Will the Tesla Model 3 revolutionize Amercan driving?

Great Debates
1

Assuming it lives up to its promises.
Going on sale in 2017
3rd generation so (hopefully) all the kinks have been worked out.
200-300 mile range.
$35,000 before government subsidies meaning it is in the price range of other new cars.

And that doesn’t even cover the current offers on the Model S that may appear on the Model 3 like autopilot and guarantied resale value. I know in this day and age everything is the next great thing until tomorrow but if the Model 3 presents a real alternative for the new car buyer, will it radically change the landscape of American motoring? Will we end up where people buy electric cars and keep some POS gas-car only for long road trips?

2

I’d say that depends entirely on a) whether the car is as durable and reliable, and has running costs as low as, the better brands of gas-engine vehicles, and b) whether there are any significant compromises in running one as a daily driver.

How’s the Model S on those criteria, i.e. as a practical car? I see quite a few around Houston, but they haven’t been around long enough to be someone’s old beater.

3

I’ve only seen a couple of Teslas.
Always with metallic black paint jobs, and being driven by a single guy.

Has anybody seen one with a baby seat ? Or with a bunch of kids at Dairy Queen?

4

But that’s point isn’t it. A family probably cannot afford a $80,000 new car but maybe a $35,000 new car.

5

Another major issue is how long it takes to recharge: people want to driver their vehicles on long trips.

6

Do they?

As a second car in a family situation 300 mile range with overnight charging should be more than enough right?

Or I could imagine “fast charge” for two hours while at the mall working equally well in a family situation.

I saw an article recently where somebody with a long term test of the Tesla tried to take it road tripping - with rather poor results.

However - if it’s the family second car, with maybe an SUV or similar also in the family for longer trips then it could work out well

7

Interestingly I saw a Tesla just yesterday, in the centre of an Austrian town. It had NL plates and a family climbed out of it ready to do some hiking. So this is obviously being used as a touring option and had already driven probably 600 miles to reach that point. I would’ve been interested to talk to the family to find out how it was working out but other priorities intervened. If anyone has had that discussion with a Tesla driver I’d still be intrigued.

On the specific OP…maybe…it depends. I’m still struck by the advancements in ICE technology.
The current crop of advanced diesel engines can do 70+mpg easily while still being fast and powerful and allow a big family car to have a 1000 mile non-stop range on a tankful that costs around 70 euro. Does the purely electric car offer significant advantages over such a vehicle? or do it’s drawbacks at the very least, cease to be a major disadvantage so that people can live with it.

In any case, it is great that both methods of propulsion are facing off as the competitive drive means better choices and greater advancement. The customer is the winner.

And, very much incidentally, the Tesla S is a handsome looking car. Often that in itself is enough to overcome very major disadvantages in other areas.

8

The last new car I bought was a yuppie mobile - nice, comfty and quite peppy.
It had an unrefueled range of 350 miles.

An electric at 300 would be competitive.

If electrics get common enough that battery packs become standard (such as tires, wheels, wiper motors, and even engines withing a manufacturer’s fleet) they will eventually get mounted for easy change/swap. A refill goes from overnight to 5 minutes at a service station. Yes, it will become self-serve, just as a gas station’s storage tanks are filled by professionals but the gas is pumped by the customer.
Drive into a bay, insert your card/type your PIN, and the machinery swaps the battery. “Your battery” will become like “your AC ‘freon’” - it is just re-cycled stuff, a commodity.

And electric cars don’t care how the electricity is generated - a big plus over cars requiring petroleum, which will get increasingly rare.
That is another thread about the increasingly expensive/risky oil extraction will become.

9

300 miles is pretty close to where electric cars need to be. My number is 400-500 miles being the point where range will stop being an issue for the vast majority of buyers.

I never bought into the idea of a swap. Fast refueling is only an issue on very long trips. With a 300 mile range, drivers will need a swap only a couple of times a year, all other refueling will be done at home. Not enough volume for a business to invest in inventory and technology for automated swaps.

I see travel destinations investing in charging technology, but not significant roadside charging investment.

10

I certainly couldn’t use one without major charging inconvenience, but I’m not every consumer. Not having anywhere to charge at home, I’d have to factor in wasted time to the ROI.

I see that >50% of households have two or more cars, although that is expected to decrease. I’m assuming most of them have somewhere to slow charge overnight.

11

If it’s relegated to a second car, that’s not going to “revolutionize driving” Right now electric cars are practical as second cars, since for most people they need a second car just for trips to work in the city.

12

My number is 600-700, or the capability for rapid charging after a couple of hundred miles. 500 is about what my average road trip is, so I want a little margin for comfort or in case I need to use the A/C or heater.

13

Ah yes, a nationwide network of fast charging points.

Who is going to build them?

What use would a regular car be without gas stations?

14

A big hurdle is profitability. Tesla is not profitable selling cars at $80,000. Selling them at $35,000, they couldn’t dig their grave fast enough. Which is why the $35,000 Tesla has been pushed back several times now, and likely will be pushed back again. At this point, it’s pretty much vaporware.

Really, none of the major automakers manages to make any money selling electric cars. GM doesn’t make any money on the Volt. Nissan doesn’t make any money on the Leaf. They sell them because they have to, not because they want to.

15

A “POS gas-car” isn’t something I’d want to take on a long road trip, and having two electric cars plus a gasoline car just for trips- most people don’y have that money or space.

Also see the Volt, which is basically an electric car that can serve as an only car, and the yawns so far.

Most families could already buy something like the Leaf for a second city-only car. They don’t.

16

Living in Si Valley, these cars are as common as VW Bugs were back in the 60s. They’re everywhere.

As for the new model… I think the key is going to be standardization of batteries so instead of charging stations you have battery swap stations. The range is just crappy.

17

Obligatory link to Oatmeal review (spoiler: he likes it):

Tesla has built them. And, they’re free.

The big problem with everybody switching over to electrics of any kind is whether or not the cities have the power infrastructure to support the load. Una mentioned in a thread a year or so ago that she had just finished a survey of a city’s ability to absorb new electric car charging, and the finding was that they could only handle about 10% of the cars switching to electric without a major (planned) upgrade to the power system, which would result in being able to absorb more like 50-60% conversion to electric.

18

Uh, Tesla’s already built quite a few, and they’re building many more in the next few years. (Scroll down to the map on this page) Looks like the densest urban areas in the US are already served by a healthy network of fast charging stations, and they plan to cover all major US interstates by the end of 2016.

Now, those superchargers still aren’t as fast as a gas tank fillup, so you couldn’t drive quite as far or as fast on a really long road trip. Adding a 30 minute charging stop while you get lunch isn’t a big deal for a 400 mile trip, but those stops would add up quite a bit on a multi-day, cross-country trip. (30 minutes stop per 2.5 hours interstate driving, basically.)

That’s probably not going to be a huge concern for most Tesla owners, even with the “affordable” Tesla 3. If I could afford to own one, I could also afford to fly instead of drive whenever I take the 700+ mile trip to see my parents.

19

If the criteria are 200+ mile range, under $30,000, and not an experimental piece of crap, I’m betting that the rumored upgrades to the Nissan Leaf will beat the Model 3 to the market by several years. But nobody is talking about the Leaf revolutionizing travel in the US… maybe that’s because the Leaf is designed by a whole company, not an amazing superbillionaire who is going to Mars on a rocket powered by attention.

20

I have a friend who has a Tesla, and I’ve ridden in it several times, and we’ve talked about the new Model 3 as well. I don’t know how much difference there would be between his and the more mid-range model, but I could definitely see it as a daily driver. The way it works for him is he has a special plug in his garage and it has a timer on it to charge up at night when the price of electricity is cheaper, so his cost per mile is even cheaper than it would otherwise be.

For the vast majority of people, the range of 200-300 miles is plenty for most purposes. Even for long trips, he does have access to the quick charge, which can refill the battery in about an hour. And while that’s good, if one is going on a particularly long road trip, like say 1000 miles, I wouldn’t mind stopping for an hour once, but having to stop that long 3 times would be too much. Plus, as far as I know, these quick charging stations aren’t exactly ubiquitous, which means planning a trip means ensuring that one never gets too far away from one. I do know that he’s driven his Tesla from here (DC area) to Miami and back before without issue.

I have also heard that Tesla is looking at expanding that infrastructure, and even looking at doing a faster, though more expensive, method of extending range by just swapping batteries, which means that a Tesla could potentially reset its range in a similar amount of time to a typical combustion engine refueling.

The other issue I see is just with regard to charging in general. I live in an apartment, so I’m not even sure how I could charge an electric car at home. The best case scenario is I could hope for a good spot and run an extension cord and hope no one steals it. I’m actually surprised to see that they offer free charging in the parking garage at my new job, but there’s only one or two stations, and they’re often taken. So I can see this being a problem, even at the lower price point, for a lot of typical families that live in an apartment or condo and don’t have easy access to charging at home or work.

Personally, I don’t see the range as an issue for me, since I don’t take many long road trips, so I’d probably save more than enough from gas that I could rent a car for those occasions and still turn out ahead. It’s the latter problem about the charging infrastructure for typical families that I think will be a barrier. Maybe if these cars get adopted quickly it will encourage some additional investment in the charging infrastructure. However, when I move to a new place, hopefully a townhouse or SFH, I’ll definitely seriously consider purchasing one of these cars.