Model X 2nd row now folds FLAT! (July 1st 2017 update)

[BluX]

@BluX thanks for all the info and pictures. Very much appreciated! How is the legroom (and knee room) for the 3rd row?

Manageable for short trips, but not great (unless you are a child). You can move the second-row seats up and back a little to make leg room for the 3rd row. Because we have large rear facing car seats, our second-row seats are pushed so far back, that there is NO leg room in the 3rd row. That will improve when we turn them around. Now that we have the car set up for how we are going to use it, the 3rd row is folded flat and we only plan to use them for occasional transport. If we have to transport an adult, we will likely move one of the kids to the third row. I would not have purchased this layout if I had kids who were about to hit their growth spurt or had teenagers.

So I don't have a Y-tube channel and am not sure I want all of my FB friends to know I am posting here. My video is 6 seconds. I watched it a few times. It looks like he pushes the top button, allows the seat to fold down until it clicks, and then manually pushes the seat forward. I am having a hard time with it, but our sales person who was in the store yesterday had the whole thing figured out in less than 10 minutes.

 

[boaterva]

Manageable for short trips, but not great (unless you are a child). You can move the second-row seats up and back a little to make leg room for the 3rd row. Because we have large rear facing car seats, our second-row seats are pushed so far back, that there is NO leg room in the 3rd row. That will improve when we turn them around. Now that we have the car set up for how we are going to use it, the 3rd row is folded flat and we only plan to use them for occasional transport. If we have to transport an adult, we will likely move one of the kids to the third row. I would not have purchased this layout if I had kids who were about to hit their growth spurt or had teenagers.

So I don't have a Y-tube channel and am not sure I want all of my FB friends to know I am posting here. My video is 6 seconds. I watched it a few times. It looks like he pushes the top button, allows the seat to fold down until it clicks, and then manually pushes the seat forward. I am having a hard time with it, but our sales person who was in the store yesterday had the whole thing figured out in less than 10 minutes.

Thanks, that's an excellent description. And, on YouTube, if you have a gmail account, you pretty much have a YouTube account. And you could just post it to Facebook as a 'here's how our new car's seats work!'. They don't need to know anything else. Then you post the link here.

But I think we get the gist anyway, and I'm going to see if the Tyson's location is getting one of these. Definitely something you need to have 'hands on' to see if you like it. Thanks much for the time to explain it all and best of luck, I'm sure you will love it as you have time to explore with it.

 

[MrAliG]

Thanks for your help @BluX

Is the space just the same as the previous 7 seater or is there something about the seat that makes it different?

The lack of folding seats put me off ordering a Model X previously so this could push me over the edge.

 

[T3xrr]

Does the six seater still have electronic push button to move seat forward and back for second row?

 

[AnxietyRanger]

Thank you @BluX for the great info and insights.

So, it seems the new second row's sliding works much like the existing third-row's folding - its manual movement is unlocked by an automated mechanism through the top button, after which you move the seat manually. Tilting on the new second row seems similar to the five-seater and thus is separate from the sliding action/entry tilt.

Not really a very elegant solution compared to the old seven-seater's automated easy entry, but seems functional enough especially for those for whom the five-seater already seemed sufficient - with the added benefit of full rear-HVAC.

Does the six seater still have electronic push button to move seat forward and back for second row?

The only change to the six-seater we know of is the price increase, otherwise the six-seater seems to remain the old one. I agree with others it would be great to get confirmation, but logic and Design Studio info suggests nothing has changed for the six-seater except pricing (price now includes optional center console - as an option).

The extra side arm space in the third row for both the 6 and 7 seat Model X is an excellent design change and would be greatly appreciated by the early purchasers of Model X who have a flat side panel to contend with.

Just to be clear, the extra "side arm space" is the same for all Model X versions built since late October, 2016, the five-seater included though of coures it can not be used as arm space there. It is actually an interesting historical point that Tesla re-designed the sides at that time to also fit the new 7-seater floor rails. This change happened already in October, 2016, so they've known of this for quite a while. I guess they were going through old 7-seater seat inventory/orders or something was holding them up...

 

[MikeBur]

Thanks @BluX and @Mark Z for the photos and descriptions. Once again have my better half thinking of an X again. Will wait for a demo/sales X in this config in Seattle area as test drive required

 

[skills]

How does the underside of the seat look like? Could this be retrofitted to the 5-seater as a way to adjust leg room/luggage room on the "same" bench?

 

[AnxietyRanger]

How does the underside of the seat look like? Could this be retrofitted to the 5-seater as a way to adjust leg room/luggage room on the "same" bench?

While we wait for photos of the underside (much appreciated!), here is what the Design Studio shows - floor rails that would seem to make a 5-seater retrofit difficult.

Here we can also see how the new rails necessitated the October 2016 revision of the Model X trunk row side panels and rear floor shape, by going much further back compared to the 6 seater rails.

 

[skills]

While we wait for photos of the underside (much appreciated!), here is what the Design Studio shows - floor rails that would seem to make a 5-seater retrofit difficult.

Wow, yeah. It seems like the entire bench and undercarriage may be the same (which makes sense), but with a completely different rail system in the floor. Probably not worth the hassle.

 

[AnxietyRanger]

Wow, yeah. It seems like the entire bench and undercarriage may be the same (which makes sense), but with a completely different rail system in the floor. Probably not worth the hassle.

Agreed.

One more detail, I guess the top part of the bench may still differ a little from the five-seater, given the entry tilt/entry release button/mechanism there?

 

[BluX]

So, I hope these are not too dark, and I am not sure what angle you all are looking for, but I currently take public transportation to work so I don't even get to drive my new car during the day :-(.

Here are my best pictures, had to use a flash.

Glad I can help, as I said this forum was invaluable to me when deciding if I wanted this car (my husband was sold right away!).

 

[Spidy]

 

[jgrgnt]

Very informative, thanks for posting! I was wondering if that protrusion underneath the seat was a lever, and this confirms that it is. Glad to see fore/aft adjustments are simple to perform without having to first fold the seat.

 

[boaterva]

One thing I'm still not clear on is how 'complete' is the floor with both seats (2nd and 3rd) folded. In the five-seater, the addition of the panel pieces make it a completely flat floor all the way forward with no gaps.

How completely continuous is the floor when you fold both seats? Do you/can you slide the 2nd row back after folding perhaps to completely hide the gap between the two? I'm pretty sure this car doesn't have any panels like the seven-seater does.

Another reason I want to get some hands on time myself!

 

[AnxietyRanger]

Much thanks to @BluX for the continued reports and images.

Thanks @Spidy also for linking. Good video from Tesla. OK, so fully manual seats (even the easy entry button is manual), but decent functionality: tilt, folding, sliding through two levers and also the easy entry button to tilt a bit or tilt fully as well as unlock seats for manual movement.

Too bad the manual seating overall looks and feels more like a minivan than a premium, let alone luxury SUV, but functionally these seem OK. For manual seats, there are OK, IMO.

 

[cdub]

This is the utility the car needed the entire time. Can't wait for the model Y

 

[alevek]

Wow! Pretty crappy and cheap looking for an extra $3K? On a $100K+ car? Should be standard and electric and a little better looking than the standard real fold flat seats on my old Chrysler minivan. Can't believe anybody actually likes that crap.!

 

[Waverider]

Wow! Pretty crappy and cheap looking for an extra $3K? On a $100K+ car? Should be standard and electric and a little better looking than the standard real fold flat seats on my old Chrysler minivan. Can't believe anybody actually likes that crap.!

I agree that the implementation seems cheap compared to the price tag, but I'd much rather have the speed and utility of a manual seat over waiting for a slow electric motor to move the seats.

 

[boofagle]

my old Chrysler minivan

I have a feeling they lost quite a lot of sales to minivans when the 7 seater was first revealed and it could not fold flat. It was a feature many people on this forum were really upset about.

 

[jelloslug]

Wow! Pretty crappy and cheap looking for an extra $3K? On a $100K+ car? Should be standard and electric and a little better looking than the standard real fold flat seats on my old Chrysler minivan. Can't believe anybody actually likes that crap.!

The speed at which you can actuate the manual latches is much better than the "luxury" of a motorized version. When people want to get out of the 3rd row, I'm sure they are not going to be saying "look at that luxury smoothness of that motorized seat" while they wait for it to finish moving.