Hi I'm new!

[brutus979]

Hello how are you?
I am totally new to this forum and the reason I join and post is because I am considering purchasing (well...financing) a Model 3. With the MR it becomes a tad bit more affordable and my car's lease is coming to an end in a few months.

I am a huge gear head and have always been a fan of the conventional ICE car companies (Merc and BMW in particular). I currently drive a C43 AMG and really like the noise it makes and driving dynamics. That being said, I know that electricfication is the future and am quite keen to get an electric car soon.

Previously I have always been skeptical to Tesla - I always thought that as soon as a major brand does an affordable EV, Tesla may lose quite a bit of the footing. However, I've read this article and cannot agree with it more - something about how it is not about over/under-estimating Tesla, but more about over-estimating how conventional car makers catch up.

As a huge fan of Merc I was really looking forward to them releasing an affordable (~50k) EV. However I have simply lost my patience. There's only so long I am willing to wait and so much I want to waste on gas (I am from BC so gas prices are insane). At the same time seeing Tesla turning a positive cashflow and profit assured me that they are here to stay, and while I did not like the looks of the M3 at the outset, seeing more of them around and seeing some nice rims on them - the M3 definitely grew on me big time - to the extent that I have arranged a test drive this weekend, and am seriously considering getting it as my next car.

Anyway that gives you a bit of background and explains why I am here - did any one of you came from owning a BMW M/Merc AMG/Audi S car? If so, could you let me know what are the things you like about the Model 3 in terms of quality and driving dynamics?

More generally, what are charging patterns like? I live in a condo building and work at a place where there is no fast chargers - I do not mind going out once or twice a week and have a meal near somewhere with fast charge - will that be enough for a average 50-70km daily use?

Are there any buying tips?

Does the range (I think for the mid range its about 420km) estimate factor into account the energy recouped from braking?

As a newbie any information from you guys would help! Thank you!

B

 

[1.21GW]

Welcome

Find some way to charge at 240V (Level 2), you won't have an easy life if you can only charge at 120V (Level 1). Try to convince your condo to let you install a NEMA 14-50 plug.

Cold weather reduces range by ~30%, plan for that. The range quoted for the car originally does include the regenerated energy, which also gets reduced in cold weather (batteries don't like to charge quickly when they are cold)

 

[TW14 9LF]

I am a prior BMW owner (2008 E60 550i MSport, 6 spd manual). I miss shifting, but my Model 3 LR RWD is a better driving car than the BMW. I can only imagine how much better the performance version of the Model 3 is than my plebian version.

Keith

 

[jelloslug]

You will find the driving dynamic "pleasing" to say the least.

 

[Glamisduner]

I wouldn't buy an EV if I could not charge at home, unless maybe there was a supercharger very close and I didn't mind wasting time there.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Unless you have an ICE car to rely on for road trips, I would avoid the MR. Just not enough range (real day to day range (90%-10%, which is where it's good to generally stay on a daily basis) is just a little over 320 km - Tesla does NOT recommend charging to 100% daily so that takes the nominal ~412km (whatever the "actual" range is) to 370km, to 0%). Road trip range in excellent conditions will be less than 385 km (realistically often less than that due to spacing of SuperChargers), depending on how much time you want to spend topping up at Superchargers.

Aside from road trips: In winter, in the cold, rain, & snow, with your relatively short trips, expect a "daily usable" range of somewhere between 160-240 km (you can push that a little bit of course by going below 10% in winter sometimes). You're going to need to hit a Supercharger on the days when you want to drive more than 240km (sounds like it will be rare, but still...).

Also, do remember the car will lose 5km of range a day doing nothing (Tesla says 1%/day for LR version, I assume it's actually 1.2%/day for the MR), so this is an additional 35km of loss each week that you need to budget for in your proposed occasional charging patterns. There is nothing you can do about this loss.

Basically if you're willing to rent an ICE or have an ICE available for road trips, then the MR is probably fine for your driving patterns, but even with your use patterns, it still really is nice to just be able to plug in at home. So I echo recommendations above to have ready access to L2 charging, either at work or at home. That makes it always ready to go, always full (well...80-90%), no range issues.

Also, do the math on your extra electricity use at home and how that will affect your bills.

I'm focused on range here, because as a practical matter that's what matters most for the vehicle since it takes time to recharge (so it's best to allocate this time overnight or when you're not doing anything with the car). And it's important to realize that in adverse conditions it simply doesn't get anywhere near the rated range (which is completely normal and absolutely fine as long as you realize it before purchasing). This is just because it is so, so efficient. So anything adverse hurts a lot more than you might be accustomed to in an ICE car. (And also heat isn't free anymore.) To be clear, what will make noticeable negative differences vs rated range (in rough order of importance, probably incomplete list) are: Cabin Heat, Excessive Speed, Snow, Tire Choice, Getting AWD instead of LR RWD (not available), Rain, A/C Use, Hilly Terrain, Wind.

Modest use of regen is accounted for in the driving cycle range estimates as far as I know, but it is always best to use no regen & no brakes. Regen is nowhere near 100% efficient (this is why hills are bad even when netting 0 elevation gain).

Check how it will affect your insurance costs too. You'll probably find it's higher than expected though if you're driving a relatively new AMG C43 it might not be much of a jump.

 

[Olds442]

check out plugshare.com and see what other charging options are near you. there's probably more than you think.

 

[brutus979]

Thanks guys!

Yeah we have another ICE car at home so long trips is not an issue. I live close to a mall with supercharge stations - so its easy for me to pop in for 30 min or so 2-3 times a week to get the car charged. The max I would drive, i think is about 100-150km per day - that would be a trip to the cottage and we will definitely have a home charging station there is we go with an EV.

I looked on charge stations websites and it looks like there are a lot of charging stations around.

It looks like charging and range wont be an issue for me - but I don't want to be over confident about that either.

It doesnt really snow where I live (2-3 days max a year) so I probably will only go for the MR RWD to save some money, too.

Btw - how excessive is excessive? I do not always floor the gas pedal but then I don't drive like a grandma either...

 

[duanra]

I live in Quebec and own a MR.
So sure a LR would be nicer, however road tripping in the winter works fine. I've done it with -15c. Each percent of battery will give about 3km, driving at the speed limit and with the heat at 16 degrees.
As for charging, round trip to work is 40km.
I typically use 10 to 12% percent per day in the winter and charging 9 to 12 hours on 120v will give me back 10 to 12%.

 

[brkaus]

Get a test drive! Most people that have driven ours have really liked it. I come from mostly BMW.

I won't repeat the other good advice here about cold or trying hard to get the ability to charge at home. Even if at lower amps.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Btw - how excessive is excessive? I do not always floor the gas pedal but then I don't drive like a grandma either...

Excessive acceleration isn't actually that bad, as long as you don't overshoot your target speed (which is VERY easy to do), and it's not accompanied by excessive deceleration (either from regen or braking - though braking is obviously worse)). It's not the BEST thing to accelerate quickly for efficiency, it just isn't that harmful for efficiency. By excessive speed I meant freeway speed; Wh/mi to overcome aero losses goes up with the square of speed (power required goes up as the cube of speed but it takes less time to cover the distance so energy required is just the square). So it's much better to be at 60 rather than 80 (it's nearly 80% more aero loss at 80). But actually the optimal speed (optimal for overall travel time) has been derived elsewhere to be higher than 60; just requires some calculus (and this equation can be made arbitrarily more complicated to account for Supercharging tapering, etc.).

Road trip math - how fast to drive, how long to charge

 

[Dana1]

Thanks guys!

Yeah we have another ICE car at home so long trips is not an issue. I live close to a mall with supercharge stations - so its easy for me to pop in for 30 min or so 2-3 times a week to get the car charged. The max I would drive, i think is about 100-150km per day - that would be a trip to the cottage and we will definitely have a home charging station there is we go with an EV.

I looked on charge stations websites and it looks like there are a lot of charging stations around.

It looks like charging and range wont be an issue for me - but I don't want to be over confident about that either.

It doesnt really snow where I live (2-3 days max a year) so I probably will only go for the MR RWD to save some money, too.

Btw - how excessive is excessive? I do not always floor the gas pedal but then I don't drive like a grandma either...

Just like in an ICE when you start going over 70 you start depleting range. Car has an energy consumption graph you can pull up on the tablet to monitor your performance. Your commute is so short I’d think you’d be fine with the dinner plan but if you have access to any kind of plug in your garage that’d help out a lot. I came from a BMW X6. Couldn’t be happier with my decision. The updates feel like I get a new car every two months.

 

[jjrandorin]

Hello OP,

I think you would find there are many of us who have come (or still have) some combination of BMW / Audi / Merc / Lexus etc. The price point of the car is in a similar range at least.

The negative:

1. The car interior is at least 2 steps below your average Mercedes, and 1-1.5 steps below your average BMW. "spartan" is a good word for the model 3 interior. I believe the Merc interior is a small step above the BMW one (the one I am most familiar with, as I have just finished my 3rd 3 year lease cycle on 2 leased BMWs in my household, and started a lease on my wifes New 2019 X3 M40i).

There is not a feeling of luxury at all in a tesla model 3. Like I said, "spartan" compared to many other brands, even ones like hyundai which is now putting in nice leather in some of their new upper tier models. You need to prepare yourself for this

2. Getting used to the big tablet (and nothing else) can be jarring for some. If you think of yourself as a "tech forward" or "tech loving" type person, you will adjust faster.

3. Even with the spartan interface, it could use a "few" more buttons or controls for things on the thumbwheel / stalks for things you have to access while driving, like windshield wipers for instance.

4. Small nitpicks on things coming from BMW / Merc, like no heads up display, no adaptive headlights, etc. I am used to all those things and miss them sometimes while in my tesla.

5. It does not achieve its rated range, just like a ICE car does not achieve its rated MPG. Same idea... except people for some reason think that EVs are different and should get every rated mile. Because you have to charge it, more people are hyper sensitve to the range.



The positive:

1. The seats are comfortable, have nice bolstering, and are surprisingly comfortable.

2. The driving experience is FANTASTIC. The steering is really really good, the handling feels great, there is gobs of acceleration, etc. The entire experience of actually driving the car is good enough to be surprising. No turbo lag, nothing like that of course. The car is happy going slow (more than happy), but also happy to go fast and canyon carve. Its good enough to make all of the above negative things I mentioned

3. Did I say it drives good? It drives really really good. Even the "slow" Model 3 is fast off the line.

4. You can have the great driving and performance, and its cheaper to drive (and it doesnt mind going slow on a commute, or going fast).

I am in the same camp as @Glamisduner I would not purchase an EV if I could not charge at home. You dont have to have super fast charging at home, but not having ANY charging at home is a recipie for frustration in my opinion, unless one is ready for the sacrifice of time it will take to go charge. One of the huge advantages of an EV is that you never have to go to a gas station to fill up, unless you are on a road trip. Normally, you plug your car in when you get home, and its full when you normally need to leave.

If you have no home charging, you lose that, and are back to going out to "get fuel"... and going out to get fuel is a lot faster in an ICE. You lose the convenience. You still have the cost reduction etc, but I could not imagine HAVING to go out and get a charge every couple of days... and the car will not get its rated range due to many factors I wont go into. Its just not going to.

If (and I mean IF) you decide a tesla is for you (it drives amazing), then you should budget for the long range one if you dont have charging at home. You want the extra range, especially if you have to charge somewhere else.

Personally, if I lived in a condo with no access to charging, I would stare longingly at a tesla, but not buy one, till I had access to charging daily AT HOME. Work charging is nice, but there is Zero guarentee one will work at the same place during the entire ownership of the car... and sometimes we dont control that.

One normally controls where one lives however, so thats why charging at home is what I recommend, and not planning on charging all the time at work if one has no access to home charging.

Good luck!

 

[brutus979]

Thank you so much again you guys have been so helpful. Quite honestly one of the reasons why I did not consider Teslas for the longest of time was the seemingly arrogant attitude some Tesla drivers demonstrate (for example there are these couple of vanity plates on Teslas that says "NO GAS" OR "GAS LOL" around town - come on now not everyone can afford a Tesla and I hate paying for gas so the rubbing it in your face thing is just a bit much). But having seen your replies and finding how helpful they are I know for sure that's only a minority of the community

I did go for a test drive! I drove the LR AWD and honestly it was impressive (and coming from someone who is into engine noises and handling and all that good stuff it means a lot). The steering feels amazing - tho the lack of engine sound means that sometimes I do not know if I am going fast or slow - that is something to get used to and I dont think I will have a problem with that.

I always found the interior to be completely plain but being inside one it actually felt quite pleasant. No rattling at all (rattling is a huge and very frustrating issue with my C43). I hope they have thigh support at the seats but even without them its comfortable (but doesnt give you the wrap-around-you feel - but that's definitely not a show stopper). I live in Victoria BC where they do not have a showroom - they occasionally bring cars over for test drives - unfortunately I was only given about 15 min with the car. I have scheduled a longer test drive in Vancouver with the MR in February so hopefully I will get a good feel as to how the car I plan to buy actually drives. Does any one of you have a MR? Have you compared it with the LR/AWD ones before?

My commute to and from work is 50km a day so I suppose I will have to charge that somewhere during the week, which is not an issue. I drive by a mall with lots of fast chargers and superchargers everyday and I'll have to get groceries anyway. Is supercharging the car one time per week to 80/90% detrimental to the batteries?

On weekend I commute to the cottage - I'll be able to get a charger there and based on the feedback above I am definitely getting one. Do you recommend the Tesla ones, or the J ones? Will I be able to charge other electric cars in the future with the Tesla wall charger (is there a Tesla-to-J adapter)? What is your recommendation?

One more question - I have been reading some issues with leaking in the Model 3. I am ok with being careful when I open the trunk when it rains, but other leaking issues seems a bit scary (e.g., the water noise inside the trunk lid itself, leaking in the glove box) - do you guys have the same experience/issues with the Model 3?

Thanks again!

 

[TJKR]

Unless you have an ICE car to rely on for road trips, I would avoid the MR

I don't think this is good advice. MR is fine for road trips with good Supercharging coverage. I've been on four, 500+ mile road trips and had no issues super charging. Great thing about MR is its very efficient and you get max charge rate, around 118 KW same as any other Model 3.

Since there's less battery to be charged and better efficiency, you get just as quick of a charge in terms of milage. I'd say that in about 30-40 minutes you probably get about the same miles as Model 3 Dual Motor/Performance. Range wise I know a guy with Model 3 P3D and he gets a just a few more miles of range with his car, he gets about 230, I get about 208 at 80% charge. Also I've heard people with the old Model S 60's going cross country with no issues and that thing only had about 200 miles of range.

 

[duanra]

I agree, unless you have a bad SC coverage for your planned road trips, the MR works just fine, i have one.
However, it is obviousely nicer to have more range if you can afford it.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I don't think this is good advice. MR is fine for road trips with good Supercharging coverage. I've been on four, 500+ mile road trips and had no issues super charging. Great thing about MR is its very efficient and you get max charge rate, around 118 KW same as any other Model 3.

Sure. Close Superchargers means it probably doesn't matter. In a cold, wet, mountainous area like BC though, range will be impacted.

In any case, the OP has an ICE vehicle, so it sounds like it's not an issue for him...

agree, unless you have a bad SC coverage for your planned road trips, the MR works just fine, i have one.
However, it is obviousely nicer to have more range if you can afford it.

I guess I'm calibrated to a P3D+, which I have, which I view as not really useful for road trips due to lack of range, though admittedly the range of the P3D+ is likely less than the MR at 60-70mph. (I will eventually get road trip tires & wheels to give me an extra 30-40 miles of range.)

However, it's more optimal timewise (Road trip math - how fast to drive, how long to charge) to drive faster (80mph at least), and at those speeds, the P3D+ will likely come out a little better (a lot better with proper tires) range, and the stops between superchargers are going to be pretty short. So, sure...if your superchargers are nice and close it's probably fine.

For my road trips I'm thinking about Utah/Nevada/Arizona, and it can be a bit far between locations there. North Rim of the Grand Canyon is particularly difficult - really need to secure charging on location, especially if you're leaving your car sitting for a week.

Also, try driving from Tonopah, NV to Great Basin National Park. Going to be a nail biter regardless of the battery size. I've driven that route (not in a Model 3), and it's a bit remote & hilly. Need to plan carefully unless you plan on a long stop to recharge - and hope you don't have the 20-30mph headwind I had, that comes whistling down in the basins between the ranges... But the LR would give you more flexibility upon arrival at your 14-50 RV outlet - if you happen to find one.

Just saying that for a car you PLAN to take road trips in, it's nice to have a bit of extra range.

 

[StellarRat]

More generally, what are charging patterns like? I live in a condo building and work at a place where there is no fast chargers - I do not mind going out once or twice a week and have a meal near somewhere with fast charge - will that be enough for a average 50-70km daily use?

If you're average drive is 50 - 70 km (35 - 49 miles) you can probably get by with just a 110v charge from a regular wall socket at night. Expect about 4 to 5 miles of range per hour to be restored. With the range reserve in the battery of about 190 miles I think you'll be fine as you can restore your daily drive use with a 10 hour overnight charge. Of course, your driving habits will make a huge difference in how much charge you use. Speed and heater use are the main killers of range. I was EASILY able to use my Leaf for six years with a daily drive of 25 miles with just a 110v charging cable. I could put over 55 miles on it every night since it sat in the garage from about 8 PM to 7:30 AM every night. Of course, with a 220v plug you wouldn't even need to think about charge time in your situation.

 

[voip-ninja]

I don't think this is good advice. MR is fine for road trips with good Supercharging coverage. I've been on four, 500+ mile road trips and had no issues super charging. Great thing about MR is its very efficient and you get max charge rate, around 118 KW same as any other Model 3.

Since there's less battery to be charged and better efficiency, you get just as quick of a charge in terms of milage. I'd say that in about 30-40 minutes you probably get about the same miles as Model 3 Dual Motor/Performance. Range wise I know a guy with Model 3 P3D and he gets a just a few more miles of range with his car, he gets about 230, I get about 208 at 80% charge. Also I've heard people with the old Model S 60's going cross country with no issues and that thing only had about 200 miles of range.

I think you've pushed this angle before in your thread titled something like "MR has the bestest range" or something like that.

You are providing misinformation. The MR has a slower charger onboard for both AC charging and for super-charging. In 30 minutes of charging the larger battery car will always recover more range than the MR car.

For the OP, @brutus979 , I'm going to say that what everyone else is telling you is correct, if there's any way you can do it you want at least 120V 15 amp charging at home. Even inefficient charging @ 4 miles of range per hour on a 120V outlet will recoup your commute every night.

I came from a 340xi and bought the dual motor Model 3. The model 3 is faster and handles better than my BMW by a noticeable margin. Throttle response is instantaneous which is something you don't get in any turbo charged car. The only thing I miss about my BMW are features and amenities that Tesla does not offer.

Since you asked for experience of AMG, S4, BMW M3 I don't know why you'd be looking at the MR. The MR is quite a bit pokier than both the LR and dual motor versions of the 3.

 

[duanra]

Well I do agree, that extra range could be an advantage. Also with the LR you can charge faster on destination chargers which could be nicer too. However quite pokier ?

As english is not my first language I looked it up and it says : dull and slow. Really ? For a difference of a few 10th of second ?