Requesting owner experience of Tesla model 3 AWD and RWS in Yakima, Washington

[prateek14]

Hello Everyone,

My name is Prateek and I recently moved to Yakima, Wa. I am doing research on Tesla model 3 (AWD only) and whether it is going to be a good choice to own a tesla in Yakima or not. I about request everyone from the region to please share their opinion, experience and thoughts on whether the decision to get a tesla is going to be a good option given all the snow, lack of public charging here! my daily miles is hardly 7 miles/day since I live close to my work, well everyone in yakima working and living does. However, weather is what I am concerned about, like, how bad the winters will affect my car's performance, miles. on a full charge, can we do a round trip from yakima to seattle/ yakima to spokane/ yakima to tacoma/ yakima to Portland/ yakima to Boise in both winters and summers.!

I would like to thank everyone in advance for their inputs!

-With supercharge,
Prateek

 

[wdolson]

First off do you have charging options at home or work. Most people do 99+% of their charging at home and/or work. You can charge from a 120V outlet, but that can be very slow. If you have 240V AC available you can charge reasonably fast. I have a Tesla brand AC charger at home and normally charge at 35 miles of range per hour.

I live in Clark County (down toward Portland) and I need to go to Yakima next week. I will need to charge to get back home and was looking at superchargers along the way. There is a supercharger in Yakima.

There are superchargers available along all of the most traveled roads now. You will have to charge on the road if you go to most of those cities you mention, but supercharging is easy and with the newer Teslas it's very fast. I have an older Model S that supercharges much slower, but supercharger stops are still only 30-40 minutes for my car (gaining about 200 miles range). With a newer car it's about half that.

If you stay overnight at your destination a lot of hotels now have destination chargers so you can plug in and charge at the hotel. I've done that many times.

We don't get snow around here that much but I live in a hilly area. I've driven my Model S in the snow without any traction devices and it was like driving on a dirt road. The car is amazingly planted and stable on snow and ice. It's a combination of a good traction control system with the center of gravity being very low and the car being on the heavy side. My partner reluctantly admitted that my Model S is better in the snow than her Subaru.

A few years back talking here on the forum about snow performance someone with a very early Model S (RWD) from Toronto was saying how great his car performs in the snow there.

In cold weather you will see a drop in range. Maybe 10% on a cold day and possibly to 20% on a really cold day. Internal combustion engine (ICE) cars use waste heat to heat the interior of the car because burning gasoline produces tons of heat. EVs don't have that advantage so you need to use battery energy to heat the interior. If you like a toasty warm interior you will find your range dropped a bit more on cold days than if you can tolerate being a little chilly. I cycle the heat on and off in the winter to save energy. I see about a 10% drop in range in the winter.

This time of year when the weather is mild, I see better than EPA range on many of my drives.

If you're going to be reliant on public charging around town (you don't have a way to charge at work or home), Plugshare is a good resource
PlugShare - EV Charging Station Map - Find a place to charge

If you just want to know where the superchargers are, this is a good site
supercharge.info

I've been driving my Model S for 7 years now and it's been super easy, though I do charge at home most of the time. Traveling with an EV is much easier now than it was in 2016.