I got to test drive a P85D today, at the Route 17 Paramus, NJ location, where they were having their grand opening. It had only arrived this morning.
I live in Ithaca, and had scheduled a test drive at the Garden State Plaza Gallery location back in October, for today, before I had even ordered the Model S. (I was going to be in this area today.) I wound up ordering the P85D without seeing a Model S. Over Thanksgiving we made a trip to Boston and on the way home stopped at the Natick location, where I had scheduled a test drive about a week before. That was my first time seeing and driving a Model S. You can read about that here if you like:
Going to see and test drive a model S for the first time today
Anyway, back to today. I had briefly wondered if I should cancel today's scheduled test drive, but I really wanted more time with the car, and hoped maybe they'd have a P85D available. I checked yesterday to see if there was a P85D at either location yet (The Garden State Plaza location or the Route 17 location that was having its grand opening) and there was not. I decided to keep the test drive appointment (it was not a hard decision) and then go over to the Route 17 location mainly to see the superchargers, the supercharger lounge, and the service center.
The test drive of the P85+ was lots of fun and very informative. I didn't get to really experience a heck of a lot of anything too exciting, as there was a lot of traffic, but I did set creep mode to off, and regenerative braking to regular, and that was quite different from my first test drive. The woman that helped us at that location was very knowledgeable and extremely helpful, so it was a very positive experience.
My wife and I then went over to the Route 17 location, where the grand opening was taking place. They had some food platters out with some sandwiches, fruit, and cookies. I had a couple of oatmeal raisin cookies as we waited for a representative and looked around. When we did speak to a rep, I introduced myself, explained where we had just been, that I had a P85D ordered, and that we were there really to just see the place and to see the service center. As we entered the service center the rep mentioned that they had just gotten a P85D that morning, and pointed to it. I said something stupid like, "But it's not ready for test drives yet, right?", and he said, "Actually, it is. Do you want to drive it?" Needless to say, he did not have to ask me twice!
As we walked over towards the car I asked him if it had the Next Generation seats. He said it did, at which point I turned to my wife, and said we'd need to see if the back seats could fold flat, and take pictures, because there were a lot of people on the forums that wanted to know that. At which point the rep said that it only had the Next Generation seat in the front. Oh well.
The rep left to get a license plate for the car, and, presumably, to make sure that I wasn't really some nutjob off the street making stuff up, and came back a few minutes later and we were ready to go.
The rep set the driving mode to "Insane." Note that there is no steering mode selectable, as on other models. Because the rep was from the Short Hills location, and this was only his second test drive in the P85D, he didn't have a good place picked out where I could try a launch or two. It was also dark. He was trying to find places, using the navigation system, but we were failing. I wound up trying one--kind of--from maybe 10 or 15 miles per hour, but it scared the hell out of me, and I totally wimped out! I never floored it to begin with, and I think I eased off the accelerator at about 55, which means it was probably about two second later. In my defense, it was dark, the road probably wasn't the best for that at all, and I had never felt acceleration anything like that before in my life! Well, at least not in a car that I was driving.
I tried a couple of other little accelerations when I could, but nothing as severe as that one.
For what it's worth, my wife, who has an issue with motion sickness, and puts on motion sickness patches if we go to an amusement park or on a boat, actually got motion sick from the very few seconds of acceleration, and did not feel well for the rest of the test drive, and for about an hour afterwards. When we get our car, we may go through a lot of patches. (Or I may not get to drive very aggressively with her in the car.)
I did notice a high pitched sound from the front engine pretty much whenever I was accelerating. I noticed it when I was accelerating lightly to moderately. The one time I really punched it I didn't notice much of anything other than the fact that things were coming at me very fast.
Also quite cool was the fact that the speed alert was set in such a way that any time my speed exceeded the speed limit by a small amount, the speed limit sign would display on the dashboard. Also there is a little white line on the speedometer indicating the current speed limit. We were approaching a 50 MPH sign and the white line was indicating that the speed limit was 55, and I remarked that it was a little off, but just as we passed the 50 MPH sign, the white line moved to 50 MPH. Presumably when I thought it was off, we really had been in a 55 MPH zone.
I did take a picture of the sticker, but others have uploaded them, and I don't think there's any new info there. I can certainly upload it if anyone wants me to. It did indicate "Recaro" seats, and the 242 mile range. The vehicle had the 21 inch wheels.
I'll be happy to try to answer any questions, but I'm not sure I'll be able to. Since this is all so new to me, it was hard to take very much in. I can safely say that I can't imagine anyone being disappointed with the P85Ds acceleration.
no videos? I've seen a couple of your videos with the aventador.
