My Kia Niro EV is in the menders at the moment to get its rear bumper fixed, after some bright spark drove into me. The insurers have arranged a replacement EV car - a Tesla model Y dual motor! It's the only EV they had available at the time, and I wasn't complaining.

It's an amazing car, accelerates at a ridiculous and scary rate, it's comfortable and roomy - and I don't think I'd ever buy one, even if I had a spare £60k.

EVERYTHING has to be done through the screen - it has auto wipers, but if you want to override that and set them to a speed of your choosing, you have to go to the screen. The only way to open the glovebox is via the screen. There are quite a few other settings I would easily do in my Niro with just the touch of a button or lever, but they require the screen in the Tesla. Basically, if you don't like 'auto' for everything, it's a total PITA.

Even charging is a PITA - my home charger can give 7kW/h to both my Niro and to my wife's Zoe, but the Tesla will only take 3.5kW/h as it seems to have decided that I must be using the granny charger. I'm asking advice on another forum where some people have Teslas and the same charger, but at the moment I'm seriously peeved.

...I hate having control taken away from me...

Hey David

I've had a Model 3 for 3 years and just ordered a Model Y.
Agree on the good stuff - acceleration, range, usability, ease of use (a lot of the time), but it can be infuriating too, so i'm no fanboy!

I must admit i'm not bothered by glovebox (there's a storage box in the centre console if you want quick manual access so I rarely open the glovebox), screen menu access can be a bit slow but not the end of the world, you can do a fair bit with the steering wheel controls & stalk like cruise, volume, phone, etc, and i find once you're used to it like with any car/tool, it becomes easier, you might not notice in a week but over time it becomes second nature. The build quality's not awesome on mine but it's quite early, the later ones seem better, not an Audi or Merc but better.

The 2 things I don't like but can live with are:

- Cruise control is mostly very good (the old problem of over-cautious braking seems to be sorted on mine) BUT it insists on the wipers being set to Auto so that it can keep the camera clean, and it occasionally wipes when dry, gets on my wick
- Only one person can operate the screen at once, so if my passenger is changing the music or heating or whatever, and I quickly need to see the sat nav or something else I have to swat their hand away from the screen

But overall - it's been great, I average 5-7p/mile, my home charger works fine at 7kw, only ever had one delay on a public charger, been Midlands to Aberdeenshire & back charging pretty easily, Midlands to Devon without stopping.

So overall I'd recommend it, but won't be buying a Tesla hat or t-shirt any time soon.....
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wow must be crazy fast, I couldn't be trusted with such a thing

Great that you are getting to try out such an expensive car. I'd love a model 3, none of the others appeal as their all so huge and bulky. Still not keen at all on the touch screen though, I will always prefer buttons and dials as they have always been the best option when your meant to be looking at the road. I just rolled my eye's with the glove box FFS really?!

Our Leaf has been absolutely brilliant in everyway apart from the wife driving it most of the time now EV's are fantastic cars.

Yes, no part of me can cope with touchscreen only and no haptic feedback. It's becoming more common too. Change the fan setting - menu, menu, click, click click. What's wrong with a knob? Something I don't have to look at to control. I'm genuinely surprised the regulators allow it, there's no "getting used to" items buried deep in a menu/diagram system, you're always going to have to look.

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Originally posted by coyoteboy
Yes, no part of me can cope with touchscreen only and no haptic feedback. It's becoming more common too. Change the fan setting - menu, menu, click, click click. What's wrong with a knob? Something I don't have to look at to control. I'm genuinely surprised the regulators allow it, there's no "getting used to" items buried deep in a menu/diagram system, you're always going to have to look.

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Originally posted by Mr Whippy
wow must be crazy fast, I couldn't be trusted with such a thing

Great that you are getting to try out such an expensive car. I'd love a model 3, none of the others appeal as their all so huge and bulky. Still not keen at all on the touch screen though, I will always prefer buttons and dials as they have always been the best option when your meant to be looking at the road. I just rolled my eye's with the glove box FFS really?!

Our Leaf has been absolutely brilliant in everyway apart from the wife driving it most of the time now EV's are fantastic cars.

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Originally posted by coyoteboy
Yes, no part of me can cope with touchscreen only and no haptic feedback. It's becoming more common too. Change the fan setting - menu, menu, click, click click. What's wrong with a knob? Something I don't have to look at to control. I'm genuinely surprised the regulators allow it, there's no "getting used to" items buried deep in a menu/diagram system, you're always going to have to look.

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Went in a Mercedes taxi in the Netherlands (airport into Ansterdam) a few years back. Brand new car, nice a roomy, quiet, fast etc, etc.

The entire dashboard was one great big screen, not a single button, slider or dial around. The owner driver said it was a pleasant car to drive and reasonably good economical on fuel. BUT massively infuriating to live with when it cam to adjusting anything you'd normally do without looking.

Somethign to be said for tactile controls IMHO.

And just to think that they want people to go all electric. All this touch screen stuff does my head in although that could be because I am the wrong side of 70!!! And I do know its not just electric cars that have touch screen. Hells bells. I find the dash on my 16 plate Kuga hard enough to understand. What chance have I with this new crap. Thank god for the switches and knobs (not many too) on my Locost not to mention my Skoda Estelle trials car.

The difference with our own cars (Niro and Zoe) is that anyone who knows how to drive a petrol or diesel automatic could sit in either, get 30 seconds of guidance, then drive off without problems (especially the Zoe). Some of the cars coming out of China in the next year or so are similar - no frills or gadgets, just a basic electric car, but a LOT cheaper than what's currently available.
The EVs currently available in the UK tend to be expensive, big, and packed with junk that pushes the price up. If they don't start to produce smaller basic cars (e.g. like the Fiesta) then the Chinese companies will wipe the floor with them.

Don't have an EV (not driving due to epilepsy) and SWMBO's car is petrol.

When I sold my Passat as I wasn't allowed to drive it the EPB (Electronic Parking Brake) totally baffled the guy that bought it. It took me several tutorials to get him moving off from outside my house when he came to get the car.

He'd never encountered such a thing before!

Haha I've just been thwarted by my push-to-start car with a starter failure - you can't bump start it because there's safety interlocks on the clutch - if it's not in "start" mode with the clutch depressed, it won't start. So you have to push, jump in, put it in gear, "on, start" and lift the clutch *just* enough to engage the engine but not trigger the "clutch lifted" switch or it will terminate the start sequence and not fire regardless of being "on" and rotating. Infuriating.

I've decided that the Tesla is the car equivalent of Microsoft's Windows 11 - it's fine as long as you do what it wants, they way it wants...

Apple. Down to the repair options and policies, and the dealer network.

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Originally posted by David Jenkins
I had a type 2 Leaf - I believe that yours is a type 1 - and they introduced so many problems with the type 2. The managed to turn a perfectly capable car into something with a string of problems...

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I had a deposit on a Model 3 then got it back when the budget version didn't arrive. Since then, my opinion on high tech has gone down the loo. Ludicrous prices of EV's (40grand for a Fiat 500!!!). Having just got my espace through an mot and costing £1400 (minor things plus brake abs pump/labour).

EV's won't get cheaper because lithium really is a finite material and as it gets mined, it gets more expensive.

I'm going older and older and thinking about something without ecu's, abs, airbags or any other stuff that will get a car scrapped due to uneconomical repair costs.

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Originally posted by Simon
I had a deposit on a Model 3 then got it back when the budget version didn't arrive. Since then, my opinion on high tech has gone down the loo. Ludicrous prices of EV's (40grand for a Fiat 500!!!). Having just got my espace through an mot and costing £1400 (minor things plus brake abs pump/labour).

EV's won't get cheaper because lithium really is a finite material and as it gets mined, it gets more expensive.

I'm going older and older and thinking about something without ecu's, abs, airbags or any other stuff that will get a car scrapped due to uneconomical repair costs.

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The aircraft I fly has done away with almost all conventional switches. A bit different in that it has 7 different touch screens to control things, however there are still some common things that you need access to quickly.
However, it has been quite well implemented. No matter what screen you are on, swiping from the top downwards brings up the radio controls for example. The one thing that isn’t controlled that way is the dimming for the displays and lights which is a couple of button presses away and was irritating - at least until you got used to it.

However, in an aircraft you can look what you are doing. All of the touch screens are raised from the surface so you can grip behind them and steady your hand in turbulence. With either of my cars, I can ever hit the right bit of the screen without looking….not ideal. Tesla addicts say ‘well you can use voice control”. Never works for me on the motorway in my BMW that’s for sure!

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Originally posted by JC
The aircraft I fly has done away with almost all conventional switches. A bit different in that it has 7 different touch screens to control things, however there are still some common things that you need access to quickly.
However, it has been quite well implemented. No matter what screen you are on, swiping from the top downwards brings up the radio controls for example. The one thing that isn’t controlled that way is the dimming for the displays and lights which is a couple of button presses away and was irritating - at least until you got used to it.

However, in an aircraft you can look what you are doing. All of the touch screens are raised from the surface so you can grip behind them and steady your hand in turbulence. With either of my cars, I can ever hit the right bit of the screen without looking….not ideal. Tesla addicts say ‘well you can use voice control”. Never works for me on the motorway in my BMW that’s for sure!

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And... I now have my own car back!

The repairers have done a very good job (new bumper and bumper bar, plus a few sundries) and I am so glad to be back in a car that does what I want, at the time I want it to happen.

But I must admit to a grin or two, watching my neighbours staring at 'my new Tesla' over the past few days!