The yoke ‘buttons’ have no physical features, nor do they move when touched; haptic feedback is obliterated by road vibration. The input wheels are prone to miss input, or make double inputs by accident. It’s far too easy to trigger a ‘button’ accidentally—often when one is forced to change hand position during a tight turn with the yoke.
Two blocks from home, I must make a left followed immediately by a quick right. To help prevent the s*&^-bags behind me from rear-ending me, I must signal early—but where are the blinker ‘buttons?’ They’re on the left spoke, which is currently nearly upside down in the 4 o’clock position. Now that the yoke has forced my arms to cross, which thumb do I use? Which ‘button’ is ‘right’?! And of course, I can’t feel the damned button, because it does’t feel like anything, nor does it move.
When I get to my house, I must swing across the street and back into my driveway. In my 2015 Model S, I never came to a complete stop—it’s not like there are gears that actually shift (that’s one of a thousand joys of driving a Tesla!) so I simply flicked the stalk as I’m swinging ’round and start backing up. But now the direction control is a long swipe on the screen—I can’t feel it, it takes way longer, I usually must look at it. By the time I’ve come to a complete stop and fiddled with the screen, I wasted an order of magnitude more time. But hey, auto ‘shift’ saved me one stalk click when I ‘shifted’ out of park, half an hour ago. Good trade? I think not. (Now imagine eight-point-turns maneuvering out of a real jam, or trying to plough; or negotiate a crowded job site, on fresh dirt, in a CyberTruck, filthy hands in work gloves, with a yoke, and no ‘shift’ stalk. This is how Tesla will lose market share to Ford.)
In the parking lot at the grocery, I’m carefully coming around the corner of parked cars when someone starts aggressively backing up toward me—I lunge for the horn button, but alas: it’s not in the center (what the hell?! the center is always the center!)—oh no…it’s on the right spoke, currently nearly upside down in the 8 o’clock position. Yes I could cover the whole spoke with my hand to trigger the horn, but how, and with which hand? Because of the damned yoke, my arms are crossed. By the time I find it, it’s too late…
This dangerous ergonomic catastrophe has no justification; it was obviously and arrogantly forced to market by Elon Musk without real world testing nor study because he thought it ‘looked cool’; or perhaps he wanted a video game controller, or perhaps an airplane yoke; but in a real world car, in real world traffic, it’s disaster. This is Tesla’s New Coke. (Tesla’s New Yoke, if you will.) But Elon is extremely unlikely to relent. I predict he’ll foist the stalkless yoke on the entire fleet soon. Our sole hope is that someone in the aftermarket is serious about a full replacement for this travesty. If not, my beloved 2015 will likely be my last Telsa.
Full self driving? Yeah, yeah, cool. I love autopilot too, but there are many occasions and specific situations when one either needs to drive, or simply wants to drive. The stalkless yoke has taken away the simple joy of aimless exploration. “All input is error,” my ass! Doesn’t Elon understand we love the feel of controls?! We love to drive a fine car. This is how Tesla loses market share to Porsche.
Because I love the company, I support the mission, I love my 2015 Model S, I have been fortunate to profit from holding TSLA, and most of all because the 2022 Model S could have been literally perfect, I find this stalkless yoke abortion absolutely heartbreaking. I can no longer recommend the Model S to my friends as I have done so relentlessly and effusively in the past. And if you think I hate the stalkless yoke, you would shudder to hear what my wife thinks of it…holy hell.
