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Tesla Model III preorders have started

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Apex said:
Even my little piece-of-junk Fiat drops only 10-15% range in the cold of winter.

30-40% would be horrible.
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IIRC, Tesla engines do give off some heat but nothing compared to what a gas engine does. In any kind of coldish weather (below freezing) you would need to use the built in electric resistive heat (?) in it... which murders the battery of course.
 
we are looking at it. I think it makes more sense in temperate climate zones, out here in western Washington, Oregon, California and across the South without the big deep freezes of the Midwest and Northeast. It would indeed suck juice when facing those polar vortexes. I see it halving the range in extreme conditions, and hammering the battery life.
 
with such a success, no doubt competitors are going to stepping up the effort to get a piece of a pie. That's all great news for consumers. Price is already starting low and will only get lower.

Before long, everyone and their brothers/sisters are going to be in a Tesla. There's little to no point in getting a second Accord/Camry in a 2 car family.

As for me, with 4 cars in the house, I'll have to sit on the sideline for at least 10 years or so.
 
tortillasoup said:
They already admitted they're going to lose money on the Bolt. The Bolt costs more than the Model 3 if you're ignoring tax credits. The Bolt is also not an attractive vehicle and looks like a Chevy Spark. It will not have any autonomous features. If you like your Chevy Volt, I can see why you'd want to own a Chevy Bolt. But with my dad as a Tesla Model S owner, despite all the warranty repairs, we're all fully enamored with the vehicle. The Model S never gave me the impression of a vehicle that half-assed it. Yes it has had lots of warranty repairs (his is a 2012 Model year) but that's because it's a new company and the quality of service and care is completely unmatched compared with other auto companies. When a Tesla fails, you have people who are apologetic and strive to make it right at whatever cost. Elon Musk is fully vested and interested in making a great vehicle while everybody else feels half-assed.

For pretty much every other automaker, it's either complete denial of there being a problem or a half-assed solution and lots of hand wringing over getting it repaired. I prefer Toyotas/Lexus due to their reliability and good engineering but even with them, I experience that issue. I've had to deal with Mercedes and BMW vehicles both late model and older vehicles and the sort of problems I encounter makes me feel like they're amateurs despite the over a century of operation Mercedes has had and nearly a century for BMW. It feels completely inexcusable for those companies while it's completely excusable for Tesla.

When Tesla owners praise and say Tesla has changed what it means to own and drive a vehicle, there is a reason for that. It's really a great experience to own and drive a Tesla.

I'm glad Chevy is coming out with a competitor vehicle as I'm sure Elon Musk is glad as well. But I don't think the vehicle will cannibalize the Tesla sales as much as you think and I'm glad for that because Elon Musk makes a great product.
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I can understand if you're a bit of a Tesla disciple, but c'mon man, you sound apologetic. I think the Bolt is a good competitor, even Chevy says it has it has more than 200 miles of range.
It doesn't look like a Spark, its not a micro-car.
 
From my viewpoint the Chevy Bolt lacks a key ingredient that Tesla has, which is access to a nationwide 100+kw charging network. This allows a Tesla to be primary vehicle for a person, you can drive a Tesla coast to coast. When GM was asked if they would build a fast-charging network, they said no. This will force the Chevy Bolt to be a second car for most people.
 
NutBucket said:
Uh, there's plenty to wear out. Unless you truly care for your car cosmetics is the first thing to go (and the hardest and most expensive to fix). Plus, there's still plenty of electronics to fail, suspension bits wear, etc. Most importantly, the battery will lose capacity.

And let's not forget there's always something better and shinier sitting on a showroom begging you to drive her home.
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This thread is all over the place, but I did want to respond to this post. Whenever I am talking up electric cars, I say that they have much less maintenance, and this is very true. The battery rebuttal is usually the first one I get, and it is not without it's merits. I am not in the auto repair field, but from my personal experience and anecdotal evidence from friends and family members, the batteries (both Ni-MH and Li-ion) are not as unreliable as some people think.

Consider the cost of maintenance items an ICE must endure for a 150K+ mile life such as oil changes, spark plugs, valve adjustment, timing belt/chain, filters, various emissions components. Depending on manufacturer, you could be paying a lot more or a bit less than a new battery on your BEV. With the electric vehicle, you also get the benefit of doing less brake jobs, or none at all if you don't drive aggressively, and have a vehicle capable of great regen.

You raise a good point about electronics, as they are prone to failure just the same as mechanical things. I don't know too much about Chevy's battery electric cars, or Nissan and Mitsubishi as well. I have always admired the Volt, and the scope of the Leaf and MiEV, I think Toyota really laid the groundwork for the counter to the battery argument. That is why I am disheartened they are skipping Li-ion and trying to go fuel cell with the Mirai. Anyhow, even ICE vehicles have a large amount of electronics to make the engines function within emission and power specs. I am not sure if you are implying that ICE cars are still running breaker point distributors and carburetors, but the failure-prone electronics is a check mark in both power sources, IMO. I get it that you are just responding in a realistic fashion to yinan's overly-enthusiastic post, and I am not trying to deride you, just keeping the facts straight.

I am probably in the minority where functionality is more important to how a vehicle looks, so the cosmetic argument is moot.

I am not going to grandstand for Tesla as yinan has embarrassingly done, but I believe the Model S is one of the most properly executed arguments for battery powered electric vehicles on the road today.

Also, I don't like the screen in that Model 3 interior one bit.
 
jpiniero said:
IIRC, Tesla engines do give off some heat but nothing compared to what a gas engine does. In any kind of coldish weather (below freezing) you would need to use the built in electric resistive heat (?) in it... which murders the battery of course.
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The coolant loops run through the AC induction motor, and battery pack, but not the inverter or any HVAC system. The waste heat from those systems is not enough to justify the complexity to transfer it to the cabin, and so it relies on resistive heating alone, which is not efficient, as you noted. Luckily gasoline is so energy dense that you can waste loads of watts of heat through the radiator and still have cabin heating from the same wasteful coolant loop. A/C is a little bit better, as it relies on phase change, which can move as much as 4 watts of heat with 1 watt of energy.
 
nk215 said:
with such a success, no doubt competitors are going to stepping up the effort to get a piece of a pie. That's all great news for consumers. Price is already starting low and will only get lower.

Before long, everyone and their brothers/sisters are going to be in a Tesla. There's little to no point in getting a second Accord/Camry in a 2 car family.

As for me, with 4 cars in the house, I'll have to sit on the sideline for at least 10 years or so.
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I'm curious to see if the Elio ever takes off too...will be interesting to see the mix of "second cars" in the future.
 
What does one have to do with the other? By all accounts VAG makes crap cars but they still sell plenty of them. Loyalty and popularity are not the same as reliability.
 
NutBucket said:
What does one have to do with the other? By all accounts VAG makes crap cars but they still sell plenty of them. Loyalty and popularity are not the same as reliability.
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The quote was in response to the question why do people buy an untested model. To me it means that, despite the reliability concerns, tesla was able to keep people happy. Whether they can do that at the model 3 scale is a huge question mark.

But my question was legitimate, I don't subscribe to consumer reports. Do any manufacturers have models where that high of a percentage would definitely buy their car again?
 
Pantoot said:
The quote was in response to the question why do people buy an untested model. To me it means that, despite the reliability concerns, tesla was able to keep people happy. Whether they can do that at the model 3 scale is a huge question mark.

But my question was legitimate, I don't subscribe to consumer reports. Do any manufacturers have models where that high of a percentage would definitely buy their car again?
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It goes by model. For EV/Hybrid, owner satisfaction on Tesla is 97 while on Prius/Volt is 83/82 respectively. Corvette is 94 for sports car, Golf is 86 for small cars, Audi A3 is 80 for Small Luxury, Chrysler 300 is 80 for large cars, Subaru Legacy is 84 for Midsize cars.
 
bradly1101 said:
I'm amazed that so many people would commit to an untested car (maybe this helps explain the popularity of Trump), especially since its fore-bearer, the Model S, turned out to have such abysmal reliability.
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My guess is that people think they won't get the tax break if they don't preorder. So if you have any interest in the car, it "makes sense" to put the deposit down. Which is probably true. I imagine a lot of people will cancel, but that's to be expected.
 
jlee said:
That's a household number, not an individual number. A $35k car isn't realistic at a $52k income level, nor would a household earning $52k fully benefit from the $7500 tax credit that is going to the early buyers.
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And that's the thing, early buyers were the only ones able to get the tax credit because with all the pre-orders for the Model 3, they already ran out of the $7500 tax credit.
 
bradly1101 said:
I'm amazed that so many people would commit to an untested car (maybe this helps explain the popularity of Trump), especially since its fore-bearer, the Model S, turned out to have such abysmal reliability.

http://www.consumerreports.org/cars/tesla-reliability-doesnt-match-its-high-performance/
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In the last Tesla Qtr call, Musk mentioned that warranty claims on 2015 Model S are 25% the amount of claims made by the 2012 / 2013 Model S in the same time span.

Tesla works in an Agile methodology. On average, they make 20 improvements to the Model S per week. The software improvements can be pushed to all cars overnight.

After one incident with road debris and a battery pack, Tesla designed a titanium shield and retrofit it to every car. Do you think GM would do that?

People are willing to put a reservation on a Model 3 because they understand Tesla the company and know they will be taken care of.

The Model S is the safest car in the world. The Model 3 will have 5 star ratings in every sub category.
 
DAGTA said:
Tesla works in an Agile methodology. On average, they make 20 improvements to the Model S per week.
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That's probably why it takes production takes so long to scale up, QC is not very good, and why for repairs it takes forever to get the right parts and are so expensive, .

The Model S is the safest car in the world. The Model 3 will have 5 star ratings in every sub category.
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That depends on the test:

http://www.euroncap.com/en/ratings-...chnologies=&includeStandardSafetyPackage=true

Getting 5 stars all around for NHTSA is pretty common place.
 
Accord99 said:
That's probably why it takes production takes so long to scale up, QC is not very good, and why for repairs it takes forever to get the right parts and are so expensive, .


That depends on the test:

http://www.euroncap.com/en/ratings-...chnologies=&includeStandardSafetyPackage=true

Getting 5 stars all around for NHTSA is pretty common place.
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The Agile process permits Tesla to improve the car faster than other auto makers.

http://www.businessinsider.com/tesl...t-safety-rating-of-any-car-ever-tested-2013-8

^ Model S achieves best safety rating of any car ever tested.
 
DAGTA said:
The Agile process permits Tesla to improve the car faster than other auto makers.
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It must also make production and after-sales support a nightmare.

^ Model S achieves best safety rating of any car ever tested.
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So they claim for NHTSA, but it gets beaten by a number of cars in Euro NCAP and hasn't been tested by IIHS.
 
bradly1101 said:
I'm amazed that so many people would commit to an untested car (maybe this helps explain the popularity of Trump), especially since its fore-bearer, the Model S, turned out to have such abysmal reliability.

http://www.consumerreports.org/cars/tesla-reliability-doesnt-match-its-high-performance/
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There have definitely been drive unit problems, which have been covered under warranty. From the very article you linked:
But those problems mostly still fall under Tesla’s four-year/50,000-mile bumper-to-bumper warranty (and eight-year/unlimited mileage battery and drivetrain warranty), so they are generally being corrected at no cost to owners
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Lots of talk of this over at Tesla Motor Club, and they even provide a loaner car while the repairs are being done. Not sure why you threw a Trump reference in, but the fact that you consider Consumer Reports a relevant source speaks volumes as to where you land on the fuddy-duddy scale. They pretty much rated it the best performing car they have tested.
 
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