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Letter To Elon Musk Regarding P85D Horsepower – Discussion Thread

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Andyw2100

Well-Known Member
Oct 22, 2014
6,547
2,448
Ithaca, NY
This thread exists to discuss the letter below, which will be sent to Elon Musk.

This letter grew out of discussions in several threads. This letter grew out of discussions in several threads. Many thanks to sorka and wk057 for their numerous and informed posts on the topic, and for their input on this letter. If you would like to add your signature to this letter, please see the first post in the signature thread here:

Letter To Elon Musk Regarding P85D Horsepower – Signature Thread Only, Please


The other threads where these topics are being discussed are:

http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/show...uld-have-an-asterisk-*-next-to-it-Up-to-691HP

http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/show...rs-world-wide-for-survey-and-complaint-letter

I don’t necessarily believe there needs to be a new thread to discuss these issues, but I definitely did not want to have discussion taking place in the thread that exists simply to collect signatures, so I started this thread to provide a place where that discussion may take place.

The letter follows.

--
Elon Musk, Chief Executive Officer
Tesla Motors
3500 Deer Creek Road
Palo Alto, CA 94304

Date, 2015

Dear Mr. Musk,

We are writing to you as a group of concerned Tesla owners, investors, and perhaps most importantly, supporters. We want to share our thoughts with you on an issue we think is critically important. While we don’t all feel exactly the same way about this matter, we all agree that this warrants your personal attention.

We’re writing because the Tesla Model S P85D falls considerably short of actually making 691 horsepower. We’ll get to the facts that support this in a moment, as well as some of the ideas we’ve discussed for how Tesla might manage this going forward. We want to say at the outset, though, that we have come to you because we think it is inevitable that if we had not, sooner or later someone or some group would go to the media. It is our hope that armed with the information this letter will provide, Tesla will be able to get out in front of anything negative that could come of this issue in the future.

The basic facts are as follows:

The P85D was marketed as making 691 horsepower. It doesn’t. We believe, based on various testing methods and tools including dynamometer testing and testing with professional performance data loggers that the maximum energy output is 415 KW, which results in a maximum horsepower of 557 before any drivetrain losses on a fully charged battery. Even without factoring in drive train loss, this is almost 20% less than the advertised horsepower.

The missing horsepower is quite noticeable at highway passing speeds. For example, from 70-90 mph, the P85D should perform like a car with a power to weight ratio of one HP for every seven pounds. Instead it performs like a car with one HP for every nine pounds. The result of this is that from 70-90 mph the P85D is easily outperformed by an Audi RS7 with a power to weight ratio of only one HP for every eight pounds.

The 691 HP figure appeared on the Tesla Motors website from October 9, 2014 the date of the D launch until the middle of May, 2015. Dozens of articles on the P85D quoted this figure. Tesla did not correct these stories. Tesla allowed the world, and more importantly Tesla customers to believe the P85D would make 691 HP.

In late December, 2014 the following statement was released to the media, and was added to the Tesla Motors website:

The P85D top speed is currently electronically-limited to 130 mph. In the coming months, we will be able to upgrade the car free of charge to enable a 155 mph top speed. This free update will be available for the lifetime of the car (not limited to the first owner). Additionally, an over-the-air firmware upgrade to the power electronics will improve P85D performance at high speed above what anyone outside Tesla has experienced to date. In other words, the car will be better than you experienced. This free upgrade will be rolled out in the next few months, once full validation is complete.

While the top speed firmware upgrade took place, the high speed performance upgrade never did. Many of us believe that promised upgrade, which some of us were counting on to bring our cars up to, or at least closer to the promised 691 HP has now turned into the Ludicrous Mode upgrade. Those of us that believe this think Tesla had every intention of releasing the upgrade at no charge, as originally promised, but found that the hardware was not up to the task, thus requiring the new fuse and Inconel contactors that are now integral parts of Ludicrous Mode.

A related issue that has some signers concerned is that Tesla apparently used 1-foot roll out when providing the original P85D 0-60 time of 3.2 seconds without making any mention of having done so, and without having done so in the past when providing the 0-60 times for other Model S vehicles. While we understand that this is to some extent a standard way of expressing 0-60 times in the United States, it is not standard all over the world. Also the fact that Tesla chose to do this for the first time with the P85D, without explaining what was being done, meant comparisons to other Model S vehicles were not valid. Many signers fear the recent analysis by Consumer Reports, a publication that has written extremely positively about the Model S in the past, will shed even more light on this particular issue.

Most, if not all, of the signers of this letter do not believe that Tesla intentionally misled anyone at any time. The fact remains, though, that many Tesla P85D customers have not received everything they have paid for. How Tesla should handle that is where the feelings of those signing this letter really begin to diverge!

This letter has grown out of several very active and at times heated discussion threads on the Tesla Motors Club forums. These threads have almost two-thousand posts! Many people have very strong feelings on this topic. Some forum members have written Tesla about this issue themselves, and have not received a response of any kind, which is of great concern to many of us. The problem is not going to just fade away.

Some of the signers of this letter are P85D owners who are completely happy with their cars. They may recognize the fact that their cars don’t make 691 HP, but they are OK with it, and are willing to give Tesla a pass on this.

Many signers of this letter think the best thing that Tesla could do would be to give away the Ludicrous Mode upgrade to affected P85D purchasers. In addition to the incredible amount of good will this would generate, and lost trust it would win back, we think there would also be an amazing amount of great press coverage.

Another benefit of this approach is that it would provide great insulation against potential bad press, should the story of the missing horsepower ever become mainstream media news. All Tesla would need to do is say, “We had every intention of being able to provide the stated horsepower. When we discovered we could not, we went back to the drawing board, made the car even better, and gave the improvements to the affected customers for free.” Being able to put out statements like that could turn what easily could have been a negative story into a positive one that improves the Tesla image and increases sales.

Some signers feel that providing the Ludicrous Mode upgrade parts for free, but charging for the labor to install them, would go far enough towards making things right.

Some signers are not sure what would make things right, but know that they want Tesla to take some sort of action to move in that direction.

Every signer of this letter wants Tesla to continue to grow, to prosper, and to succeed in changing the world! We trust that with the information we have provided, you will come up with a solution that works for Tesla and for the affected customers.

Thanks very much for your time!

Sincerely,

Andrew Wallenstein
[email protected]
P85D Owner, VIN # P64227

P85D Owners

Other Tesla Owners

Tesla Investors but not Tesla Car Owners

Tesla Supporters
 
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@Andy... what are folks expecting to get from this letter? i have been following most of the threads and the discussion seems pretty intense however i have for one have been happy with the car and was just curious as for expectations in terms of response etc... thanks..
 
@Andy... what are folks expecting to get from this letter? i have been following most of the threads and the discussion seems pretty intense however i have for one have been happy with the car and was just curious as for expectations in terms of response etc... thanks..

As the letter says, different people want different things.

I think the main goal would be to get Tesla and Musk to realize this is a serious issue that needs to be addressed. Thus far Tesla has seemed to have taken the approach that if they ignore the issue, it will go away. With today's "Consumer Reports" article, it's more clear than before that the issues aren't just going to quietly go away. Tesla should do something.

The letter is pretty clear in saying that different signers feel differently with respect to what should be done. We have ideas, but we certainly aren't making demands. We just want to make sure Tesla realizes there are real issues here. I believe it is in Tesla's best interests to be out in front on this. I think a lot of forum members agree.
 
I just signed it via PM. Personally, I'm just hoping for some response/clarification/explanation from Tesla, anything really. I have no skin in the game since I don't have a P85D, I'm just curious as an owner who is a big admirer of Tesla, but can't understand the ever-growing list of communication shenanigans. I'm considering upgrading my car to a P90D next year, but not before some kind of trust is restored (or another ridiculously cool new feature/upgrade of course).
 
Overall, it's a decent summary of the concerns raised in other threads. However, the pitch for free Ludicrous is fairly obvious. I would say good luck on that one. I remain a skeptic that will happen, but who knows.
 
Consumer reports did their test without rollout but people want true 0-60 times, and not drag strip setup ones. I guess Tesla should be more conservative with their numbers, and then there would be no problem with any publisher getting the advertised times. As long as they don't torque brake it.
 
Consumer reports did their test without rollout but people want true 0-60 times, and not drag strip setup ones. I guess Tesla should be more conservative with their numbers, and then there would be no problem with any publisher getting the advertised times. As long as they don't torque brake it.
On the whole 0-60 thing, for the US market at least, I think that distracts from letter (makes it lack focus and seems somewhat tacked on). However, I believe Andyw2100 wants this to be signed also by the Denmark group, so perhaps that is why that was added.
 
Applying 20th century descriptives of performance (HP) to a 21st century device is subject to a lot of interpretation and frankly you would be best served by buying a car based on whether you like it rather than whether it meets some arbitrary and subjective performance measure. If you like the performance of the RS7 at 60-80 MPH then buy that one instead. And the whole issue of 0-60 times is nothing but a who's is bigger contest between boys. Wringing your hands over 0.5 seconds in a single performance metric is straining at gnats. My advise is spend more time enjoying the car and less time writing letters lecturing people who are smarter than you and know more than you do about the subject.
 
Consumer reports did their test without rollout but people want true 0-60 times, and not drag strip setup ones. I guess Tesla should be more conservative with their numbers, and then there would be no problem with any publisher getting the advertised times. As long as they don't torque brake it.


what blows me away with the several hundred messages on this topic.. is folks getting so worked up over several tenths of a second speed... rollout vs non rollout etc.. everyone get a life and enjoy the car.. there are more important things in this world.... and no I'm not a fanboy..
 
According to post #371, there's already been direct communication with Tesla starting 6 days ago. Calling P85D owners world-wide for survey and complaint letter - Page 38

It sounds like the Danish group was discussing with Tesla primarily whether or not there was a change in their firmware versions that caused a reduction in their 0-60 times. I wanted to send a pretty broad letter, that many people would feel comfortable signing.



Consumer reports did their test without rollout but people want true 0-60 times, and not drag strip setup ones. I guess Tesla should be more conservative with their numbers, and then there would be no problem with any publisher getting the advertised times. As long as they don't torque brake it.

On the whole 0-60 thing, for the US market at least, I think that distracts from letter (makes it lack focus and seems somewhat tacked on). However, I believe Andyw2100 wants this to be signed also by the Denmark group, so perhaps that is why that was added.

Many people are well aware of the 1 foot roll out issue. But others are not. stopcrazypp is correct that initially I wasn't going to include anything about the 1 foot roll out in the letter. The Danes would have signed anyway. The reason I included it was with the "Consumer Reports" article today, I think there will be a lot more attention being paid to this, and I think it will be even more important for Tesla to respond.

The other aspect of the 1-foot roll out issue that I was unaware of until today is that Tesla only started using it for the P85D. As others have pointed out, that makes it impossible to make any sort of fair comparison between the P85D and earlier Tesla Model S vehicles.




My advise is spend more time enjoying the car and less time writing letters lecturing people who are smarter than you and know more than you do about the subject.

I'll agree that Elon Musk is smarter than me. I certainly don't agree that the letter had a "lecturing" tone. And as for knowing more than I do about the subject? The subject that I chose to write about was how the P85D's horsepower proving to be less than it was advertised as was being discussed and received on TMC, and the ideas coming out of those discussions. I believe I do know more about THAT subject than Elon Musk does.
 
what blows me away with the several hundred messages on this topic.. is folks getting so worked up over several tenths of a second speed... rollout vs non rollout etc.. everyone get a life and enjoy the car.. there are more important things in this world.... and no I'm not a fanboy..

Extremely dismissive. If you bought a carton of eggs and got 10 instead of 12, would you be happy with the person next in line saying "move on buddy, why are you making a big deal of 2/12 of a carton? These eggs are great, go home and enjoy!

If people didn't care about increased performance, Tesla wouldn't be selling the performance upgrades in numbers (P85, P85+, P85D, P95D, Insane, Ludicrous etc). If it's not important to you, fine, but don't offhand dismiss (especially in a condescending manner) the concerns of others.
 
There’s another side to this: With orders taken for and cars delivered with the Ludicrous Mode upgrade, there will be another explosion of ill-will if existing P85D owners get it for free and those who paid do not immediately get a $10k refund.

I stand in awe of how breathtakingly inept Tesla’s handling of this issue has been.
 
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OMG
Another discussion on this topic.
BONNIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A lot of the discussion in the other threads is about trying to get Tesla to do something. If the letter accomplishes anything, Tesla --WILL-- do something, and then the discussion will stop.

I didn't really think there needed to be any discussion here. That's why I included the links to the other threads in the opening post. But I definitely didn't want discussion on the "signatures only" thread, so I started this thread at the same time, to give people who needed a place to discuss a place to do so.

It's basically the same stuff going around and around again, with a new twist in that this time people can attack me personally, since I wrote the letter. That's fine. I'm a big boy.
 
There’s another side to this: With orders taken for and cars deliverer with the Ludicrous Mode upgrade, there will be another explosion of ill-will if existing P85D owners get it for free and those who paid do not immediately get a $10k refund.

I stand in awe of how breathtakingly inept Tesla’s handling of this issue has been.

It really hard to argue with that.

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I sincerely hope you hear something back, because I'm pretty sick and tired of seeing multiple threads about this same topic.

Hard to argue with that too :)