Telsa - affordable fleet vehicle (Yes! That's right)

WOW what an experience! Having only driven one other EV, I may not be best placed to review this vehicle, however, I took the opportunity as a personal learning experience.

It’s often said that Telsa is a luxury vehicle and whilst it drives like one, loaded with technology I’ve never used before, the pricing has reduced and made these vehicles very affordable, even for fleets!!

So, before I kick off explaining my experience, I wanted to highlight pricing - Model 3 has a range of 383kms – so if you are looking at taking a trip to Falls Creek from Melbourne, this is achievable on one charge, starting price is $57,400, the Model Y being the more expensive and a great range of 533kms starting at $65,400. I say starting as you can unlock further technology i.e., auto pilot and other features for more $$$$$.

My colleague gave me the Model Y with 129kms on it, I thought ‘no worries’, that will get me to the 50Kw charger that’s just over a kilometre from my house, easy! 50Kw free for an hour charge, which is a massive bonus. Well, NO……. the charger was down and has been for a while! Next step was to look at plugshare – not sure if you read my Kia Niro EV blog, but that was a message left on the vehicle to help me locate a charger in any area I am in - https://www.plugshare.com/map/australia

I found a few chargers close to home, all of which were not in use, but broken for one reason or another. The reason for using these chargers, they are more powerful and personally for me, my garage at home is very small.

?I had no choice but to plug the vehicle in at home, complete with extension cable and an open garage overnight (lucky I live in a quiet and safe area). The trickle charge was sufficient to get me to 255kms, which was enough to take the vehicle to some prospects and get to work 1st August, however, until I see my new power bill, I have no idea how much it costed me.

I love the Tesla APP, being able to heat the seats, steering wheel, and car before getting into it on a cold morning, really is a novelty and one I enjoyed. ?Also being able to open the boot, put the vehicle in dog mode, while my little mate was in the boot, this may be ideal for keeping the vehicle at a temperature, while you duck into a shop for 10 minutes and I am thinking about this more in summer!

I enjoyed the touch screen for everything in the vehicle – Spotify, climate control, etc.

My biggest dislike – I prefer using Waze as my navigation tool, and not being able to connect to that from my phone to the vehicle, was a little frustrating, the navigation in the Telsa is fine but not as efficient in my opinion. I would like Telsa to either introduce Waze as an APP.

All in all – the driving experience is great, the panoramic sunroof allows maximum light into the vehicle, I didn’t at any time get range anxiety, as I could clearly see what KMs were available.

I would recommend paying for home charging for those that are doing more KMs per day, i.e. 100kms. The investment is worth it and less hassle than relying on public charging stations.

What is really needed, is the chargers that are around, need to be working more than not.?