Tracking P85D delivery thread

[Andyw2100]

I'm with Rice on this one. It's, once again, pretty poor communication by Tesla that causes so much (unnecessary) hostility and worries.

Elon obviously knew of the inefficiency problem. The Delivery Specialists obviously didn't. How hard would it have been to inform them so they could say to people taking delivery now:
"You're one of the very first P85D owners. We're still tweaking the Normal mode which means that for now you'll experience unnecessarily high energy consumption on long drives. We'll fix this soon with an OTA update."

I mean would that had made anyone not take delivery??? Also, do they really not think buyers of this car are not smart enough to put one and one together??? (Normal mode missing from menu + unusually high Wh/mile numbers). I mean a lot of buyers now are going straight from a RWS Model S.

Tesla rehiring Reyes has NOT helped their communications strategy, which is by far their weakest quality.

On an unrelated note: Merry Christmas all TMCers!

I definitely agree with you that once again, Tesla failed with respect to communication. A little communication would have gone a very long way here.

I'm not sure if this is the way you meant this or not, but I want to address one aspect of what you wrote.

When you wrote: "Also, do they really not think buyers of this car are not smart enough to put one and one together??? (Normal mode missing from menu + unusually high Wh/mile numbers). I mean a lot of buyers now are going straight from a RWS Model S."

I think you were saying that if they had explained it to us, we would have believed them, and it wouldn't have caused anyone to not buy the car.

But if, by some chance, you are saying that we should have been able to put 1 and 1 together on our own, and realized that's all it was, let me say this:

a) Someone here did post that thought yesterday, hours before Elon Musk's tweet

b) While that was a possibility, there was also the possibility that Tesla had just "changed their mind" about giving us a normal mode, and that we were going to be stuck with this worse than expected range. I mean why would we think that the halo car would launch from day one with such a key feature under-delivering in such an obvious way with no one from Tesla saying a word about it? Their silence was a very good reason for us to think something really was amiss.

I spent much of yesterday really worried about the range issue. My P85D is to be delivered today. I have been the one pushing to buy the Tesla from the beginning. My wife, who will be driving the car quite a bit, is much less enthused about the whole thing, largely due to the cost, than I am. She is also much more worried about range issues. I hadn't even told her about all the lousy range reports that had been coming in yesterday! (As luck would have it, our schedules didn't allow for us to see each other much yesterday.) I was going to let her know what was going on, but it was going to be a scary conversation that almost certainly would have included her making comments like "why are we buying this car." I am very relieved that when I tell her about all of this now, I can also tell her about the eventual software update. But it would have been nice to not to have to worry at all.

 

[OConnorStP]

Why would you prefer FWD over AWD in bad weather?

I contemplated that while taking a walk. I think the answer is "habit." The only AWD cars I've owned only power the rear wheels during anti-skid moments and I find that I often don't like the choices that are made. Being able to force FWD would be a nice option. But I've never owned a full-time AWD car and that may be a completely different thing. Mostly it's the idea of being able to choose, and tune the car a bit in response to driving conditions, that appeals to me.

 

[REBroker]

Seeing all of these range issues I'm quite glad I am a February delivery, heck, if the update is not out early next year I nay request to be moved to March! I'd like to see if the software update really fixes this issue before I take delivery. BTW, I've got my VIN assigned, FFP69991!

 

[Johan]

@Andy: I meant that the Tesla crowd were bound to identify the issue very quickly anyway, so why not be open about it???

@O'Connor: I think well implemented AWD will beat FWD any day of the week!

 

[anticitizen13.7]

Executive Summary
Your comments and attitude are very negative. If you are simply unhappy with Tesla return the car, get your $ and (queue mcLarry) shut the h&*% up.

Thesis
There is something bigger going on here. We often marvel at how Tesla is disrupting an age old industry. We marvel how a company that made nothing only a few years back is now in the same sentence as Benz, Audi or Lamborghini. But there is another side to this disruption. Namely Tesla is also disrupting the consumer experience. For weeks now the P85D delivery threads (and all the moaning and bit*&ng going on) are testament to this disruption and all the discomfort it brings with it. We are now recipient of the same force we marveled at and we don't like it.

Where does this disruption come from? In short, it's Elon applying Agile to hardware. I would probably say he's the first person in the world to do so on a grand scheme. The car is evolution on wheels. Constantly changing. Release with limited/buggy features only later to be patched. Iterate. Iterate again. Consumers of tangible products are very unfamiliar with this experience. We want specs, water fall execution, deep QA. I.e. what Benz or Audi do.

No doubt this can be done better. The new marcomm guy at Tesla has clearly got his work cut out. One might say he's failing badly as we speak. Nevertheless, I think everyone that is going to buy a Tesla needs to understand what they are signing up for. Tesla/Elon probably doesn't want to be a Benz. Much like Oracle doesn't want to make products the way IBM wrote mainframe code. Be it Gen 3, 5, or 10.

Summary
It's us who have to adapt. So please check the attitude at the door, come with an open mind and be prepared to go on a ride - literally and figuratively.

I actually think it's good that Model S has gone through the iterative process, because the P85Ds that are driving off the factory line today are, by customer accounts, much higher quality than then P85 and P85+ cars of a year and 2 years ago. The same goes for the software.

I just don't think many customers outside of people who closely follow Tesla are aware of the iterations and the associated implications for the customer. I think that people would be willing to adapt as long as they aren't blindsided. There are zillions of potential future customers out there who aren't going to be tech enthusiasts or experts in agile development methods. These people are going to be blindsided by the process if nobody explains it to them.

 

[wk057]

Why not let the car dynamically change which one is idle? Use the motor that is in the most efficient range.

Well, the issue I see with this is that since there is no transmission on either motor there is no way to disengage the motor physically from the wheels. So, even in neutral while moving both motors are going to keep spinning. There is certainly some penalty to this with dual motors. In the P85 neutral seemed relatively friction free on flat road. In the P85D I think the added weight makes it feel about the same, although I want to do a side by side neutral test with my fiance's P85 and see how it goes.

Anyway, I think the truly make a motor not a factor in movement they would have to supply power to that motor to "idle" it. Maybe I'm crazy. But to make it coast like a P85 they would have to pump a small amount of juice into the front motor to overcome the losses. Not really putting power to the road, just making the motor seem invisible in a sense. I'm not sure, however, what this power requirement would be. I would guess it would be negligible, as in under 1 kW.

Personally, I would like the ability to tune and control both motors myself, but that's me. It seems that some software that utilizes real time data from both motors could easily calculate out the most efficient method of getting the right amount of power to the road. This doesn't even seem that complicated... the math isn't hard. I'm surprised it doesn't already do this. The car has real time data on power usage/input. It has speed data, accelerometers, and all sorts of other info. Putting the second motor to idle most likely is not going to be the most efficient solution for efficiency the majority of the time.

 

[MikeBur]

I contemplated that while taking a walk. I think the answer is "habit." The only AWD cars I've owned only power the rear wheels during anti-skid moments and I find that I often don't like the choices that are made. Being able to force FWD would be a nice option. But I've never owned a full-time AWD car and that may be a completely different thing. Mostly it's the idea of being able to choose, and tune the car a bit in response to driving conditions, that appeals to me.

Agree on handling characteristics being different in inclement weather, though once I got used to AWD and its nuances I have always insisted on it due to the increased safety.

Both the earlier post and Elon's tweet align with my belief that potential to get better range than the P85+ for freeway, with the different gearing ratios and ability to dynamically modify energy distribution (both to drive motors and regen). The gearing difference alone could be very interesting, though I give my sympathies to the Tesla engineers on being able to deliver upon this complex realization whilst satiating fellow early adopters' need to tweaking.

3 hours to pickup...

 

[JRP3]

It seems that some software that utilizes real time data from both motors could easily calculate out the most efficient method of getting the right amount of power to the road. This doesn't even seem that complicated... the math isn't hard. I'm surprised it doesn't already do this. The car has real time data on power usage/input. It has speed data, accelerometers, and all sorts of other info. Putting the second motor to idle most likely is not going to be the most efficient solution for efficiency the majority of the time.

I'm assuming the car will dynamically optimize efficiency at any point in time in "normal" mode, which should mean prioritizing whichever motor is in it's most efficient operating range at any point in time. At a steady state highway driving speed that may mean cutting power to a motor, or maybe supplying a small amount of power to "idle" it.

 

[skilly]

I contemplated that while taking a walk. I think the answer is "habit." The only AWD cars I've owned only power the rear wheels during anti-skid moments and I find that I often don't like the choices that are made. Being able to force FWD would be a nice option. But I've never owned a full-time AWD car and that may be a completely different thing. Mostly it's the idea of being able to choose, and tune the car a bit in response to driving conditions, that appeals to me.

My 991 911 turbo electronically controls torque on the fly between the front and rear wheels...getting past the fact that its an ICE (and an incredible one at that) the computer does this all in the background against what the car is trying to accomplish - completely hidden to the driver unless I choose to look at torque distribution management on the help screens. Like ABS, I dont think a driver can respond to or understand how best to tune the bias between the two motors in real time - the software should do it on the fly and electronically with a simple "normal" mode - perhaps just called 85D mode..

 

[DPDsModelS]

Can someone remind me what the range of the P85+ was/is again?

Back to the thread topic...

Took delivery yesterday and am still soaking it all in. Currently having opticoat applied in my garage as I type this. Rich Grasa from Explicit Details in CT really seems to know what he is doing and it'll be cheaper and better that Tesla's paint armor! Here's the first photo of my "rare breed" Green P85D...

 

[skilly]

anyone else just get a notification that a new SW package is ready for download? Its not showing in my dashboard with any release notes....

 

[DPDsModelS]

Just got the same notification on my iPhone app but the car is still being detailed....

anyone else just get a notification that a new SW package is ready for download? Its not showing in my dashboard with any release notes....

 

[Andyw2100]

anyone else just get a notification that a new SW package is ready for download? Its not showing in my dashboard with any release notes....

My P85D is on a truck, about ten minutes away from being delivered.

Please download the software and be the first to tell us all it has "Normal" mode!

 

[Cottonwood]

anyone else just get a notification that a new SW package is ready for download? Its not showing in my dashboard with any release notes....

Installing in my car now. I had 6.0 (2.0.77); let's see what new version is.

It was interesting that this update wanted to install in 15 minutes rather than wait until 2am. I pushed install now.

 

[yak-55]

Originally Posted by Boeing777
Tampa has called me to confirm our delivery on the 27th. We're flying in to Tampa (not trading in a car), staying overnight in a hotel and Tesla is sending a "town car" to pick us up for the delivery. Although others have had their share of missed expectations, we confirmed our order on 12/5, and will be driving our specially ordered supercar home 3 weeks after ordering. That is truly astonishing. No, we're not famous, or connected to Tesla. And, we're not previous Tesla owners. Silver spoon? Perhaps...Well done TM!

Supposedly picking up mine in Tampa on the 27th also. Must be on the same truck. Of course, mine was ordered on 10/10, so you clearly are more on the A-list than I am.

Heard from the DS today that mine has finally found a truck too ... but it looks like I missed the one you guys are on. Now estimating a 12/31 delivery in Tampa ... I guess when they said *late* December they meant it !

 

[jgsuperstar29]

anyone else just get a notification that a new SW package is ready for download? Its not showing in my dashboard with any release notes....

I just got the notification via the Tesla iPhone App - and now my car is updating in the garage...I really want it to hurry up! I wonder if this could be the range "fix"? Hopefully it's the range fix + more autopilot features...now that'd be a nice Christmas surprise!

 

[403portside]

Installing in my car now. I had 6.0 (2.0.77); let's see what new version is.

It was interesting that this update wanted to install in 15 minutes rather than wait until 2am. I pushed install now.

Fingers crossed for something substantial!

 

[evboost]

Delivery moved up to Saturday 11am in Fremont. Can't wait!!!

 

[skilly]

Originally Posted by Boeing777
Tampa has called me to confirm our delivery on the 27th. We're flying in to Tampa (not trading in a car), staying overnight in a hotel and Tesla is sending a "town car" to pick us up for the delivery. Although others have had their share of missed expectations, we confirmed our order on 12/5, and will be driving our specially ordered supercar home 3 weeks after ordering. That is truly astonishing. No, we're not famous, or connected to Tesla. And, we're not previous Tesla owners. Silver spoon? Perhaps...Well done TM!



Heard from the DS today that mine has finally found a truck too ... but it looks like I missed the one you guys are on. Now estimating a 12/31 delivery in Tampa ... I guess when they said *late* December they meant it !

I was doing a pick up yesterday at Fremont and there were literally hundreds of P85Ds there being prepped for delivery. They were running hard and I didnt see it stopping (I didnt get to leave service till about 8pm). If youre still waiting, they really look like they are trying to get these cars to you....it was impressive how many they were prepping for delivery.

Something to note - I took some time walking through a few rows of the cars. All of the NG cars that I saw with the black leather option had them in the front but not the back. And, I didn't see one car with a color other than black that had NG seats when the option was selected.

 

[Sgt Barone]

Anyone find out what the update was all about?