Okay so here's a probably dumb question. Had the AWD a week now and loving driving it. Probably having too much fun with the car to even think about my Wh/km. Will start taking it easier on the acceleration and using the regen more fully. With standard regen that rapidly slows the car, if your brake lights don't go on is anyone concerned about cars behind you not paying attention and not noticing you are slowing down since no brake lights? Thanks.
The brake lights do come on with standard regen, so this situation shouldn't worry you. Good question though, because it is a bit of a subtlety about EVs most people dont think about. The car actually calculates what g-force is being produced by the regen and turns them on once a threshold is reached. I believe I read somewhere a while back that there is a law governing this and once the slowing force reaches ~ 0.3G the brake lights have to turn on. You can see them come on at night while driving around in your subdivision and looking in your rearview mirror or with the read camera on....if you feather the accelerator they turn on, take your foot right off when going 40-50km/h and they will turn on. My wife's bolt does the same thing, but my first generation volt did not do that (the regen wasn't powerful enough to go above the threshold required by law....)
Yes I had the same concern when I got my AWD and went digging in the manual where I found a section stating that the break lights will activate when deceleration is detected from Regen. Can post images yet but will add the reference when I can.
Thanks @pcons, we were discussing this and were thinking of taking both cars out and checking, but didn't get a chance yet. Makes good sense. I actually really like the standard regen setting. In the city or an the hwy I almost never need to actually brake while driving, only if I come to a full stop. Cheers and thanks for the valuable info!
If you pay attention to your little model 3 model in the HUD, the brake lights will light up - wish the Speedo would flash RED thought to make it more obvious (like when it alerts you to pay attention for hands on wheel for EAP).
I find the brake lights on the display car too small to notice consistently. Or my eyes are just really bad. I agree, a more obvious indicator would be useful. Going from red to RED isn't that noticeable on a display that I only peripherally glance at.
As others have said the brake lights do turn on when you slow rapidly. However it can still be a concern if someone is right on your bumper and you slow just a little bit by lightening up on the accelerator: brake lights don't go on immediately with regen. There's a deceleration threshold of a certain amount of g forces. Happened to me once, didn't get hit but guy behind me was gesturing at me trying to tell me my brake lights are broken.
Agree on that point. Even with the foot still on the peddle and feathering off - it slows down enough while still not engaging the brake lights.
People gear down in standards all the time with no brake lights. It has never been any kind of safety concern. No one every thought it needed to be addressed. The whole brake lights thing is just another one of those things that every car has but its only a problem in a Tesla.
Not just in a Tesla, every EV. In fact, in the first gen Volt the brakes lights never came on and people did not like that at all, including me. Not disagreeing with you, just pointing out EVs are about more than just Tesla Fully agree with your point about downshifting in a standard car though.
That's true and you can find questions about brake lights by people driving standards for the first time in general car forums. And same problem with no lights and being tailgated.
Also on original topic I have an AWD and can get over 100% efficiency if I turn off climate (or drive downhill). Otherwise I'm hitting about 95% on a good day these days with climate on 20 and auto. At about 10 degrees outside.
