Tesla Model 3 News
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After a spate of crashes involving drivers using Tesla's Autopilot system, the press is awash in speculation about its effectiveness. Now the IIHS, which rates accident avoidance systems across many automakers, has given the Tesla Model 3 its highest rating of "Superior" in its front crash prevention tests. DON'T MISS: Report: Tesla rejected additional driver sensors for Autopilot The IIHS gives three ratings for forward collision avoidance systems: It verifies whether car has a forward collision warning system that meets the standards of the NHTSA, with an adequate alert to the driver when...
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Tesla Model 3 software updates revealed
As Tesla has been working to ramp up assembly of its more affordable Model 3 sedan, the company has also been adding features to existing examples with its over the air software updates. We spoke with Tesla to learn the extent of updates and found five updates that have been rolled out to existing...
Eric C. Evarts -
Elon Musk says all-wheel-drive, Performance Model 3s will be available to order this week
In a tweet response Friday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that buyers waiting to order a Model 3 with all-wheel drive or the Performance package can begin placing their orders by the end of this week. Last month, Musk had said that the Dual Motor all-wheel-drive and Performance versions of the Model 3...
Eric C. Evarts -
Tesla shuts down Model 3 production for five days amid quality concerns
The company says the shutdown has been long-planned and that it will not affect the ramp-up in Model 3 production to the company's long-promised 5,000 cars a week.
Eric C. Evarts -
Some Tesla Model 3 cars haunted by "phantom touch" and "vampire draw" (updated)
At this point, the variable build quality of early Tesla Model 3 electric cars has been well documented. One of the main issues is the "phantom touch" on the car's all-important central display. The phantom touch is what Green Car Reports reader Jeff Southern of Atlanta suffered in his car before...
Eric C. Evarts -
When will Tesla Model 3 all-wheel-drive, lower-range models be available?
Musk says the problem is that adding additional configurations with all-wheel drive would make production so much more complicated that it would jeopardize the company's ability to build up Model 3 production to levels that would bring in the revenue the company needs to stay afloat.
Eric C. Evarts -
Tesla reported Tuesday that it built 34,494 electric cars in the first quarter of 2018, by far its largest quarterly production total ever. But all eyes were on one number: the production of Model 3 sedans, which was 9,766 vehicles out of that total. Of the rest, 11,730 were Model S hatchback sedans and 10,070 were Model X crossover utility vehicles. DON'T MISS: 2018 Tesla Model 3 Long Range: first drive review of 310-mile electric car For more than eight months after the first Model 3 cars were delivered to buyers at the end of July 2017, Tesla has struggled to get Model 3 production rates...
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2018 Tesla Model 3 Long Range: first drive review of 310-mile electric car
“The Tesla Model S was a moment. The Model 3 is a product.” That pair of sentences perfectly summarized the several hours we spent last month with the 2018 Tesla Model 3 kindly loaned to us by reader Jeff Southern of Atlanta. We’d covered more than 100 miles on a variety of...
John Voelcker -
Tesla employees say Model 3 parts need substantial rework after production
Electric-car maker Tesla is known for troubled launches, at least for the four products it's offered since the first Roadster in 2008. But the launch of the Tesla Model 3, its lower-priced electric sedan, may be the most challenging yet—and it may be the Tesla with the highest expectations...
John Voelcker -
Tesla Model 3 quality is terrible, but will it matter to buyers?
So we've finally had the chance to spend time with a 2018 Tesla Model 3, courtesy of a generous and devoted Green Car Reports reader. We'll have our first-drive report and a full review of the car within a day or two—but that's not what this article is about. The build quality of the early...
John Voelcker -
Tesla now makes almost 1,000 Model 3s a week, Bloomberg tracker estimates
Production numbers for Tesla electric cars have always been slightly murky. The company announces deliveries only quarterly and refuses to break them down by country, meaning there are no sales figures that directly compare with those routinely issued by other makers. The Tesla Model 3 has endured...
John Voelcker -
"Overall, I think, while there were challenges associated with Model 3 ramp, we were in a deeper level of hell than we expected, so a few levels deeper than we'd like to be, but swiftly exiting, I think." Those chastened but seemingly optimistic words came from the CEO of Tesla, Elon Musk, during a conference call discussing the company's full-year 2017 financial results on Wednesday afternoon. Following that call, however, customers who had put down reservations for the Tesla Model 3 noticed their projected delivery dates had changed. DON'T MISS: Tesla Model 3: what parts breakdown says...
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Tesla Model 3: what parts breakdown says about high-volume electric car
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has aspirations of vertically integrating his companies as much as possible, trying to avoid traditional suppliers wherever he can. While Tesla has been successful in developing things like their electric motors in-house, the company still relies on others for many of the...
Bozi Tatarevic -
Tesla Model 3 Long Range rating of 310 miles: Is it understated?
Amidst all the coverage on Wednesday of the Tesla Model 3 production numbers, we realized we'd forgotten one piece of the Model 3 saga. That would be the official EPA range and efficiency ratings for the 2017 Tesla Model 3 Long Range version. Those were issued at the end of November, and they...
John Voelcker -
What was our most important story of 2017? Twitter poll results
Year-end roundups are an unavoidable necessity of the media business. They let editors and writers opine, and they fill space when there may be little real news. They also serve the more valuable function of forcing a longer-term perspective on the hundreds of news items a month that flow through...
John Voelcker -
What was the most important green-car story of 2017? Take our Twitter poll
Lists, news roundups, and general reflections are the usual order of business as a calendar year comes to a close. We've published more than 1,600 green-car news stories so far during 2017, and it's proven to be quite a year. In the car market at large, the most notable trend was a continued move...
John Voelcker -
Tesla Model 3: impressions of a BMW i3 driver (and reservation holder)
With DC fast charging fully electric vehicles can be charged to around 80% of their full battery capacity in under 30 minutes
Tom Moloughney -
Competition for the title of most popular electric car has sparked a long and highly charged race between Tesla and Chevrolet. Though these brands offer vastly different versions of electric vehicles, they seem to be the two dominating electric vehicle sales in 2017. Reports show that top monthly electric car sales rotated between the Chevy Volt, the Chevy Bolt EV, and the Tesla Model S for the majority of the year. DON'T MISS: Plug-in electric car sales for Nov: Volt vs Prime neck-and-neck, Bolt EV just misses 3K The Tesla Model S is the current winner of overall sales for 2017, but the...
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How many Model 3s will Tesla deliver by Dec 31? Twitter poll results, again
What a difference a few months makes. In June, one month before the delivery of the first 30 Tesla Model 3, we polled our Twitter followers on how many of the lower-priced electric cars Tesla would deliver by the end of this year. The view then was pretty rosy, with more than half the respondents...
John Voelcker -
Configuring a Tesla Model 3: buyer walks through the process with us
Very few of the 455,000 people who put down $1,000 to reserve a place in line for the Tesla Model 3 electric car have received the opportunity yet to configure their cars online and place a firm order. The volume of Model 3s is still apparently at low numbers—a few hundred last month...
John Voelcker -
Tesla Model 3 Long Range electric car tested by Motor Trend
Within the last week, we wrote that not one major automotive media outlet had independently tested the less-expensive and higher-volume Tesla Model 3. That changed on Monday, when Motor Trend published the first instrumented test of Tesla's affordable electric car. This gives us the first...
Sean Szymkowski -
How many Model 3s will Tesla deliver by Dec 31? Take our Twitter poll, again
More than five months ago, before the 2017 Tesla Model 3 officially launched, we published the results of a poll asking how many of the lower-priced electric cars would be delivered by the end of this year. Survey respondents on Twitter were optimistic, with more than half suggesting Tesla would...
John Voelcker -
Tesla Model 3 video review compares lower-priced electric car to Model S
There have been no full reviews of the 2017 Tesla Model 3 to date by automotive media outlets, meaning professional test drivers spend a few days with the car putting it through a standard battery of tests. A few early video reviews, apparently by owners, have also vanished from the Internet...
John Voelcker