Tesla Model S 85D
Discussion
bolidemichael said:
I also noticed in the link to voice commands that a voice instruction is 'Okay Elon' 
That is in the list of things the Author thought it ought to have so does not work…. yet.
July 2020
I have driven the Tesla very little since March as I have been working from home since lockdown, and since getting the Chimaera back on the road I have been using that when it has not been raining. However that will change – a bit, 1st work have reopened the office so I will be back in once or twice a week and secondly we decided to sell the family Volvo XC90 as we no longer need 7 seats and used the funds to buy and insure a little VW Polo my Daughter can learn to drive on as it turns out as Teslas and TVRs are not appropriate for learner drivers! I am pleased that I managed to sell the Volvo for £2.5K more than I was offered in part exchange before lock down!
Unfortunately the insensitive touch screen on the Tesla struck again so I booked it into EV-Link again for a new screen – $550 including VAT from Tesla for the screen itself and £72 for the fitting. I have kept the screen for some further investigations. Gary at EV-Link is still working through a MCU memory chip failures and new ones are coming to him every day.
I have now had to install the Tesla App on Mrs Spunagain’s phone so A) she will always know where I am and B) She can get her own back and turn up the cabin temperature remotely when I am driving it. This led to another family milestone - Mrs Spunagain went up to visit her family on her own - 1st long road trip without me and it went without a hitch. Definitely not just my car now.
Another small thing, at some point the front bumper got grazed, so while getting the Volvo door scrape tided up by the local Smart repair guy, I got the Tesla bumper done too.
September
Uh oh - after a trip to deepest Essex to visit an old school friend, I got home and a couple of warning messages flashed up on the small display:
Acceleration and Top speed reducedPerformance may be restored on next drive.
and
Vehicle may not start Service is required.
In the notifications window on the main display it added the codes BMS_u008 and BMS_w172 to the 2 messages. So I left it for a bit and had to collect my daughter an hour or so later, but errors still there and while driving there was no battery regeneration at all.
I did a firmware reset and left it a day and it is still there
I removed the front “engine” cover and checked the battery coolant level which was fine. The 12V battery was fine at 13.7V.A little googling suggests it could be either
- Dead motor (Yay under guarantee)
- Dead main battery (as above)
- Dead battery coolant hater (boo not covered and probably a few hundred quid)
Place your bets!
I took the car in to the Service Centre last week and the problem was as I suspected - the battery coolant heater had died. It actually took 5 hours to replace but I was charged for one and a half hours as quoted when I arrived. Total cost with VAT was £727.30. I was able to work in the customer waiting room with fast enough WiFi to do conference calls over IP (all masked up of course!)
I have also noticed that since the last FW update I get the odd erroneous warning that a window is open on the phone app. I was advised to see what happens over the next couple of updates rather than paying for investigations which may not show up anything physically wrong.
I can also report that you can fit a superking mattress folded in to two into the back with the rear seats down, so not regretting selling the Volvo yet!
I have also noticed that since the last FW update I get the odd erroneous warning that a window is open on the phone app. I was advised to see what happens over the next couple of updates rather than paying for investigations which may not show up anything physically wrong.
I can also report that you can fit a superking mattress folded in to two into the back with the rear seats down, so not regretting selling the Volvo yet!
Just hit 80,000 miles with nothing much to report. We just spent a week on the Isle of Wight with the car and we got a discount on the ferry for having an electric car. The place we stayed - Rookley Farm Park, did not have dedicated chargers but were happy for me to hang my Granny charger cable out of the window which was great as the car was parked right outside the cottage. This ensured we had no problems with keeping charged which was a relief as when checking out the public chargers on the island, I found nothing but awful reviews for the associated apps or web based access for those providers.
On another topic a security specialist friend of mine sent me this https://youtu.be/BMy7O2RNe20 which is a Pentest partners talk on the Tesla model S over the air update methodology. It is interesting from a technical point of view with a summary of “it feels like it is held together with sticky tape, but is fundamentally secure without physical access to the main controller board”. However an interesting aside was that the Model S OBD port does nothing except provide power, whereas a normal car provides limited access to the cars ECU which provides some diagnostic data and limited commands to get fault codes etc. Tesla do provide a dedicated Tesla connector which provides direct unfiltered access to all 5 oF the car’s CAN busses. You can buy a connector which connects the drive train CAN bus to a Bluetooth OBD dongle which allows you to see lots of interesting stuff. However the presenter pointed out that this bus is unfiltered and that most Bluetooth dongles are not secure with the Bluetooth PIN hard wired to 1234 so if you drive about with it connected you are vulnerable to someone being able to control your drive train remotely - so don’t do that!
On another topic a security specialist friend of mine sent me this https://youtu.be/BMy7O2RNe20 which is a Pentest partners talk on the Tesla model S over the air update methodology. It is interesting from a technical point of view with a summary of “it feels like it is held together with sticky tape, but is fundamentally secure without physical access to the main controller board”. However an interesting aside was that the Model S OBD port does nothing except provide power, whereas a normal car provides limited access to the cars ECU which provides some diagnostic data and limited commands to get fault codes etc. Tesla do provide a dedicated Tesla connector which provides direct unfiltered access to all 5 oF the car’s CAN busses. You can buy a connector which connects the drive train CAN bus to a Bluetooth OBD dongle which allows you to see lots of interesting stuff. However the presenter pointed out that this bus is unfiltered and that most Bluetooth dongles are not secure with the Bluetooth PIN hard wired to 1234 so if you drive about with it connected you are vulnerable to someone being able to control your drive train remotely - so don’t do that!
Edited by Spunagain on Sunday 1st November 15:49
Compared to most cars, Teslas are relatively secure; they were designed with security in mind, given that they’re a new manufacturer and are considered as somewhat of a gold standard for automotive, especially by pen testers who want the notoriety of finding problems...
Edited by yajeed on Sunday 1st November 20:39
Edited by yajeed on Sunday 1st November 20:39
February 2021
Good news! In November I got an email from Tesla to say the MCU memory issue is covered by warranty and a recall and I should get details in March for claiming back the costs I paid to replace the memory chip earlier last year.
I also I noticed on one of the more recent FW updates the fix I really wanted came in. The streaming media player now remembers where you were on a track or podcast, so if you go to listen to the radio or something else, you can go back to where you left off when you go back to the original track. Great for podcasts when Mrs Spunagain takes the car and puts on the Six soundtrack!
I booked a service and MOT with Cleevely EV in Cheltenham in December 2020. Total cost of £175, only thing to report is that I may need new rear suspension bushes next year - Cleevely have sourced the bushes so I will not need to replace the entire arms.
So I have now had the car for almost 4 years!
Here are the cost breakdowns for those 4 years
A 29mpg petrol equivalent would be about 18p per mile or over £11k in petrol.
Which still compares well with the AA projected cost of 50p per mile for a £20-£32k car doing 20k miles per year
Free stuff
2 Tesla wall chargers and a set of Arachnid wheels and tyres worth about £4,000.00 all in.
The plan for now is to keep it for next year (insurance has come out at £480 - from LV again). The question is whether to sell it when it at 6 or 7 years old with 1 or 2 years of drive-train warranty remaining, or to keep throwing the dice and see what happens. I still love the car, it is simply the most stress-less way to commute I have ever experienced and it is still fun to hustle when I want to. If I were to replace it I would want to try something different, but at the moment the non Tesla EV charging infrastructure is still (IMHO) not fit for purpose.
For the 2 years running without a warranty I have paid £2114 for repairs (of which I expect to get at least £600 back from Tesla.)
So not paying £3200 for the 2 year warranty worked out ok this time!
I think I will throw the dice again - self insure and see what happens!
Good news! In November I got an email from Tesla to say the MCU memory issue is covered by warranty and a recall and I should get details in March for claiming back the costs I paid to replace the memory chip earlier last year.
I also I noticed on one of the more recent FW updates the fix I really wanted came in. The streaming media player now remembers where you were on a track or podcast, so if you go to listen to the radio or something else, you can go back to where you left off when you go back to the original track. Great for podcasts when Mrs Spunagain takes the car and puts on the Six soundtrack!
I booked a service and MOT with Cleevely EV in Cheltenham in December 2020. Total cost of £175, only thing to report is that I may need new rear suspension bushes next year - Cleevely have sourced the bushes so I will not need to replace the entire arms.
So I have now had the car for almost 4 years!
Here are the cost breakdowns for those 4 years
| Item | Date |
|---|---|
| Miles when I picked it up | 21664 |
| Miles 4 years later | 82137 |
| Total miles done by me | 60473 |
| Supercharger miles | 2520 |
| Average Watt hours per mile while I have owned it | 344 |
| Date picked up the car | 18-Mar-17 |
| Today | 20-Feb-21 |
| Home charging kWh | 19935.8 |
| Price/kWh 1st 50k miles | £0.1329 |
| Price remaining miles Octopus Go | £0.0500 |
| Cost per mile of Octopus go rate | £0.0172 |
| Total cost if I had paid for all charging | £2,466.02 |
| Total cost/mile if I paid for all charging | £0.041 |
| Total cost to me so far (- supercharging) | £2,350.81 |
| Total fuel cost to me /mile actual | £0.039 |
A 29mpg petrol equivalent would be about 18p per mile or over £11k in petrol.
| COSTS | Amount | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Charger install | £319.00 | Apr-17 |
| Insurance 2017-2018 | £637.00 | Mar-17 |
| Insurance 2018-2019 | £1,100.00 | Mar-18 |
| Insurance 2019-2020 | £918.00 | Mar-18 |
| Tax 2017-2020 | £0 | All |
| Swap Rolec over for Tesla Charger | £20.00 | Nov-18 |
| Service April 2017 @At Tesla SC Bristol | £700.00 | Apr-17 |
| Service Dec 2018 @At Tesla SC Bristol | £504.85 | Dec-18 |
| Chademo adapter | £358.00 | Apr-17 |
| Set of 4 tyres | £880.00 | Jul-17 |
| Insurance Excess | £850.00 | Mar-18 |
| Electricity | £2,350.81 | to date |
| Dashcam | £200.00 | Nov-18 |
| Service and MOT Cleevely EV | £180 | Dec-19 |
| 12V battery and MMC chip replacement (EV link) | 780.55 | Feb-20 |
| Ebay sale of Rolec charger | -£330 | Feb-20 |
| Insurance 2020-2021 (LV) | £509.77 | Feb-20 |
| Replace MCU screen (EV Link) | £606 | Jul-20 |
| Replace Battery heater module (Tesla SC) | £727.3 | Sep-20 |
| Service and MOT Cleevely EV | £175 | Dec-20 |
| Total | £11,486.28 | |
| Cost per mile | £0.19 | |
| Price I paid | £57,000.00 | Mar-16 |
| Price now | £35,000.00 | Feb-21 |
| Depreciation | £22,000.00 | |
| Total costs | £33,486.28 | |
| Cost per mile including depreciation | £0.55 |
Which still compares well with the AA projected cost of 50p per mile for a £20-£32k car doing 20k miles per year
Free stuff
2 Tesla wall chargers and a set of Arachnid wheels and tyres worth about £4,000.00 all in.
The plan for now is to keep it for next year (insurance has come out at £480 - from LV again). The question is whether to sell it when it at 6 or 7 years old with 1 or 2 years of drive-train warranty remaining, or to keep throwing the dice and see what happens. I still love the car, it is simply the most stress-less way to commute I have ever experienced and it is still fun to hustle when I want to. If I were to replace it I would want to try something different, but at the moment the non Tesla EV charging infrastructure is still (IMHO) not fit for purpose.
For the 2 years running without a warranty I have paid £2114 for repairs (of which I expect to get at least £600 back from Tesla.)
So not paying £3200 for the 2 year warranty worked out ok this time!
I think I will throw the dice again - self insure and see what happens!
A quick cheap fix 
I noticed that condensation had started building up in my passenger rear light - one of the ones mounted in the boot lid. The driver’s side had been replaced under warranty a several years back, so having seen a video on the sorting condensation in the Model 3 lamp I thought I would have a look.
The lamp is held on with 4 nuts: two 8mm nuts visible behind little rubber caps on the inside edge of the boot lid:
And two more hidden away inside the boot lid skin. I prised off the boot lid hand grip with a screwdriver wrapped in cloth and you can see the connector and the two 8mm nuts holding the lamp unit on, sorry about the smeary camera phone lens!:
I removed these with a small socket and then moved to the outside, I used my fingers to pry the plastic chrome trim back which is fixed to the lamp with foam tape, and released the lamp. I reached behind the disconnected the lighting electrical socket - this was very fiddly but would have been worse through the hand hole.
On closer inspection the condensation was worse than I thought:
The video for the model 3 lamp suggested there would be a Goretex patch to allow the lamp to breath, but not on the S! Model S owners seem to just buy new lamps! Undeterred I looked for the leak and when tipping it back side down, water trickled out through the circuitry on the back. I rocked it about until the worst was out then popped it into the oven at 50°C for and hour:
Once out and cooled down I had a closer look and found the foam seal had come away from the back of the lamp,I refixed this with Comma Seak and Seal and ran a bead of it all around the ultrasonic weld between the clear plastic and the black body for luck. The lamp is not hermetically sealed so I think the main issue was with the foam seal. If it goes again I will buy some new sticky backed foam and cut a new seal.
I then fitted the lamp back into the boot lid and screwed the nuts back on the 2 outer studs and one of the inner ones but could not reach far back in enough to do the furthest one so had to wait for my daughter to come back from school to do it for me. I was worried she would drop the nut and I would have to pull the lamp off again so I tied the nut to one of her hairs so we could retrieve it. As it was she spun it on in seconds and was also able to pop the electrical connector back on. Small hands and arms are worth having around!
And this is how it looks now.
It isn’t perfect, but short of spitting the lamp apart with the risk of cracking it this is as far as I am willing to go for now.
I noticed that condensation had started building up in my passenger rear light - one of the ones mounted in the boot lid. The driver’s side had been replaced under warranty a several years back, so having seen a video on the sorting condensation in the Model 3 lamp I thought I would have a look.
The lamp is held on with 4 nuts: two 8mm nuts visible behind little rubber caps on the inside edge of the boot lid:
And two more hidden away inside the boot lid skin. I prised off the boot lid hand grip with a screwdriver wrapped in cloth and you can see the connector and the two 8mm nuts holding the lamp unit on, sorry about the smeary camera phone lens!:
I removed these with a small socket and then moved to the outside, I used my fingers to pry the plastic chrome trim back which is fixed to the lamp with foam tape, and released the lamp. I reached behind the disconnected the lighting electrical socket - this was very fiddly but would have been worse through the hand hole.
On closer inspection the condensation was worse than I thought:
The video for the model 3 lamp suggested there would be a Goretex patch to allow the lamp to breath, but not on the S! Model S owners seem to just buy new lamps! Undeterred I looked for the leak and when tipping it back side down, water trickled out through the circuitry on the back. I rocked it about until the worst was out then popped it into the oven at 50°C for and hour:
Once out and cooled down I had a closer look and found the foam seal had come away from the back of the lamp,I refixed this with Comma Seak and Seal and ran a bead of it all around the ultrasonic weld between the clear plastic and the black body for luck. The lamp is not hermetically sealed so I think the main issue was with the foam seal. If it goes again I will buy some new sticky backed foam and cut a new seal.
I then fitted the lamp back into the boot lid and screwed the nuts back on the 2 outer studs and one of the inner ones but could not reach far back in enough to do the furthest one so had to wait for my daughter to come back from school to do it for me. I was worried she would drop the nut and I would have to pull the lamp off again so I tied the nut to one of her hairs so we could retrieve it. As it was she spun it on in seconds and was also able to pop the electrical connector back on. Small hands and arms are worth having around!
And this is how it looks now.
It isn’t perfect, but short of spitting the lamp apart with the risk of cracking it this is as far as I am willing to go for now.
June 2021
Some good news: I have just received a £500 refund from Tesla for the MMC memory chip replacement work I had done at EVLink in February last year. I have asked about the VAT which they left out, as I suspect they did not understand the UK invoice as it also had a 12V battery and fitting on it too. It would be nice to see the other £25 but I am still surprised and pleased to get any refund at all.
This nicely covers this year's insurance premium of £487 with enough left for a small round!
I also give the interior a well needed clean. I got given some Halfords car interior cleaner so sprayed pretty much he whole bottle over the cloth seats and carpets, gave them a scrub and rinsed them using Bissell SpotClean Pet Pro we Vac (Thanks to Kelvinator's Recommendation) The photo below shows what I extracted just from the seats - euww!
Some good news: I have just received a £500 refund from Tesla for the MMC memory chip replacement work I had done at EVLink in February last year. I have asked about the VAT which they left out, as I suspect they did not understand the UK invoice as it also had a 12V battery and fitting on it too. It would be nice to see the other £25 but I am still surprised and pleased to get any refund at all.
This nicely covers this year's insurance premium of £487 with enough left for a small round!
I also give the interior a well needed clean. I got given some Halfords car interior cleaner so sprayed pretty much he whole bottle over the cloth seats and carpets, gave them a scrub and rinsed them using Bissell SpotClean Pet Pro we Vac (Thanks to Kelvinator's Recommendation) The photo below shows what I extracted just from the seats - euww!
Edited by Spunagain on Tuesday 15th June 12:45
Sorry no photos as you really could not see the difference with the black interior but it did smell nicer!
So on to July 2021
Finally the tyres on my free 21” wheels reached the wear limit so I have swapped them back with my old shadow-chromed 19 inch wheels with their nearly new tyres from April 2019. I did this myself being careful to make sure the jack stayed on the plastic jacking blocks and not on the battery.
The Model S wheel nuts have little chromed plastic covers which need to be removed before removing the 21mm nuts. The car does not come with a tool to do this but I had a similar tool from another car (might have been my old Elise) and with two of the 4 ears broken off the tool, it could be used to pull the Tesla covers off. I did try using a couple of screwdrivers but I don’t think this would have worked without causing damage as the covers were firmly fitted in place. Unfortunately one of the tyres was flat after over 2 years in the garage. It is a slow puncture so I will get it looked at next weekend. The 21” tyres lasted well over 25k miles which is pretty good going. The ride is definitely quieter and more compliant on the 19s! I need to figure out whether to keep or sell the 21” one now which could do with refurbing.
The tyres needed swapping urgently as the next day we were booked into a holiday house in Newquay. The journey took 7 hours each way with half an hour spent at Darts Farm supercharger near Exeter for electrons and a very nice steak sandwich. The journey down was slow so we arrived at 15:30 and avoided the lunchtime queue using the one free stall when we arrived. The queue was being flagged up on Facebook earlier as being about 20 minutes long and clear on the navigation screen showing all chargers busy. On the way back home we left early and arrived just after 11 to find 2 slots free. By the time we left there was a queue of 6 cars and more arriving as we left! They are building another 8 stalls and it looks like they need them for the lunch time rush!
Just before leaving Newquay I checked all the tyres (and topped up the slow puncture) and the valve on one of the other wheels failed open - I managed to get the cap on and a new valve insert fitted for free at the very helpful MJB Tyres I also asked them to look at the slow puncture but they did not want to jack the car up without using special blocks to protect the battery from their jacks which have larger contact pads than mine. I have now ordered a set on ebay for jst £13.
I found the place we stayed in Newquay by searching for cottages with chargers as the West country does not seem to be well served with chargers. The house we stayed at was a new development built last year on Pentire and each house has a double carport with its own charger.
The owner popped round to fix a problem with the heating which was WIFI controlled and had crashed and he was quite pleased as he arrived in a Model X and we were his 1st EV owning customers!
We are starting to consider a replacement for the S next year with the thought that it will be easier to sell with over a year of drive-train and battery warranty remaining. We saw the Kia EV6 at Goodwood FOS which looked great and I will test drive it when our local dealer gets one. Our plan is to do a Sunderland trip next year using public chargers and see how we get on. If it goes badly we will keep the Model S and perhaps wait for a 2nd hand Model Y to become available instead.
So on to July 2021
Finally the tyres on my free 21” wheels reached the wear limit so I have swapped them back with my old shadow-chromed 19 inch wheels with their nearly new tyres from April 2019. I did this myself being careful to make sure the jack stayed on the plastic jacking blocks and not on the battery.
The Model S wheel nuts have little chromed plastic covers which need to be removed before removing the 21mm nuts. The car does not come with a tool to do this but I had a similar tool from another car (might have been my old Elise) and with two of the 4 ears broken off the tool, it could be used to pull the Tesla covers off. I did try using a couple of screwdrivers but I don’t think this would have worked without causing damage as the covers were firmly fitted in place. Unfortunately one of the tyres was flat after over 2 years in the garage. It is a slow puncture so I will get it looked at next weekend. The 21” tyres lasted well over 25k miles which is pretty good going. The ride is definitely quieter and more compliant on the 19s! I need to figure out whether to keep or sell the 21” one now which could do with refurbing.
The tyres needed swapping urgently as the next day we were booked into a holiday house in Newquay. The journey took 7 hours each way with half an hour spent at Darts Farm supercharger near Exeter for electrons and a very nice steak sandwich. The journey down was slow so we arrived at 15:30 and avoided the lunchtime queue using the one free stall when we arrived. The queue was being flagged up on Facebook earlier as being about 20 minutes long and clear on the navigation screen showing all chargers busy. On the way back home we left early and arrived just after 11 to find 2 slots free. By the time we left there was a queue of 6 cars and more arriving as we left! They are building another 8 stalls and it looks like they need them for the lunch time rush!
Just before leaving Newquay I checked all the tyres (and topped up the slow puncture) and the valve on one of the other wheels failed open - I managed to get the cap on and a new valve insert fitted for free at the very helpful MJB Tyres I also asked them to look at the slow puncture but they did not want to jack the car up without using special blocks to protect the battery from their jacks which have larger contact pads than mine. I have now ordered a set on ebay for jst £13.
I found the place we stayed in Newquay by searching for cottages with chargers as the West country does not seem to be well served with chargers. The house we stayed at was a new development built last year on Pentire and each house has a double carport with its own charger.
The owner popped round to fix a problem with the heating which was WIFI controlled and had crashed and he was quite pleased as he arrived in a Model X and we were his 1st EV owning customers!
We are starting to consider a replacement for the S next year with the thought that it will be easier to sell with over a year of drive-train and battery warranty remaining. We saw the Kia EV6 at Goodwood FOS which looked great and I will test drive it when our local dealer gets one. Our plan is to do a Sunderland trip next year using public chargers and see how we get on. If it goes badly we will keep the Model S and perhaps wait for a 2nd hand Model Y to become available instead.
Am I right in saying it's about 8k a year Total cost of Ownership then? do you think it's worth that? I've followed this thread with interest as i like the idea of EVs but like my barges too much to swap yet.
would you do it again if you could go back in time or would you do something different like lease? (if that was available then!)
would you do it again if you could go back in time or would you do something different like lease? (if that was available then!)
gowmonster said:
Am I right in saying it's about 8k a year Total cost of Ownership then? do you think it's worth that? I've followed this thread with interest as i like the idea of EVs but like my barges too much to swap yet.
Would you do it again if you could go back in time or would you do something different like lease? (if that was available then!)
Sorry I did not see your post! Yup 8k per year is about right. For a car that was 70-80K new that’s not bad at all and the cost of 55p per mile is still lower than what you would be paying for doing 20K miles per year for a £20-£30K new car. All for a car with the real world performance that is still frankly astonishing.Would you do it again if you could go back in time or would you do something different like lease? (if that was available then!)
If I went back in time I would do it again, because of the sweet spot of cost, range and the essential charging network. Next time we shall see - depends on the state of the national charging network and how old I am when I change!
The plan is to keep it indefinitely at the moment, as I think the risk of total battery failure after 8 years is low as I have looked after mine and the guessometer range is still greater than 250 miles. Even if the battery does have an issue after 8 years then the independent garages are planning to have routes to do low cost fixes in the same way as the Electrified Garage did for YouTube Hoovie’s Model S or a refurbed battery from Tesla is $13k in the US ($20k for a new one).
November 2021 updates
A slow puncture was fixed at Headley Tyres with some sealant to between the wheel and the valve. Any more leaks and I need to get a valve sealing kit from Tesla. 2 months and no problems so far.
I have had a couple of instances where my home charger has tripped the MCB (miniature contact breaker) in the Consumer unit at the side of the house. This happened twice in one week so I decided to try the cheapest route to fix it and replace the 32A Type B MCB. The original brand did not come up in any google searches for reliable options so I bought a Schneider one from Ebay for £4. I switched off the main supply and popped off the cover and un screwed the old one, unlatched it at the bottom and pulled it out.
You can see my yellow multimeter on the left, I used that to make sure there was no power getting to the switches before I pulled it out.
I then fitted the new one, slotting it onto the copper bus bar at the bottom, then latching it into the mounting at the back and finally popping in the brown cable and screwing everything down good and tight.
Switched on and popped the bus bar cover back in and lid back on and so far 2 weeks and several charges later all is good.
While planning holiday checking out the superchargers I noticed all the new chargers that are in development and some of the new ones that are up and running are CCS only, so won’t work with the Type 2 shaped charging port I have on my older car. So I booked the car in August to get the latest CCS upgrade which gets me access to all of the Tesla charging stations and most of the public CCS fast charging network so I should be future proofed with access now to CCS DC, Chademo DC and Type 2 AC chargers. The whole process took about 2 hours and cost me £280. This involved fitting a new charge controller inside the car, a SW update and an adapter dongle which plugs into the car’s charging socket and into the CCS charge cable. We actually needed it for our last run to Sunderland which we did with one stop and the only free Manfield supercharger was CCS only.
I have also booked a service and MOT with Clevely EV in Cheltenham in December 2021.
December 2021
So, 91000 miles done now and service and MoT at Cleevely EV was all done today for £186. A couple of minor advisories on the mot:
It just keeps munching miles!
So, 91000 miles done now and service and MoT at Cleevely EV was all done today for £186. A couple of minor advisories on the mot:
- one for near side suspension bush worn but not showing excessive movement
- slightly worn bushes on both front shocks.
- slight service brake fluctuation.
It just keeps munching miles!
December 2022
Back in the summer I made a big road trip to visit the guys who are sorting out the Elan bodywork in Norfolk and the guy rebuilding the gearbox in Mansfield!
I topped up the car overnight adding 48.5kWh 4 hours charging at 5p/kWH and the rest at 13.5p
The total fuel cost for the trip was £4.17!
So, 107835 miles done and service and MoT at Cleevely EV plus brake fluid refresh all done for £336.84. And it failed the MoT for the 1st time - my off-side rear tail-light cluster has less than half its LEDs working, so a replacement was ordered and arrived in time for a free retest.
The lights, fitting and some new wiper blades cost me another £454. I have kept the old lights ans when I get some time I will have look to see what has broken!
As it is a pre 2017 car it has also avoided the tax rise in 2025 so I will just get charged £20 a year!
Other than that, it just keeps eating the miles.
Back in the summer I made a big road trip to visit the guys who are sorting out the Elan bodywork in Norfolk and the guy rebuilding the gearbox in Mansfield!
- I left home at 8 in the morning.
- Home to Thetford SC 148 miles, 25 min charging stop
- Thetford SC to Gt Yarmouth 54 miles 2 hour visit
- Gt Yarmouth to Norwich SC 24 miles, 45 min charging stop and lunch
- Norwich SC to Dronfield 141 miles, 90 minute visit
- Dronfield to Mansfield SC 22 miles, 25 min charging stop and dinner
- Mansfield SC to Warwick SC 82 miles, 15 min charging stop
- Warwick SC to home 66 miles arrived midnight
I topped up the car overnight adding 48.5kWh 4 hours charging at 5p/kWH and the rest at 13.5p
The total fuel cost for the trip was £4.17!
So, 107835 miles done and service and MoT at Cleevely EV plus brake fluid refresh all done for £336.84. And it failed the MoT for the 1st time - my off-side rear tail-light cluster has less than half its LEDs working, so a replacement was ordered and arrived in time for a free retest.
The lights, fitting and some new wiper blades cost me another £454. I have kept the old lights ans when I get some time I will have look to see what has broken!
As it is a pre 2017 car it has also avoided the tax rise in 2025 so I will just get charged £20 a year!
Other than that, it just keeps eating the miles.
July 2023
So I have owned the car for over 6 years now and am now on 119,400 miles.
I received a notification from Tesla that I had a “Tesla Mobile Service Appointment Confirmation” which I had not booked last month - checking the app showed they wanted to do an “internal sim card update”. Seems Tesla are swapping data providers. The Mobile tech came over and took about 30 minutes to swap it over. The coverage is not as good at my house so the car relies on my Wifi when parked at home now.
Something broke! The wipers stuck on their way to park on the motorway. After lots of googling for fuses (there isn’t one for the wiper motor on my model I found the arm had jammed against the lip of the bonnet. The wiper mechanism has worn and needs replacing. Using the App I booked a Ranger to come and fix it who arrived a day later but without the mechanism. He has improvised a fix by tightening the rubber mounts for the mechanism to give some more clearance. I am now waiting for the new assembly to come in stock - I have been quoted £200 for the fix.
And I have got through another set of tyres, I have gone with Michelin Primacy 3s this time as they are very quiet and have good economy and general performance ratings another £950! This was nicely offset as I sold the 21" wheels last year to make space in the garage and after Ebay fees got £1050 for them.
Quick update on running costs:
Even though the price of high mileage Teslas has dropped a lot, the total cost per mile is still not bad!
So I have owned the car for over 6 years now and am now on 119,400 miles.
I received a notification from Tesla that I had a “Tesla Mobile Service Appointment Confirmation” which I had not booked last month - checking the app showed they wanted to do an “internal sim card update”. Seems Tesla are swapping data providers. The Mobile tech came over and took about 30 minutes to swap it over. The coverage is not as good at my house so the car relies on my Wifi when parked at home now.
Something broke! The wipers stuck on their way to park on the motorway. After lots of googling for fuses (there isn’t one for the wiper motor on my model I found the arm had jammed against the lip of the bonnet. The wiper mechanism has worn and needs replacing. Using the App I booked a Ranger to come and fix it who arrived a day later but without the mechanism. He has improvised a fix by tightening the rubber mounts for the mechanism to give some more clearance. I am now waiting for the new assembly to come in stock - I have been quoted £200 for the fix.
And I have got through another set of tyres, I have gone with Michelin Primacy 3s this time as they are very quiet and have good economy and general performance ratings another £950! This was nicely offset as I sold the 21" wheels last year to make space in the garage and after Ebay fees got £1050 for them.
Quick update on running costs:
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Miles when I picked it up | 21664 |
| Miles 4 years later | 120000 |
| Total miles done by me | 98336 |
| Supercharger miles | 14750 |
| Average Watt hours per mile while I have owned it | 344 |
| Date picked up the car | 18-Mar-17 |
| Today | 20-Jul-23 |
| Home charging kWh | 28753.4 |
| Price/kWh 1st 50k miles | £0.1329 |
| Price remaining miles Octopus Go | £0.0950 |
| Cost per mile of Octopus go rate | £0.0327 |
| Total fuel cost if I had paid for all charging | £3,865.50 |
| Total fuel cost/mile if I paid for all charging | £0.039 |
| Total fuel cost to me so far (- supercharging) | £3,191.15 |
| Total fuel cost to me /mile actual | £0.032 |
| COSTS | Amount | Date |
|---|---|---|
| Charger install | £319.00 | Apr-17 |
| Insurance 2017-2018 | £637.00 | Mar-17 |
| Insurance 2018-2019 | £1,100.00 | Mar-18 |
| Insurance 2019-2020 | £918.00 | Mar-19 |
| Tax 2017-2021 | £- | All |
| Swap Rolec over for Tesla Charger | £20.00 | Nov-18 |
| Service April 2017 @At Tesla SC Bristol | £700.00 | Apr-17 |
| Service Dec 2018 @At Tesla SC Bristol | £504.85 | Dec-18 |
| Chademo adapter | £358.00 | Apr-17 |
| Set of 4 tyres | £880.00 | Jul-17 |
| Insurance Excess | £850.00 | Mar-18 |
| Electricity | £3,191.15 | to date |
| Dashcam | £200.00 | Nov-18 |
| Service and MOT Cleevely EV | £180.00 | Dec-19 |
| 12V battery and MMC chip replacement (EV link) | £780.55 | Feb-20 |
| Ebay sale of Rolec charger | -£330.00 | Feb-20 |
| Insurance 2020-2021 (LV) | £509.77 | Feb-20 |
| Replace MCU screen (EV Link) | £606.00 | Jul-20 |
| Replace Battery heater module (Tesla SC) | £727.30 | Sep-20 |
| Service and MOT Cleevely EV | £175.00 | Dec-20 |
| Insurance 2021-2022 | £487.00 | Mar-21 |
| Tesla MMC refiund | -£500.00 | Jun-21 |
| Tesla CCS adapter | £280.00 | Aug-21 |
| Service and MOT Cleevely EV | £186.00 | Dec-21 |
| Insurance 2022-2023 | £490.00 | Mar-22 |
| Sold 21 inch wheels | -£1,050.00 | Mar-22 |
| Service and MOT Cleevely EV | £336.84 | Dec-22 |
| Tail light and wiper blades Cleevely EV | £454.00 | Dec-22 |
| Insurance 2022-2023 | £491.39 | Mar-23 |
| Set of 4 Michelin Primacy 3 tyres | £952.00 | Jul-23 |
| Wiper mechanism | £200.00 | Jul-23 |
| Total | £14,653.85 | |
| Cost per mile | £0.15 | |
| Price I paid | £57,000.00 | Mar-16 |
| Price now | £21,000.00 | Jul-23 |
| Depreciation | £36,000.00 | Jul-23 |
| Total Cost of ownership | £50,653.85 | |
| Cost per mile including depreciation | £0.52 |
Even though the price of high mileage Teslas has dropped a lot, the total cost per mile is still not bad!
Well, this has been a fascinating read. Thank you for all of the time you've put into the thread!
I'm currently considering either a Superb or Passat GTE, as I couldn't make the man-maths work on a Model Y. However, I have noticed 75D Model Ses dropping dangerously close to my used car price bracket.
The things that concern me are:
- Out of warranty costs
- Reliance on Tesla for many fixes, which seem to be time consuming
- Real world range. Your 85 at 200 miles doesn't fill me with confidence. For comparison, I was looking at the Model Y LR for <=280 in the summer, <=250 in the winter.
Still, I am mightily tempted...
I'm currently considering either a Superb or Passat GTE, as I couldn't make the man-maths work on a Model Y. However, I have noticed 75D Model Ses dropping dangerously close to my used car price bracket.
The things that concern me are:
- Out of warranty costs
- Reliance on Tesla for many fixes, which seem to be time consuming
- Real world range. Your 85 at 200 miles doesn't fill me with confidence. For comparison, I was looking at the Model Y LR for <=280 in the summer, <=250 in the winter.
Still, I am mightily tempted...
All good points!
My winter real world range with motorway speeds now feels more like 180 miles, but realistically that is a long slog without a break. I still do regular runs to Sunderland, Newquay and to Great Yarmouth, and the supercharger network has never let me down. It is worth having a think about what your long routes might be, and look at what fast charging networks are available.
There are a few workshops which work on Teslas now for much better rates than Tesla so it may be worth calling them and asking for costs to fix some of the known issues - dead heater element, dead battery heater etc, as that may help with your risk management.
I am a little apprehensive on the years ahead once the battery and drive-train warranty runs out on 1 Jan, but let's see what happens. There was a good YouTube episode on Rich Rebuilds last week on thoughts on traction battery failure and his summary was, if you battery dies out of warranty then
I still do not want to move out of the cocoon of the Tesla supercharging network as my mates who have I3S, ID3, EV6 are still not impressed with the reliability and coverage of the rest of the world charging network yet. I still think I will keep my S until the network is properly fit for purpose.
My winter real world range with motorway speeds now feels more like 180 miles, but realistically that is a long slog without a break. I still do regular runs to Sunderland, Newquay and to Great Yarmouth, and the supercharger network has never let me down. It is worth having a think about what your long routes might be, and look at what fast charging networks are available.
There are a few workshops which work on Teslas now for much better rates than Tesla so it may be worth calling them and asking for costs to fix some of the known issues - dead heater element, dead battery heater etc, as that may help with your risk management.
I am a little apprehensive on the years ahead once the battery and drive-train warranty runs out on 1 Jan, but let's see what happens. There was a good YouTube episode on Rich Rebuilds last week on thoughts on traction battery failure and his summary was, if you battery dies out of warranty then
- if it is <$17,000 and you have the money then pay Tesla to fix it and keep driving it.
- if it is <$17,000 and you don't have the money then sell it using Copart or Ebay he reckoned you would get around $9000 dollars for it with a dead battery
- if it is >$17,000 then sell it using Copart or Ebay.
I still do not want to move out of the cocoon of the Tesla supercharging network as my mates who have I3S, ID3, EV6 are still not impressed with the reliability and coverage of the rest of the world charging network yet. I still think I will keep my S until the network is properly fit for purpose.
December 2023
Spending time!
I had the MoT and service done at 125,955 miles at Cleevely EV in Cheltenham this week and it was a little costlier than I was expecting.
It failed the MoT on “Service brake excessively fluctuating Front” and had a host of advisories on 5 suspension bushes, one anti-roll bar ball joint, one suspension ball joint and rear service brake fluctuation.
I asked Cleevely to fix all of the the suspension, and the brake issues were brought back to advisory levels by running the “Brake Burnishing” procedure which it done selecting “Brake Burnishing” on the UI, where the computer disables brake regen and then guides you through a series of acceleration and brake cycles (do it on a clear and quiet road).
The brakes work and feel fine and the mechanic recommended I run the Brake Burnishing cycle myself before the next MoT!
So all in all that set me back £1,136.45.
And there’s more!
I got a warning on the screen 2 weeks ago that the car may not restart and an error code BMS_w035 in the history window. A new one to me, so I contacted Tesla through the App and they quoted £674.74 for a new battery heater, yes - the same one I had replaced in 2020. I booked it in for replacement at the service centre in Reading. They also wanted to replace the VCM to upgrade the 8GB MMC card that I have already had replaced, so even though I asked them to remove that from the job list it was still done at no cost! I asked for a discount on the battery heater but no luck.
And yet more!
On the way to Cheltenham I got no data for the Google maps imaging on my sat nav and I also got a warning on the screen this week about the 3g cellular discontinuation with a link for more explanation: https://www.tesla.com/support/3g-cellular-network-....
So I needed to pay £143 +VAT to get a 4g modem fitted so I have booked this in at the same time as the battery heater replacement work.
All in all £1985.19! Ouch - but hopefully should be ok for a good while longer! We seem to be getting into the costs of running an ageing barge now!
I also had a chat with the Guys at Cleevely about the battery and for those of us out of battery warrant they have a couple of options now:
They offer a battery warranty which they do after doing a remote assessment of the car’s battery heath - I have not dug into the costs of this yet.
They offer a service to repair failed batteries which involves dropping the pack, finding the broken models and replacing them at a cost of worst case of around £7K including VAT, diagnostics and fitting.
I think if my pack fails at this point I now think the best approach would be get Cleevely to fix it and then sell it!
Spending time!
I had the MoT and service done at 125,955 miles at Cleevely EV in Cheltenham this week and it was a little costlier than I was expecting.
It failed the MoT on “Service brake excessively fluctuating Front” and had a host of advisories on 5 suspension bushes, one anti-roll bar ball joint, one suspension ball joint and rear service brake fluctuation.
I asked Cleevely to fix all of the the suspension, and the brake issues were brought back to advisory levels by running the “Brake Burnishing” procedure which it done selecting “Brake Burnishing” on the UI, where the computer disables brake regen and then guides you through a series of acceleration and brake cycles (do it on a clear and quiet road).
The brakes work and feel fine and the mechanic recommended I run the Brake Burnishing cycle myself before the next MoT!
So all in all that set me back £1,136.45.
And there’s more!
I got a warning on the screen 2 weeks ago that the car may not restart and an error code BMS_w035 in the history window. A new one to me, so I contacted Tesla through the App and they quoted £674.74 for a new battery heater, yes - the same one I had replaced in 2020. I booked it in for replacement at the service centre in Reading. They also wanted to replace the VCM to upgrade the 8GB MMC card that I have already had replaced, so even though I asked them to remove that from the job list it was still done at no cost! I asked for a discount on the battery heater but no luck.
And yet more!
On the way to Cheltenham I got no data for the Google maps imaging on my sat nav and I also got a warning on the screen this week about the 3g cellular discontinuation with a link for more explanation: https://www.tesla.com/support/3g-cellular-network-....
So I needed to pay £143 +VAT to get a 4g modem fitted so I have booked this in at the same time as the battery heater replacement work.
All in all £1985.19! Ouch - but hopefully should be ok for a good while longer! We seem to be getting into the costs of running an ageing barge now!
I also had a chat with the Guys at Cleevely about the battery and for those of us out of battery warrant they have a couple of options now:
They offer a battery warranty which they do after doing a remote assessment of the car’s battery heath - I have not dug into the costs of this yet.
They offer a service to repair failed batteries which involves dropping the pack, finding the broken models and replacing them at a cost of worst case of around £7K including VAT, diagnostics and fitting.
I think if my pack fails at this point I now think the best approach would be get Cleevely to fix it and then sell it!
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