Six Months With a Tesla Model Y
Let’s Be Realistic
As I began writing this post, I’ve put 7,657 miles on a 2021 Tesla Model Y Long Range that I leased in early June. I drove 2,036 of those miles in just five days around Thanksgiving, traveling from Connecticut to Indiana, around, and back again. As this summer and fall were my first foray into the electric vehicle (EV) space, I consider this an experiment in personal transportation. Not an experiment for society, just for me personally. It’s inevitable that I’ll draw a few conclusions along the way. So here’s my attempt to share what I’ve learned so far. I’ll do so in the form of answering the questions that I’ve been asked to date.
How long did it take to get the car?
I went to Tesla.com and placed my order on May 6th, 2021. I paid my initial $100 deposit in the form of 0.00180123 Bitcoin which Tesla accepted briefly at the time. I took delivery of the car on June 11th, 2021. You may be aware that Tesla’s order volume has accelerated steadily since then, creating a much larger backlog. Were I to order the same vehicle in December, 2021, I wouldn’t expect to receive it until July, 2022. That car would cost $8,000 more now than it did back then.
Did you have any fit or finish problems?
From a fit and finish perspective, the car is just fine. The gap around the rear liftgate is slightly larger on one side than the other, but not large enough to notice unless you’re closely examining the car for panel gaps. After hearing that gaps are a problem with Tesla, I started noticing them on internal combustion engine (ICE) cars built by long-established manufacturers too. My Tesla wasn’t washed upon delivery, it still had some green tape from the manufacturing process stuck to the inside, and there was a random plastic fastener sitting in the passenger seat. Those issues are easily remedied by any owner or car detailer.
I did have a significant initial problem that wasn’t related to fit or finish. On the day I took delivery, I had numerous pop-up warnings about the charge port that started on the drive home. That was unnerving and took away from the new-car experience. The issue was ultimately determined to be a loose ground lug near the charge port. Once tightened down, I haven’t seen the warning since. This did require leaving my car at a nearby Tesla service center for all of a Monday through Friday before they looked at it and fixed the problem. They gave me an older Tesla Model S as a loaner so I wasn’t without transportation for that week. But I hear that some customers are given Uber credits instead of a loaner car. And that’s unfortunate.
How long does it take to charge?
This is what everybody’s worried about, right? That they might be waiting all day on their car to charge? If you drive a Tesla, that’s hardly the case at all. The most time I’ve ever spent at a Tesla supercharger is 62 minutes. A typical stop on a road trip is 20 to 45 minutes. Tesla’s in-car route planner optimizes charging stops for overall speed of travel. The fact that a battery charges fastest when it’s empty and slows down as it gets full leads Tesla’s trip planner to recommend a lot of half-fillups rather than charging to full at every stop on a road trip. Overall, I estimate that charging adds about two hours to a 750–800 mile drive compared to the same trip in an ICE car. That’s about as far as I personally want to drive in a day.
How do you find charging locations?
Finding charging stations is the easy part. When I get in the car for a trip, I begin by typing the destination into the navigation portion of the center display. After a few seconds of calculating, the car tells me all the places I’ll need to stop for charging, as well as how long I’ll charge at the next stop and what my battery percentage will be as I get there. Once I get to the next stop and begin charging, the car will tell me how long I need to charge before getting back on the road. I find this so convenient that, were I to ever drive a gas car again, I’d want the car to suggest gas stops for me instead of having to find a gas station myself. Tesla’s trip planner — and similar technology in other EVs — is the reason that you don’t see any highway signage directing you to electric vehicle chargers like you do for gas stations. There’s no need. I’d be comfortable driving my Tesla from New York City to Los Angeles without worrying about finding the next charger.
I should mention that Tesla has their own proprietary plug and DC fast charging ecosystem, while virtually all other EVs sold in North America use the Combined Charging System (CCS) Type 1 connector for fast charging. Currently only Tesla cars can charge at Tesla superchargers, though that may change in the future. Other EVs such as the Ford Mustang Mach-E and the Volkswagen ID.4 use CCS charging networks including Electrify America and EVgo. That’s not all there is to know, and the topic of charging technology probably merits its own article.
How much does it cost to charge?
For all of my Thanksgiving 2021 holiday travel, I drove 2,036 miles in my Tesla and spent $194.69 on charging, or 9.6 cents per mile. To put this expense in the context of a gas car, if using regular unleaded at the national average of $3.39/gallon per AAA, it’s cost comparable to getting around 35.5 MPG. If comparing the Model Y to a premium crossover running 91 octane at $3.75/gallon, it’s cost comparable to getting 39.2 MPG. I’ve never spent more than eighteen dollars for a single EV charging session, which is not something I can say about fueling up a gas car.
The Tesla window sticker bears a rating of 125 MPGe. It would be easy to assume that the Tesla will be much less expensive that the numbers I quoted earlier. Keep in mind that on that road trip, one has little choice but to use commercial DC fast chargers like the Tesla superchargers. In reality, most EV charging is done at home in one’s driveway or garage. In many parts of the country, electricity is dramatically less expensive than the $0.36/kWh that Tesla’s Connecticut superchargers now charge near me. Having said that, residential electricity where I live costs $0.26/kWh, so electricity isn’t ever cheap here unless you’ve got rooftop solar. But it is still cheaper than gas for a vehicle with similar size and performance.
What do you do while you’re waiting?
Thankfully many Tesla superchargers in the northeast US are located at gas station convenience stores or at interstate travel plazas. These places typically have restrooms open and serve food or at least snacks and beverages around the clock. I have stopped at a handful of superchargers that were near restaurants open only during business hours, but that’s been the exception and not the norm during my driving. So I use the restroom. Maybe I get a drink or some pizza. I try to never stop except for charging so that I can make dual use of that time, thereby minimizing any time wasted. It doesn’t hurt to have a book in the car just in case you get bored.
Is your Tesla fast?
Was the 12-cylinder Ferrari Testarossa from the 1980s fast? A Tesla Model Y Long Range is faster. Compare the Ferrari’s 5.2 second 0–60 MPH versus the Model Y’s 4.8 seconds today. And if 4.8 is not fast enough, for an extra two grand, you can buy the Acceleration Boost to drop your 0–60 down to 4.2 seconds. Finally, if that’s not good enough, there’s also an available Performance model of every Tesla offered.
As an aside, I’ve recently decided that the Garden State Parkway after 9:00 PM on Sunday night should henceforth be referred to as NASCAR after dark. You really need the performance of an EV to keep up with traffic.
Are EVs the real deal or is this all premature hype?
Where I live, less than one mile from a Tesla service center and 1.4 miles from a bank of 14 Tesla superchargers, I see three or four Teslas every time I’m out. A Tesla is a very suitable vehicle for living along I95 in southern Connecticut. Fifty percent of the executive team at my work now have an electric vehicle. It fits with the life that I’m living day to day. But that’s not the case everywhere.
In my recent holiday travel, I noticed only 3 EVs the entire time I was in Indiana with the exception of pulling into a supercharger where there were always several cars charging. Part of that is cultural. But it’s also a chicken-or-egg thing. An electric car’s usefulness increases as the number, density and frequency of electric chargers increases. And this is more economically feasible in areas with a population density of thousands of people per square mile rather than a hundred.
It’s my opinion that we’re still on the leading edge of the electrification of transportation. It’s reached good-enough status for personal, day-to-day transportation for many people, but the transition has barely begun. Maybe the transition will be like going from film to digital cameras, which happened much faster than most people expected. Maybe it’s going to take longer given the average cost of a new car and our current supply chain woes. But electrification has started.
If you live in a single-family home with multiple vehicles, considering an EV almost certainly makes sense if you’re in the market for a similarly-sized, well-performing vehicle. If you live in a condo or apartment near enough to a public charger, having an EV is sustainable, though it still requires just a little more effort than the gas cars we’re all used to. If you live in a rural setting and travel significant distances regularly, the technology may not be quite there yet. And if you tow heavy trailers over long distances, there’s no EV currently in the marketplace that can replace a medium-duty diesel pickup truck from Ford, Chevy or Ram. So I guess we’re heading in the EV direction, but we’ve also got a ways to go.