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My wife is in the market for a new SUV, so we decided to see what all the fuss was about. You know, that Tesla fuss…
The process for booking a test drive was quite easy. Go to the website, book a day and time and model and voila….show up 15 minutes before your scheduled time oh and watch about 5 videos on how to drive and operate the car because there won’t be a sales person coming with you….and it has nothing to do with Covid.
One little wrinkle….there was no scheduled times for the day of, so a simple phone call to Tesla and young fellow on the phone was very happy to provide a list of times for that day. I did find it funny that he insisted we should order the car with him right there, on the phone, at that minute prior to test driving the car. Silly boy. But I will say, I do like the no haggle, clean way of actually purchasing a Tesla. Literally 3 or 4 options at most and that’s it.
We arrived 15 minutes prior to our scheduled appointment. The Tesla store near our house was quite busy with other interested customers asking questions. The salesman was a little distracted, but handed us a keycard, gave us a few tips and we were on our way.
The first thing you notice is that there is about a dozen test cars in the lot, intermingled with customer cars getting a free charge and no easy way to distinguish between the one you’re supposed to drive and all the rest. We haphazardly went along running the key card near the drivers side door slot before one finally opened.
Our demo car was charging, so we removed the charger, put it back on it’s little holder. We hopped in and as instructed, placed the little credit card between the cup holders and the center arm rest.
Just then, things came to life. We sat there for 10 minutes figuring out all the options on the screen. Nothing overly complicated for myself, but adjusting your mirrors, climate control, etc. is a multi step process. We weren’t quite sure what a lot of the options did and I was thinking at that moment, it sure would have been nice to have the sales person along. Oh well….we have four University degrees between the two of us, we should be able to figure it out. If not, we have a 13 and 16 year old who can pretty much do anything with tech.
I admired the interior and felt it was “adequate”, maybe a little cheap feeling for a car costing nearly $65,000, of course without all the extras like the charging station. But it was just a test drive. We did not inspect the Model S or X, but hope the interior would be a step up considering both are $100K vehicles. I admired how the vehicle from the outside had a bit of an odd, not so appealing egg shape, but from inside, it was quite nice. I really liked the gigantic sunroof/sky roof/whatever they call it. This is a car designed from the inside out. Meaning, it’s appeal was being in the car, not necessarily from the exterior.
The heart of the Tesla is it’s giant screen in the middle. It’s where you can make all the necessary climate control adjustments, adjust your mirrors, tune the radio, adjust even the vents for the cold air, set your sat nav, find out your battery life and various other things some of which are good and some which are stupid….more on that later.
We got the seat adjusted, mirrors adjusted, jokingly yelled out to Siri (which brought a back seat of laughter from the kids) and searched around for how to make the damn thing go. Ah, where the windshield wiper would normally be, there was R/N/D and the little push button on the side was P. Got it. Oh, and speaking of windshield wipers….yeah, those are a few touches deep on the screen. Odd. Pulled down on the lever and we were in drive and off to the races.
I thought the lack of an engine roar would bother me, but it really didn’t. I appreciated the silence. The car felt solid and very quick even just pulling out of the parking lot and onto the main street. We eventually found a strip of road and really got to test out this machine. This was the long range version, not the performance version, but let me tell you, it was lacking for nothing. The torque from an EV, even one with as modest spec as this one is VERY impressive. It’s like be thrust into space. The standard combustion engine has great torque too, but this is just different and quite hard to explain. There is no lag whatsoever….it’s just hold on and launch!
Handling of the vehicle was good, not midengine sports car good, but good for a four door saloon car/suv. Ride comfort was very good, not Mercedes S class good, but very good none the less.
We pulled over, played a little more with the settings on the giant screen, switched drivers and off we went again. I found my wife zipping along at 80mph in a 35mph zone and had to gently say “dear, this is a 35mph zone and you’re doing 80!” She slowed down and smiled. “It’s quite zippy!” Yes it is and it’s easy to lose track of the speed limit because of the seamless never ending glorious torque that this vehicle has.
We tried parking it in some spots, navigating some roundabouts and trying a variety of maneuvers. It passed with flying colors.
Were we ready to head back and place our order? Well….no.
It’s because of the one peddle driving, among other things. What is the one peddle driving? Take your foot off the gas and the car starts to brake firmly. Tesla calls this “regenerative braking”. Basically, you’re using the cars momentum to power up the batteries while slowing down the vehicle.
So what’s the problem? It did take a little to get used to and perhaps with a few weeks of driving it you get really get it down, but frankly, it made us all quite sick. Nauseous. Car sick if you will.
We pulled over, called the salesman and asked how we turn this damn thing off (it was grayed out on the screen). He explained that Tesla had removed it for all cars a few months ago. A search on the internet found many Tesla owners complaining about it (and making their families car sick) and noting that Tesla had quietly “turned it off”. Quite stupid if you ask me.
I’ve never felt so ill driving a car as I did with the Tesla. After an hour, I couldn’t wait to get it back. I would happily give up 50 or 100 miles of extra range (it’s probably more like 20), just not to have this herky jerky driving. It’s like having your left foot on the brake and right foot on the accelerator at the same time, all the time.
We got the car back to the Tesla store and sat in the car to talk about it. The kids of course loved the technology, loved that you could play video games in your car. But for the two people who could actually afford the car and would likely even consider the $100K X or S models, there were some serious deal breakers.
For me, it was the one pedal driving. It really made us sick not only as a passenger but for me, especially as a driver.
For my wife, there was a few more things. She wanted buttons. My wife is not a technology person. Pairing her Apple Watch to her phone is quite simply far beyond her technological abilities or patience. But she has many other skills, especially relating to the health care field. Her ability to understand hundreds of medications, the human body and such tends to make me glaze over.
But she wanted buttons. Hard physical buttons. She doesn’t even use cruise control. This is how much technology she doesn’t want in her car. This business of going into screens and clicking here and back over there and such was far beyond what she wanted in a car. Even adjusting where the air vents blow on you is a task in searching through screens.
But then there is what I would call “silliness”. When a 50 year old medical professional and Mother is considering a new car, I can assure you, farting noises, fart bags, fart horns and other fart related items, burping horns, burping noise and other such stupidity are a complete a utter turnoff for them.
The silliness of video games and other such things as well are a complete turn off. If Tesla is trying to appeal to the 9 year old (who can’t drive) with this stupidity, I can assure you, they succeeded. But if they are trying to be a serious car company and to be taken seriously, they would be well advised to keep the silliness hidden unless someone enters a code to enable them. And why any self respecting middle aged professional man or woman would do that, is beyond me. Perhaps to impress their 9 year old son or grandson. That’s it.
We plugged back in the car, locked it, returned the key card to the salesman and chatted for a while. We had several discussions about the single peddle driving and the ridiculous new “yoke”. It certainly does not feel right or good, but to be fair, we did not get a chance to drive a car with it.
There is no doubt about the appeal of electric vehicles and we will certainly keep an eye on what other manufacturers are doing as well. Most, admittedly, are playing catch up and are years behind Tesla. Tesla obviously is going in their own direction and carving out their own path. Good for them! It’s obviously been very successful. But for many reasons, I don’t think my wife and I will be a customer of theirs any time soon.
Earlier in the day, we test drove a Porsche Macan. Base model 2021. This one was modestly configured and was about the same price as the Tesla Model Y. My takeaway from that test drive was that it was a proper SPORT utility vehicle from a proper sports car company that was well made, extremely fun to drive and didn’t have any stupid one peddle driving nor farting horns. It had excellent acceleration, excellent braking, fantastic steering and buttons galore to appease my wife. The 2022 is reportedly going to be the last combustion engine Macan. After that, it will be an electric version for Porsche, which had better get their range ratings up or Tesla will lap them all again.
The future is EV’s. But today’s buyer needs to do some hard comparisons to really find if they are ready for a new way of driving. For us, we will wait a little bit longer.
The process for booking a test drive was quite easy. Go to the website, book a day and time and model and voila….show up 15 minutes before your scheduled time oh and watch about 5 videos on how to drive and operate the car because there won’t be a sales person coming with you….and it has nothing to do with Covid.
One little wrinkle….there was no scheduled times for the day of, so a simple phone call to Tesla and young fellow on the phone was very happy to provide a list of times for that day. I did find it funny that he insisted we should order the car with him right there, on the phone, at that minute prior to test driving the car. Silly boy. But I will say, I do like the no haggle, clean way of actually purchasing a Tesla. Literally 3 or 4 options at most and that’s it.
We arrived 15 minutes prior to our scheduled appointment. The Tesla store near our house was quite busy with other interested customers asking questions. The salesman was a little distracted, but handed us a keycard, gave us a few tips and we were on our way.
The first thing you notice is that there is about a dozen test cars in the lot, intermingled with customer cars getting a free charge and no easy way to distinguish between the one you’re supposed to drive and all the rest. We haphazardly went along running the key card near the drivers side door slot before one finally opened.
Our demo car was charging, so we removed the charger, put it back on it’s little holder. We hopped in and as instructed, placed the little credit card between the cup holders and the center arm rest.
Just then, things came to life. We sat there for 10 minutes figuring out all the options on the screen. Nothing overly complicated for myself, but adjusting your mirrors, climate control, etc. is a multi step process. We weren’t quite sure what a lot of the options did and I was thinking at that moment, it sure would have been nice to have the sales person along. Oh well….we have four University degrees between the two of us, we should be able to figure it out. If not, we have a 13 and 16 year old who can pretty much do anything with tech.
I admired the interior and felt it was “adequate”, maybe a little cheap feeling for a car costing nearly $65,000, of course without all the extras like the charging station. But it was just a test drive. We did not inspect the Model S or X, but hope the interior would be a step up considering both are $100K vehicles. I admired how the vehicle from the outside had a bit of an odd, not so appealing egg shape, but from inside, it was quite nice. I really liked the gigantic sunroof/sky roof/whatever they call it. This is a car designed from the inside out. Meaning, it’s appeal was being in the car, not necessarily from the exterior.
The heart of the Tesla is it’s giant screen in the middle. It’s where you can make all the necessary climate control adjustments, adjust your mirrors, tune the radio, adjust even the vents for the cold air, set your sat nav, find out your battery life and various other things some of which are good and some which are stupid….more on that later.
We got the seat adjusted, mirrors adjusted, jokingly yelled out to Siri (which brought a back seat of laughter from the kids) and searched around for how to make the damn thing go. Ah, where the windshield wiper would normally be, there was R/N/D and the little push button on the side was P. Got it. Oh, and speaking of windshield wipers….yeah, those are a few touches deep on the screen. Odd. Pulled down on the lever and we were in drive and off to the races.
I thought the lack of an engine roar would bother me, but it really didn’t. I appreciated the silence. The car felt solid and very quick even just pulling out of the parking lot and onto the main street. We eventually found a strip of road and really got to test out this machine. This was the long range version, not the performance version, but let me tell you, it was lacking for nothing. The torque from an EV, even one with as modest spec as this one is VERY impressive. It’s like be thrust into space. The standard combustion engine has great torque too, but this is just different and quite hard to explain. There is no lag whatsoever….it’s just hold on and launch!
Handling of the vehicle was good, not midengine sports car good, but good for a four door saloon car/suv. Ride comfort was very good, not Mercedes S class good, but very good none the less.
We pulled over, played a little more with the settings on the giant screen, switched drivers and off we went again. I found my wife zipping along at 80mph in a 35mph zone and had to gently say “dear, this is a 35mph zone and you’re doing 80!” She slowed down and smiled. “It’s quite zippy!” Yes it is and it’s easy to lose track of the speed limit because of the seamless never ending glorious torque that this vehicle has.
We tried parking it in some spots, navigating some roundabouts and trying a variety of maneuvers. It passed with flying colors.
Were we ready to head back and place our order? Well….no.
It’s because of the one peddle driving, among other things. What is the one peddle driving? Take your foot off the gas and the car starts to brake firmly. Tesla calls this “regenerative braking”. Basically, you’re using the cars momentum to power up the batteries while slowing down the vehicle.
So what’s the problem? It did take a little to get used to and perhaps with a few weeks of driving it you get really get it down, but frankly, it made us all quite sick. Nauseous. Car sick if you will.
We pulled over, called the salesman and asked how we turn this damn thing off (it was grayed out on the screen). He explained that Tesla had removed it for all cars a few months ago. A search on the internet found many Tesla owners complaining about it (and making their families car sick) and noting that Tesla had quietly “turned it off”. Quite stupid if you ask me.
I’ve never felt so ill driving a car as I did with the Tesla. After an hour, I couldn’t wait to get it back. I would happily give up 50 or 100 miles of extra range (it’s probably more like 20), just not to have this herky jerky driving. It’s like having your left foot on the brake and right foot on the accelerator at the same time, all the time.
We got the car back to the Tesla store and sat in the car to talk about it. The kids of course loved the technology, loved that you could play video games in your car. But for the two people who could actually afford the car and would likely even consider the $100K X or S models, there were some serious deal breakers.
For me, it was the one pedal driving. It really made us sick not only as a passenger but for me, especially as a driver.
For my wife, there was a few more things. She wanted buttons. My wife is not a technology person. Pairing her Apple Watch to her phone is quite simply far beyond her technological abilities or patience. But she has many other skills, especially relating to the health care field. Her ability to understand hundreds of medications, the human body and such tends to make me glaze over.
But she wanted buttons. Hard physical buttons. She doesn’t even use cruise control. This is how much technology she doesn’t want in her car. This business of going into screens and clicking here and back over there and such was far beyond what she wanted in a car. Even adjusting where the air vents blow on you is a task in searching through screens.
But then there is what I would call “silliness”. When a 50 year old medical professional and Mother is considering a new car, I can assure you, farting noises, fart bags, fart horns and other fart related items, burping horns, burping noise and other such stupidity are a complete a utter turnoff for them.
The silliness of video games and other such things as well are a complete turn off. If Tesla is trying to appeal to the 9 year old (who can’t drive) with this stupidity, I can assure you, they succeeded. But if they are trying to be a serious car company and to be taken seriously, they would be well advised to keep the silliness hidden unless someone enters a code to enable them. And why any self respecting middle aged professional man or woman would do that, is beyond me. Perhaps to impress their 9 year old son or grandson. That’s it.
We plugged back in the car, locked it, returned the key card to the salesman and chatted for a while. We had several discussions about the single peddle driving and the ridiculous new “yoke”. It certainly does not feel right or good, but to be fair, we did not get a chance to drive a car with it.
There is no doubt about the appeal of electric vehicles and we will certainly keep an eye on what other manufacturers are doing as well. Most, admittedly, are playing catch up and are years behind Tesla. Tesla obviously is going in their own direction and carving out their own path. Good for them! It’s obviously been very successful. But for many reasons, I don’t think my wife and I will be a customer of theirs any time soon.
Earlier in the day, we test drove a Porsche Macan. Base model 2021. This one was modestly configured and was about the same price as the Tesla Model Y. My takeaway from that test drive was that it was a proper SPORT utility vehicle from a proper sports car company that was well made, extremely fun to drive and didn’t have any stupid one peddle driving nor farting horns. It had excellent acceleration, excellent braking, fantastic steering and buttons galore to appease my wife. The 2022 is reportedly going to be the last combustion engine Macan. After that, it will be an electric version for Porsche, which had better get their range ratings up or Tesla will lap them all again.
The future is EV’s. But today’s buyer needs to do some hard comparisons to really find if they are ready for a new way of driving. For us, we will wait a little bit longer.
