This was actually our second trip in one of the cars, but the first time we really planned it out and thought it out carefully, with one objective being To avoid the New Jersey and Washington corridors by jogging slightly West of 95. The trip down in January for my wife in our midnight silver was stressful, and exhausting if she tried to do it in two days which really meant ~800 miles a day and ~14 hours on the road with recharging. On the way back this time we took our time, broke it into three legs, with the longest leg just barely 600 miles, and it was a lot more doable. We space to supercharger stops so that no leg was really significantly more than about 210 miles, and this meant we did not have to stare and is in a severe white knuckling as the battery cranked into single digits.
If you're coming up from Southwest Florida or for that matter even from Southeast Florida, you might look at this route and of course you can reverse it if you're going down which is what were going to do in the fall.
Overall thoughts: enhanced autopilot was amazing and although it's far from perfect (explicated below) it is a game changer for long distance driving, where the most fatiguing aspects namely lane centering and speed matching are taken off your plate. My nephew Andrew did most of the driving in our other car and quickly fell in love with EAP. More on that later.
Here's our route with stops Including overnight accommodations – Mileages are in parenthesis from starting point to supercharger stop. We were disappointed with the Wyndham Super 8 in Santee South Carolina, but loved the Comfort Inn in Carlisle PA. Reasonable prices and a fantastically comfortable bed. We will definitely stay there on our reverse leg in the fall.
Route 75 from Port Charlotte to Ocala FL (185 mi)
Kingsland GA (140 mi)
MUST BE at 95+% when leaving Kingsland to get to Santee comfortably
Santee SC (208 mi)
Super 8 Santee
9125 Old Hwy 6
Santee, SC 29142 US
Fayetteville NC (150 mi)
Rocky Mount NC (92 mi)
Fredricksburg VA (173 mi)
(after this, nav should direct to RT 81 for next SC stop
in Carlisle but best route may depend on traffic around DC)
Carlisle PA (165 mi)
Comfort Inn PA Turnpike - I-81
77 Shady Lane,
Carlisle, PA, US, 17013
+1 (717) 706-3400
Moosic PA (130)
Danbury CT (140 mi)
MUST BE AT 90+% To get to Nashua comfortably
Nashua NH (177 mi)
We frequently came in at anywhere from 10 to 20% battery. We did not have to do any speed restriction given the intermediate length between stops with no leg over 210 miles. Speeds were highly variable and so was our mileage consumption. As traffic got heavier are Watt hours per mile actually got better, but we probably varied between averaging about 290 Watt hours per mile on some slower legs to 350 Watt hours per mile when we were going 80+ the whole leg.
The cars are really amazingly comfortable for long distances in part because of the autopilot but also in part because of the generally fine ride and superb front seats. We have quieted down both cars with the rpm wind noise kit and extensive dynamatting. Average road noise at 70 was only about 64 DB and only 66 Db at 80 which is a real serious reduction.
Further thoughts on autopilot and supercharging:
1) the system is too paranoid some of the time and not paranoid enough at other times. One consistently annoying feature is that when you're trying to change lanes, the system needs an enormous distance between you and the cars in front or in back and I understand the ~ 2 seconds rule, but it seems like it sometimes needs a lot more than that.
It's not paranoid enough on the other hand when you're passing trucks in an adjoining lane and the truck is hugging the lane boundary, and 1.5 feet or so away from you. I wish you would have the option to change its lane centering heuristics to move a bit away from large trucks. There were a few episodes of phantom regen braking particularly it seems when you're going around the turn and the system can clearly distinguish who's in your lane as opposed to lose in an adjacent lane.
2) But these are small quibbles in an otherwise superb system. For sure it's a total game changer in relationship to trips and long distance driving.
3) The new upgraded 150 kWh charging rate does make a discernible difference particularly until about the 50% mark on your battery. It charges up to that point really quickly. We rarely had to share A/B charging stalls, but there were still times when the charging rate seemed unduly low – and it certainly wasn't from cold batteries as destinations were always set to the next supercharger. I know this has been speculated about in various threads, but I wonder if some of the units need service – particularly in terms of possible sub optimal connections between the car and the charging cable. I do wish that Tesla would make sure that there was a Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts nearby every supercharger. In general there is some kind of place to get a snack but in some cases he had to walk quite a difference.
Pictures to follow (although they're not all that interesting frankly)
Best cars ever. The more time we spend with them, the clearer that becomes. Although waiting for your car to finish supercharging is sometimes somewhat inconvenient, and we estimate that we could have comfortably covered an additional 100 – 150 miles a day if not using SC if we took out our 2 to 3 supercharger stops, we would not trade our Tesla Model 3 for any ICE vehicle price no object. We think they are safer highway cars than anything else you can buy.
If you're coming up from Southwest Florida or for that matter even from Southeast Florida, you might look at this route and of course you can reverse it if you're going down which is what were going to do in the fall.
Overall thoughts: enhanced autopilot was amazing and although it's far from perfect (explicated below) it is a game changer for long distance driving, where the most fatiguing aspects namely lane centering and speed matching are taken off your plate. My nephew Andrew did most of the driving in our other car and quickly fell in love with EAP. More on that later.
Here's our route with stops Including overnight accommodations – Mileages are in parenthesis from starting point to supercharger stop. We were disappointed with the Wyndham Super 8 in Santee South Carolina, but loved the Comfort Inn in Carlisle PA. Reasonable prices and a fantastically comfortable bed. We will definitely stay there on our reverse leg in the fall.
Route 75 from Port Charlotte to Ocala FL (185 mi)
Kingsland GA (140 mi)
MUST BE at 95+% when leaving Kingsland to get to Santee comfortably
Santee SC (208 mi)
Super 8 Santee
9125 Old Hwy 6
Santee, SC 29142 US
Fayetteville NC (150 mi)
Rocky Mount NC (92 mi)
Fredricksburg VA (173 mi)
(after this, nav should direct to RT 81 for next SC stop
in Carlisle but best route may depend on traffic around DC)
Carlisle PA (165 mi)
Comfort Inn PA Turnpike - I-81
77 Shady Lane,
Carlisle, PA, US, 17013
+1 (717) 706-3400
Moosic PA (130)
Danbury CT (140 mi)
MUST BE AT 90+% To get to Nashua comfortably
Nashua NH (177 mi)
We frequently came in at anywhere from 10 to 20% battery. We did not have to do any speed restriction given the intermediate length between stops with no leg over 210 miles. Speeds were highly variable and so was our mileage consumption. As traffic got heavier are Watt hours per mile actually got better, but we probably varied between averaging about 290 Watt hours per mile on some slower legs to 350 Watt hours per mile when we were going 80+ the whole leg.
The cars are really amazingly comfortable for long distances in part because of the autopilot but also in part because of the generally fine ride and superb front seats. We have quieted down both cars with the rpm wind noise kit and extensive dynamatting. Average road noise at 70 was only about 64 DB and only 66 Db at 80 which is a real serious reduction.
Further thoughts on autopilot and supercharging:
1) the system is too paranoid some of the time and not paranoid enough at other times. One consistently annoying feature is that when you're trying to change lanes, the system needs an enormous distance between you and the cars in front or in back and I understand the ~ 2 seconds rule, but it seems like it sometimes needs a lot more than that.
It's not paranoid enough on the other hand when you're passing trucks in an adjoining lane and the truck is hugging the lane boundary, and 1.5 feet or so away from you. I wish you would have the option to change its lane centering heuristics to move a bit away from large trucks. There were a few episodes of phantom regen braking particularly it seems when you're going around the turn and the system can clearly distinguish who's in your lane as opposed to lose in an adjacent lane.
2) But these are small quibbles in an otherwise superb system. For sure it's a total game changer in relationship to trips and long distance driving.
3) The new upgraded 150 kWh charging rate does make a discernible difference particularly until about the 50% mark on your battery. It charges up to that point really quickly. We rarely had to share A/B charging stalls, but there were still times when the charging rate seemed unduly low – and it certainly wasn't from cold batteries as destinations were always set to the next supercharger. I know this has been speculated about in various threads, but I wonder if some of the units need service – particularly in terms of possible sub optimal connections between the car and the charging cable. I do wish that Tesla would make sure that there was a Starbucks or Dunkin' Donuts nearby every supercharger. In general there is some kind of place to get a snack but in some cases he had to walk quite a difference.
Pictures to follow (although they're not all that interesting frankly)
Best cars ever. The more time we spend with them, the clearer that becomes. Although waiting for your car to finish supercharging is sometimes somewhat inconvenient, and we estimate that we could have comfortably covered an additional 100 – 150 miles a day if not using SC if we took out our 2 to 3 supercharger stops, we would not trade our Tesla Model 3 for any ICE vehicle price no object. We think they are safer highway cars than anything else you can buy.
