Get Amped Tour: Dallas, Texas 8/18-19

[jerry33]

Ok. Will early Saturday work?

Sure, that works great.

 

[W.Petefish]

I'll see about Saturday. I don't know TM's schedule, but I'd like to either meet early or late on saturday. I was thinking of something like 9:00AM which should be before anyone has a drive scheduled. If it is in the evening, something like 7:00PM. Which would allow all of the drives during the day.

On another note: If anyone wants a Laser Cut Name Tag. PM me with your TMC username, Your name, and anything else you'd want on it.

 

[jerry33]

I should be able to do either.

 

[ctmaverick]

Are we trying to meet up with the TM folks Friday evening near Palomar? If so Mockingbird station is across the street with quite a few choices.

 

[jerry33]

Actually, Friday evening would work too, just not Friday during the day.

 

[W.Petefish]

Friday evening, at the Dallas Makerspace. I will see if anyone from TM would like to be present. I think that we might have Pizza and drinks there. If you'd like anything else, either bring it or tell me so I can see what I can do.

If you'd like a name tag/badge let me know by wednesday next week. I need about a day or two to make them.

 

[W.Petefish]

Here is approximately what the name tags will look like. I have a Red LED in mine. I can get other colors.

 

[gg_got_a_tesla]

Here is approximately what the name tags will look like. I have a Red LED in mine. I can get other colors.
View attachment 8744

Hardcore, William! Can any of us request one for future TMC meetups?!

 

[W.Petefish]

Yeah. I have the template, and it is pretty easy to edit it in inkscape. All you need after that is access to a laser cutter.

 

[7racer]

those look awesome! man bummed gonna miss this!

BTW, did anyone get a response to the invite from Tesla? I didn't and wonder if it got buried in my spam box

 

[heems]

Yes, i got a confirmation email within 10 minutes of making the reservation...

Get Amped Model S Tour
Hi Hooman,

Your Model S test drive is confirmed. Please bring this email with you, and forward to your passengers if you do not plan to arrive as a group. We recommend arriving 30 minutes early to begin the check-in process.

When
Saturday, August 18th at 3PM

Who
Hooman, driver
Cindy

Where
Hotel Palomar Dallas
5300 E. Mockingbird Lane
Dallas, TX 75206


Please enter the Hotel Palomar on E. Mockingbird Lane located right off the TX-75 feeder. When you enter the valet space you will be greeted by Tesla staff, who will escort you to the test drive check-in, located on the second floor in the Maestro Boardroom.

Upon arrival head to the check-in tent to receive your Get Amped event passes.
Entry to the Test Drive Lounge opens 20 minutes prior to your appointment time.
A Tesla Product Specialist will walk you through a brief, but informative pre-drive overview.
Reservation holders will be limited to one test drive during the event.
One driver per test drive.
A Tesla Product Specialist will accompany all drives to answer questions and ensure you optimize your time in Model S.
You may bring up to three guests to ride in the back seat during your drive.
For their safety, children under eight are not allowed on test drives or in the loading and unloading area. An activity space will be available to entertain your kids during your test drive.
Drivers must be 21 and older and show a valid U.S. driver's license.
We can't wait to get you behind the wheel. See you this weekend!

 

[blakegallagher]

Shoot doubt i can make Friday will be driving up after work on Friday from san Antonio. Will try and get off early though my dad is very excited ! Will be his first time to see an ev those laser cut tags look awesome

 

[W.Petefish]

The event at Dallas Makerspace will officially end at 7:30, but I'll still be there probably until 10:00 or so. If you can, stop by. (it doesn't take that long to get to Dallas from San Antonio. (~3-4 hrs.))

 

[W.Petefish]

Just to be clear, the Dallas Makerspace is at:

2995 Ladybird Ln
Dallas, Tx

 

[pete8314]

Do we know what colors are going to be here? I can't find Tesla's usual update on Facebook for this one.

 

[heems]

I think all of Texas is getting the same tour. They are driving the cars from Houston to Austin and now to Dallas. From the fb page:

"Tesla has taken on the Lone Star State! Model S in Blue, Pearl White, Silver, and Brown have been making their way across Texas. After a great start in Houston, The Get Amped Tour continues with test drives in Austin beginning tomorrow and heads to Dallas this weekend!"

Ps: i just drove by 20 minutes earlier and saw no activity outside. Either the cars not here yet, or under ground in the garage...

 

[blakegallagher]

Well sorry I missed the get together ... ended up getting into granbury at 3 am last night lol. Had to work untill 10 pm on friday but oh well. Someone from the Austin event said there were a few NON reservation holders that got a test drive so I am crossing my fingers .... Me and pops will be headed up there today to see that beautiful car one way or the others. If you are going to be doing a test drive today and have room for a passenger pm me or shoot me an email at [email protected] . Hope to see some of yall there ... I will be the one with wide eyes and my mouth open staring at the spaceships around me

 

[jerry33]

I spent over three hours at the tour and it's well worth your time.

Driving:

1. The drive was very short although much longer than the drive at the Leaf dog and pony show. I don't have much new to report there.
2. It would be nice if there were either tone feedback or accelerator pedal feedback when the Model S was energy neutral (no regen and no motor power being used). I tried to see how easy it would be to hold that, but the ride was too short to draw any conclusions. This screams for an app once they get that part working.
3. The outside mirrors didn't seem to adjust very far outwards. Using the head-wobble method I ran out of adjustment before I ran out of wobble. There wasn't enough time during the drive to really tell if they adjusted far enough or not.
4. The car didn't feel big at all. A pleasant surprise.
5. The silver was by far the best looking car at the tour (white, blue, brown, silver) but even so the chrome stuck out like Bozo the Clown at a wedding. (Well, it was really worse than that but this is a family friendly forum.) I'll have to do something to cover it up (not to mention the handles have to be wiped off after every use--they show fingerprints badly. Perhaps Tesla needs to provide a lifetime's supply of white gloves for driver and passengers--that would also solve the problem.
6. The white was the next best looking but the blue and brown just didn't do anything for me--ho hum is the kindest description I can think of. I suspect that the blue and brown will look better at night than they do in the daytime. Too bad there wasn't a grey one, I wanted to see one of those.
7. The ride convinced me that I will definitely not get the leather seats. I wish I could have sat in the cloth seats and I wish the cloth seats were heated.

How now brown car:

1. The brown car was the static car and I spent a lot of time around it. (Most of the three hours, in fact.) I'm sure the Tesla folks were wondering when I was going to leave. Also because of the cool name tag (post #27) W.Petefish created for me, a number of attendees thought I was a Tesla employee so I was asked a lot of questions. Thanks to this forum I was able to answer them but I had to put in a disclaimer that I wasn't a Tesla employee.
2. I noticed that there was a lot of orange peel in the places that wouldn't be visible with the door/hatch/hood closed, such as the rain gutters around the hatch. The body panels that are normally visible were free of orange peel and the paint was very nicely applied.
3. It was cool and overcast most of the time, though the sun did come out at the very end, so no new information on the pano roof. The rear seat had one fist of room (9-10 cm) above my head (I'm 175 cm).
4. The brown car didn't have the owners manual installed so I couldn't look at that.
5. With the steering wheel controls there are a number of chicken-dances required to access both the menus and some of the functions. Someone will need to make a cheat-sheet. Five pages should just about cover it and three or four hours of study and practice should be enough to commit them all to memory. I wouldn't call the steering wheel controls user friendly. I wasn't able to play with the touch screen but it seems far better than the steering wheel controls or other automotive touch screens.
6. Getting out of the rear is an adventure. Be sure there is a cute girl (or guy depending) in the middle position so you can put your head in her (his) lap while exiting--might was well turn a negative into a positive. The front is fine getting in or out, 90% as easy as the Prius.

Obligatory interior comments:

1. With the cup holders exposed my elbow just rested on the edge of the centre console so no real problem. However, the Prius' cup holder arrangement is much better because the cups are beneath your hand rather than behind your elbow. The most charitable guess is that the designer lives in New York or some similar city and neither owns nor drives a car.
2. The glove box was larger than expected.
3. There still needs to be some kind of hidden storage convenient to the driver. Reaching over to the glove box is a long way--especially if the object wanted has shifted to the far right. The manilla envelope I brought (containing the minimum amount of geek charts that might be needed) didn't really fit in the centre space and there wasn't any other place to put it. In real life it would end up under either the passenger's or driver's feet. I doubt anyone would go to the trouble of putting an envelope in the frunk. A pocket in the back of the seat, like every other car has, would fix this.
4. The steering wheel did not seem to go with the rest of the car. It's a hard thing to describe, but it felt foreign to the car (and not because of the MB turn signal placement either, which I flubbed a couple of times even though I knew what to expect). For those who are torn between the S and X, my understanding is that the steering wheel is different in the X. I'd think that would be enough to tip the scale.
5. The lacewood is the best looking of the wood I saw, but it's still wood and makes the Model S look like it was built exclusively for those over 80.
6. There was a parcel shelf. It sits on two molded plastic pieces that are part of the headliner (for lack of a better term). Looked like it should be free rather than $250. Because it wasn't fastened down in any way, this would be a projectile in any accident but perhaps this isn't the final version of the shelf. There is a cover to the real footwell (assumes no third row seating) so there is plenty of covered storage even without the shelf.

Conclusion:

• Engineering: A+
• Driving: A+
• Controls: B (lost a grade and a "+" because of the complexity of the steering wheel controls)
• Quietness: A
• Cargo room: A+
• Ease of entry/exit: C (Those rear doors are really an F)
• Styling: D+ (The chrome plus the basically geriatric styling.* Unfortunately, the Model S really does look just about like every other car made in the past 100 years. Without the chrome it would be a C.)
• Interior: D (No convenient storage, awkward or missing cup holders, lack of rear headroom, no non-glossy non-wood materials unless you're purchasing a performance model.)

* It does look better in person than in pictures (that's the + in the D+). However, the Model S, Jaguar, Fisker, and Oldsmobile pretty much tie for the top geriatric car design award.

 

[chmod a+wrx]

I spent over three hours at the tour and it's well worth your time.

1. The ride convinced me that I will definitely not get the leather seats. I wish I could have sat in the cloth seats and I wish the cloth seats were heated.

Could you elaborate on this a little more (why you prefer the textile seats)?

• Styling: D+ (The chrome plus the basically geriatric styling.* Unfortunately, the Model S really does look just about like every other car made in the past 100 years. Without the chrome it would be a C.)
• Interior: D (No convenient storage, awkward or missing cup holders, lack of rear headroom, no non-glossy non-wood materials unless you're purchasing a performance model.)

Wow...I'm taken by surprise....I guess....that you feel so strongly about the styling and these features...and this is not to say you aren't entitled to your own opinion..... Is this something strong enough to make you reconsider your reservation???!!?

 

[ctmaverick]

Jerry,
Wow that was a harsh review. I am not a reservation holder so my group showed up at 9am and managed to wrangle 2 test drives before the event officially started.(many thanks to the tesla rep that let us jump in a car) I drove the blue car and rode in the white performance car. I gotta say that the rear exit was not a big deal and I respectfully disagree on the styling. Everyone in my group was blown away by the looks of the car!
My only other high end car experience was a 2008 e63 and I would say that the model s was close to this car. Perhaps my expectations were to low for the model s after reading all of the nitpicking on this forum, but I came away completely sold on the car!