UK and Ireland sub forum - your thoughts

[Mark-R]

I just wanted to get peoples thoughts on the UK and Ireland sub forum.
...
I am asking as a result of someone querying the content of some posts in UK and Ireland threads and whether they contain information specific to this region or are better posted elsewhere on the forum.

I will occasionally read and post on the main forum, but as others have stated there is sometimes too much info to wade through, and 'international' threads often go off-topic and focus on country-specific issues, with discussion often generating more heat than light
The UK Ireland forum is generally a more friendly place, and I feel I get a better return (useful info) for my investment (time spent reading posts).

 

[Drew57]

.....its raised a few eyebrows elsewhere that a largely independent sub forum contains many non region specific topics.

Not meaning to be facetious but looking at todays' front page just now, the majority of links & threads really are specific to UK/Ireland issues (appreciating that the 'stickys' are specific anyway)

Although I do search to avoid duplication before creating a new thread, I prefer to do that only in this section of the forum because replies nearly always contain UK specific information. I don't have the inclination or time to filter out from a potentially less relevant global section & then check the UK/Ireland separately.
UK Charge Point Installer Recommendations
For Sale / Wanted / Free
UK 2021 Orders and Deliveries
UK Supercharger Site News
Model 3 Leasing
Useful local UK contact information
[UK] Commonly Used Acronyms
2021 Shipping Movements
Tesla Model 3 and speed limit signs
[UK] 2021.4.x
UK Model 3 Performance 2021 Waiting Room
Insurance renewal
Short 3Ph charging cable
Has Anyone Successfully Signed in to YouTube?
Selling my car .... What's the best place to put an AD?
Zappi question.
etc...

 

[Fraank]

Choosing to spend time reading or contributing to a forum is a form of community. I don't think it's surprising that a lot of us find it incredibly easy to feel comfortable hanging out here, whereas engaging on a US centric forum would have quite a few hurdles to achieving that feeling of community. I'm sure our Northern American friends would find a few challenges to spending more time here also?

I would also guess that many of us have favoured UK forums for previous car marques also, I certainly always have.

Hopefully it's clear I'm complementing how good this forum is. And there in lies the "problem"

 

[browellm]

its raised a few eyebrows elsewhere that a largely independent sub forum contains many non region specific topics.

 

[doats1]

Its really about why people do not use the global forums and post/read here instead.

The UK and Ireland sub forum is a bit of an outlier with it being used to support a large range of topics and its raised a few eyebrows elsewhere that a largely independent sub forum contains many non region specific topics.

The topic isn't the only thing that makes the discussion region-specific. The difference in local knowledge, humour, the time of day and the colloquial language (among other things), also make the discussion different.

The other day a member of the forum posted a question in the main Model 3 section about body shops in Edinburgh. The only response he got was probably only relevant to the US, and when the member tried to follow up he got air. You could argue that if we are all in the same sub-forum, a more relevant response is more likely. But it's also likely that more misunderstandings will turn into disagreements because people aren't aware of how things may vary in other countries and regions.

I wonder if the eyebrow-raisers are reading the content and not just the titles? What's your take on this if it's not too controversial to ask?

 

[Billbrown1982]

If this sub forum dissapeared, I suspect a lot of its regulars would find somewhere else to go as well.

So many of the threads here, although might start off as being "generic" can so quickly become country/region specific - the amount of times in the past i've googled things and found answers that are only any good in America or other parts of the world.

 

[NewbieT]

The fact is there are difference between LHD & RHD models. Also..,

Shipping, laws, road signs, English (British) is different to English (American) language : just try getting speech recognition to work, CCS & dynamic time of use tariffs, to name a few.

I’m finding other pass times at the minute but do lurk here. Without the UK threads I’ll be gone for one.

Best thread: Supercharger sticky.

 

[HenryT]

The topic isn't the only thing that makes the discussion region-specific. The difference in local knowledge, humour, the time of day and the colloquial language (among other things), also make the discussion different.

+1 for that.

I would add that the tone of this forum is more agreeable too. Less aggressive, not so much of the 'look at me' mentality, plus it's funnier too.

Two nations separated by a common language and all that. (Still struggle with 'frunk' by the way, and 'pavement' on the road and....)

 

[Glan gluaisne]

The language differences between UK English and American English alone are pretty significant. I was reading a news item a day or two ago about Facebook banning a group from the Black Country for discussing a local dish, faggots and peas, for example, that was almost certainly down to American English misusing a perfectly acceptable UK English word.

 

[Durzel]

I think everyone has covered it, but for me the reason I spend most of my time on here (I have ventured out to other forii (?) for general knowledge) is mainly because it’s a somewhat different experience, and a different car to some extent, than it is in the States.

I think if you looked at most threads on here you’d find there’s a UK slant on the subject that makes it appropriate to be on here. If someone is asking how to take a door card off - then fair enough, that should be in the general section, but if I thought there was something wrong with my auto headlights, well I’d want to know how my car compares to other UK cars, it doesn’t help me to know that non-UK cars are better or different (I suspect they are not), etc,

Also where an I supposed to moan how non-FSD-like FSD is over here, and how Summon moves at a glacial pace and you have to walk the car like a dog? Over in the States that stuff actually works!

 

[alset27]

I just wanted to get peoples thoughts on the UK and Ireland sub forum.

Many topics in this sub forum are not really specific to the UK and Ireland so I am wondering why people post in this sub forum and not in the global areas?

Is it that people are not aware of the other areas etc? For those that start threads, why do you start them in this sub forum not in a potentially more specific global thread?

If you don't want to say in public but wish to air your thoughts, please feel free to PM me and I can aggregate and repost anonymously on your behalf.

I am asking as a result of someone querying the content of some posts in UK and Ireland threads and whether they contain information specific to this region or are better posted elsewhere on the forum.

The reason I would look at posting this subsection is because it has the feeling of a local community rather than a global one. We are relatively unique in the fact we have a right-hand drive situation, drive on many roads which were not really designed for motorcars ! , and have certain nuances in the way we express ourselves in forums ! As a newby to the forum, (my car currently on a ship in the suez canal) I have found this subsection to be most informative and useful and really helps to manage my expectations when I pick up the car mid-March.

 

[EzekielJM]

I think this forum section is excellent. As above, I rarely bother looking at any other section. So many things relate specifically to the UK and Ireland, from deliveries, though to RHD specific issues (like changing the air filter) to things that relate to UK and Irish laws and regulations. In addition, it seems that many of the software issues are fairly specific to these regions, because of the way our roads are laid out, the typical weather conditions, or as recently discussed, why wheelie bins are given so much prominence in the visualisation.

Add in that finance arrangements, used sales, vehicle registration requirements, insurance, etc are very much region dependent, and the argument for keeping this section as it is seems compelling.

Pretty much everything i was going to say has been mentioned here. There are way too many UK specific topics RHD, FSD in the UK is totally different to elsewhere, chargers, electric supply, service, accessories due to RHD etc that i just dont bother with the other parts of the forum as most answers just dont apply. As such i think the UK folk use this section almost as our our mini tesla forum on any topic tesla rather than just odd queries.

Please keep it this way.

Ezekiel

 

[MrBadger]

What's your take on this if it's not too controversial to ask?

The tone of the sub forum had been set in history long before I became a member in 2019, so I was curious whether my views were in line with others - I'm of the similar opinions that have been said here.

However, with my moderator hat on, there is sometimes a bigger picture at play and occasionally posts or topics appear in the sub forum that I feel may be handled better elsewhere - either due to breadth of available response or the topic or its specific content. Thankfully, I don't think any Pandora's box has been opened with me asking (in a moderator only area) for some advice on how best to handle these posts even though some commented on the region specific nature of these posts. But I wanted to be in a position that I could justify some topics should the need arise, hence canvasing opinion here.

 

[Avendit]

I find the other areas too specific - great if you need an answer to an M3 question, but rubbish for building a community. In here we get a nice level of exposure to model 3, S, X, electrical wiring, little bit of UK specific renewables news, offers of local help sometimes and so on. I come here to browse and learn, whereas the car specific forums I might go if I have a specific problem, but I couldn't browse them. The M3 forum is too single topic so gets dull, I wouldn't continually browse all the specific topics (I'm not actually all that interested in the S, but its good to see the occasional bit of info cropping up etc).

This size of forum, and the people and community around it, is just nice. The other areas are too much of a set of monocoultures for me to browse regularly, and without browsing the community falls apart.

And they wouldn't understand if you said something like 'Tis but a scratch, come back here you chicken!'

 

[browellm]

Let's face it, sporadic attempts at integration haven't been great:
"Voice control is rubbish."
"No it isn't!"
"Yes it is!"
"No it isn't"
"Yes it...oh never mind."

 

[Dilly]

The tone of the sub forum had been set in history long before I became a member in 2019, so I was curious whether my views were in line with others - I'm of the similar opinions that have been said here.

However, with my moderator hat on, there is sometimes a bigger picture at play and occasionally posts or topics appear in the sub forum that I feel may be handled better elsewhere - either due to breadth of available response or the topic or its specific content. Thankfully, I don't think any Pandora's box has been opened with me asking (in a moderator only area) for some advice on how best to handle these posts even though some commented on the region specific nature of these posts. But I wanted to be in a position that I could justify some topics should the need arise, hence canvasing opinion here.

I think it’s been well and truly said that a UK centric sub-forum is absolutely right. When we’re online tossing some banter or looking for info or help with something, we know that generally, someone from the UK is going to understand and respond.
If I were to say that TACC is pants, will anyone beyond the UK have a clue what I mean?

 

[DavidUK]

HI, I am about to collect my M3 LR White, in a few weeks.
I have tried to join the UK forum but I get a post that looks as below

"Oops! We ran into some problems.
Your user group is unable to send PCs to anyone.
Please notify the site admin of this message.
(Maximum conversation recipients = 0)"

Can anyone tell me how i can join that forum or is it inactive?

 

[MrBadger]

You have certainly posted here and previously in the UK and Ireland sub forum so that works.

What you, or any new users will not be able to do is send private messages until you have posted iirc 10 posts.

 

[Mrklaw]

I don’t like the car specific ones as they feel too fragmented and sometimes my question doesn’t naturally fit into one of those pigeon holes so I’m not sure where to post it

some posts are tech specific but many have at least a layer of locality to them - whether local electricity regs, homes and parking commonality, motorway and other charge point providers and locations etc

just makes sense for me to bring the small percentage of non-local comments into a section where 80-90% has some local relevance

 

[Andrew_SE23]

To echo what has been said before, nearly every conversation we have is UK-specific either initially or eventually. This is generally because we get a worse service from Tesla pre and post-deliver. We get older and/or worse features for our cars that are frequently priced differently. We have different regulations.

I care about driving to France; tyre and wheel choice and availability; supercharger networks across Europe; third-party charging networks in the UK; accessories that I can actually buy without paying a fortune in import duties; UK insurance; and domestic car charging devices and regulations. All of which are UK-specific.

Last night, I was reading about track days, which I’d like to do. I don’t want to read about Laguna Beach, but rather I want to know where from SE London would be best to get to with fast chargers close by.

In our local forum, we get a lot of autobiographic essays about people’s six months of ownership - I don’t care and would happily see these cast into the oblivion of the global forum, but they do generally reflect (i) the standard of customer services that we receive locally, (ii) the financing options that people use locally, and (iii) our local consumer rights laws.

Tesla is such a US-specific company that their US consumers are generally very ignorant of the realities of being a Tesla owner elsewhere in the world. I wouldn’t mind taking a more active part in an ex-US forum, but I wouldn’t stick around here if our conversations are absorbed into the global conversations.