Obvious features/functions that weren't obvious to you

[daniel]

Something that wasn't obvious to me at first was that automatic lane changes are only available in highways, even though the rest of AutoPilot can be used outside highways.

Had I known this earlier, I would've saved myself a lot of "Weird, it usually works when I'm alone..." moments when I demo'ed it out to colleagues.

Someone's probably already commented on this (I just got home from a trip and skipped 8 pages of this thread). My car would do auto lane change only on the freeway until yesterday. Now with V9 auto lane change works on city streets.

The right pedal is the gas, the left is the brake... saved me a few times from hitting someone!

You have a gas pedal??? Must be an aftermarket thing. My car does not have a gas pedal.

 

[Runt8]

Not sure if this has been posted yet - In V9, drag up or down from the music icon to bring the entire music sheet up or down. Much easier than trying to drag the little line at the top of the sheet.

 

[Abnoidz]

Homelink question. I have not figured out how to properly use the Homelink auto open and close feature yet. hope someone explains it to me. I have programmed it to auto open but when I arrive from work it shows it will open in 40ft... 30ft... then 5 ft... and my car is like inches from the garage door and it still wont open. is there something wrong with how i programmed it? also auto close does it only work if you open the garage door with the homelink button of the car and wont close automatically if you use the house garage opener before you enter your car? thank you in advance for patiently answering this seemingly easy feature that for the longest time have plagued me.

 

[Runt8]

Homelink question. I have not figured out how to properly use the Homelink auto open and close feature yet. hope someone explains it to me. I have programmed it to auto open but when I arrive from work it shows it will open in 40ft... 30ft... then 5 ft... and my car is like inches from the garage door and it still wont open. is there something wrong with how i programmed it? also auto close does it only work if you open the garage door with the homelink button of the car and wont close automatically if you use the house garage opener before you enter your car? thank you in advance for patiently answering this seemingly easy feature that for the longest time have plagued me.

For auto open, it sounds like you should need to either increase the distance that it opens, or reset the position when you are parked in front of the door (not in the garage). Both can be done from the homelink settings.

As for auto close, it should work regardless of how you open the door initially.

 

[G78M3]

For v9 only: user manual states that an USB drive cannot be used both for dashcam and for Music. The correct statement is that both dashcam and music cannot be in the same USB partition. I successfully split a 64GB thumb drive into one 20GB partition for the dashcam and another 44GB partition for music and the car sees both perfectly.

 

[astrowunder]

Homelink question. I have not figured out how to properly use the Homelink auto open and close feature yet. hope someone explains it to me. I have programmed it to auto open but when I arrive from work it shows it will open in 40ft... 30ft... then 5 ft... and my car is like inches from the garage door and it still wont open. is there something wrong with how i programmed it? also auto close does it only work if you open the garage door with the homelink button of the car and wont close automatically if you use the house garage opener before you enter your car? thank you in advance for patiently answering this seemingly easy feature that for the longest time have plagued me.

I tried to use auto open for a few days and gave up- it just didn't work reliably for me. As most things with this car, it will probably improve over time. I find it not that hard to hit the popup when it appears when I'm close.

 

[follow.johnny]

I can't get this to work, but I never tested it prior to Version 9. Can someone confirm whether it went away with v9, or am I just doing it wrong?

Thanks

This easter egg for the silhouette of the car still works in both v8 and v9 now just confirmed.
• Press the Tesla logo T at the top and press and hold the "E" of "Model" for about 3 seconds and it will change the picture to a silhouette of the car.

 

[follow.johnny]

Here are some few neat tips/tricks I found as a owner for 3 months now:

• Press the speed limit icon to set your TACC speed to the speed limit
• Press the battery icon to bring up the charging screen
• To engage TACC/Autopilot, you just have to push down on the stock halfway instead of the full click.
• Siri commands as others as mentioned
• Quick navigation to home/work - Swipe down or right of the "Navigation button"
• Easter Egg - Click the Tesla logo T at the top and press and hold the "E" and it will change the picture to a silhouette of the car.
• Easter Egg - Rainbow charging logo on charge port light - Press the charger button on the UMC 10 times while the charger is plugged in

Hope this helps any new owners! I bet there might be some new updates with v9.

Here's a small update to my tips/tricks now that more owners have v9 and reported new tricks:

• Press and hold the phone icon to change to old school phone icon that is renamed to "Ahoy-hoy"
• Previously when you long press on Tesla logo T it takes you to easter egg of Sketch Pad now it takes you to Atari Game Console (Credit @ChicagoP3D)
• Drag up or down from the music icon to bring the entire music sheet up or down (Credit @Runt8)
• Dash Cam: Press to save last footage (Saved in 1 minute clips) - A green check mark will appear, press and hold to pause recording (no red light indicator)
• Swipe right or down of the "Navigate button" to navigate home (or work if at home already) (Credit @TT97)
• You can close any window (Setting, Phone, HAVC, Camera etc.) by simply tapping the top of your car image on screen (Credit @privater)

 

[israndy]

Just to be clear, there are some streets that I can make AP auto-lane changes that are just regular city streets - NOT highways

I have not tried in V9 but in V8.1 there were highways that would allow a lane change and then just a few miles later ON THE SAME ROAD it would not, and I would be blinking my turn signal forever. I finally checked in with the online support people about this behavior.

"Why isn't there an indicator of whether or not I can auto lane change?"

"Sorry, that software isn't very mature."

I was hoping there would be a visual indication when you hit the turn signal to let you know it's waiting for you to do something.

-Randy

 

[CameronB]

I tried to use auto open for a few days and gave up- it just didn't work reliably for me. As most things with this car, it will probably improve over time. I find it not that hard to hit the popup when it appears when I'm close.

When I first started trying to use this feature (9+ months ago), it was quite unreliable. But several months ago (long before v9) there was a small update (probably one that had no release notes - I don't remember which one) and since then it has worked 99% of the time for both auto open and auto close. I think in the last 3 months there has maybe been 2 times when it didn't work. It is almost perfect for me now. But I can say it originally worked maybe 35-40% of the time then after a few updates it went to maybe 60% success (but still was kind of a coin flip). Then there was that one unremembered update and all of sudden it went to near perfect.

Sorry you are having problems with it still. Can't hurt to file a bug report (voice command: "Bug report" then say something like "garage auto open didn't open" or whatever the case is).

 

[CameronB]

I have not tried in V9 but in V8.1 there were highways that would allow a lane change and then just a few miles later ON THE SAME ROAD it would not, and I would be blinking my turn signal forever. I finally checked in with the online support people about this behavior.

"Why isn't there an indicator of whether or not I can auto lane change?"

"Sorry, that software isn't very mature."

I was hoping there would be a visual indication when you hit the turn signal to let you know it's waiting for you to do something.

-Randy

Well now you know that there IS an indicator of whether you can auto lane change (at least most of the time) - just look at the autopilot display and see if you see another set of lane lines to your left, right, or both. If you see the other lane lines - AP auto lane change will work (in that direction). If not, then it won't. Admittedly it is pretty subtle. But you'd think that the Tesla support people could at least tell you that.

As to WHY it could auto-change at say Mile 500 but not Mile 503 but would work again at Mile 508...that's a mystery. However, sometimes (and I stress sometimes, because it doesn't always work), if you turned on your blinker and you AP auto-lane change wasn't available randomly, if you shut off the blinker (cancel AP auto lane change request), wait 3 seconds, sometimes, the next lane lines suddenly re-appear and AP auto lane change will work if you then try it again. Maybe it's placebo effect, but it does seem to help sometimes to cancel, wait a few seconds and then just try again.

 

[daniel]

Sometimes autosteer itself is unavailable for brief times. I assume because the car cannot see or distinguish the lane lines. I will speculate that the same may be true for auto lane change: If the car cannot see or distinguish the lane lines for the adjacent lane, the feature will be unavailable. This may be due to the road condition, or may just be a brain fart in the computer.

 

[israndy]

Well now you know that there IS an indicator of whether you can auto lane change (at least most of the time) - just look at the autopilot display and see if you see another set of lane lines to your left, right, or both. If you see the other lane lines - AP auto lane change will work (in that direction). If not, then it won't.

No, I picked up on that clue, but I have seen it happen many a time where I sit there NOT changing lanes. Perhaps there is some other thing keeping me from changing lanes, like a car too close or approaching quickly. But I will just have to take over and do the lane change for it and no one hits me so don't know what it was waiting for.

I was SUPER excited to see that it changes lanes so much quicker now. Used to leave me hanging, blink-blink-blink-blink, OK *now* I'll turn. If I hit that 3rd blink I would just have to take over, felt like an idiot signaling and not turning. When I am driving I usually look, then signal, and start my turn with the signal. The new software is almost that quick. Cannot wait to see what else it does.

-Randy

 

[israndy]

I think I miss many of the subtle updates to the settings menu. I look around for differences and sometimes see videos pointing out differences, but I still miss them. I JUST noticed that an Adjust Headlights feature is in the service setting section of the menus now. I was going to post a "what's new in v9" entry until I found someone referencing it months ago.

So if you find your headlights don't hit at the correct place on the road or your garage door, you can adjust them with the wheel like you can your mirrors. Hope I'm not the LAST to find out about this.

-Randy

 

[10splayer]

If you hold the Tesla logo for a few seconds it asks for an access code.

What does the code access???

 

[ceekz]

Homelink question. I have not figured out how to properly use the Homelink auto open and close feature yet. hope someone explains it to me. I have programmed it to auto open but when I arrive from work it shows it will open in 40ft... 30ft... then 5 ft... and my car is like inches from the garage door and it still wont open. is there something wrong with how i programmed it? also auto close does it only work if you open the garage door with the homelink button of the car and wont close automatically if you use the house garage opener before you enter your car? thank you in advance for patiently answering this seemingly easy feature that for the longest time have plagued me.

Homelink works for me when I'm driving away or pulling up to the garage, regardless of whether I used it to open/close the door previously. The only option I see is to "skip" the auto open/close. If it not working every time even when the system shows green and it beeps, you might have a blocked signal.

 

[ceekz]

For v9 only: user manual states that an USB drive cannot be used both for dashcam and for Music. The correct statement is that both dashcam and music cannot be in the same USB partition. I successfully split a 64GB thumb drive into one 20GB partition for the dashcam and another 44GB partition for music and the car sees both perfectly.

This might be a no-brainer and I am lacking that brain partition, but I had to dig around to find out which USB ports would work for a USB drive to record dash cam info. Apparently, the two in the front console are the only ones that connect to the computer. (The rear seats ones are for charging only.) Unless you want to disconnect one of the phone chargers, you have to install a hub to increase the number of USB ports, and use a recommended 265 GB drive.

Please let me know if this is not correct. Dear hubby was looking for the 3rd front port until he realized the manual stated "Model 3" USB front ports, not "3 front ports"...

 

[Need]

If you hold the Tesla logo for a few seconds it asks for an access code.

What does the code access???

On Model X, you can punch in MODELXMAS to make it do the X'mas dance and song. I don't think there is any code for the Model 3 yet.

 

[Jedi2155]

Homelink question. I have not figured out how to properly use the Homelink auto open and close feature yet. hope someone explains it to me. I have programmed it to auto open but when I arrive from work it shows it will open in 40ft... 30ft... then 5 ft... and my car is like inches from the garage door and it still wont open. is there something wrong with how i programmed it? also auto close does it only work if you open the garage door with the homelink button of the car and wont close automatically if you use the house garage opener before you enter your car? thank you in advance for patiently answering this seemingly easy feature that for the longest time have plagued me.

HomeLink works great for me. The important thing was during the initial programming of your remote, was your car right next to the garage door? It stores your car's GPS position as the garage door position during the initial programming of your remote and uses this as the auto open position. It was part of the instructions when programming it.

When I programmed it I placed my car outside in front of the garage door which seems to work great.

As for your other questions, Auto Close sends a signal as you leave the geo tag location, and assumes you already opened the garage door. Auto open sends the open signal about 20-30 feet before I reach my driveway giving it plenty of time for my 20+ y/o garage door to open.

 

[israndy]

If you hold the Tesla logo for a few seconds it asks for an access code.

What does the code access???

Isn't that for the Tesla Ranger who comes to your house and puts the car in Diags mode and can learn all sorts of things about the car that we cannot. I commented to a Ranger I met at a Supercharger that the code for my RV chassis was something someone eventually found out and posted to the net. He said that the code is specific to your car AND it changes every day. So they go to a password protected interface, enter your acct. info and get back the access code to put into your car. Hard to hack.

-Randy