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New Roadster owner, but not new to Tesla

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ecarfan

Well-Known Member
Moderator
Hi everyone, I am now the very happy owner of 1.5 Roadster #425! After being a Model S owner since last December, and being on TMC for about a year, I just had to go all electric. Once you've owned an incredible EV like the Model S, nothing else quite measures up...except another Tesla. So I sold my 2009 Porsche Cayman and bought this "Very Orange" Roadster. It was for sale at a BMW dealership in Sarasota, FL.

A big and very public "THANK YOU!" to Nigel Mould of Sarasota for inspecting and driving the car for me and giving me the confidence to buy it sight unseen (by me). If it hadn't been for Nigel I don't think I would have had the nerve to buy it.

The car has just 12K miles on it. It was built in April 2009. I have not had any contact with the previous owner (who I assume traded it in on a new BMW) but apparently it was kept indoors in a climate controlled garage. The exterior is immaculate except for one small wheel scratch. The interior is very nice, just some wrinkles in the drivers seat base and a small crack on the interior edge of each sill cover, which are hardly scuffed at all. Maybe someday I will replace them with the sills that have the silver metal insert (not interested in the carbon fiber sill covers). Tires are AD08 and AD07, I think the fronts are original and the rears were replaced in 2013 based on the DOT dates.

This past June the ESS/battery was repaired by Tesla because the standard SOC declined from the 80 - 85% range to less than 20% in a space of just 3 weeks, based on the log file that Nigel pulled and sent to me. The CAC measured at 152.25 as of 09/12/14. Nigel had them do a range charge which showed 241 miles but he thinks it didn't actually finish, something interrupted it. The battery now has a one year warranty by Tesla from the date of the repair. The invoice from Tesla says the cost of the repair was $11,000.

Included with the car was the Roadster HPC and I will get that installed in my garage next week. For now I'm using the SMC, charging painfully slowly at 110V/12A. No UMC came with the car, but it did come with the Roadster J1772 adaptor. It has the Tesla Paint Armor protection but I'm not sure if the car has any other options. Not sure how to tell if it has the Electronics Group Option. I didn't get much paperwork with it, but do have what appears to be the original window sticker and it doesn't show any options (which is odd since I got the HPC but maybe the first owner bought that later?). The window sticker shows a price of $125K. I paid $60K which seems like a great price considering the condition and the included HPC.

I have already ordered an HID kit from DDM to upgrade the low beams. Also ordered a shower cap from sector111. Thinking about a hardtop someday.

I am incredibly excited about owning this car and going 100% EV. After driving a Model S for 10 months driving the Roadster is an entirely different experience, but I prefer small cars that feel very connected to the road and am fine with the very direct steering and firm ride.

Here are some photos. I took these just an hour after the car was unloaded from the transporter, I hadn't even cleaned it up yet.

in the driveway.jpg


seats.jpg


in the garage.jpg


two teslas.jpg
 
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Congratulations Barry! Looks like the car did well in transit, I'm glad it got there without problems. The car handles beautifully and the steering is still nice and tight; once you've got it charged up, find yourself a nice quiet curvy road and go have some fun. :)

BTW, I've got spare sill covers with the aluminum inserts somewhere in my garage, I'd forgotten all about those. I'll dig them out and e-mail you.
 
Looks very clean, you'll have a blast driving the Roadster down the coast. You should do a Big Sur drive in it when you get a chance, so much fun.

Since your in the Bay Area and have a Roadster now you should join the local Tesla Roadster Bay Area Yahoo group:
Yahoo! Groups - Tesla Roadster

As for the sills, they'll most likely keep cracking in that same place unless you address the underlying issue. There's threads on it, I believe you need to lift part of the sill slightly with double-sided tape or something that takes space in a subtle way. Any space and the sills will crack when pressure is placed in the wrong place. The stock sills are very very fragile. Actually any of that foam mold is super fragile, the door panels are made of it. Its easy to break/crack. So use caution around it or removing it. I went with the Tesla Carbon Sills and love them. For getting in and out of the Roadster I think its essential. I can put as much weight on that sill and don't have to worry about them breaking. You'll see and perfect the style of getting in and out of the Roadster. For me I plant all my weight on my hand and pivot in/out of the Roadster. That way I don't stress any part of the car or my body. Its rather fluid and that's what you want. Keep an eye on people grabbing onto the door getting in / out of the Roadster. That'll make the door sag since they'll put all their weight on the edge of the door and the hinges weren't designed to handle all that weight. Also the silver on the sills are not made of metal, I thought the same, its painted plastic. I don't know why they went with silver, its a very scuff prone area. My CF sills had that silver, didn't like it, and had it covered with a 3M black mat covering. Tesla stopped making the fully black sills so was forced to go that route. The black doesn't show the shoe scuff marks all that bad.

Congrats!
 
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So I'm trying to figure out what factory options are on my Roadster, which is #425 (that is the last three digits of the VIN). Among the papers that came with the car are what I had assumed was the original "window sticker", shown below. Looking it over I noticed that under "Selected Options", none are shown, there is a price of "$0" for each one. However, the car came to me with floor mats with "Tesla" embroidered into them, and I got the High Power Connector, the 70A Clipper Creek unit. It also has the factory Paint Armor protection (at least I think it is factory). I do not know how to determine if the car has the "Electronic Group" option, but I have verified it has Bluetooth because I paired my iPhone with the car today.

I thought it was odd that the car appears to have some options even though the window sticker indicates it has no options. Then today I noticed that the VIN on the window sticker does not match the VIN shown on the car! The car is definitely #425 but the window sticker document shows #427. So this window sticker is not for my car! I have no idea where it came from or why it was given to me with the car. I have removed the name shown at the top center below the "This vehicle was custom made for" line to protect that person's privacy but as far as I know the name shown does not match with the name of the owner before me. Kind of a mystery...

Window Sticker-owner name removed.jpg


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And there is another thing about that document that confuses me. Under "Standard Exterior Features" is listed "Home-based charging system with integral safety features for full re-charge in about 3.5 hours." That clearly refers to the HPC, which I understand was an option. The UMC and SMC cannot recharge the car in 3.5 hours, only the HPC can do that.

But then under "Selected Options" is shown "High Power Connector", the HPC.

So why is the HPC listed as both "Standard" and an "Option" in this document?
 
Congrats @ecarfan! Fantastic story.
As a matter of fact, I am contemplating the same. Got our S85 in May and we're totally hooked!
We'll be replacing our 2nd car in the next couple months, and I've really wanted to get a 911 convertible. Went for a test drive with my wife, and she came back completely underwhelmed ("Lame. Drives like a truck..."). Story to be continued...

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NB... Out of curiosity: Did you test drive any Roadster prior to pulling the plug on this particular one?