I have owned a Model S for two years and now my wife will be driving a new Model 3 LR AWD.

reed_lewis

We just ordered the Model 3 LR AWD last night after she test drove. Right now she drives a Volt which is a perfectly fine car, but living in New England she needs AWD. So the Volt is getting traded in, and she is going to be driving an brand new 3. Dark silver, black interior. We have about 25K miles on the Volt, and 22K of that is electric.

Of course I used my referral code to get the 6 months of super charging.

But what amazed me about the 3 is the tightness and handling of the steering. It makes my S feel like I am driving a large 1980's era luxury car that is not as tight as the 3.

The only thing she did not like is the lack of heated steering wheel, but with pre-heating it should be fine.

jordanrichard_629778

This whole "have to have AWD because of being in a cold weather state", is a bit oversold IMHO. I am now in my 5th winter with my RWD S85 here in CT, on the stock all season Michelins and I have had no issues. I get there is some additional benefit to AWD, but it's the "have to have" part of it that is over sold.

mcmack15_98171493

Similar boat here----also in NE. Had the S a year and a few months now, and wife got her S in November (dark grey with black interior). Get the FOB for the 3 is my only two cents. Wife hated the phone and card--loves her fob.

Congratulations!

mcmack15_98171493

jordanrichard

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is was awd for my wife or she wasn't getting a Tesla. That is how much she prefers the awd----it is why she waited on the list for so long. Happy wife; happy life.

coleAK

My wife had S for 4 years and we sold it to get the 3 (LR AWD). She wishes the 3 was the car she got in the first place. Well if it had been around at the time.

pjohri_98286818

I would suggest reading the thread I started on Model 3 skidding in snow. Looks like the S does well in snow, the Model 3 doesnt.

LarryZ

I too had a Volt and when the lease ended, I got a Model 3. I got AWD so I could use it to go up to the mountains, where AWD is required to avoid chains on days with weather. I had been borrowing my wife's Audi Q3 for that, but she was turning it in on an Insight. I really liked the Volt, especially when it was on electric, so knew I wanted to head in the electric direction. What I didn't anticipate was how much better I'd like the Model 3 than the Volt. My experience in the snow with the Model 3 (multiple weekends in some pretty impressively bad conditions) has been excellent.

PhillyGal

Congrats to da wife!

I happen to feel the same about the 3's drive now that we have both and I almost never drive the S. Fortunately hubby prefers the S so there are no qualms.

EVRider

@mcmack15: We were going to order a key fob for my wife's new Model 3, but it was out of stock. Now that we've had the car for about 6+ weeks, we no longer think the fob would be useful. Both my iPhone Xs and my wife's iPhone 6s have worked 100% of the time as a phone key, and we turned on walk-away locking so we don't have to fiddle with the phone or key card to lock the car. Tesla saves us $150 by not having the fob in stock. :-)

тесла3

Congrats - your wife is going to love driving the 3!

rxlawdude

@jordan, I can tell you that our late 2017 RWD M3 LR does not do well in the snow - could not make it up a snowy/icy driveway. In stark contrast to our AWD 70D.

I can't comment on comparing AWD M3 with AWD MS, but I'm sure others will chime in.

reed_lewis

AWD is always better even on dry pavement. In the snow it will perform better also because you have four wheels instead of two pulling the car forward.

If RWD were so good, then FWD would be even better. My wife's Volt is OK in the snow, but not great. And this is with all the weight of the engine, and battery near the front.

Plus she is a nurse so she needs to get to work even if the roads are not completely plowed.

I know that RWD Teslas are pretty good in the snow, but AWD is always much better.

If the car does not do well, we might get a set of snow tires and the end of the season this year for next year. I recently saw a P100D model X with studded snow tires. I guess he never wants to be stuck!

reed_lewis

The only thing she wants disabled is 'fart mode' She really does not like that!

RedPillSucks

RWD Model S vs RWD Model 3 is not such a good comparison since the Model 3 is about 1000lbs lighter.

mcmack15_98171493

EVRider----my wife had terrible luck getting the phone and card to work in November and December. Several times a day I would hear her grumbling. Since the FOB arrived in late December I haven't heard a peep. I'll have to ask her tonight if she has tried the phone lately.

TabascoGuy

Smart girl reed, she sounds like a keeper.

mcmack15_98171493

Just PS and FYI on the Fob. Every other night we have to leave one car outside in the cold, unplugged. The next morning the car left outside would be in a deep sleep and not connect to the phone for pre-heating (unfreeze the doors and or windows). What we learned from 2-3 folks on this Forum is that the Fob will wake the car left outside up so that it will recognize the phone and allow us to use the pre-heating app. Has worked 100% of the time in the last 3 weeks---even with this bitter cold.

kcheng

I had a 2016 Volt with 25k miles, traded in for a Model 3. The Volt, great car, was terrible on OEM tires in snow. Had to have snow tires. The AWD Model 3, is quite good on OEM all-seasons in snow. Surprising. Is it the AWD? Probably helps.

EVRider

@mcmack15: If the car left outside is within Bluetooth range of the phone, you should be able to unlock it using the phone instead of the fob to accomplish the same thing. A phone that is set up as a key can unlock the car via Bluetooth even when the car is asleep.

mcmack15_98171493

EVRider,

Just asked the boss---she is using both the fob and phone now, but not the card. She said if she has time she will use the phone as it can take a while for the car to connect to it.

As for waking the cars up in order to use the phone app to pre-heat

---

neither of our phones can wake the S up on the colder mornings when it is left outside and unplugged over night (temps in the lo 20's and below). The car just will not connect to either phone. But, the FOB will wake it up immediately, and so far, 100% of the time in the last 3 weeks it has then connected to the phone without fail. I forget who, but two folks on this Forum gave me this tip.

I try to keep my wife's 3 in the garage on these colder nights, so we haven't needed to test the above practice on her car enough to draw definite conclusions; however, the 2-4 times we used the fob to wake the 3 when it was outside it woke the car up, versus just trying to wake it with the phone didn't take (my wife thinks if we waited some 5 plus minutes that maybe it might have worked).

coleAK

As for the snow driving. As I mentioned above we had him S and sold it for a 3. We had Hakka 8 on the S and hakka 9 on the 3. On great winter tires the cars golf do just fine in the winter. Never had a problem getting around in either car. The same things slightly hinder the 3 and S in the snow: Wide tires, lots of torque, stability control that needs adjusting first snow, RWD bias AWD, And relatively heavy.

silverslim1_93430409

My AWD 3 with stock Michlins walks up my relatively steep snow/ice covered driveway like it is middle of summer. Since we're retired, we avoid driving when the roads are snow covered so can't comment on handling at speed. But I suspect the 3 would be a bear in the snow with good snow tires.