Tesla Vision fails as owners complain of Model 3 cameras fogging up in cold weather::A number of Tesla owners have taken to Reddit after their front cameras fogged up and stopped working in cold weather, leaving several features, including the US$10,000 FSD Beta, inoperable. Tesla has declined to assist to these customers, despite many of their vehicles being covered under warranty.
Why do people still buy Teslas? Serious question
Edit - great responses everyone. It was a genuine question & I appreciate the candor
They don’t know better
Status symbol
Weird obsession with Elon
It use to be this was excusable. But there are a lot of options now, no?
Yeah. Wanting a Tesla 5 years ago is very different from still wanting a Tesla today, in 2023, after Elon has told everyone, in public, exactly who he was.
Elon was pretty out and out an asshole back then too. He just wasn’t in the news 24/7 for being an asshole, just once every week or so.
There are so many options. Manufacturers that have been in the market basically since the inception of cars, and have decades upon decades of experience designing and building them all have EVs. You can easily get a higher quality EV for much less.
As someone who does not follow cars. What’s a budget EV considered these days?
There are alternatives. Fiat 500e is probably the cheapest, here in Sweden it goes for about 260k. Not as cheap as a Dacia Sandero (Petrol), which goes for ~180k.
There’s also the Nissan Leaf and the Renault Zoe, which will bump the price up to around 380-390k.
1USD is about 10.88SEK currently, so the 500e goes for about $24kUSD~, rounded up.
Petrol vehicles are cheaper. The Sandero is a fantastic car, particularly given the price. It doesn’t feel cheap at all. Hopefully with petrol vehicles getting phased out and more battery technologies maturing, that will change.
Personally, I don’t see myself buying an EV. I won’t drive very often, most likely not more than once or twice a month. I don’t want to spend much on a car, so I’d rather get a used one. Problem is one of the reasons I need a car would be for emergency stuff, like taking my dog to the nearest vet hospital, 166 kilometres away. A second-hand EV won’t have much range, and in an emergency you can’t afford to stop and charge for 20 minutes.
I’m only answering because you sound sincere in your desire for the opinion of others. I’m not a Musk fanboy (years ago I was, admittedly). I’m not looking for a fight. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, here is mine because you asked for it:
Other EV brands are shockingly (no pun intended) behind in technology or implementation. Most other EV manufacturers are making cars today that are closer to what Tesla was making 5 or 10 years ago, including lots of design or construction mistakes with those other manufacturers. Add to that, I know the idea that Tesla cars are expensive in still in most people’s minds, but Model 3 (available now at $31k USD) is one of the least expensive EVs on the road today with the tax credit from its fully domestically built battery. Non-Tesla charging infrastructure (in the USA, and even in Canada) is a joke to try to depend on it. Its also nice to be able to buy a car that supports the American workforce. A Tesla (bought in the USA) is the most American car you can buy! The top 4 “most American made cars” are Y, 3, X, and S. The number 5 slot is the Honda Passport.
Lastly, at least in the USA, buying a car from any other brand (except maybe Polestar now) means having to go through a local dealership, which is a horrible and exhausting experience. Buying a Tesla is refreshing in how transparent and low pressure the sales process is. No surprise fees, no dealer markup, no high pressure extended warranty or service plan sales.
I despise Musk’s childishness and politics, but the product and buying experience tops every other EV on the market today. The other brands have need to mature very quickly. However it doesn’t appear that Tesla is slowing down its growth either.
TLDR; Tesla makes the cheapest, most domestically produced, highest performance, most charging supported, best buying experience, most advanced mass market EV on the road today by a large margin.
Yeh I completely understand in your situation, fortunately this is all a USA problem. None of these issues exist in Europe. It will get better I’m sure.
I’m envious of Europe’s public charging infrastructure. The USA and Canada will be in better shape in a few years with the mass adoption of the NACS connector for nearly all EVs.
I bought mine in 2019 before I knew Elon is a lying turd. I bought FSD because I like tech stuff and I was doing a lot of highway driving at the time. My opinion of Elon and the car might be less negative if I didn’t feel like I got scammed out of $6000 for FSD. It’s been a good car otherwise, but I wouldn’t buy another one.
Same here. Waiting for a good Porsche SUV EV to come around. Same price range as Tesla, none of the bullshit.
Because they’re pretty great in most ways. They are one of the most energy efficient EVs, they are the most fun to drive of all the EVs I’ve driven (best acceleration and handling), I love not needing keys anymore. I love being able to control my car from the app. Tesla has almost twice as many high speed charging stations as every other charging company combined. They are more affordable than most other EVs. The lane assist is better than any other car on the market. Sure Elon is a dick, but Tesla has some adults in the room making good design decisions. It’s certainly not perfect but it’s a solid choice if you’re looking for an affordable, fun, and efficient car.
This is definitely not true. Teslas are expensive, and you have so few models! The Model 3 will go for about 520K here. I could get an Opel Mokka for 40k less. If I’m not aiming for an SUV but just a standard car, then a Peugeot e-208 costs 240k. I could get two of those and still have money to spare, or a base-level Tesla.
If I wanted a battleship more akin to a Tesla, I’d probably go for the Volvo XC40. A car that actually works if it rains on it, and doesn’t try to murder cyclists. Or perhaps a Toyota bZ4X, since Toyota has crazy good warranty on their vehicles. If I wanted luxury, then Polestar has that base covered.
The nice thing is that these are all established and reputable companies, they’ve been in the business for many, many years. They’re well known, and don’t pull things like “well maybe you shouldn’t let your car get rained on.”
The affordability is probably more US centric. Because they are made in the US using mostly US parts they qualify for huge tax rebates. I got mine for about $28k which beats most of the EV market here, and is a fairly good deal even for an ICE car.
Most of the other companies you mentioned don’t sell cars in the US so I can’t make much of a comparison but I’m glad Europe has a better variety of EV options than the US. Seems like more companies are switching to EV every year.
That makes sense. They’re not exactly prohibitively expensive here, but they’re not a good value for your money. Particularly not with the dealers (being Tesla themselves) monopolising repair. All that coupled with the fact that they’re trying to skirt regulations and doesn’t respect workers rights makes them an incredibly shitty company, and if you buy a Tesla here you’re equally shitty for supporting them.
The way they operate today should disqualify them from the EU market.
As a quick point of comparison, lets compare a Mach-E to a Model 3 in the US.
The Mach-E starts at $43k and is eligible for a $3,750 tax credit, bringing it’s cost to $39,250. And that is before the dealer fucks you over.
The Model 3 starts at $39k and is eligible for a $7,500 tax credit, bringing it’s cost to $31,500. And there is no dealer to fuck you.
The Tesla is the much more economical car.
Compare something like an MG4… £27k, so about $33k. Model 3 base model is £39k, so $48k.
US Tesla price is subsidised like crazy…
From an Australian perspective, I wanted an ev and I wanted to be able to take it on road trips. The supercharger network is the most comprehensively built out infrastructure here and frankly the only way to reliably make long road trips.
The minute they open it up to other manufacturers that advantage disappears; similarly if we had any genuine effort from any corner to build out competing infrastructure.
It’s easy to shit on Tesla because, well, , but in some markets they still hold a distinct and compelling competitive advantage.
Meanwhile my anecdotal n=1 stranger on the internet story is that I’ve not had any issues with my model 3 so far: for me, it’s been a great car. When I purchased it, the decision came down to the 3 or the polestar 2, and at the time polestar had zero service capability here: based on 12 months of driving I feel I made the right decision.
With all of their flaws, they remain one of the best EVs on the market. And at least for the very short future, they are some of the few cars that can use the only charging network that doesn’t suck. Though, that very notable advantage will be gone in about a year.