Hi everyone! I haven't posted in a while but I just came up on 5 years of ownership of my M3P- or whatever people are calling them these days (essentially an AWD model + performance\track mode). I thought I would do a little review of what the last 5 years have been. In particular I'm concerned about battery degradation which seems worse than the average I have seen of other owners.
Car: Red Model 3 Performance, without the wheel and tire package, with black interior, Autopilot, FSD
Ordered: 2016 online during the announcement
Delivered: Aug 9th, 2018
Full PPF: ~2018
Location: Primarily in the Seattle area, with occasional road trips to Canada and other parts of WA
Mileage: 28,380
Current rated range at 90% SOC: ~235 miles
Lifetime avg energy efficiency: 312 Wh/mi. During the first several years with stock wheels and tires I was right around 300Wh/mi. After my first tires needed to be replaced I went with winter tires. I also bought separate aftermarket rims+summer tires. The combination of those two seems to be more in the 320-330Wh/mi range.
- Winter: Stock 18" aero rims without the covers + VIKINGCONTACT 7 XL (as of October 2021)
- Summer: Signature 19" SV302S rims + MICHELIN PILOT SPORT 4S (as of March 2021)
More detailed stats from "scan my tesla":
Service appointments: 6
At some point I had a service appointment scheduled about the concerning amount of battery degradation i was seeing as my VIN was also close to a window where there were many cars with known battery lifetime issues, but the service team cancelled my appointment. I guess this is becoming more interesting with the recent news about the service team celebrating cancelling these types of appointments.
Other Tesla experiences:
- I ordered 2 wall connectors in Dec 2021 to install and get a tax rebate before the end of the year. I received them promptly, but one of them was very clearly not in the original box, and was dead on arrival. I contacted Tesla support multiple times over the next month or two to get a replacement, but other than someone asking for pictures I never got a response. I ended up having to put a claim in with my credit card company to get the cost refunded, and didn't get a replacement ordered until the end of April. At least in that time the price had dropped substantially, so I ended up saving a bit of money for the wait and hassle.
Summary:
Overall I've been really happy with with the car. Now that it is out of warranty I do worry about the upcoming maintenance a lot more. I have heard of many people having the AC charging issues and it is $2k to fix out of pocket. I'm lucky I noticed my issues just before the warranty period was over. I'd like to think that they have installed improved parts, but I've heard of new M3s with the same issues, so that seems unlikely.
The battery degradation also seems like an issue, although unfortunately at the current rate not one that will be bad enough to hit the 30% loss threshold by the time the warranty is up at 8 years. I'm predicting I will have 29.99999% battery loss when the warranty expires Hopefully it has leveled off and will not get much worse. The low efficiency plus the battery loss means realistically I only have 150-200 miles of range. Fortunately we got our refresh Model X last year, so I generally don't use the Model 3 for road trips any more. I just hope it doesn't end up with the same kind of battery issues, otherwise I might be done with Tesla.
Car: Red Model 3 Performance, without the wheel and tire package, with black interior, Autopilot, FSD
Ordered: 2016 online during the announcement
Delivered: Aug 9th, 2018
Full PPF: ~2018
Location: Primarily in the Seattle area, with occasional road trips to Canada and other parts of WA
Mileage: 28,380
Current rated range at 90% SOC: ~235 miles
Lifetime avg energy efficiency: 312 Wh/mi. During the first several years with stock wheels and tires I was right around 300Wh/mi. After my first tires needed to be replaced I went with winter tires. I also bought separate aftermarket rims+summer tires. The combination of those two seems to be more in the 320-330Wh/mi range.
- Winter: Stock 18" aero rims without the covers + VIKINGCONTACT 7 XL (as of October 2021)
- Summer: Signature 19" SV302S rims + MICHELIN PILOT SPORT 4S (as of March 2021)
More detailed stats from "scan my tesla":
- Nominal full pack: 64.6kWh (full pack when new 77.8kWh) - 17% battery degradation assuming these numbers are right
- DC lifetime charge: 2149 kWh
- AC lifetime charge: 9207 kWh
- Regenerated lifetime charge: 2813 kWh
- Energy use: 8968 kWh
- Stationary energy use: 1513 kWh
Service appointments: 6
- Sept 2018:
- Address Issues from delivery
- Scratches on the hood
- Budging rubber seals on rear door (they just put hockey tape over it...)
- Small paint chips
- Panel + headlight misalignment
- Address Issues from delivery
- Jan 2020
- Address Issues from delivery
- Provide Dual Motor Performance badge missing from delivery (I debadged the car, so they didn't install them. although they forgot to give me the red underline)
- Scratches on the chrome trim around the door (replaced)
- Budging rubber seals on rear door (replaced)
- Service bulletins
- Replace charge port pin deadfronts
- Adjust hood latch
- Replace battery breathers (Was having very noticeable banging during winter charging and driving)
- Other
- Phone As Key very unreliable at times, but service unable to do anything about it. Got better at some point in the future when I bought a new phone, but then an Android system update seem to have made it bad again. It was especially bad near the rear right side of the car (not enough antennae coverage in the car there I'm told)
- Address Issues from delivery
- June 2020
- Install HW 3 computer
- Dec 2021
- Warranty Covered Repair
- Replaced Inverter - Rear Drive Unit after getting BMS_a035 error
- Seal trunk lid after water ingress that would slosh around in there
- Warranty Covered Repair
- April 2022
- Service bulletins
- Seal Upper Control Arm Ball Joints
- Warranty Covered Repair
- Replaced PCS after getting PCS_a019 error during AC charging
- Service bulletins
- July 2022
- Insurance covered windshield replacement (rock chip + crack)
- Pending Service Bulletins:
- Rear harness recall (waiting on parts, for almost a year now...)
At some point I had a service appointment scheduled about the concerning amount of battery degradation i was seeing as my VIN was also close to a window where there were many cars with known battery lifetime issues, but the service team cancelled my appointment. I guess this is becoming more interesting with the recent news about the service team celebrating cancelling these types of appointments.
Other Tesla experiences:
- I ordered 2 wall connectors in Dec 2021 to install and get a tax rebate before the end of the year. I received them promptly, but one of them was very clearly not in the original box, and was dead on arrival. I contacted Tesla support multiple times over the next month or two to get a replacement, but other than someone asking for pictures I never got a response. I ended up having to put a claim in with my credit card company to get the cost refunded, and didn't get a replacement ordered until the end of April. At least in that time the price had dropped substantially, so I ended up saving a bit of money for the wait and hassle.
Summary:
Overall I've been really happy with with the car. Now that it is out of warranty I do worry about the upcoming maintenance a lot more. I have heard of many people having the AC charging issues and it is $2k to fix out of pocket. I'm lucky I noticed my issues just before the warranty period was over. I'd like to think that they have installed improved parts, but I've heard of new M3s with the same issues, so that seems unlikely.
The battery degradation also seems like an issue, although unfortunately at the current rate not one that will be bad enough to hit the 30% loss threshold by the time the warranty is up at 8 years. I'm predicting I will have 29.99999% battery loss when the warranty expires Hopefully it has leveled off and will not get much worse. The low efficiency plus the battery loss means realistically I only have 150-200 miles of range. Fortunately we got our refresh Model X last year, so I generally don't use the Model 3 for road trips any more. I just hope it doesn't end up with the same kind of battery issues, otherwise I might be done with Tesla.