I have always fancied a Model S but settled on the I3 because of where Jayne parked at work, after we bought it the car park was handed back and the building is going the same way so working from home is now the norm! Should have bought the model S shame I couldnt see into the future

 

Hope you are planning on keeping this thread updated. This could be fascinating.

 

You are referring to doorbingate?

 

EPB. You can push P once lightly to get the auto hold. I was expecting that you'd be able to just press the accelerator and just get going but it seems to want the full brake pedal push and put it back into drive. This is a bit irritating. Also had a warning about parking brake not releasing properly when I used it the second time which isn't great. Every other EPB car I've had just lets you drive off and it drops the brake off as you set off. Is there a setting I've missed that would enable it to be a bit more normal?

When you come to a stop, try pushing the brake pedal hard after the car has stopped - you should see a symbol come up to tell you it's now in "hold". Then drive off with the throttle. Hold may need enabling in settings.

 

Excellent. I thought it had it. I'm sure the P button said Hold as well when I used it but maybe it didn't.

 

Out of interest, have you gone into this with a "war chest" to fix any of the common faults on these older cars?

 

It's just been bought from a specialist so I'd think anything serious that fails in the first few months would be on them. Rest of issues seem partly due to lack of proper maintenance schedule. It will get serviced by Cleevely Mobile as soon as possible so I'm sure they'll identify any issues that need sorting out.

MCU has already been upgraded to the MCU2 as well.

Money pits are my favourite kinds of cars so yes, there is spare money to fix things

 

The early Model S didn't have Auto Hold. Tesla introduced a software fix using the motor which has a simliar effect, but it's not the same. The refresh (2017+) introduced the i-boost braking system which has auto hold.

 

One slight mystery. I have set mirrors to not auto fold. They weren't when Ieft the car last night but in the middle of the night they folded themselves in. What would do that?

 

It might be a profile thing - most settings are saved in your user profile, and things like that need to be set in all profiles.

 

I will be watching this thread with much interest as I have been contemplating the same course for some time. The price of Model S's are now very attractive for some early cars. There are loads around between £25k and £35k. Some with surprisingly low mileages. And some with legacy free supercharging. With an option of a base MG or a bells n whistles Model S at similar prices there is much to ponder.

 

Do you have warranty, do you still have free supercharging?
Who will service the car?

Very interesting topic OP!

 

Servicing is likely to be Cleevely Mobile. Their main workshop is too far and I want someone with a good clue to work on it. Tyres/suspension I could probably arm twist my usual independent to do for me.

Not sure about free supercharging. It ought to but there's so many ways Tesla can pinch it that I won't assume it would stay (annoying) Hopefully premium connectivity would stay with it as that's arguably more useful as who doesn't want to watch netflix while they're charging?

 

Hopefully premium connectivity would stay with it as that's arguably more useful as who doesn't want to watch netflix while they're charging?

That should remain, but I don't think Netflix is supported in the early cars? It wasn't in my 2017 Model X.

 

Will you get CCS upgrade? Or can you live with home + superchargers.

 

I'm likely to get the CCS upgrade as some of the new superchargers are Tesla CCS only. I've got a chademo adaptor so I'm going to see what that is like as well. The CCS one seems to be far less cumbersome. The chademo one looks like you need a box to stand it on to take the cable weight.

 

The Chademo adaptor is limited to 125A, so even on >50kW Chademo chargers you won't be able to charge at more than 43kW or so.

The CCS adaptor is capable of much higher currents. Higher than the max charge rate of a 2014 S (120kW?).

 

I didn't see anyone reply about the wipers, sorry if I missed it. Being an early car you'll have the good old fashioned and highly reliable rain sensor. The stalk determines the function with off, long gap, shorter gap, no gap and fast. AP2 cars have the "who needs a sensor when the camera's can see the rain" version.

Re free Supercharging, I think that may have been a purchase option at the time. Only a test will tell and if the car ownership has passed through Tesla's hands if it was free it might not be anymore.

I'd defo go for the CCS adapter, its £280 including whatever needs replacing under the rear seat whihc is part of the modification. Night and day using that instead of the heavyweight CHAdeMo, and condsiderably faster. As you mention, new sites are CCS, mostly 100% CCS and £280 is good value for the future proofing.

 

Also, what sort of supercharging speeds are you expecting? I've heard some horror stories about Tesla downrating.

 

I was getting around 60-70kw but it was an unplanned stop. I think you have to be on fumes to get the 100kw speeds.

 

Not necessarily fumes, but the battery has to be in exactly the right state (temperature wise) to take maximum charging speed. This can take much longer than anticipated in terms of driving time (2 hours+ in the cold) and may require preconditioning which requires setting the supercharger as a destination in the navigation. If the battery is well conditioned for charging then it should be quick even to 30-40% SoC.

Many reports of slow charging are because someone sets off to a supercharger 20 minutes from home without setting it in nav and then wonder why they're only getting 38kW into a stone-cold battery. Teslas are notably more picky about battery temperature and charge rates than a lot of other EVs, but since the typical use case should be that a supercharger is something that you use when you're a few hours into your journey then it shouldn't be a problem in normal use.

Edit: the other thing that leads to these reports is the change in behaviour. Over the years Tesla have learned a LOT more about when the batteries can and can not take high charge rates and through software updates have changed the charging behaviour. Many people are unaware of the changes or why they have occurred and all they see is that where they used to get fast charging they no longer do (as Tesla significantly reduced cold-battery charge rates about 18 months ago) - many interpret this as "my car has been totally limited to a low charge rate" without testing the battery when hot/preheated. Reports of low charge rate are very seasonal with the weather. There was also a period of time where charge rates were limited during an ongoing investigation into battery safety and they were restored later (minus the low temperature caveat). Many of those with free supercharging have used this in lieu of home charging and thus are used to making a short journey to a local supercharger and end up experiencing the low charge rate problem.

 

Is there a minimum battery percentage for pre conditioning the cabin when the S is unplugged?

 

Every time I left a Tesla (S and 3) unplugged overnight with a decent SoC, I was treated to a “Christmas tree” on the dashboard the next morning and no autopilot.

Someone will be along shortly to tell me how I had the only two bad Tesla’s on the planet

 

Been watching the hoovies garage with the 2013 knackered out of warranty battery model S.

I'd suspect the 12v drain is silly and that's why you are supposed to leave them plugged in. If the 12v wasn't buried I'd pop a Bluetooth battery monitor on it to see.

 

I'd suspect the 12v drain is silly and that's why you are supposed to leave them plugged in. If the 12v wasn't buried I'd pop a Bluetooth battery monitor on it to see.

The main pack keeps the 12v charged so that's not a problem - except if the car is below 20% then I believe it stops charging the 12v and that's when the 12v battery can start to suffer.

 

That explains a lot actually. Damn shame if you’re staying somewhere without a charger though - I’ve never known any other EV to panic after one night of standing in the cold 😆

 

Left mine plugged in. It's in full sun without a sun shade at the moment. Put the cabin over heat protection thing on so hopefully that will stop the insides melting too much.

I assume when it's left standing in the cold it likes to heat the batteries so if it's not plugged in it will be anxious about being left too long. Bless.

 

These cars withstand the heat of California and cars are designed not to melt when sitting in high temperatures. Using cabin overheat is a waste of energy. We only worry about it now because we have a temperature readout.

If you can leave the car plugged in then that's just a good habit to get into, and when plugged in any preconditioning will use shore power. If that's not posssible or a drag e.g. if you have an untethered point, I personally wouldn't leave the car sitting at below 20%. As the battery cools the energy available reduces and you might find on returning to the car you've only 10%. I've read plenty of stories of people stopping close to home to do a bit of shopping with 10% left only to return 1/2 hour latter and be down to 5%. That can be a bit sweaky!

As for overnight drain, my '17 S75D lost about 1% overnight and my '20 S LR doesn't even lose that. So long as you don't keep waking the car by checking the app it's no big deal. I'm not sure if your car has Sentry (prob not) but that's a battery killer.

 

Sorry I have to ask. Life without door bins?

What's the reference?

 

The Model S doesn't have door bins - the usual space at the bottom of the door card to leave random crap in

 

The kind of crap I find my kids put in the door bins, not having them could actually be a benefit. One less place to clean. Getting an old model S is really tempting, but I guess they don't make great city cars! Will probably have to wait for the Model C(ompact)

 

so dear OP, what is the actual range 7 years down the line? Is it still a long cruiser?

 

I think it's 200 odd miles. I've got use to the Corsa starting with 200 and actually getting nowhere near it so if this starts with 220 from 100% and actually gets that it's a massive improvement. With the navigation estimate it feels so much less of a concern. I generally just make sure I have 40 or 50 miles more than I need on a long journey to avoid any mishap.

It's definitely a cruiser and with the integration with superchargers range isn't much of a concern. I've also got a chademo adapter so I can stop at normal chargers anyway. I was mostly thinking 'wow this is massive isn't it' on the way home so I didn't pay that much attention

 

Here's the text from the email:

Our records indicate that you own, or previously owned, a Model S or a Model X built before March 2018. Your vehicle is subject to conditions covered under the 8GB embedded MultiMediaCard (eMMC) recall that addresses the malfunction of the eMMC memory chip due to accumulated wear.​

If you previously paid out-of-pocket for the specific part and condition covered by the recall, and the repair was within the 8GB eMMC Recall period, you may be eligible for reimbursement.​

To submit your reimbursement, please complete the eMMC reimbursement request form. You will be prompted to log into your Tesla Account to access the form. Once you have submitted the required information, we will review your claim and notify you of your reimbursement eligibility within 60 days of receipt. If we require additional information, we will contact you directly.​

Please note, your local Tesla Service Centres and Customer Support teams do not have the ability to track or process reimbursement requests.​

Thank you for being a Tesla customer, and we apologise for the inconvenience.​

I assume this is the bit that causes the issues?

 

Here's the text from the email:



I assume this is the bit that causes the issues?

That only relates to the cost of replacing the eMMC assuming you had already had that done - not the cost of the MCU2 upgrade. The eMMC replacement was available from Tesla briefly at a cost of around £450 - I tried to get mine done at the time but due to shortages and backlog of failed eMMC's they would only change it if it had actually failed. After much tooing and froing Tesla accepted the need for a recall and agreed to change the eMMC when/if it fails and to refund the equivilent cost of the eMMC replacement for those who had it done outside Tesla.

As stated earlier, the eMMC replacement only put the MCU back into its original state, albeit with a higher memory card capacity = less prone to same failure. They do not and have not offered MCU2 upgrades at their cost, worse still, there are many examples of people who have elected to upgrade to MCU2 preemptively who have had no refund at all because their eMMC hadn't actually failed.

Tesla were pushing the MCU2 upgrade really hard when I was trying to get my eMMC changed as my screen was on its way out. In the event I took a similar approach to you and sold the car instead.

 

Ah, didn’t realise they were different replacements. I thought they just replaced the whole MCU.

Oh well. Next Tesla won’t have that problem.

 

Yep, sadly the eMMC is an 'embedded multi-media card', in other words an SD card soldered into the main board. All they did was pull out the failed 8GB card and stick in a 64GB card instead. They wouldn't even offer the cost of the eMMC replacement (£450) as a discount on the MCU2 upgrade, hence me and many others losing the plot.

 

Checked the trip meter thingy and it says 235 miles and 66.4 kWh used which is roughly 3.5 miles per kWh. Showing about 190 miles as it's roughly 80% I think now. Left it plugged in.

Annoyingly approach door handles popping out to say hello don't seem to work. Also it's forgotten my phone. Had to reconnect it from the car end. It was just connecting automatically It's the only phone set so it's a bit stupid.

Checked the key fob update and it was up to date

Still waiting for app access. Turned folding mirrors back on to see if it's a strange glitch that's causing other features not to work. Bit of a faff to keep fishing the key out of my pocket rather than just grabbing a door handle. Key has this weird cover on it. Wonder if that's reducing the key signal?

Not using comfort access either.