My son would like to drive my brand new Model 3, I'm still debating the request... I do love that I can tell exactly where he'll be at all times though...
My oldest is only 10, but he keeps saying that he can't wait until he turns 16 so he can drive my X... I'm going to need to use "chill mode" on the car, and "valium mode" on my wife...
Thank you for posting a thoughtful response to your son's request. I'm still stuck on "no" when my 18 year-old daughter asks to take my car. She has a sweet little MINI Cooper at her disposal, so the Model 3 is just for show. Exactly the reason to NOT let her drive it, loaded with friends. However, prom is this weekend, and her date doesn't drive...
Having been a 17 yr old, I still would have said "Hell No". Back 50 yrs ago the sex on prom night was likely more urban legend than not but now-a-days alcohol, sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll likely are the norm. 17 yr olds are still and for several years to come under the complete control of unbridled testosterone. Think if your car was a tricked out Ford Mustang rather than a Tesla...Teens don't get to drive hot rods until they can afford their own. YMMV.
I agree with your plan and sounds like it worked out great and nice to be able to dial down the car and keep track of it and especially on Prom Night. My philosophy was that I wanted my son to not only experience speed, but learn to handle it and react appropriately and not be doing it when I was not around. I tell everyone who has a boy or girl turning driving age to attend the Tire Rack Street Survival School. The split it up into classroom and driving (in the kid's or Mom and Dad's car) with an experienced instructor over a day and it is very inexpensive (we paid $75). They teach a variety of things including wet skid pad (my son's instructor kept pulling the hand brake until he could control the spin), threshold braking, high speed lane changes etc. They even did a lap of Sebring raceway to give them a taste of a race track. We went further participating in a number of auto-crosses and events that were in controlled environments to help him learn car control and know the feeling of under and over-steer and how to react. From the day he had his permit, I made him drive. Regardless of whether, traffic, time of day. He would complain he was tired sometimes or my wife would freak out that he was driving in a bad rain storm. The more situations I could put him in with me in the car the better trained he would be when alone. Just some ideas for those of you with kids getting ready to drive. This is him with an instructor doing some high speed turning at the Street Survival. 074A8954 by PDACPA posted May 9, 2019 at 11:40 AM
As my 23 year old nephew has proven after 2 minor car wrecks - one boy + one girl, the OTHER brain is doing the thinking!
My 15-year-old is learning in the 3. It's either that or the S. Chill mode and creep. Pretty much at the stage of steering around parking lots and just applying or releasing the brakes.
This would only be possible in California under certain restrictions. For example, " During the first 12 months after you are licensed, you cannot drive between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m. and cannot transport passengers under 20 years old, unless accompanied by a California-licensed parent or guardian, a California-licensed driver 25 years old or older, or a licensed or certified driving instructor."
A little off topic, but the data doesn’t support your claims. Teens today are less likely to drink, smoke, have sex, and get pregnant. I still don’t know if I’d trust one with my 3 though! Today’s teens are better than you, and we can prove it
I've enjoyed the responses! My thinking was more along the math lines of as you put more boys in a car, the brain power goes in the denominator, not the numerator (1 boy = 1 brain, 2 = 1/2, 3=1/3 etc.) A little more generous than the previous post, which claims that the brains go to zero at 3, but I can't say which one of us is closer to the truth. I have to state that I think kids today are indeed better behaved when it comes to driving than I was. But perhaps it is just wishful thinking and our parents thought the same thing. Our kids talk openly of foolishness of drinking and driving, and how dumb it is to simply not call an uber (or a parent) if you are in that situation. I hope they mean it, but its possible they are just telling me what I want to hear. I can say that in the six years that I've had teenagers in high school, there have thankfully been far fewer tragic stories of kids drinking and driving than there were when I was growing up. As for prom, I knew he would be driving another couple, so there would be 1 other boy in the car (so we are at 1/2 brain power). I suspected that there would be other friends driving near him (opportunity to race a friend: multiple negative brain points). The next morning he complained that a stranger in a hopped up civic began revving to try to race him at a stoplight. He said that it was embarrassing that he couldn't toast him decisively since he was in chill mode. I told him that he just proved my point. I'm happy to let him drive the car. It is just a car, after all. But I won't let him risk his life, or his friends lives, in a car with more power than he has the experience or the judgement to handle. I was pretty pleased that the Tesla software allows owners to make this compromise. To the previous post that enrolled their kids in street survival, kudos to you, I think that is awesome training. Kids really should experience how to handle a car when it starts to loose traction. They need to learn the limits of braking and turning. It is far better to mash a few cones than a tree or guardrail. Living in Northern Vermont, the Street Survival schools that the BMWCCA runs are not held close by or often, I've tried to get the kids into one. I've had to settle for practicing skids on icy empty parking lots with them (which was fun for both of us).