That is... stunningly bad luck!Today should be a happy day as it's my pick up tomorrow. However a ridiculous spanner has appeared in the works - the touch screen on my phone died this morning - I can see lots of messages from Tesla on lock screen but no way of accessing phone. Booked in for a repair on the phone, hopefully get that done after work. Failing that I'll rock up tomorrow and see what's happening.
Life...
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Tow Hitch Waiting Room
- Thread starter MrBadger
- Start date
Fullerene
Member
Wasn’t able to get phone repaired yesterday evening, loaded up a new phone with Tesla app the barrage of messages will be a mystery until I get to the SC or repair phone. Hopefully squeeze my reg out of the SC when I get there this morning and no issues with car.
On the positive side on the way to get stupid phone repaired a model S stopped for me at a pedestrian crossing and I saw my first parked up white perf M3! Looked lovely
Sirricardo
MSM LR 19" Tow....The Unicorn.
Doh. Delivery expected today cancelled.
Logistical error WTH.
Moved to Saturday grrr.
Walk of shame at work today .... hey wernt you getting your car today.....I almost feel like staying at home.
Logistical error WTH.
Moved to Saturday grrr.
Walk of shame at work today .... hey wernt you getting your car today.....I almost feel like staying at home.
pmg102
Member
@Fullerene good luck today!! We expect a write up and pictures - once you’ve finished having fun driving of course!
Fullerene
Member
Nuts, so sorry to hear that, I’m picking up at same slot as you had, I will be mortified if I turn up and it isn’t happening..
Thanks! Will do, I think the therapy required to sort my head out after the ordeal will be more costly than the car.. maybe we could get a discount for group therapy?
Seems like buyers in Scotland are getting a raw deal on delivery. I have the same spec as you delivering on Monday to west Drayton yet I ordered on 29th July. Perhaps in the rush to maximise Q3 deliveries they're prioritising deliveries to the south of England as it's quicker to get large volumes off the boat and to the new owners.Fullerene -
Definitely want pictures
You've essentially the same spec (LRAWD, MSM, black, tow) as me apart from FSD.
The FSD really seems to have made a huge difference to delivery time for you.
I ordered 9th May and not even a VIN yet.
Possibly a reversal of the prioritisation that Scottish buyers seemed to get in Q2? What goes around etc.
I think delivery sites closer to the ports will always be in a beneficial position for last minute rushes though.
Fullerene
Member
Apologies if this post is an incoherent mess, it was written in dribs and drabs - this week has been a whirlwind let alone the M3 side of things. Woke up this morning and realised I didn't need to check the shipping forecast...and breathe...
Hum the tune..
Start the Crawl:
Pre-Collection Stress
Wednesday - my phone multitouch died, the screen was working and I saw numerous messages from Tesla and wasn't able to get into it to read the messages. Took the phone to be repaired in the evening and they couldn't (long story) so I picked up a new phone.
I loaded the app up but the SMS messages would be unknown, so there was a chance my car wasn't going to be at the SC today as per @Sirricardo who was due to pick up same time as me.
Collection
Thursday - I got the train to West Drayton and arrived at the SC about 09:30, two hours ahead of allotted time, half expecting to hear the worst, were the unread messages bad news? Handed over my driving license and the staff confirmed all was well and pointed me in the direction of the waiting area. Freshly cooked cookies, Barrista making coffee, seating, free wifi.
The large number of staff at the SC were brilliant. Thanks to Anthony R, Oliver and the many others who answered questions. The first being I had a load of texts, any chance my Reg was in those. They quickly looked up my reg and I was able to complete on my insurance.
Someone kindly put the Rugby on the TV - streamed from their phone I think, and it was nice to chat to many of the staff and soon to be owners.
There was a presentation done at one end of the waiting area by Oliver, it was every 30 minutes or so - as I turned up early I joined in with the audience for the first of the day. The audio from the Mic / speaker wasn't brill, would recommend sitting near the front if like me you can't lip read and your hearing could be better.
There was a RHD M3 parked up in the waiting area so plenty of opportunity to look over it and get a feel for the setup. The round lumber button on the seat didn't appear to work, or more likely I couldn't get it working, but all of the controls made sense. Navigating the menu is mainly intuitive and guidance is given on screen.
Outside there were a lot of M3s being driven around with protective film on door handles as well as car transporters coming and going.
Some staff were taking groups to their cars and some people like me got a 1 to 1 - I was probably singled out for being particularly clueless.. The staff said take as long as needed to check over the car but more importantly take your time when you get the car back home.
In the end I didn't spend too long examining the car at the SC, it looked great. Ten miles on the clock and just over 100 miles of charge on the battery.
Journey Home
Driving the car out of the SC and to the nearby supercharger was a moment of super cautious driving, I was only marginally quicker than continental drift.
The chargers were busy - I waited for 10 minutes and got parked up. I am glad the car has ultrasonics and cameras as I was super cautious about parking up.
The SuperCharger at the SC gave a slowish 27kW but was enough to give me 50 miles more so I could get home without needing to stop off. This was at least an opportunity to fiddle with screen and setup spotify etc.
Heading out of the SC was a juggling act of concentrating on an unfamiliar road and getting my head around the screen layout and notifications.
Needless to say there were a few new M3s on the roads out.
Driving is very intuitive, press accelerator gently and it will move with very fine control. The brake and hold just did the right thing so that was no issue at all. I got a few notifications about pressing brake and accelerator at the same time, brake wins and motor is not powering. Obviously I was left foot braking though this was on hills whilst 3 point turning and slowing right down. I was worried about rolling the wrong way, once I stopped overthinking things it was fine and the M3 stopped nagging me.
Once the calibration notice disappeared (20 miles or so in) and I was in fairly consistent traffic I was able to try out the AP/FSD things. They seemed to be ok - though there is a definitely a moment of "I hope it will steer" when on bends.
Heading down the M3 (motorway ) I noticed a blue MX in the rear view mirror (with probably the best MX registration in the UK) we had a car checking out session whilst driving and thumbs up and then I zipped off.
I pulled into Fleet services southbound & parked up at the yet to be commissioned SuperChargers as the car park was very busy.
Quick pit stop then out onto the M3 again - floored it on the slip road and had to very quickly ease right off as I was nowhere near the point of joining the main carriageway and the speed would have reached a number that I wouldn't have liked to merge into the traffic at.
The rest of the drive home was great, the biggest part of the journey was that the seat was without question the most comfortable I have ever sat in. I usually get a pain in my hip from driving, I thought it was part of getting old, it appears to be due to my car.
Got home, the kids had a little look in the car, needless to say the whoopee cushion feature was most loved.
TeslaMate
Due to the phone debacle I didn't have VPN set up on new phone so I wasn't able to check if adriankumpf/teslamate was functioning for the journey home. One home I logged in via computer and restarted the docker containers and the car appeared. Shame to have missed out on my first big journey and data but, that's life. TeslaMate is really, really cool. Nice to see what's going on, plenty of stuff to look at, map of the drive is awesome as moving the cursor across the graphs updates the dot position in the map. Sample screen grabs:
Another spin with passengers - should have taken 'one of those bags, like on planes'
Took the family out for a spin, nice and easy until I had to get up to speed from a standing start to join a main road, up to legal limit in no time at all, however, my other half felt really, really nauseous, so I took it very easy for remainder of the 30 minute drive. Massive negative of the car is it's so quiet the kids were driving me crazy with demands for whoopee cushion noises, at least I had a co-pilot to deal with that.. Also with kids in the back seats I got quite a few seatbelt warning notifications as the kids kept leaning on the middle rear seat to see where the whoopee cushion was.
The biggest negative was squeezing into my garage - I've got a steep short ramp up, a bit like going up a very big drop kerb. This is at the narrowest point going through the doors. Originally I measured up and thought I had 3 inches clearance either side, it's more like a 1.5 inches at best. The steep ramp means I have to give the car a real boot, it seems to resist this at first and then goes in with quite a lurch, this is moderately terrifying. I'm not yet confident enough to do this without a banksman. I've tried summon outside but I have a gut feeling summon will freak out trying to enter the garage as the gap is too tight.
General Observations
Nobody asked to see insurance.
No issues with wind noise - seems fine.
No spooky pedestrian alert sounds at low speeds.
I had one incident of a red-screen background notification(?), a car in front of the car in front was having a moment at a roundabout and was straddling two lanes. Kind of wish I had that recorded as there was a lot going on and it was all very brief. Seemed to me that the radar had spotted something ahead that was not particularly visible from driving position.
I've plugged an SSD in but haven't checked the footage yet.
Haven't had a chance to properly play with the tow bar...
The plate holders aren't exactly elegant - I feel a stick on order being made very soon.
I only noticed MSM & White M3s in the SC, was looking out for a blue and didn't spot any.
If anyone is worried about driving their M3, try not to worry!
Snags
I took the car out in the rain and when I got back I noticed that the rear light clusters seemed to be a bit fogged up on the inside. I will raise this with Tesla as I don't think they should be like this.
Best of luck for everyone waiting - look forward to seeing you out there
Hum the tune..
Start the Crawl:
Wednesday - my phone multitouch died, the screen was working and I saw numerous messages from Tesla and wasn't able to get into it to read the messages. Took the phone to be repaired in the evening and they couldn't (long story) so I picked up a new phone.
I loaded the app up but the SMS messages would be unknown, so there was a chance my car wasn't going to be at the SC today as per @Sirricardo who was due to pick up same time as me.
Collection
Thursday - I got the train to West Drayton and arrived at the SC about 09:30, two hours ahead of allotted time, half expecting to hear the worst, were the unread messages bad news? Handed over my driving license and the staff confirmed all was well and pointed me in the direction of the waiting area. Freshly cooked cookies, Barrista making coffee, seating, free wifi.
The large number of staff at the SC were brilliant. Thanks to Anthony R, Oliver and the many others who answered questions. The first being I had a load of texts, any chance my Reg was in those. They quickly looked up my reg and I was able to complete on my insurance.
Someone kindly put the Rugby on the TV - streamed from their phone I think, and it was nice to chat to many of the staff and soon to be owners.
There was a presentation done at one end of the waiting area by Oliver, it was every 30 minutes or so - as I turned up early I joined in with the audience for the first of the day. The audio from the Mic / speaker wasn't brill, would recommend sitting near the front if like me you can't lip read and your hearing could be better.
There was a RHD M3 parked up in the waiting area so plenty of opportunity to look over it and get a feel for the setup. The round lumber button on the seat didn't appear to work, or more likely I couldn't get it working, but all of the controls made sense. Navigating the menu is mainly intuitive and guidance is given on screen.
Outside there were a lot of M3s being driven around with protective film on door handles as well as car transporters coming and going.
Some staff were taking groups to their cars and some people like me got a 1 to 1 - I was probably singled out for being particularly clueless.. The staff said take as long as needed to check over the car but more importantly take your time when you get the car back home.
In the end I didn't spend too long examining the car at the SC, it looked great. Ten miles on the clock and just over 100 miles of charge on the battery.
Journey Home
Driving the car out of the SC and to the nearby supercharger was a moment of super cautious driving, I was only marginally quicker than continental drift.
The chargers were busy - I waited for 10 minutes and got parked up. I am glad the car has ultrasonics and cameras as I was super cautious about parking up.
The SuperCharger at the SC gave a slowish 27kW but was enough to give me 50 miles more so I could get home without needing to stop off. This was at least an opportunity to fiddle with screen and setup spotify etc.
Heading out of the SC was a juggling act of concentrating on an unfamiliar road and getting my head around the screen layout and notifications.
Needless to say there were a few new M3s on the roads out.
Driving is very intuitive, press accelerator gently and it will move with very fine control. The brake and hold just did the right thing so that was no issue at all. I got a few notifications about pressing brake and accelerator at the same time, brake wins and motor is not powering. Obviously I was left foot braking though this was on hills whilst 3 point turning and slowing right down. I was worried about rolling the wrong way, once I stopped overthinking things it was fine and the M3 stopped nagging me.
Once the calibration notice disappeared (20 miles or so in) and I was in fairly consistent traffic I was able to try out the AP/FSD things. They seemed to be ok - though there is a definitely a moment of "I hope it will steer" when on bends.
Heading down the M3 (motorway
) I noticed a blue MX in the rear view mirror (with probably the best MX registration in the UK) we had a car checking out session whilst driving and thumbs up and then I zipped off.I pulled into Fleet services southbound & parked up at the yet to be commissioned SuperChargers as the car park was very busy.
Quick pit stop then out onto the M3 again - floored it on the slip road and had to very quickly ease right off as I was nowhere near the point of joining the main carriageway and the speed would have reached a number that I wouldn't have liked to merge into the traffic at.
The rest of the drive home was great, the biggest part of the journey was that the seat was without question the most comfortable I have ever sat in. I usually get a pain in my hip from driving, I thought it was part of getting old, it appears to be due to my car.
Got home, the kids had a little look in the car, needless to say the whoopee cushion feature was most loved.
TeslaMate
Due to the phone debacle I didn't have VPN set up on new phone so I wasn't able to check if adriankumpf/teslamate was functioning for the journey home. One home I logged in via computer and restarted the docker containers and the car appeared. Shame to have missed out on my first big journey and data but, that's life. TeslaMate is really, really cool. Nice to see what's going on, plenty of stuff to look at, map of the drive is awesome as moving the cursor across the graphs updates the dot position in the map. Sample screen grabs:
Another spin with passengers - should have taken 'one of those bags, like on planes'
Took the family out for a spin, nice and easy until I had to get up to speed from a standing start to join a main road, up to legal limit in no time at all, however, my other half felt really, really nauseous, so I took it very easy for remainder of the 30 minute drive. Massive negative of the car is it's so quiet the kids were driving me crazy with demands for whoopee cushion noises, at least I had a co-pilot to deal with that.. Also with kids in the back seats I got quite a few seatbelt warning notifications as the kids kept leaning on the middle rear seat to see where the whoopee cushion was.
The biggest negative was squeezing into my garage - I've got a steep short ramp up, a bit like going up a very big drop kerb. This is at the narrowest point going through the doors. Originally I measured up and thought I had 3 inches clearance either side, it's more like a 1.5 inches at best. The steep ramp means I have to give the car a real boot, it seems to resist this at first and then goes in with quite a lurch, this is moderately terrifying. I'm not yet confident enough to do this without a banksman. I've tried summon outside but I have a gut feeling summon will freak out trying to enter the garage as the gap is too tight.
General Observations
Nobody asked to see insurance.
No issues with wind noise - seems fine.
No spooky pedestrian alert sounds at low speeds.
I had one incident of a red-screen background notification(?), a car in front of the car in front was having a moment at a roundabout and was straddling two lanes. Kind of wish I had that recorded as there was a lot going on and it was all very brief. Seemed to me that the radar had spotted something ahead that was not particularly visible from driving position.
I've plugged an SSD in but haven't checked the footage yet.
Haven't had a chance to properly play with the tow bar...
The plate holders aren't exactly elegant - I feel a stick on order being made very soon.
I only noticed MSM & White M3s in the SC, was looking out for a blue and didn't spot any.
If anyone is worried about driving their M3, try not to worry!
Snags
I took the car out in the rain and when I got back I noticed that the rear light clusters seemed to be a bit fogged up on the inside. I will raise this with Tesla as I don't think they should be like this.
Best of luck for everyone waiting - look forward to seeing you out there
pmg102
Member
Great update (I’ll forgive no pictures of the actual tow bar in use)
really pleased you’ve finally got it... question is... is it still a unicorn now it exists?!
pmg102
Member
Wife asked me a question last night...
“In all seriousness... when is your car coming??”
me: “honestly... absolutely no idea”
I think she thinks I’m playing it cool and going to surprise her... she expected it to be there when I picked her up from the airport on Sunday. But honestly. No idea.
“In all seriousness... when is your car coming??”
me: “honestly... absolutely no idea”
I think she thinks I’m playing it cool and going to surprise her... she expected it to be there when I picked her up from the airport on Sunday. But honestly. No idea.
pmg102
Member
Fullerene
Member
It's called 42 at the moment - TeslaMate retrieves the name from the car as:
Hopefully more unicorns on their way soon
Sirricardo
MSM LR 19" Tow....The Unicorn.
Yesterdays Story.....
I got off the train at West drayton and it was only a 15min walk to the showroom. The very nice lady there took my details and arranged for my private plate to be made up (£40 ish).
The delivery centre was partitioned off so you couldn't see the cars which added to the excitement. After a 20min presentation and QandA we were taken to our cars in small groups. They went over the settings and controls and when we were comfortable we could drive away.
I only had 140 miles which was not enough to get home, so had to que up for about 20min to get on the supercharger. It was quite a pleasant experience as all the people charging were excited and chatting about their cars.
I unfortunately parked next to 2 model x's so the charge rate was only 50kwh but after 1 of them drove away it went up to 80. Maybe they have load priority so thats something to watch.
During this time I checked the car over. All perfect except a missing frunk mat, a paint run and small scratch under the rear wheel arch. No big deal. One of the delivery guys said he will arrange to sort them out.
My bigest concern was the lifting points but they were undamaged except for a small scratch on 1.
Overall an excellent delivery experience expecially considering the volume of cars they are managing. Everybody seemed cheery.
On the way home stopped to top up the charge at another supercharger. During the charging I heard 5 large bangs from under the car. Sounded like thermal expansion of sheet metal.
Despite the pre delivery anxiety we have all been suffering for ages, I am extremely pleased with the car and all is forgiven Tesla....
The best part .... freaking out the passengers when I boot it... Muhahaha.
Car name...'Unicorn' of course.
I got off the train at West drayton and it was only a 15min walk to the showroom. The very nice lady there took my details and arranged for my private plate to be made up (£40 ish).
The delivery centre was partitioned off so you couldn't see the cars which added to the excitement. After a 20min presentation and QandA we were taken to our cars in small groups. They went over the settings and controls and when we were comfortable we could drive away.
I only had 140 miles which was not enough to get home, so had to que up for about 20min to get on the supercharger. It was quite a pleasant experience as all the people charging were excited and chatting about their cars.
I unfortunately parked next to 2 model x's so the charge rate was only 50kwh but after 1 of them drove away it went up to 80. Maybe they have load priority so thats something to watch.
During this time I checked the car over. All perfect except a missing frunk mat, a paint run and small scratch under the rear wheel arch. No big deal. One of the delivery guys said he will arrange to sort them out.
My bigest concern was the lifting points but they were undamaged except for a small scratch on 1.
Overall an excellent delivery experience expecially considering the volume of cars they are managing. Everybody seemed cheery.
On the way home stopped to top up the charge at another supercharger. During the charging I heard 5 large bangs from under the car. Sounded like thermal expansion of sheet metal.
Despite the pre delivery anxiety we have all been suffering for ages, I am extremely pleased with the car and all is forgiven Tesla....
The best part .... freaking out the passengers when I boot it... Muhahaha.
Car name...'Unicorn' of course.
Last edited:
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
I think more likely that Heathrow / West Drayton is tooled up to hand over masses of cars. Back in June when M3 first arrived in UK it was 100 a day, I am now hearing figures of 200, 250, 300. At the end of the quarter that makes a different to Tesla figures on Wall Street ... sadly.
All Tesla drivers can lip read. Well ... at least a Lambo or Zonda driver saying "WTF?"
For folk not used to driving in London Traffic then Chill Mode and setting Regen to Low,before setting off, may help. Also worth setting CREEP to OFF unless you have come from automatic and prefer that. I find the sensitivity of Tesla accelerator to be phenomenal, in terms of the amount of fine-control I have. No idea if all EVs are like that, but folk used to Creep may find that turning that off in Tesla doesn't have risk of nudging into garage wall etc.
I expect you were "paired". For stalls with the same number, the A-and-B stalls are paired, and first car gets full wack, and second car gets the left overs - until the first car leaves (after which another car arriving gets your left-overs). If only some stalls are occupied best to park at a stall which is not paired.
Worth considering a different Supercharger, if you have range enough and the ones at handover are very busy. On the map the Dark Red pins are Superchargers within range, the light-red ones are out-of-range. Although also an opportunity to do further checks, before departure, of course.
If this was West Drayton then, yeah, its tight, and often lots of cars there for Service / visiting / whatever, which makes the process even slower.
Were you left-foot-braking from rally driving habit, or unfamiliarity driving an automatic? Either way, probably best in Tesla to use only right foot. If not familiar with Automatic then risk of slamming on the brake, in an emergency, with muscle-memory thinking left foot is pressing the clutch.
Pushing the brake hard, or a "second time", will engage Hill Hold ((H) Icon appears). Just press accelerator to pull-away from Hill Hold. Note that if you nudge either pedal (i.e. including brake
) that will cancel Hill Hold.From memory I think you can adjust how sensitive Summon is to narrow gaps, so you might find that Summon will put the car in garage for you. Watch out for Wing Mirrors unfolding by themselves when you get into the car (I think there is a setting to override that, not sure if it is GPS-aware)
I reckon that would be because your speed and direction were on collision course
I think it worth trying that out deliberately, in any new car, so you know what it sounds / behaves like in a real emergency. For example, drive at the tail end of a row of parked cars, with clear road ahead obviously , and delay "pulling out" until the warning is set off.Yup, that is expansion on Model-3. Not sure why it doesn't happen on Model-S/X.
Fullerene
Member
Yes - used to race when I was a lot younger
I also need to take car not to 'press the clutch' I rarely drive automatics, have been ok so far but contemplating putting velcro hooks on my left shoe.Pushing the brake hard, or a "second time", will engage Hill Hold ((H) Icon appears). Just press accelerator to pull-away from Hill Hold. Note that if you nudge either pedal (i.e. including brake
Got the hang of that now, definitely worth a little practice, it works really well. Aware of the danger of unwittingly pressing the brake once stopped on a hill. I'm always on the lookout for (H) now. Was on FSD yesterday and the car had a real demented rocking horse moment at a very busy and unusual roundabout. On the whole it is amazing, I know where it works successfully and where it will struggle and need to pick up control.
One of my biggest gripes is that if I lose the data connection spotify takes an age to get going again. It's a shame it doesn't buffer to the enormous SSD that I've got plugged in.
WannabeOwner
Well-Known Member
Yes, me too. I toggle Spotify-Radio-Spotify to fix it, but would expect it never to happen with buffering. But maybe the buffering is already huge, and the times it drops out the black-spot is bigger than I realise ... I'll try driving through it faster