Tesla Roadster Ownership

Kevin Sharpe said:

ok...

Motor overheating when racing... really needs to be liquid cooled.

Brakes are not up to super car quality... you need to be able to stop quickly!

Three Phase charging... it's a pain plugging into a 22kW Charging Station and sipping at 7kW. This is really noticeable in Europe where 11kW charging is common and charges the Roadster at just 3.5kW.

Custom Charging Connector... requires adaptors for Type 2 infrastructure (although it's also great that nobody else can use the HPCs so this isn't really a frustration ).

Elon Musk has promised us some major Roadster updates this year and it's possible that will include some of the above

Click to expand...

In a mere 2 months / 1K miles ownership, I'd agree with this.

I followed US owners on TMC, and just added carbotech pads .. a big improvement on brakes.
Also Neil Wise, (ex Tesla UK top Technician) has done several updates, including brakes to racing VX220 spec's

Noise was one of the reasons I didn't buy new (along with the obvious £££ needed), Gian's Demo car (green) did not have soundproof kit and was pretty rattly/noisy - kinda off putting. My car had the kit fitted, and also now various squeaks and creaks have been traced and silenced - I'm pretty pleased with sound levels (on long M'Way cruises). But tyre and wind noise could be better - US owners on TMC are reporting Michellin's are better for noise.

The interior build quality is more 'hand-made' (Ok leather stitching etc.) but not super neat, and of the kind of quality that you see on production 80's say Jags. I'd prefer BMW, Nissan, and Audi/Porsche levels of 'production' fit and finish, rather than 'Lotus' (however.. I'm huge lotus fan for handling tho' ... its THE best, eg Elise, Exege, Evora and 60's Elan .. and not nec at illegal speeds - just great steering 'feel').

More comments to follow .. testing in transit is such a tough job

So just before my cars 4th Birthday (1st July) I arrive home to this error message on Friday...



I thought it might be the infamous PEM overheating message but it seemed unlikely because I had the latest hardware upgrades. I cleaned out the PEM fans anyway but no change in the error message.

At 19:57 on Friday I emailed the Tesla UK workshop looking for suggestions on possible workarounds. I thought they might acknowledge the email on Saturday but more likely on Monday morning which I thought was reasonable. I settled down with a beer and started looking through the web for possible solutions.

At 20:30 on Friday evening Simon Whittock (Tesla Regional Service Manager UK & Ireland) called me and we had a discussion about possible workarounds which I tried. With no luck he asked me to send him the car logs which he'd review on Saturday... he apologised for the delay but said they were busy preparing 150 Model S for delivery this week.

On Saturday morning Simon confirmed that they would need to undertake some work on the car and it would be quicker this week to recover the car rather than send out a mobile unit. He said they would try to pick it up on Saturday but Monday was more likely. He also said they'd happily undertake the MOT at the same time to "save me the bother".

This Morning (Monday) The Roadster was put into the transporter and will be delivered to West Drayton tomorrow for work to start. They had planned to complete the work in time for The Eco Technology Show on Wednesday but @Alexander Sims stepped up and lent ZCW his car and therefore I can give Tesla more time to complete the work

As always, Tesla blow my mind with their commitment to customer service and I think every car company in the world should take lessons from them