Gone Electric... Xav's Tesla thread

[Xavier]

Rather pricey upgrade really, and to be honest, the 0-60 on mine isn't that far off - it improved recently and wasn't officially documented... I need to do some more logging, but I don't think I'm that far off. Others get around 2.6s...

[Hedge]

I had the pleasure of a demo courtesy of Xav this lunchtime. It is huge, fast and smooth. Full of gadgets and doesn't do a bad job on the not so straights.

 

I took a mate along for the ride as I knew he would appreciate it and he was gobsmacked. I would say I'm a convert but it lacks a little soul for me. I could learn to live with it but would need something with suck, squeeze, bang, blow in the garage for the weekends.

 

Still a hugely impressive car. The acceleration is blistering. 

Edited 30 August, 2016 by Hedge

[Xavier]

Thanks Ian.

I did wonder if there could be some hack where it pumps engine sounds through the speakers, much like the i8.

You could take it quite far and have several different engine noises to choose from. They could even link it fully to the drive system where it would introduce acceleration pauses to mimic gear changes.

But somehow, I doubt that feature is his on Elon's list!

[Xavier]

Thought I might as well post an update, now I'm two months into Tesla ownership (and Richard has now moved on to louder things!)

 

The biggest highlight of my second month was a 10-day holiday, driving through to the South West of France, in the Pyrénées to see my mum. The one-way trip was 847-odd mile door to door and I did that in a single day.

 

Having an EV means that it is worth doing a tiny bit of planning up front to see how you'll manage your charging (where, how long, etc). There is an awesome EVTripPlanner website designed for Teslas that calculates it all for you

 

Here's what I had planned:

 

 

I had booked the Channel Tunnel because it's quick and also provides Tesla Superchargers to top up before boarding the train.

 

I set off before dawn as I had a 6:30 crossing from memory. The car was around half charged, so had enough to reach Dover. Once I arrived and checked in, I parked up at the Supercharger, plugged in and went to have a coffee and croissant waiting to board the train.

 

 

I had booked the single-level carriages to eliminate the need to negotiate the dog leg in the normal carriages. The car is super wide and it can be a bit of a squeeze driving past the staircase passages.

 

 

Once arrived in Calais, I stopped at the nearby Supercharger to top up and give me enough charge to get to Rouen, my next stop. Around 15 minutes was enough, so just popped in for a quick loo break.

 

The drive to Rouen was horrible. Torrential rain at times, high winds and generally pretty poor visibility. The wind didn't bother the drive as the car's weight helps keeping it planted on the road. The rain did have a substantial effect on the range though, eating up far more Wh/mile than normal for the given cruising speed of ~110-130km/h. On a P90D, you'd hope to get around 300 Wh/mile, I was averaging at around 400Wh/mile!

 

Two hours later, I arrived at Rouen, where the weather had started to improve a little bit. Still grey, but at least it wasn't chucking it down anymore. Another plug in for around 35 minutes, during which I caught up on my email and facebook chit chat.

 

A dutch Tesla was also there charging up.

 

I was debating whether to eat here, in the end, I didn't as the hotel wasn't that welcoming - I decided to hang out till I reached Le Mans, my next stop which I knew was at a Shopping centre with quite a few eateries.

 

A few hours later, I arrive at Le Mans, which has a large Supercharger bay as well as a CHAdeMO charger for Leafs and other EVs.

 

 

Ahh, Pizza! A really nice one too. In fact, I decided to take it away, ate half of it and would keep the other half for dinner!

 

The car had charged more than necessary with the time it took me to get my pizza slices and eat one of them. Next stop: Tours.

 

This Supercharging station is located at a rather s w a n k y hotel, a few minutes off the motorway. (spacing as the swear filter would make you think it's a bad hotel when it's the opposite!)

 

A few more Teslas here

 

 

A few hours later, I was at Saintes for a shorter top up to give me enough to get to Bordeaux. The weather had now seriously cleared up and it was an absolute pleasure driving (or rather be driven with Autopilot) along the smooth, quiet French motorways. Listening to various different tunes on the way thanks to the integrated Spotify. With Autopilot, I could relax my legs a bit, and just keep a light grip on the steering and an eye on what's ahead, but without having to massively concentrate on the road. As a result, despite being in the car for over 8 hours by now, I wasn't feeling tired, strained, tense or stressed. Quite the contrary.

 

At Saintes:

 

I'm now at Bordeaux. It's close to the Airport. They're expanding the Superchargers here, adding a few more.

 

The final leg of the trip was quite magical. I took the super-expensive A65 which was deserted. Imagine driving along (at times, 15 minutes passed without me seeing a single car!), with the sun setting off to the side on a billiard-smooth surface. It's like gliding along. Just wonderful with no engine noise, no vibrations, just a little wind noise and a rather loud Michael Jackson!

 

I finally arrive just before 10pm. In total, door to door was around 17 hours. Yet, I wasn't overly tired. The drive would have been quicker in an ICE, but at what cost of physical fatigue?

 

Whilst some people see the "charge every two-three hours on long trips" an inconvenience, it means you also take a break. You time your halts accordingly and it's completely natural.

 

Another amazing thing with the Tesla is the amount of logging you get available through the API. I'm using Teslalog.com which logs just about everything. Imagine a centralised VCDS on the cloud without you having to plug anything in or do anything at all (apart from initially set it up).

 

Here's a summary of that day's drive and charging:

Edited 2 September, 2016 by Xavier

[Xavier]

Time for another update, three and a half months into ownership.

 

I've finally just about adjusted to the size of the thing, feeling more comfortable with its huge width. 6ft6 width restrictions are still uncomfortably tight, but manageable, I haven't kerbed an alloy yet!

 

Not being able to charge at home is still an inconvenience. I'm working around it, it just means popping into the Supercharger at M4 J11 around Reading or the IKEA at M4 J12 and use the CHAdeMO adapter. Over the last few months, Ecotricity who manage "Electric Highway" charging network along the UK's motorways has started charging (money) for charging (electricity). It's caused a massive uproar in the EV community, a lot of people complaining that the new pricing structure - fixed now at £6 for a 30 minute charge is disproportionately expensive compared to cheap rates at home. Whilst I agree with this, it has had the positive effect of removing Mitsubishi Outlanders who would occupy the charging bays often leaving their cars to get the pathetic 20mile charge. I've yet to use one of these motorway chargers and try to avoid if possible. Fortunately, the IKEA chargers also run by Electric Highway remain free (at least for now).

 

Using the CHAdeMO adapter hasn't been without issues though. I've had big issues charging on DBT (manufacturer) chargers used by EH and also abroad when I was in France. Charging would start then after anything from a few seconds to a minute or two, would abort saying there was a CAN bus communication error.

 

 

Thanks to the awesome Tesla community on facebook (similar to Brisky, but for Teslae), we narrowed the problem down to it being an issue with my car more than my adapter. And we then realised other people also with the newer facelift cars had issues. Speaking to Tesla, they took my car in for a couple of weeks to do some extensive testing whilst I was working away in Paris. The issue was narrowed down to bad quality chargers and the workaround has been the design of a new CHAdeMO adapter with additional filtering circuitry to manage the noise generated by the DBT charger which affects CAN communication. I now have this new adapter and the same pump 1301 now seems to charge my car OK

 

One big change over the last week has been the upgrade to v8 of the software. This has brought on a completely redesigned user interface with many visual tweaks and updated Autopilot behaviour. Some people have complained that the Autopilot changes are now rather restrictive and the car will complain a lot quicker if you take your hands off the wheel and doing so repeatedly will disable Autopilot until you can stop and put the car in park to "reset" it. I've not had the problem as I keep my hands on the wheel - most of the time Visual changes are, in my books, for the better. When going round bends with Autopilot, cars tracked ahead are now shown rotated, following the curve of the road. Autopilot now also relies less on the front facing camera and more on radar and can now pick up two vehicles ahead of you, so the car directly in front of you and the car in front of that one, by having the radar bounce on the road under the car's body. It certainly makes for an improved, smoother ride. It feels less "robotic" and more human-like. I've done a few hundred miles so far and it's been great. Just one false alert when it thought there was a car in front and beeped when it wasn't.

 

There's been a lot of bad press regarding Autopilot and so I guess Tesla have had to firm up its usage to protect itself. Just a few days ago, Germany have now banned the usage of the term "autopilot" as it infers a level of automous driving that isn't true. All I'd say is if you RTFM and agree on the beta status of the software, then you're fully aware of what it's currently designed to do and where the limits are. I don't have a problem with this and wish people actually read and researched things before coming out with a load of bull online. This goes as much for press and journalism as it does for personal haters and doubters of the tech... Anyway, rant over

 

I also have a feeling the newer software gives a bit more oomph when really giving it some beans. I can't categorically deny it being placebo, but there's more a sense of urgency with launch control and it seems even more visceral than before. It makes me giggle uncontrollably and makes passengers either giggle too or scream as their internal organs and eyeballs are displaced when they least expect it.

 

As the weather has cooled down, range does appear to be affected a little bit, but it's more noticable on short journeys where the battery doesn't get a chance to fully warm up. On a long run, and once warmed up, I haven't noticed a massive difference, taking into account I'm also using the cabin heating which draws a few kW of power. Being able to turn the car's heating on remotely whilst sat at home sipping a coffee before heading of brings a level of comfort and smugness that can't be ignored! I was already benefitting from it in the summer turning on the AC, but somehow appreciate the heating when its cold even more. It's a shame you can't turn on the heated seats or window defrosting remotely though.

 

I'm still loving the amount of information available through teslalog.com it's really great being able to track all kinds of variables, like having a permanent VCDS log available online. Currently at 8,211.7 miles and counting. Running cost so far, probably around £2 to £3 for when I charged in France. Pretty much nill running cost, massive amount of fun, zero emissions, going into London tomorrow with no congestion charge, free parking / charging in Westminster. Yep, I'm still in love! :love:

 

People local to Reading are welcome to come and meet up for a ride if you want, just let me know. I'm planning on going to the JKM RR day on 29th October so will see some of you there.

Edited 21 October, 2016 by Xavier

[Xavier]

Oh and I joined the 0 miles club the other day. :peek:

 

Dotted yellow line on the right shows power is limited to around 200kW to preserve what's left in the battery

 

Arrived at the Supercharger with not a lot left!

 

Fill me up please!

[KenONeill]

Sounds like they've got the "autopilot" doing the same sort of thing I try to, and looking at what the idiot 2 or 3 cars ahead of me is up to!

[octyal]

.....but I'll mention it when it goes in for its first service.....

 

 

If I worked at a Tesla service desk, I would have a special invoice ready for the first service showing an oil and filter change just for the fun of it.

Seriously though, great car with impressive credentials, just a shame they are so damn pricey!

[Xavier]

If I worked at a Tesla service desk, I would have a special invoice ready for the first service showing an oil and filter change just for the fun of it.

Seriously though, great car with impressive credentials, just a shame they are so damn pricey!

You could try, but strangely, I think you'll find that those items aren't on the list of billable items! There are a few filters they do change, the HEPA air filter, and there are some hydraulics in the car for braking, although that hardly gets used thanks to the awesome regenerative braking - which has also improved / increased with the last update. Over 50kW of regen power going back into the batteries now when slowing down

[mdk1]

Glad your enjoying it still, will ask for a ride down at JKM next week.

[Xavier]

No problem

[Xavier]

Did a quick 0-60 run this afternoon. I reckon it could be a little better with warmer tyres / warmer weather. A hint of loss of traction at the start. Timed at 2.7 seconds, but the GPS was a bit iffy - need to get a better position. As a result, I haven't embedded the telemetry.

Edited 22 October, 2016 by Xavier

[Glynn]

Thats is so wierd to watch! Must be a hoot to drive though. Lovely car!

[Xavier]

A few vids of the reaction at JKM's rolling road day today

 

 

 

NSFW with language!

 

[mushtafa]

Hahaha didn't realise you were recording! The reactions are brilliant. 

[Xavier]

One big piece of news from Tesla: new cars bought after 31st Dec / delivered after 31st March will no longer have free unlimited supercharger use. It's causing a massive debate on the various Tesla fora. Similar to Ecotricity earlier this year, Tesla have now decided to start charging after a free 400kWh consumption.

 

I won't be affected by this, but some wonder whether it's a way to try and bump sales for the last quarter! I suppose I'd miss the free charging as I'd have to pay for it being unable to charge from home at the moment.

 

I did price up a new P100D similar spec to mine but with the obvious bigger battery and full Autopilot (with fully autonomous in the future). It's just shy of £150k That's a massive increase in the space of a few months! So I know I'll keep mine for quite a while.

 

They also dropped the Performance version on all of the cars except the P100D, so whilst you can still get a 90D, you cannot get a P90D which makes my car quite exclusive as it's no longer available...

 

Interesting times!

 

I just hope Trump doesn't kill it all off with his unashamedly pro-fossil-fuel position :(

[sharkrider]

hhhmmmm interesting.

[Wardy]

Had to happen eventually I guess! Hardly a sustainable position, long-term.

[Xavier]

As well as other generic Tesla news (now charging for overstaying at Superchargers which is great news along with AP2), time for an update on my side.

 

I had my first major setback with mine: whilst driving to a friend to go out for a demo drive, a message popped up saying "service required - car might not restart". It then went away, but when I arrived at my friend's house and the car shut down, it was impossible to restart. After a long and very helpful chat with their support on the phone in the car with them running remote diagnostics and reboots, it turned out they couldn't get it going again, so it had to be recovered.

 

Unfortunately, the service centre the car was taken to was massively oversubscribed and they didn't return my phone calls. It became a serious issue a few days later as I had a business trip planned to France so wanted to know if my car would be repaired by then or whether I needed to find alternative travel arrangements. After still failing to get back to me due to internal comms issues, I threw a rant on the Tesla Facebook page. Within 20 minutes, I had an email from the MD of Tesla Europe (!!) apologising for the lack of communication and he'd take it up with the servicing team. He had PDFd the facebook post and would discuss it with the team, making for a rather pleasant meeting next time he was there. The following morning, I get a phone call from the service centre confirming my car wouldn't unfortunately be ready for me to pick up before heading to Paris, but they were in the process or sorting out a loaner Model S and would get back to me confirming its availability.

 

I did ended up with a loaner (older than mine but with 21" performance wheels). I put over 2,500 miles on it in 10 days with the drive to Paris then continuing down to the South West, with a trip to Spain, the coast and Toulouse thrown in before the long drive back to the UK. The loaner performed faultlessly. I really did miss my black alcantara headliner, LED headlights and HEPA filtering. The 21" wheels were harsher but provided more precise steering and boy you could chuck this round corners. It was an absolute hoot to drive!

 

Upon my return to the UK, I had arranged to pick my car up en-route back home. They'd arranged it outside, I had my spare key with me so parked up the loaner, loaded up my car with my stuff and then carried on home, posting the key of the loaner in Tesla's letterbox.

 

The fault with mine ended up being the HVAC unit. Apparently, the compressor had pretty much disintegrated and caused a short from the main 400V DC battery to ground and the car's safety systems isolated the main battery ensuring there was no risk of electric shock (I'm pretty sure a 400V DC would kill you!). So top marks for the safety aspect. My biggest moan was Tesla's lack of communication and not returning my promised phone calls, but they came good with the loaner organised at such short notice.

 

I'm now back on the road with mine, and I still love every second. ANY excuse to go out for a drive. It really is that good.

 

Taking the loaner into account, I'm now at around 14,000 miles in 5 months. Although the car was expensive to buy, I still benefit from the Supercharging network which is continuing to expand and I'll maintain the free use of it. In other words, 14,000 miles and it's cost me pretty much £0 in running costs. I'm probably up to around €10 total for the charging I've done in France where I live, but that's about it.

 

Oh and new software is continuously being developped and deployed to the car. I'll now (at last!) get driver profiles associated to the key (not of that much use to me as SWMBO doesn't get to drive it!). The Tesla destination charger program is great too - I'm getting destination chargers installed at my friend's Cabaret / Restaurant business north of Toulouse in France. Tesla provide the hardware absolutely free of cost (up to 3 chargers). You also end up on Tesla's sat nav giving you an extra free advertising / marketing point. You just pay for the installation and electricity used. It's such an awesome way of developing the charging infrastructure across Europe.

 

I'm still smitten :)

 

Still happy to show the car to anyone interested. Ludicrous launches still never get tedious :D although it's a little trickier with the wet and greasy roads at the moment!

[DavidY]

Apparently, the compressor had pretty much disintegrated and caused a short from the main 400V DC battery to ground and the car's safety systems isolated the main battery ensuring there was no risk of electric shock (I'm pretty sure a 400V DC would kill you!). So top marks for the safety aspect

 

I think it's not so much the voltage as the voltage x current which kills you. And a Tesla battery can surely deliver a lot of current.

Plus, if not isolated, I'd have thought there was a fair risk of starting a fire and burning your Tesla to the ground.

Edited 24 December, 2016 by DavidY

[Xavier]

I know David.

The car can deliver in excess of 1,500 amps of current from the battery. That'll melt pretty much anything!

[Xavier]

Sounds like they've got the "autopilot" doing the same sort of thing I try to, and looking at what the idiot 2 or 3 cars ahead of me is up to!

Indeed!

 

Collision alert / avoidance kicks in well before impact of the car in front.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWDYa9kpqrc&feature=youtu.be

 

:O

Fortunately, everyone was OK.

[Ryeman]

How are the tyres standing up?.

[Xavier]

9 hours ago, Ryeman said:

How are the tyres standing up?.

Well I've done 13.5k miles and still a healthy amount left I'm really impressed with tyre wear considering weight and obvious power.

[Xavier]

A month or so ago, I was toying with the idea of starting up a new business selling mains leads and a rather clever modular approach enabling people to charge their cars whilst abroad with suitably made adaptors for the countries they were visiting.

I eventually launched the site and have taken in a load more orders than I had anticipated. So it's good, although certainly keeping me busy for now.

I did have the fun of unloading a 100kg H07RN-F 5G6 cable drum from the boot of the car on my own. Nice challenge, although I'm feeling the effects now!

https://www.xavelec.co.uk if you're curious