Model 3 Canada

[Birdman325]

There has been a fair bit of speculation about potential delivery dates for people who made their reservation “a while ago”.

Anyone around who has only recently paid the deposit and reserved a M3 and getting any sense of timing? Web site says 12-18 months but with all the backlog I would have thought even that is optimistic for new reservations. ?

 

[Hawesome]

I reserved mine in June - end of 2018 is my estimator, but...

 

[Nikkin]

Reserved in August 2017... still seeing Late 2018 as the "estimate". Pretty convinced its just a boilerplate line they put on all Canadian drivers since that's when "Left Hand Drive International Markets" were supposed to start getting their deliveries originally.

Seems like there's already some work being done with getting the car approved by our Transportation ministry as there's sightings of different cars on the West coast and Montreal/Ottawa region, so from a regulatory perspective there might not be too many issues there.

The way I see it, if Tesla is able to ramp up and blow through its USA orders next year, Canada is an easy market to extend their deliveries to (geography and a cooperative government play a big role in this). Canadians looking for 2018 deliveries may be limited to first production trims though, which may be a non-starter for many since it doesn't include AWD.

In any case, I look forward to another 12 months of obsessing needlessly over this saga. There should be many reviews and ratings popping up online in the coming months with all the deliveries occurring to non-NDA customers-- so that should keep up busy at least.

 

[Neo_fd3s]

Having patience is the hard part. Canada won't be receiving any orders till at least 3rd or last quarter of 2018.
I know I'm one of the few just waiting of the configurator to go live for the general public.

 

[wayner]

Seems like there's already some work being done with getting the car approved by our Transportation ministry as there's sightings of different cars on the West coast and Montreal/Ottawa region, so from a regulatory perspective there might not be too many issues there.

You might be over-analyzing the situation. IMHO, a Model 3 at the Squamish SC in late November indicates that a Tesla employee with an early Model 3 was going skiing or snowboarding at Whistler over the US Thanksgiving Holiday break rather than Tesla doing testing with Transport Canada. A US car driven into Canada is somewhat different than a car being legal to sell in Canada.

 

[5JMJ]

It appears Canadian deliveries will coincide with launch of awd, thoughts on if that will also mean heated steering wheel option is coming. I know its a different wheel than in the current model s/x but I think its a useful feature, and most of its competitors and even cheaper evs like the leaf have it available

 

[doubeld]

They are stupid to not include a heated steering wheel. The whole "Just preheat your car" argument is ridiculous. It only heats the air in the cabin, and maybe your seat a little bit if the preconditioning even allows for the seat heaters to operate.
The steering wheel in my car (and I'm sure any other non-heated car) takes a good 1/2 hour to get up to cabin temperature if the car has been cold-soaked in -10 or colder temperatures. That sucks, even when using leather gloves (Which you'll then have to remove to operate the damn controls on the LCD screen).

Yes, I'm a little frustrated/antsy about buying a car made by a bunch of surfer dudes in California to be used in an actual winter environment.

 

[Tony_YYZ]

You might be over-analyzing the situation. IMHO, a Model 3 at the Squamish SC in late November indicates that a Tesla employee with an early Model 3 was going skiing or snowboarding at Whistler over the US Thanksgiving Holiday break rather than Tesla doing testing with Transport Canada. A US car driven into Canada is somewhat different than a car being legal to sell in Canada.

The Model 3s spotted in BC and QC had California Manufacturer plates on them. So they are not employee cars.

 

[Hawesome]

Having patience is the hard part. Canada won't be receiving any orders till at least 3rd or last quarter of 2018.
I know I'm one of the few just waiting of the configurator to go live for the general public.

I would say you are one of many...

 

[Hawesome]

They are stupid to not include a heated steering wheel. The whole "Just preheat your car" argument is ridiculous. It only heats the air in the cabin, and maybe your seat a little bit if the preconditioning even allows for the seat heaters to operate.
The steering wheel in my car (and I'm sure any other non-heated car) takes a good 1/2 hour to get up to cabin temperature if the car has been cold-soaked in -10 or colder temperatures. That sucks, even when using leather gloves (Which you'll then have to remove to operate the damn controls on the LCD screen).

Yes, I'm a little frustrated/antsy about buying a car made by a bunch of surfer dudes in California to be used in an actual winter environment.

I'm not sure how any of the controls work from the phone, but it would be damn nice if you could control the heated wheel and seats from your phone so you can get into your perfectly customed vehicle in the dead of winter.

 

[Hawesome]

It appears Canadian deliveries will coincide with launch of awd, thoughts on if that will also mean heated steering wheel option is coming. I know its a different wheel than in the current model s/x but I think its a useful feature, and most of its competitors and even cheaper evs like the leaf have it available

the timing would be perfect if this is true, as I only want the M3 with dual motor AWD for our environment anyway. I have never owned anything but AWD and I'm certainly not going to change that living in Barrie...lol

 

[wayner]

I'm not sure how any of the controls work from the phone, but it would be damn nice if you could control the heated wheel and seats from your phone so you can get into your perfectly customed vehicle in the dead of winter.

Agreed - and also the rear defroster. It would be great to keep the snow from ever building up.

 

[wayner]

They are stupid to not include a heated steering wheel. The whole "Just preheat your car" argument is ridiculous. It only heats the air in the cabin, and maybe your seat a little bit if the preconditioning even allows for the seat heaters to operate.
The steering wheel in my car (and I'm sure any other non-heated car) takes a good 1/2 hour to get up to cabin temperature if the car has been cold-soaked in -10 or colder temperatures. That sucks, even when using leather gloves (Which you'll then have to remove to operate the damn controls on the LCD screen).

There are a bunch of things in my Model S that aren't well suited to Canadian weather but the steering wheel heater gets hot very quickly - like 2-3 minutes and many folks complain about it being too hot.

 

[wayner]

The Model 3s spotted in BC and QC had California Manufacturer plates on them. So they are not employee cars.

I don't know that you can say that for sure. Maybe they are company owned cars, especially since the one in BC was a very early model, but I find it hard to believe that they are on official company business in Squamish BC during US Thanksgiving.

 

[Birdman325]

I assume the answer is "yes", but can the deposit made for the M3 be transferred / applied to the purchase of a MX (if one changes their mind)?

 

[Doug_G]

Tesla started shipping Model S to the Canadian market long before thet “blew out

They are stupid to not include a heated steering wheel. The whole "Just preheat your car" argument is ridiculous. It only heats the air in the cabin, and maybe your seat a little bit if the preconditioning even allows for the seat heaters to operate.
The steering wheel in my car (and I'm sure any other non-heated car) takes a good 1/2 hour to get up to cabin temperature if the car has been cold-soaked in -10 or colder temperatures. That sucks, even when using leather gloves (Which you'll then have to remove to operate the damn controls on the LCD screen).

Yes, I'm a little frustrated/antsy about buying a car made by a bunch of surfer dudes in California to be used in an actual winter environment.

My previous Model S didn't have a heated steering wheel. I did find that preheating took the edge off the temperature of the steering wheel. Yes it would be 1/2 hour for it to be very comfortable, but it was more than tolerable after 10 minutes.

They do make gloves that can operate a touchscreen. I have a pair in my car.

And yeah, there were a bunch of things the "surfer dudes" missed back in 2012, including vents that couldn't keep the windshield clear and HVAC controls that did dumb things... but they very quickly fixed most of it.

Little bit of Signature nostalgia: Winter Ice Adventure

 

[Hawesome]

Agreed - and also the rear defroster. It would be great to keep the snow from ever building up.

that would be my plan....have the car just stay at a constant cabin temperature to avoid any accumulation...how much battery do you think that would eat up on a 8 hour work day? I'm such a sissy in the winter, but that's my reality.

 

[wayner]

that would be my plan....have the car just stay at a constant cabin temperature to avoid any accumulation...how much battery do you think that would eat up on a 8 hour work day? I'm such a sissy in the winter, but that's my reality.

This particularly makes sense if you car is parked outside and freezing rain is going to hit. You don't want your car encased in a cm of ice. I think you may be able to do this with the new camping mode - but I am not 100% sure that you can initiate it from the app rather from the car. I think the Remote S app for iPhone also has camping mode.

 

[wayner]

And yeah, there were a bunch of things the "surfer dudes" missed back in 2012, including vents that couldn't keep the windshield clear and HVAC controls that did dumb things... but they very quickly fixed most of it.

They still had poor design for winter a few years later, like the concave shape of the sensor under the front nose cone on AP1 cars. This will very quickly build up with ice and slush:

 

[Hawesome]

20″ wheels were spotted on production units with manufacturer plates on a few occasions – leading us to believe that the option could be coming soon.

Today, Ryan McCaffrey asked Musk about it:

I agree

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 11, 2017

Now the simple “I agree” confirms that he also prefers the look of the 20s, but he is not confirming that it will be offered as an option – though it sounds likely at this point.

Electrek’s Take

I think that’s inevitable. All the aftermarket companies working on Tesla vehicles were all working on bigger wheels to market to Model 3 owners.

Now it sounds like Tesla could cut the ground from under their feet with a 20″ option.

The 21″ option is very popular for the Model S, especially for the performance versions, but tires are more expensive at that size and they wear faster.

Tires for 20″ wheels are more reasonable in term of pricing and should also result in the aesthetic look that people are looking for with bigger wheels.