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First impressions in wet conditions

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I drove from NC to FL on Saturday 4/7 and it rained the entire way, sometimes some of the hardest rain I’ve driven in. Car drove perfectly at speed, mostly with AP enabled except in the heaviest rain when I was concerned with seeing the lines which weren’t clear anyway. I forgot to reset the trip meter but in my first 1000 miles driving since I got it, I’ve averaged 266 Wh/m and I’ve not tried at all to get good efficiency.
 
I drove from the SF Bay Area to the Medford Oregon area under very rainy conditions. My TM3 performed exceedingly well under hammering rain and the occasional snowy conditions ( over Mt. Ashland and near Mt. Shasta). I never felt remote concern about tracking or steering. Both TACC and AP performed very well. I was impressed with how well AP performed under rainy conditions. AP dropped out only once on its own coming down I5. I was coming up a railroad overpass with a curve to the left. I was in the right lane with a truck ahead and another coming up fast on the right. AP dropped out, but TACC slowed the car as I took over steering. I stopped in Corning for charging in heavy rain and had no problems whatsoever. The rain sensing automatic wipers were spot on, keeping the windshield clean. I was still learning to new climate controls, so had a bit of fogging until I put the controls on automatic. I’ve now had the TM3 for two months and my appreciation for the initial quality and continuing improvements to the car is growing. This looks like a major improvement to the art of making exciting automobiles to this participating observer.
 
Follow up: got in a nice ~400mi road trip from Portland to Seattle and back this weekend (right after my upgrade to 2018.12.1). The trip up was overcast, with a bit of light rain here and there, and the trip home was dusk->dark with heavy rain most of the way. Autopilot did about 95% of the driving- I shut it off for parts of the mess in Tacoma, a couple construction zones, and to really put my foot in it passing a couple clumps of pokey people. EAP generally worked amazingly, even in heavy downpour conditions where I would've struggled to keep the car in the lane myself. Overall efficiency for the trip was 270Wh/mi, with a mix of heavy crap Seattle traffic and rural freeway driving at 72-78mph.

At dusk, in rural areas without overhead lights, the auto-wipers didn't work quite as well with fine mist from other cars/trucks- it did eventually wipe, but not as frequently as I would've liked (especially if AP wasn't doing most of the driving). There were a few times I had to manually request a wipe or just turn on the wipers for awhile, but in general it still worked pretty well, especially with heavier rain.

Anyway, the car performed great on a longer wet trip- still totally loving it!
 
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At dusk, in rural areas without overhead lights, the auto-wipers didn't work quite as well with fine mist from other cars/trucks- it did eventually wipe, but not as frequently as I would've liked
I had the same experience. Auto wipers work perfectly in rain, but post rain, when you're just getting a mist spray off the road from other cars, it doesn't want to wipe very often.
 
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Are you experiencing any range loss due to the weather? I am from Vancouver Canada and our temperature in winter/spring should be somewhat similar.

It's far from scientific since I don't have a daily commute to evaluate against repeatedly in different conditions (I work from home), but it seems that my efficiency on my regular drives is maybe 10-15% lower when it's raining.
 
If you're curious about how a Model 3 drives in a flood, read on. Here in Atlanta today, flash flood inducing storms are flooding the city but I needed to get home. There were a number of the normal 4-6" puddles in low-lying intersections that were no problem. The biggest problem with those kinds of traverses is that most people feel differently than I do about how to get through deep water in a car. Most people seem to think that going as slowly as possible is the best way but I disagree. In an ICE, going slowly has the potentially devastating effect of allowing the water to percolate up into the engine bay, putting LOTS of relatively cold water in contact with really hot things, like an oil pan, which may cause it to crack. Also, the whole exhaust system getting a massive thermal bath undoubtedly warps it badly. And who knows what else. So, what does this mean for an all-electric Tesla? Well, I still feel that the best way is to approach the edge of the mini-lake, line it up, and then power through it quite forcefully. When the tires push into the water most of it goes to the sides, creating a fairly shallow area under the car but it only lasts a second or two. Watch a car ahead of you that goes quickly through one. If nothing else, crawling through deep water that gets up to the door seals is asking for trouble in terms of it leaking in. Door seals are not designed to be submerged. So, punch it and get through. Now, moving to my experience today, there was one section of road about 75 feet long that had, based on watching a pickup truck crawl through it with the water up to his axles, about 18" water in it. There was a line of cars stacked up behind me and a line of cars on the other side sitting immobile. I decided that I could make it so I lined the car up in the middle, waited for a trash can to float out of the way (I'm not kidding) then I went for it. The first part was no problem but I was worried in the middle section when the wave I was pushing came up over the front of the hood. I'm sure I scared the hell out of the people on the other side. But the bow wave subsided after a tense couple of seconds and Nicole (my model 3's name) pushed on through and we came out the other side.
Once I was clear on the other side I checked the battery display on the touchscreen to make sure nothing bizarre was showing there and everything was nominal. Upon getting to higher ground with nothing more than normal rain on the ground I tried the auto steer to check the condition of the sensor package (knowing that the radar and ultrasound transducers are in the front bumper which was plowing through water) and it worked just fine. I got home about 20 miles later with everything seeming normal. Once in the garage I opened the frunk to see if it was flooded and, no, it was perfectly dry.
So, my impression is that Tesla designed and tested the Model 3 to handle such a situation. If you find yourself in a similar situation, try to avoid going through the deep but, if you have to do it, know that some guy in Atlanta did it with no problems. I also still firmly believe that lining it up and punching through the deep water is the best way to do it.
 
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I live in the Houston area. I was caught out in a sudden intense thunderstorm (hardly uncommon in this area) in my m3. water quickly became about 1-2 feet deep. there was no easy way out so I just drove through it. the car drove well and was entirely dry on the inside including the frunk and trunk.

However, when I got home I discovered that the force of the water had ripped off the rear bumper cover. this piece comes forward several feet under the trunk area and acts like a giant scoop or sea anchor if you drive through water up to the bottom of the car. I'm certain that tesla did not test the design in this sort of condition. I have suggested to the that the bumper cover should have some relief holes in it to allow water to pass through and vent pressure. final result - 4 weeks wait for replacement parts and about $2300 body shop repair.