There have been a number of rumors about it so I emailed my wonderful rep with questions about a couple changes in the Specs page since March. There is now no longer any mention of rear seat LED reading lights or LED illuminated mirrors on the sun visors. Here is his response in its entirety: "I received some notification just a bit ago regarding both your questions. Apparently it is true that the rear LED reading lights have been eliminated, along with the LED illuminated mirrors. The rear map LED reading lights were removed in an effort to improve rear seat headroom, and the front illuminated mirrors were eliminated to make the sun visors more slim, and thus improve frontward visibility for taller drivers. This also makes sense why some of the test drive cars may or may not have the LED lights, as they were built prior to their removal." Hopefully this clarifies the situation. (Also posted on Tesla Motors forum) ---------------- UPDATE 8/1/2012 ------------------------------------ Mod Note: George B has cleared this situation up, and it should not be an issue. Please see this thread: Official word from Tesla (GeorgeB) on the vanity mirror light and rear reading lights ---------------- UPDATE 8/31/2012 ------------------------------------ Mod Note: Lights are back.
If the rear LED lights were on the C-pillar, there'd be no problem with headroom. Without these lights, it removes the potential for the Model S to be in the "town car" car-service market. There is not one premium sedan with no rear-seat light -- bad call, Tesla.
IMO, those are both bad calls. for a five passenger car, not having at least temporary illumination in the back is bad, but not having a place where my wife can check her "game face" before stepping out to dinner or over at a friends house borders on the criminal.
+1 (or -1?) This is going to be a BIG negative with my wife! Using that mirror is the first thing she does when getting in the car, and the last thing before getting out. Is there no mirror at all, or is there a mirror but no light? Maybe we can use that reading light to illuminate her face?
I emailed my rep back asking for clarification on just this point. I will post his reply once received.
Premium sedans should not be without rear reading lights or vanity mirror lights. This is a disappointing design decision for Model S.
Yup, that's a mistake. Now we have a back seat with no lights, no cup holders, and no adjustable headrests. Tesla must really not have a lot of love for the back-seaters. :/
Agreed. Big mistakes both. Esp the vanity mirror lights. I doubt the extra visibility it provides is worth adding potential fuel to the "the car's interior isn't really well thought out" fire. It's just more that people will need to "explain away" to interested people who ride in the car with you. It adds more "buts" owners will need to address. *Sigh*
My wife and are both tall and both a bit concerned about the lack of headroom (especially in the rear), so on one hand we are happy to hear there are efforts to improve headroom and view out the windshield. that said, it's hard to believe LED lighting is the thing to go, it's so compact and I agree, lighting is important, front and back.
Tesla is taking this minimalist interior concept to the extreme. Unfortunately, it is getting out of hand. Another fail for the interior which continues to disappoint.
See the white dot in the photo - how does that diminish headroom? By the diameter of a low voltage wire? On the top rail over the door? I'm a minimalist interior fan but this is an unfortunate turn (together with eliminating vanity lights at mirror). At least stuff them into the tech package...
I had not looked into this before .. but ... the rear seat headrests ... are not adjustable? Can they be removed completely? I find on my current car (LEAF) that they cut down on a TREMENDOUS amount of rear view. Model S seems to cut down on at least 25%. Tell me I can remove them? As for LED's ... I am reading that they were in the rear view mirror. Then I read about mirrors embedded into sun visors. Which is it? Not that I ever use it, but I can see how removing lit mirrors for the ladies is a NO NO! I agree, that for a $100k car (my config) the more "refinements" they make, the worse it seems to be getting.
I fell pretty awful starting this thread. There are so many rumors and so much unsubstantiated speculation in these forums. I was just trying to put some rumors to rest by contacting a definitive source at Tesla an posting his response. I did not realize that his response would set off so many negative comments. My sincere apology for stimulating negativity. Remember, we do not know yet whether there are still [non-illuminated] mirrors on the sun visors so don't assume they have disappeared just because the LED's did. I'll post my rep's response about that too when he gets back to me.
This makes no difference to me. As a matter of fact, if the removal of the visor mirrors cuts down on their size, without cutting down on their functionality, I am all for it.
The interior is so sparse and poorly thought out IMO that even though I want to believe that this is not true , I will not be surprised if it turns out to be fact.
First I'm very disappointed to see this both for my car (now I have to figure out how to cut holes in the headliner and add lights back in) and for how I think this will show to the general public. So if I walk to the car at night, and open the door, is the interior of the car now almost all dark? With that said, I don't know if I really accept the reason given, I think it's much more likely that these items are on the list of supplier issues parts, and removing them is a faster path the getting the cars manufactured in number and delivered.
You can't be serious? The lack of map lights in the back and vanity mirrors on the visors make the car "almost" totally dark? Or did I miss something and they removed other interior lights? My current car has no map lights and the vanity mirrors are close when I open the door.