Mixed but mostly positive 19 month long term Model S review. Much more in the link.
2015 Tesla Model S P85D - Long-Term Road Test Wrap-Up
LONG-TERM ROAD TEST WRAP-UP
2015 Tesla Model S P85D
Witnessing change in 36,000 miles, plus one really long road trip.
From the April 2017 issue
We knew that Tesla was driving massive changes in a century-plus-old industry, but we’d soon be surprised to discover that the Model S was itself capable of change. When we took delivery of the car, Tesla was touting 691 horsepower from a car that would practically drive itself—just as soon as the engineers finished writing the software. Plugging the Model S in behind the office, we could feed the car with our 40-amp circuit, adding 22 miles of predicted range per hour of charging.
Nineteen months later, when our Model S embarked on a 4000-mile sendoff from Ann Arbor to Los Angeles via New York City, the car that completed that journey could steer itself down the highway, its two electric motors were now understood to make a combined 463 horsepower, and the 17-inch touchscreen, twice upgraded by software updates, had learned to plot the necessary high-speed-charging breaks on long-distance routes. Those stops would be dictated by Tesla’s network of proprietary Superchargers, which had grown from 188 U.S. locations to 325 during our time with the car, including a station just three miles from our Ann Arbor office. When we needed a quick jolt of electricity, that Supercharger could refill the battery at a rate roughly 10 times faster than that very first charge at 1585 Eisenhower Place. Our Model S was still red when it completed its 40,000-mile tour of duty, but in many ways, it was as if we were living with a different car.
Our car’s big battery pack made electric living easy. The EPA rates the P85D at 253 miles per charge while our own real-world range test extracted 206 miles during a 75-mph highway cruise. There’s good reason newer EVs are targeting the 200-mile threshold that Tesla cracked.
Any trip that requires one or two Supercharger stops is relatively painless. Anything longer, however, quickly becomes tedious.
December 5, 2016
40,000 miles: Model S finishes its long-term tour
Tesla should be celebrated for building the infrastructure that’s crucial to electric-vehicle adoption. No other automaker has made such a commitment. The difference between a Tesla Model S and a Nissan Leaf is as much about the Supercharger network as it is the larger-capacity battery pack.
Time certainly made our Tesla smarter. A software update in October 2015 enabled Autopilot, which combines adaptive cruise control, a self-steering lane-keeping program, and automated lane changes (activated by triggering the turn signal). Autopilot can cover scores of highway miles without driver involvement, and yet it occasionally yanked—suddenly and alarmingly—at the steering wheel when it lost the scent of lane markers, causing the vehicle to swerve out of its lane.
While the instrument cluster implores the driver to keep their hands on the wheel during Autopilot use, the system’s seeming competence easily lulls you into false confidence and dumb behavior such as texting or, in the case of our drivers, writing notes in the car’s logbook.
We’ve been promised that EVs will reduce operating costs, but Tesla’s service prices don’t reflect its vehicles’ simplicity. The 12,500-mile maintenance stop involves replacing the cabin air filter, the windshield-wiper blades, and the key-fob batteries and performing an inspection. It cost $432. Every second service calls for replacing the brake fluid and the air-conditioning desiccant bag, upping the price to $756. It appears that even in the electric future, the service department remains a profit center.
In the big picture, our Model S proved dependable, with none of the showstopping battery or motor failures that troubled some early cars. Several build-quality issues did remind us, however, that Tesla is the youngest automaker by a large margin. Adding to the irritation, the service center was often slow to schedule minor warranty work. Note the three-month lag between ordering and installing the third driver’s seat in our Service Timeline. That driver’s seat (along with the first replacement) developed enough play in the frame to noisily rub against the center console. Halfway through the test, the sunroof began to leak during rainstorms and required two service visits to correct. The chrome trim on the rear hatch had to be replaced after the original allowed moisture into the tail lamps. The 5010-pound P85D also consumed a control arm and an anti-roll-bar end link, and it wore through its Michelin Pilot Sport PS2s in 15,000 miles. We sacrificed one windshield, one tire, and one wheel to Michigan roads.
The Model S’s novel and distinctive aura is equal parts Silicon Valley ingenuity and startup naiveté. In its quest to redefine the user experience, Tesla forgot several simple features that we take for granted. There are no grab handles above the doors, no sunshade for the glass roof, and no rear wiper. The fixed rear headrests impinge on rearward sightlines, and our seven-passenger Model S had just three cupholders.
While the in-car technology feels so very of-the-moment, less sophisticated cars better withstand the test of time. Our Model S’s 3G modem was outmoded the day it arrived at our office, and the navigation system frequently displayed blank gray tiles while Google Maps loaded. Simpler tasks such as changing radio stations left the impression that the 17-inch touchscreen was aging ungracefully, slowing down the way an old smartphone does. That complaint first appeared in the logbook with just 11,861 miles on the clock, while another driver counted a 10-second lag between tapping the screen and hearing a new station.
With immediately available torque and no need to downshift, the P85D accelerates from 30 to 50 mph in 1.9 seconds. A Bugatti Veyron does it in 1.8.
We averaged 69 MPGe, well below the EPA’s 93 combined MPGe. With electricity at a national average of 13 cents per kWh, running our Tesla cost the same as driving a 38-mpg car with gas at $2.40 per gallon.
Efficiency, though, seems like one of the less compelling arguments for buying a Tesla. The Model S’s appeal lies in the thrill of instant torque, the comfort of seamless acceleration, the tranquility of near-silent idling, and the convenience of at-home refueling. Tesla alone made EVs cool, with its focus on the primal desire for style and performance. We just hope that the company can embrace the kind of continuous improvement we witnessed in the Model S. If Musk can advance its build quality and send a SpaceX rocket to retrieve its pricing from the upper stratosphere, as he intends to with the $35,000 Model 3, Tesla’s transformation from startup to automotive institution will be complete.
WHAT WE DON’T LIKE: “If the first time I drove this car was in its current state, I don’t think I would be very impressed,” associate online editor Joseph Capparella noted in the Tesla’s logbook. Capparella pointed to the squeaky brakes, several rattles, worn-looking leather, and a driver’s seat that rocks on its mounts as evidence that our Model S has lost more luster than most of the vehicles that endure our long-term test regimen. “It just doesn’t feel solidly screwed together,” he wrote.
WHAT WE LIKE: Of all of the fast and slinky cars that pass through our parking lot, the Tesla Model S is the only one that consistently astounds automotive enthusiasts and agnostics in equal measure. We’re big fans of the P85D’s effortless 3.3-second zero-to-60-mph blast—sudden but never violent—but we’re even happier that Tesla seems to be getting average Americans excited about cars again.