it had a similar driving style as the electric fit.
6. The reviewers are right, it is not a luxury car by any means. I had a used but extremely well-maintained 2001 Volvo S80 for awhile & it was an absolute joy to sit in. You could take a nap in that puppy. The Tesla, eh, not so much. The premium seats are decent (nice bolstering), the regular seats were just okay. The steering wheel felt surprisingly cheap; it looked meaty, but didn't have a nice grip. They also took away perforated seats because people were spilling drinks in them, so no A/C ventilated seats. I would really like to see a luxury version of the Model S because at that price, I feel like it should have really ridiculously nice seats, great touchpoints, etc.
7. Better visibility in the Fit as well. I'm test-driving the Chevy Bolt EV in May (238-mile electric range) and I think that will be a really great vehicle because of the bubble design. I think the Bolt will actually be the car to get, short of either an X if you're looking for spaciousness or the P100D if you're looking specifically for peformance.
8. I honestly am not crazy about the touchscreen. From an idea POV, sure, it's great, but I like buttons. The Tivo remote with the peanut shape & unique buttons was my favorite remote of all time, followed by the tiny Roku remote. A giant touchscreen with only steering wheel controls is kinda meh in my book. That's actually one of the things I really hated on the new Honda models - nice large touchscreens with not even a physical volume knob. Yuck. I believe either the latest CR-V or Pilot update added the volume button back in. I'm a button person for sure. Not a dealbreaker, but a strong "nice to have".

Model X:

1. Oh my gosh. Soooooo much better than the S. Fell in love with it right away. This put the Tesla smile on my face for a number of reasons.
2. For starters, the gullwing doors (falcon doors) are awesome. They had bugs on the early ones, but dumped that vendor & have been doing well since. Again, I'm 6' tall, and could stand up straight on the floor of the backseat & fit my head under the opened door. Super awesome.
3. Far more spacious than the S. Not cramped at all. Very open. I have a Jeep Renegade now & one of the reasons I picked it was because I loved the width & roomy feeling
4. I had no idea the X had a panoramic windshield. It's insane. It's like driving an RV or a bus with the big bubble windshield. Incredible visibility. City driving is awesome if you like skyscrapers because you can just see everrrrrrything.
5. Ludicrous mode on the X is equally insane (2.9 on the X vs. the ~2.2 on the S). It's incredible to be in a machine that large & that heavy and still have that kind of power. Also, zero to sixty in under 3 seconds is like a punch in the chest. LOVED it. You're at 60mph before you can even suck in a breath haha. Launch control is awesome too, they pull those tires riiiiiiight to the limit.
6. Tons of room inside. No hump in the middle. Third row folds down for a larger trunk. Middle row slides forward via a button & makes third-row access very easy.
7. Not a fan of the design. I think it's kinda ugly, like a bland BMW X6. It's basically an inflated, marshmallow version of the Model S. The Model S already looks like a nicer clone of the newer Ford Fusion design until you take a minute to really look at it, so they are kind of nice as stealth mode cars, plus you don't draw attention driving fast because there's no noise. I mean, the X isn't awful to look at, but it's not a car I would based on looks alone.
8. Autopilot is fantastic. My wife's Subaru has EyeSight, which is radar cruise - you just babysit the wheel & it stays a safe distance behind the car in front of you. This basically adds automatic lane-stay too (which a few other cars have already, but not to this extent). I was only nervous for maybe 30 seconds until I saw how well it drove. Drove way smoother than I did. Full stop, then going again was awesome. I'd kill to have this in the traffic I sometimes sit in now, just awesome. You do kind of have to jiggle the wheel so it knows you're still there...it would be far better if you didn't have to do that, but you can kind of just space out and it will drive and that's just awesome. Very natural-feeling, especially if you've used TACC before. I wouldn't get a Tesla without this feature, for sure.


Summary:

1. I would buy a Model X in a heartbeat. Downside, $155k as optioned (and that's not even the highest configuration!). Roughly $2.2k a month loan (or lease). That buys an awful lot of house in most locales.
2. Wasn't crazy about the Model S. Too snug for me. And to be honest, as mentioned earlier, I didn't feel a whole lot different from driving a pretty well-polished EV like the Honda Fit electric. Faster, sure, nicer features, sure, but also $60k to $140k vs. a $199/mo lease. I think the Bolt will be a huge hit for people who want an EV just to have an electric car.
3. All cars need Autopilot. What a great feature. They need to perfect it & remove the requirement for you to hold your hand on the steering wheel so you could nap or eat or play on your phone. I drive between 1 to 2 hours daily for work. Would love love love this feature.
4. I'm hoping they offer a 500 or 600 mile battery. The X does nearly 300 as-is & the S does a bit more than that with the new 100D option, and even really getting on it doesn't kill your battery like it does in the 80-mile pack cars, but it'd just be nice for some peace of mind. And also for cost...again, the Bolt goes 238 miles & the base Model S 60 RWD does 218 miles...for $60k. I feel like a really huge battery option would be a very compelling offering at this price range.
5. Would really like to see a luxury option at some point. They need to steal Volvo's seats, especially once the gen2 Autopilot goes completely live. I wanna take a nap in this thing! Haha.
6. I'm glad I got to drive both models; I would not buy a Model S myself now having driven one. Would definitely buy a Model X (optioned with Autopilot & with Ludicrous mode, for sure), which is not a model I had considered because (1) yuck @ the design, and (2) the falcon doors are kind of attention-getters in the parking lot (stands out quite a bit in an otherwise semi-stealth under-the-radar vehicle design). The catch is that the non-Ludicrous X starts at $90.1k & the P100D version starts at $127.1k, a whopping $37,000 more. Also, less range on the more expensive one...289 miles vs. 295 miles. But mostly, the price difference, wow. But Ludicrous is crazy fun haha. Passing people is fun. Making yellow lights before they even kiss red is fun. Punching it when people aren't expecting it is fun. I don't know if stomping it up to 60 in three seconds would ever get old, really.
7. There is something visceral about a real car engine though. I've been seriously eyeballing an Ecoboost mustang, and even in the 4-cylinder with the fake speaker engine noise, having that kind of "tactile" feedback can really add to the driving experience, and that was something both Tesla models were lacking...sure, the silence was fantastic, but especially in a performance car, having that engine grunt is pretty dang cool. I'm sure I could get used to living without it, however

Overall, really neat vehicles. The Autopilot Model X with Ludicrous mode would be my vehicle of choice. The tricky part is convincing my wife that we don't need to get our starter house this year...or for like, the next six years...

 

[desura]

Tesla is valued more than Ford motors right now which is a little extreme.

Yeah, I have a fear that with electric cars they go too far in trying to maximize mileage at the expense of real utility, first and foremost are LRR tires.

 

[Kaido]

Tesla is valued more than Ford motors right now which is a little extreme.

Yeah, I have a fear that with electric cars they go too far in trying to maximize mileage at the expense of real utility, first and foremost are LRR tires.

I hope that isn't the trend. The nice thing about the Teslas are that they are virtually no-compromise cars, aside from the charging time (and unless you drive in excess of 200-300 miles per day, that isn't a super big deal). I'm very curious to test-drive the new Bolt in a few months & see how it compares to the other EV's I've been able to get my hands on. Oh, and here's a fun little article on EV tires:

https://www.wired.com/2016/05/hidden-battle-make-perfect-tires-electric-car-divas/

Forgot to mention the tires & ride on the Teslas. So, it's a performance car, but being large & heavy (but fast), that helps to smooth out some of the ride bumps, but it definitely isn't a Cadillac by any means. You definitely feel the road, so if you're looking for plush, get a Volvo. The ride-height adjustment feature is really cool, it has quite a bit of lift if you need it. As far as the tires & a spare goes, they recommend having a professional do it...they don't give you a spare tire & I believe they skip out on the jack for a variety of reasons (heavy car, tightly-torqued lugnuts due to the weight of the car, difficult mounting points to jack it up, and run-flat tires apparently were crap on this car, so they recommend just calling in when you get a flat, supposedly they can often get a guy out with a who spare tire & wheel for you). I hate that cars don't come with spares anymore & always make sure to buy a donut & jack kit for every car I have because waiting on a tow or AAA or a Tesla Ranger or whoever isn't too appealing to me.

Overall, the Teslas just make everything easy. It's almost like going from a Pentium 4 with a hard drive to a quad i7 with an SSD...sure, they're both computers, but one is so much smoother & nicer to use than the other. tbh, getting to play with both the X & the S has kind of ruined all other cars for me, haha. Although I do think that gasoline cars, especially muscle cars, give you that visceral noise & vibration experience that you just don't get with EV's, which is still really appealing despite being able to go zero to sixty in under three seconds on battery power.

 

[desura]

Hmm, that's kinda lousy about the tire situation. I had a flat the other day in my hybrid and it sucked. The prius at least still has a Spare tire...

and it isn't exactly green to require someone drive out a spare tire to you in case of emergency. Also, the aluminum body makes repairs crazy expensive and requires such high energy in construction.

Like, all I want is just a normal car with normal construction and normal utility but with an electric drivetrain and battery. And I can live with lower range and slower acceleration for that. All those little gimmicks don't even add that much mileage, maybe 10-15%.

 

[Kaido]

Hmm, that's kinda lousy about the tire situation. I had a flat the other day in my hybrid and it sucked. The prius at least still has a Spare tire...

and it isn't exactly green to require someone drive out a spare tire to you in case of emergency. Also, the aluminum body makes repairs crazy expensive and requires such high energy in construction.

Like, all I want is just a normal car with normal construction and normal utility but with an electric drivetrain and battery. And I can live with lower range and slower acceleration for that. All those little gimmicks don't even add that much mileage, maybe 10-15%.

Yup. That's why I'm thinking the Chevy Bolt will be a huge hit (provided they market it right). Then again, the Kia Niro is making waves with near-Prius mileage in a really unique design for the hybrid space. So there's a lot of stuff coming out that will start to change the playing field, which I think is great.

Although I think where the Model 3 will really take off is the self-driving feature. Sure, it's cool-looking, and sure, it's a fast electric car, but the Bolt will be available long before the Model 3 is widely available for non-downpayment holders...but the Bolt doesn't have self-driving. That's huge. That's a feature I'd love to have today, right now, for my everyday commute.

 

[bigi]

Thanks for your views.

Batteries are still the majority of the cost of a Tesla. Once Gigafactory(ies) are up and running, the economy of scale will work out so this will be much cheaper.

I expect model X like car to be in 40-60K range in 5-8 years (?) but this is very hard to predict exactly.

The model 3 will be a big player for Tesla. I am glad that Hyundai IONIQ, Chevy Bolt, Nissan Leaf and BMW i3 are fully developed EV models that compete now.

This all price talk will look very different in few years.

 

[Kaido]

Thanks for your views.

Batteries are still the majority of the cost of a Tesla. Once Gigafactory(ies) are up and running, the economy of scale will work out so this will be much cheaper.

I expect model X like car to be in 40-60K range in 5-8 years (?) but this is very hard to predict exactly.

The model 3 will be a big player for Tesla. I am glad that Hyundai IONIQ, Chevy Bolt, Nissan Leaf and BMW i3 are fully developed EV models that compete now.

This all price talk will look very different in few years.

Yeah. Personally, I want a 500 to 600 mile battery. I mean, my buddy has put 70k miles on his Fit EV, which only goes 80 miles on a charge, so it's doable, especially with the new 238-mile Bolt, but for the amount of driving I'm currently doing, I'd like a larger buffer, so I hope they can figure something out. I believe Musk said they do have a 500-mile battery built on a prototype, but the battery itself costs more than the entire car, so hopefully we'll see it come out (and come out as affordable) as the Gigafactory ramps up production & prices drop with the mass production of the Model 3.

I do like where the competition is driving things. I am impressed that GM not only released the Bolt, but released it with such an amazing range for the price. Kinda stinks to buy a base Model S with less range for twice the price! Also as mentioned above, for the price of a Tesla, you kind of expect a luxury feel to it & it definitely doesn't have it. It's pretty sparse in there. The premium seats are decently comfortable, but on little things it was either barebones or a little cheap, like the stitching on the windguard on the S's sunroof was already unraveling on the car I drove & the steering wheel material felt really super cheap, like that crappy paper-like leather on uber-cheap furniture. I'd really like to see them go as nuts with ergonomics, comfort, and a premium look & feel as they did with the technology parts of the car.

It was a fun experience though. Now back to my regularly scheduled Kia threads

 

[desura]

I would actually watch NASCAR if electric cars were in there.

 

[K1052]

Yeah. Personally, I want a 500 to 600 mile battery. I mean, my buddy has put 70k miles on his Fit EV, which only goes 80 miles on a charge, so it's doable, especially with the new 238-mile Bolt, but for the amount of driving I'm currently doing, I'd like a larger buffer, so I hope they can figure something out. I believe Musk said they do have a 500-mile battery built on a prototype, but the battery itself costs more than the entire car, so hopefully we'll see it come out (and come out as affordable) as the Gigafactory ramps up production & prices drop with the mass production of the Model 3.

Virtually nobody needs an EV with 500-600 miles of range (especially Tesla owners with access to the supercharging network) and I think it will be quite a few years before that's even a option.