Wednesday, May 27, 2020

Update May 2020 - Supercharger filtering and Dashcam improvements

Tesla pushed out the May 2020 Update and some minor improvements as noted in the screenshots. Seems that the Tesla Toybox has been made easier. I like the new design. Also the charging sites map for superchargers and destination chargers indicate the speed and can be filtered upon by - Destination vs V2 vs V3.

Also the Dashcam can finally format the drive, I know there have been countless discussions on how to format the drives. See my post regarding my selection of USB drive, which after a year is still going strong. Really don't care about the backgammon improvements, though.

New Toybox and Charging Sites

Sunday, May 24, 2020

Setting Up and Using Track Mode V2 on Model 3

Track Mode on the Model 3 is pretty cool, especially because it keeps getting better as time goes on. It was very basic when I got my P3D- and has got better two times already. I have driven a number of times with track mode and it is simply a blast to drive, the beast wakes up in track mode especially when it puts down over 1000 Wh/mi of power and pulls 1 G of acceleration and 1 G of braking on non-sport brakes. Re-gen FTW!

Fun on some back roads with track mode.

Here is how to setup track mode and all the options that are available:

Thursday, May 14, 2020

New Sentry Mode Screen Animation

So apparently MGM did not like Tesla using Hall 9000 from the movie '2001: A Space Odyssey' for Sentry Mode. So it switched to something else with an update that resembles a turret from the game Portal. Those jerks at MGM!

Sentry mode is pretty cool to keep the vehicle safe when left alone, though it does use some additional power but not much to affect range unless you leave it on for many days. This is what the new icon looks like:

New Sentry Mode screen graphic when activated

One thing I have found is that Sentry mode gets a lot of false alarms at night. See the video.

Sunday, May 10, 2020

Tesla Summon with integrated HomeLink opens & closes garage door to pull itself out

The Model 3 does not come with HomeLink built-in anymore. It can be purchased as an accessory after the fact for $300. 

My suspicion is that this was done to keep licensing costs to HomeLink by Tesla low, so that instead of it being licensed on every car, it is just on the ones that need it. Annoying for those that need it, but good business strategy. On the flip side I like that the Model 3 doesn't come with XM radio, which is a waste on most cars.

A service center receives the accessory when ordered and then a mobile tech can come and install it if you do not want to go to a service center.

My local mobile tech came over with the part and installed in my garage. The install requires, both hardware and software to be installed. The hardware gets installed behind the front bumper, which must be removed by the tech and then the software loaded remotely and finally the user configuration.

The configuration is simple. Just click on the HomeLink icon and configure attach to the existing garage door as per the instruction here: https://www.tesla.com/support/homelink-faq
Configuring HomeLink on the Model 3
The optimal configuration for the garage door I found is configuring it with the car in the garage.
Awesome video at the end of this blog.