As we are finalizing our configuration before our confirm date, my "engineer's daughter and highly practical" significant other is skeptical about a glass roof and worried about damage from flying road objects. My ICE car windshield recently got smacked good by a flying rock and is beyond repair so will need to be replaced. Has anything like this ever been reported?
I've never heard of that happening, either here or 7 years on the BMW X3 forums for our other car (it, too, has a massive panoramic glass roof). It would have to be a freak trajectory on a road object to arc down onto the roof, and even then it would be a glancing blow given the low incident angle of impact. FWIW, the Model S pano roof is laminated safety glass, same as the front windshield, so it is stronger than typical automotive glass.
Not the same vehicle, but I have a 2009 Ford Flex with a panorama roof and have never had any issue with debris or damage up there.
The windshield is more vertical than the pano roof so objects like rocks or car parts are more likely to damage the windshield. I have a small nick in the paint armour from car parts thrown up by a car going the other direction.
When open yes, I got the front edge of mine chipped while open, right in the middle...can't see it when its closed, but obvious when open...this is one of the disadvantages of the configuration, as opposed to it sliding inside the roof on other cars...