Smart Air Suspension in the "real world"

It works... everytime. I have a steep driveway that I will scrape on if not raised up. Everytime I approach the house, the car is already on the way up. It is really amazing actually, and quite simple.

I have seen it still raising when I enter the turn into the driveway, but it is always just about done.

FWIW, before the GPS options I manually did the lift on a P85+, and remarkably only forgot once or twice. I had concrete installed at the base of the driveway about 18" wide, enough that it softened the approach angle and didn't screw up street drainage.

Smart Air is also useful when you enter a heavily rutted parking lot and the like.

Works...raises before I get there without needing to slow down...granted I'm not going very fast due to a turn.

You will need to teach the car where the suspension needs to be raised - so the first time you're travelling to a new location or pulling into your driveway you'll need to keep the Suspension screen open and make sure you're travelling <35mph for the High setting. I believe Very High is <20mph. The next time you hit the same spot the suspension will raise itself as long as your speed is correct, which it sounds like it will be. There should be no need to lower the suspension as you can just drive above 35mph and it will auto-lower. Conversely if you want to go lower you can also set this in the Suspension screen, I have mine set to lower at 50mph which is generally when I'm driving on roads that are in decent condition!

It works as advertised. Once you set the height the first time, it remembers.

robatbeach said:

raises before I get there without needing to slow down

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...does this account for a 1' rollout ?

austintexas said:

I'm a little bit confused after reading your responses and after talking to a Tesla service center today. Are all air suspensions -- whether labeled "Active Air Suspension" or "Smart Air Suspension" able to adjust based on geofencing/GPS? I was under the impression I'd need a 2014 or later car with "Smart" in order to do this.

Thanks

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Austin,

It is not correct that you need a recent model S in order for the smart-ness to work. We have VIN 00166 and it works fine.

The entrance to my road (that is a sharp upwards hill) is on a bend in a 55 mph zone. The suspension won't start to raise until you get below about 30 mph.

Luckily the shoulder is almost wide enough to fit the whole car in while I wait for the air suspension to raise, but occasionally I have people that refuse to go around me and lay on the horn anyway. It's a bit annoying, but not as annoying as scraping the front of my car on the pavement...

austintexas said:

Thanks Harry. This is great news -- I thought I was going to have to buy a 2014 to get this feature.

Thanks everyone else for validating its usefulness.

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You just have to be at a certain firmware level. All air suspension Model S will geofence.

It raises on geo location until you delete the location, and if you are going slow enough. I have found that lowering is not geo remembered, but happens when you hit the speed thresholds.

I have speed humps on my street in Boulder that need extra height if I go over 25 mph, and in Pagosa, I have a gravel road that I like to give extra space. I like the suspension at normal in my garage for loading and unloading the dogs to/from the back. Luckily, I have 400 meters of nice smooth asphalt before the garage in both places, so I just accelerate to 36 mph or higher in the home stretch of both driveways. :biggrin:

Mine works perfectly and I love it.

austintexas said:

Does the GPS feature of Smart Air Suspension work as well as claimed?

My main reason for getting Smart Air Suspension is for our steep driveway. I like the idea of the car automatically rising as I approach the driveway. How does this work in practice? If I'm driving down my street about 100 feet form the driveway, going about 10-15 MPH, will it start to rise? Or do I need to wait a few seconds at the base of my driveway before driving up it?

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As everyone has said, it does work very well.

I have a steep driveway, so use the very high setting, and it does take perhaps 10-15 seconds to adjust. (I haven't timed it...just guessing.) So a suggestion I'll give you is rather than get to your own driveway, stop, and set it the first time, set it to raise at a point before you reach your driveway.

If you set the point at your driveway, the air suspension system will start raising X number of feet before you get there, but it may not be finished when you get to your driveway, in which case you'll need to wait for it a bit.

But if you set the point at Y feet before you get to your driveway, the system will start raising at Y + X feet before you get there, and that should give it enough time for the suspension to be at the maximum height. You just need to remember to be driving slowly enough when you get to the point that the system wants to start making the adjustment. (If you aren't, you'll get a warning, and then if you slow down, the system will adjust the height.)