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Efficiency of OEM 19" Pirelli P0 Elect Summers vs OEM Continental All-Seasons

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Zarwin

Zarwin

Member
May 12, 2014
682
997
Hillsborough, NC
#1
I can't seem to find any info specific to the efficiency differences between the two OEM 19" options that come with the refresh Model S. Mine came with the 19" OEM Pirelli P0 Elect Summer tires (not to be confused with the new Pirelli P0 Elect All-Season or Winter) and I'm trying to find out what efficiency (wh/mile) difference to expect if switching to the 19" OEM Continental ProContact RX T1 All-Seasons. Does anyone know or have a general guesstimate? On the Pirelli site they reference the Elect line as having lower rolling resistance in general but being summer tires I thought they would be less efficient than all-seasons. I am far from knowledgeable here and would appreciate any insight from others!
 
Last edited:
#2
Zarwin said:
I can't seem to find any info specific to the efficiency differences between the two OEM 19" options that come with the refresh Model S. Mine came with the 19" OEM Pirelli P0 Elect Summer tires (not to be confused with the new Pirelli P0 Elect All-Season or Winter) and I'm trying to find out what efficiency (wh/mile) difference to expect if switching to the 19" OEM Continental ProContact RX T1 All-Seasons. Does anyone know or have a general guesstimate? On the Pirelli site they reference the Elect line as having lower rolling resistance in general but being summer tires I thought they would be less efficient than all-seasons. I am far from knowledgeable here and would appreciate any insight from others!
Click to expand...
I wondered the same thing.

I ended up with the summer 19” as well and wonder if I’m taking a range hit.

On my past 2 Tesla’s 3 and X I could beat the “reference line” (EPA) on the energy graph by 10% on nice days (no HVAC or very little cooling) not exceeding 65mph. On the S with summer tires I can barely meet the reference line (240 wh/m).

My life time is 252 wh/mi.

I suspect with more efficient tires I’d be doing better. But I really like the tires. Certainly not bad on efficiency and they are quiet.

I always planned on winter tires regardless.

According to Tirerack the summer tire is rated better in every metric except snow and tread life (obviously).
 
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#3
Thanks, I'm going to switch them out for the OEM Continentals in the fall (or sooner) and was wondering if or by how much the efficiency would improve. I know the Continentals didn't get great reviews but I'm not interested in switching back and forth from summer to winter tires and more interested in max efficiency. Mediocre performance all seasons with great efficiency are what I want lol. My lifetime at 6500 miles now is 268 wh/mile and was hoping for an improvement on that.
 
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#4
My '21 came with the 19" Pirellis and switched to the Continentals. Noise went up. My efficiency chart from Teslafi is below. Blue is Pirelli and green/orange is Contis. Higher speeds definitely favor the Pirellis.

Screen Shot 2022-05-19 at 11.31.16 PM.png
 
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#6
Blue Stuff said:
My '21 came with the 19" Pirellis and switched to the Continentals. Noise went up. My efficiency chart from Teslafi is below. Blue is Pirelli and green/orange is Contis. Higher speeds definitely favor the Pirellis.

View attachment 806456
Click to expand...
Were both sets of tires brand new when you put them on?

And did you switch to the Tesla OEM spec Contis?

Tire characteristics definitely change as the tires wear down and break in, and Tesla OEM-spec tires have lower tread depth to artificially increase efficiency (at the cost of tire life).
 
#7
Blue Stuff said:
My '21 came with the 19" Pirellis and switched to the Continentals. Noise went up. My efficiency chart from Teslafi is below. Blue is Pirelli and green/orange is Contis. Higher speeds definitely favor the Pirellis.

View attachment 806456
Click to expand...
Great info! One question is regarding other influencing factors, mainly time of year/temp. Were the Continentals used more in colder weather? Since the P0s are summer tires this would make sense and I thought I'd ask. I was really expecting the Continentals to have slightly higher efficiency but this would suggest slightly worse overall unless another influencing factor was involved.
 
#8
Both sets were new. Car was delivered with the summer Pirellis and I had Tesla mount new OEM Continentals late December. I'm in Pennsylvania so Continentals were exposed to more cold weather but it was mostly a mild winter. Includes data for 1400 miles for the Pirellis and 3000 on the Continentals. Note that I don't have data for the first 800 miles on the Pirellis as I didn't have Teslafi until later.

Here is a chart by temperature:
Screen Shot 2022-05-20 at 4.10.35 PM.png
 
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#9
Blue Stuff said:
Both sets were new. Car was delivered with the summer Pirellis and I had Tesla mount new OEM Continentals late December. I'm in Pennsylvania so Continentals were exposed to more cold weather but it was mostly a mild winter. Includes data for 1400 miles for the Pirellis and 3000 on the Continentals. Note that I don't have data for the first 800 miles on the Pirellis as I didn't have Teslafi until later.

Here is a chart by temperature:
View attachment 806766
Click to expand...
I think you've got some of the first actual documentation comparing the two out there, so thanks for putting these together.
 
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#10
Interesting about the noise. My experience was the exact opposite. My car was delivered with the Pirelli summer tires in January in the northeast. Tesla finally managed to switch them for the Continental AS tires in March. The temperatures were very different because of the time of year. I was averaging around 300 w/mile with the Pirellis and that has dropped to around 250 w/mile with the Continental tires. The noise level was immediately noticable as less with the Continental tires. They also seem to have fine traction in the rain in exit ramps and etc near me. Granted I don't really push it very hard, but I do routinely pass other cars on 2 lane exit ramps. I am enjoying a much quieter ride with the Continentals and for the kind of driving I do I don't really see a handling problem. The cold tire pressure with the Pirellis was 41 psi and I am running the Continentals at 42 psi.
 
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#11
Welp, I just re-activated my TeslaFi account and will collect data for a while on the Pirellis before switching to the Continentals. I will run into the same issue of not having the early data on the Pirellis as they already have 6800 miles on them, but will at least have another data point with a caveat!
 
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#12
Pirelli’s might not run as efficient or as quiet if you are running them in the cold.

Tirerack reviews are consistent with what @Blue Stuff reported. And consistent with what I’m seeing with them being fairly efficient and fairly quiet. As things warmed up the Pirelli’s have got better on both metrics.

However I did get a howl out of them the other day. Pretty hot day and I think the pressure was a tad to high on them.

I don’t buy that Tesla OEM tires have less tread on them.
 
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#14
fetar30310 said:
Here's one example.

For the Model 3, there's Tesla T1 Spec OEM tires on TireRack. Tread Depth: 8/32", under Specs.
Generic Michelin Primacy MXM4s on the Michelin website. Tread Depth: 9.5/32".
Click to expand...
I’m referring to tires shipped with car vs what you buy at Tirerack.

If it’s different spec tire then it could be anything. And for who knows what reason.

I doubt lower tread depth makes much efficiency difference.

I’ve put non Tesla OEM tires on that were much quieter, no foam, longer tread life and more efficient. They so happen to be Pirelli’s. I love Pirelli tires.
 
#19
Blue Stuff said:
Both sets were new. Car was delivered with the summer Pirellis and I had Tesla mount new OEM Continentals late December. I'm in Pennsylvania so Continentals were exposed to more cold weather but it was mostly a mild winter. Includes data for 1400 miles for the Pirellis and 3000 on the Continentals. Note that I don't have data for the first 800 miles on the Pirellis as I didn't have Teslafi until later.

Here is a chart by temperature:
View attachment 806766
Click to expand...
How did you create the two different data sets in TeslaFi?
 
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