RE: New Tesla Model 3 Performance gets 510hp

The modern day equivalent of a Peugeot 405 Mi-16.

Though nowhere near as much fun.

Funny people being muddled by 'OG'.

Would love a new TM3P. Had a TM3LR, after decades of VW, Volvo, Audi, Lexus, Toyota, BMW cars. But the TM3 is by far the most fun and nice to live with.

None of the made up arguments against them, from people who've never owned one really matter to me or usually are even valid.

As far as I can make out the biggest issue with this new version is the lack of stalks.

Will this new Performance version cause the previous version to drop a little further in price, early Performance models are already around the £20k which makes for a lot of performance for the money.

What do you expect PH to do, they exist in a large part to deliver automotive news (by definition this is generally about new vehicles)? Unless you hadn't noticed, the ICE chapter is very rapidly reaching an end and therefore, unsurprisingly, an ever increasing amount of new vehicles coming to market are EV due to the manufacturers recognising 5-10 years ago which way things were going.

Is the penny finally dropping that EVs aren't just a passing fad? By all means stick with ICE vehicles yourself, but I don't think you can expect an automotive news website to remain stuck in the past.

In 15 years i foresee heaps of these laid up while everyone tries to work out how they should be sustainably disposed of..

still fugly, like a 90's jelly mould. Still has the fisher price interior, still made by the man-baby company, still sales are falling. But it is fast once or twice in a straight line. Muricans gonna love it.

I've never, in 20k miles per year, seen an EV being driven noticeably differently than an ICE car.

I haven't seen one ripping the tyres off around a country lane, but I've never seen a Ford Mondeo do that either.

I drive mine like a normal car....because it is a normal car. It just has different propulsion.

Best efficiency during acceleration is less valuable to consumption than during cruise, simply due to the duty cycle of each.
ICEs tend to produce peak efficiency at close to maximum torque and in the lower half of the rev range.
Conversely, traction motor/drive systems can be designed with maximum efficiency at partial torque and at higher rpms.
The later is better suited to passenger car use.
One of the reasons why ICEs are fitted with multi-ratio gearboxes to try to keep the engine closer to its peak efficiency most of the time.
The other is to have sufficient power at lower rpms to accelerate the car, but by virtue of the multi-gearing resulting in a saw-tooth profile with respect to road speed, you can end up with excess power at high rpms in low gears.
This goes some way to explaining countless hedge excursions in high-powered ICEs, particularly 2WD/RWD.

Anyway back to the acceleration run for the EV.
The decay in torque in the upper rpm region of the motor is primarily due to the 'field weakening' techniques used to provide sufficient headroom between the battery voltage and motor back-emf.
The drives work on the principle you describe up to peak power, fixed torque, fixed current, frequency and voltage increasing with speed.
For most EVs, to keep the current at manageable levels and achieve a high torque to mass ratio for the motor the windings are chosen such that back-emf gets close to battery voltage in the 0-60 mph range.
Above this speed, the back-emf is 'suppressed' by various methods, either by the drive, or in some cases (e.g. BMW) the rotor is brushed and the field is weakened by reducing the current flowing in the rotor windings.
Anyway, the weaker field means less torque at maximum current, and the power output remains quasi-fixed.
This doesn't compromise efficiency during cruise, as the torque required for that at typical motorway speed is still well below the maximum torque curve.
This 'electrical gearing' method avoids the need for a mechanical gearchange.
Some manufacturers opt for 2 mechanical ratios of course, for further optimisation and/or preserving maximum wheel torque at high road speeds, for ultra high speed performance.
The acceleration appeal for many EV brands, including Teslas, tend to be more about the 0-60 run, so the focus is on closely matching road speed to power output in that run.
This chart for the Plaid shows is clearly.



Regarding the drag power consumption, as mentioned before, the power is proportional to speed cubed which results in the consumption due to drag being square law relationship between energy per mile and speed. Minimising CdA is therefore top of the agenda for both average efficiency of the car and increasing the top speed for a given power output.
It becomes even more acute during cold weather because the air density increases and so does the drag, partly explaining the poorer winter range we all love to get animated about.

This latest model 3 has an improved Cd of nearly 5% lower, so maybe those bemoaning the looks should consider that it's most likely a result of how mother nature wants the car to look.

I see beauty in the pursuit of engineering excellence, and my own personal feeling towards Teslas is not one of desire but of respect for the quality of engineering, boring I know!

Still needs either a HUD or small instrument cluster in front of the driver for key details like speed. Such a simple thing to add, it’s nuts something touted as so futuristic doesn’t have a HUD

We all have opinions and for me the Teslas are a bit nondescript albeit they speak to the brand, nether good nor bad. i think the grilles on the new BMWs are horrendously ugly. However the BMW Z4 i find quite aesthetically pleasing. Most McLarens are pretty grim excluding the original F1. Ferrari however seem to have it nailed.

Basically it is in the eye of the beholder.

I'm pleased that Tesla are pushing forward and trying to improve their cars which in turn keeps the pressure on European manufactures. The cheaper Chinese stuff fits with the buyers that can afford that price point.