Do we regret buying a Tesla Model 3 after 100,000 miles?
Hi, I’m Richard from Electric Classic Cars and on this week’s episode sponsored by Mouser Electronics and AMS Oram, we’re going to be looking into my wife’s Tesla Model 3. It’s 6 years old. It’s done nearly 100,000 mi. And people always say, “Hey, electric cars, they’re cheaper to run, less maintenance, more reliable.” But is that really true? Today’s episode, we’re going to find out. [Applause] Now, this is the Tesla Model 3 standard range plus. What the plus is, I don’t know. Comments below. What does the plus mean? Why didn’t they just call it the standard range? So, this is the base base model of the Tesla Model 3. And we bought it back in 2018 when it had first come out. The only ever new car we’ve bought. And over the 6 years and 100,000 miles, it’s not had an easy life. I mean, we’ve got young family. I certainly younger back then and a dog and it this got hammered quite frankly. Um, and now I was already four years into electric car ownership with my converted classics. Uh, so this was the first electric car for my wife. Prior to this, she had a a really cool uh VW Beetle Turbo silver edition or something like that, I think it was. So, how’s it far over the years? Now, let’s start with the wear and tear side of things. I’ve not washed this car. Well, it’s not my car. It’s my wife’s car. Have you ever washed a car? Uh, yeah, I wash my cars. No, but you know, it’s not for me to wash this car, is it? I don’t know. But wear and tear wise, you know, a lot of people say, “Oh, Tesla’s, you know, poor build quality and stuff.” And that may have been true. were in the very early days, but as far as build quality uh and and ruggedness, if you like, of this car, it’s fared really well. I mean, you’ve got the usual damaged, you know, um what are they called? Hub caps. Hub caps. Yeah, wheel trims. Wheel trims. Hub caps. Well, they were in our direct, but wheel trims. I mean, it’s been curved a few times. Um but the original ones are still on it. Um external wise, oh, there is one thing. Come over here. We live in Mid Wales and we All right, no need for that. We live in Mid Wales and uh there is one stupid animal around here which is the dumbest animal in the world and whenever there’s a car near, it will literally just jump in front of it to commit suicide. I’m talking about feeasants. Feeasants. Because whenever there’s a car coming, it likes to dive in from the front of a car and do things like that. So there’s a fee feeasant hit right there. It’s pushed this light in. Um, that’s pretty much it really. Other than that, it looks really good to me. I mean, I’m pro I’m pretty sure if I reach my if I did a reach around, wink wink. And um push that back, it would probably clip into place, but nothing else hanging off. Nothing else. I mean, 6 years of ownership, 100,000 mi. Interior wise, so it’s, you know, the bolster hasn’t ripped or anything like that. I mean, it’s just it’s fine. It It’s still like a new car in here. Um hasn’t got the new car smell anymore thanks to kids and dog. But there’s nothing really broken in here. There is only one thing I’m aware of that is broken over the years and that is um if we go around the other side and if you come follow me, there’s one thing I remembered that did get damaged a couple of years ago. Um and it’s that button there. So, I mean the there’s a little What’s that for the seat? Yeah, there’s a little little plastic thing here. I think one of my kids, you know, was getting in and stepped on it or they kicked it or something, but there’s normally a plastic uh button this way, but it still works. Still goes back and forth. Just hasn’t got the plastic button that So, apart from a pheasant and a child damage, deliberate damage, there’s nothing’s fallen off. No, that’s pretty good. It’s all right, is it? So, there we go. Wear and tear. Massive tick for Tesla Model 3 there. Well done. Okay, so that’s durability. Next on the list is going to be reliability. But before we do, a word from this week’s sponsor, AMS OSAM. All about lights. It’s fair to say that automotive lighting has moved on a lot in the last 100 years. from this simple filament bulb that here that everybody in classic car world will recognize to the latest technology and lighting that’s in something like this Tesla Model 3 that I’m sitting on here. And in that 100red years, one company has been at the forefront of technology and innovation and that is AMS Osram. AMS Odramm Automotive covers the entire range from the visible to the invisible light and scenting applications in the automotive segment. As well as providing market leading static and dynamic headlight systems, AMS OSAM also provides sensors for advanced driving assist systems and autonomous driving as well as sensors for rain sensing windscreen wipers. AMS OSAM’s innovative illumination sensing and driver control systems also extend inside the car to enable automotive smart services using capacitive sensors to detect hands-on steering wheels for automotive driving as well as ambient lighting and display back lighting. Now, if you want to find out more about AMS Oram’s market leading technology and sensors and illumination, go to the link in the description or go to mouser.com. Also, we’ll put that link in the description. And on that note, back to the Tesla Model 3, right? Then, so reliability, what’s this been like over those six years? Has it had to go back for loads of like repairs, uh, recalls? Is it broken down, etc., etc.? The short answer is no. Quite frankly, it’s been extremely reliable. We have had um one recall. So, um, there was a stupid design if you ask me. In fact, go around the back. Pick it up, Tim. Let’s let’s let’s talk about it at the back here. So, what happened to the boot? Well, first of all, we can open it. So, if I open it here now, earlier this year, the boot wouldn’t open from the inside or the outside. Kids had to climb in and manually open it with this thing here. So, we called Tesla or put it via the app and notified them. And then within the week uh an engineer came to the house and they replaced the wiring loom. So this bit here that goes to there through there and into here somewhere. 20 minutes later he was done. Turns out it was a known issue recall. Um we didn’t have to pay for it. It was just you know part of the Tesla service if you like. Um and what it was a wire had broken inside here. And as the boot comes down, that wire there or the the wiring loom if you like goes like that and then folds back onto itself. And that over the years had just broken one of the wires. That was it. If I knew that, I probably would have fixed it myself. So yeah, that was just done uh this year. Um that’s the only thing that’s happened. Um there is one other thing that happened this year as well and um all the previous years has been absolutely 100% reliable. Nothing ever went wrong with it. This year um it failed the MOT disaster. We were thinking, “Oh, here we go. What’s happened here now?” Turns out it was something really simple and it was related to the rear suspension. So, I must say I was a little bit shocked when I heard the Mote had failed on the car, but it turned out it was something really simple. Um, so this is the rear hub um assembly and it’s got a number of suspension pickups. 1 2 3 4 five and one of the bushes had gone. That was it. So, this bush here was just, you know, on its way out. And I think he said there’s an advisory on one of the others. So, I could have just taken this off, pushed this bush out, put a new one in for about I think they were £18. And as I was looking, I saw that you could buy a complete new one of these assemblies for I think it was £150. Uh, and I thought, you know what, for the extra hassle of having to push out the bush, and I probably would have pushed out the other ones as well, just because that’s gone rusty a little bit there, I just bought a whole new assembly for 150 quid. So, for 300 quid, this has now got complete new rear hub assemblies on. But that’s it. That’s the only stuff that I’ve had to do in the last 6 years is literally just call it a Tesla engineer for free that came and fixed it and put on some 300 quid um new hubs. I could have done it for cheaper, but that took me a couple of hours. That was it. So, six years of ownership, reliability, massive tick for Tesla there. So before we move on from reliability, let’s just discuss battery degradation because that’s something that comes up a lot in electric car discussions. What is battery degradation? Well, over the lifetime of a battery charging up and depleting, etc., the amount of energy that a battery can store will reduce. So a car that has 100,000 miles may not may not be able to store the same amount of energy that it did when it left the factory. So, this is something that comes up a lot. So, when it went this car went for its one and only service last year, I asked the guys to tell me, “What’s the battery degradation at? How much energy can my battery in this Tesla still hold?” So, they did this test where essentially they depleted the battery all the way down and then they charged it all the way back up and they, you know, essentially counted how many kilowatt hours went into the battery and the figure was 12% battery degradation. So, this car has 12% less range, if you like, than it did when it left the factory 6 years ago. And bear in mind, this is a 100,000 mi car. The average, you know, car that gets scrapped in the UK is around about 123,000 mi. So, I think this would be absolutely fine to do 200,000 mi. You’ve got, I would say, somewhere uh around about I think it’s 12 to 20% battery degradation. you’d expect to see on a 200,000 mi Tesla. So, I think that’s pretty good. And there’s there’s Teslas out there, aren’t there, that have done 250 300,000 mi. Oh, yeah. And they’re still in use. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Lots of taxis, for instance, are really high mileage cars. But, you know, if you have a a 200,000 mile Renault or, you know, what’s yours? A Vauxhall, isn’t it? Astra. Yeah. Which has done 100,000 miles. And any any every mile from now on is a bonus the way I look at it. But let’s say you kept that for 200,000 mi and the engine went bang. Would you contact Vauxhall for a brand spanking new Vauxhall engine to put in it? No. No. You go to a Yeah. an engine reconditioner or a scrapyard with a low mileage engine or you just scrap that or I’d scrap it. Yeah. Scrap it. Exactly. There you go. But if you did want to replace the battery on a Tesla Model 3 and people say, “Oh, if you need to replace the battery after a few years,” obviously you don’t. the facts don’t agree with those opinions. But if you did want to replace the battery, a quick look on eBay now shows a a good low mileage battery replacement for this is a anything between 3 and £4,000. So if you did after 200,000 mi or plus wanted to keep the car, the rest of the cars good and replace the battery, it doesn’t cost 20,000 30,000 as some people say, it will literally just be, you know, three, four, £5,000 probably plus labor. So there you go. Battery degradation so far on this is 12%. Right, let’s talk about money. How much has this car cost us in 6 years? And I’ve got my maths teacher glasses ready. We’re going to break this down into three sections. We’re going to cover fuel costs. We’re going to cover depreciation. And then we’re going to cost uh cover all the other running costs if you like as to you know parts servicing etc etc. So, let’s start then with fuel costs. Now, this is an easy one for me because I can go into the Tesla app and I can go down to charge stats down here and it will tell me everything I need to know about the charging that we’ve been doing in the past year, previous years, etc. And it breaks it down to home charging, superchargers, and other charging. Uh, obviously, we’ve put our home energy rates in there. And obviously for us again, it’s cheaper to charge at nighttime and it takes that into account. So this is a true representation of how much it’s cost to charge this car. So far this year, we’ve spent £742. Uh we’ve put £3,000 kw hours into it. Um but in addition, it also compares it to a petrol equivalent. So, if we had a petrol equivalent car, it would have cost us £1,582 this year compared to us spending £742 on the Tesla. So, essentially, we’ve saved £840 this year. Uh, if we go and slide it this way, we can see how much it was for the previous year and previous year. So, we can go through right the way back to when we bought the car. Um, so for what’s this? 2023 we’ve saved £2375 in fuel. Now give me a minute and I’m going to total up all those figures and put it on the screen for you. Okay, the results are in. I’ve toted all the fuel savings up now from the year that we picked it up to right now. And the amount we’ve saved in fuel by having a Tesla Model 3 compared to an equivalent petrol car is Tim, how much do you reckon we’ve saved? I reckon about,000 a year. So six grand. I say six grand. You’re miles off. This car has saved us £13,190 in fuel over 6 years. And actually, to be honest, it’s probably higher than that that we’ve saved because the Tesla app isn’t clever enough to take into account the fact that we have solar panels at home and charge quite often in the summer of solar. But even if you didn’t have solar panels, £13,000 of fuel savings in 6 years is a lot. You impressed by that, Tim? I am. Look at the shock on Tim’s face. If only I could turn the camera around. I’m doing the bad maths now and see if I can see buy my next car. Exactly. So there you go. You could have afforded your next project car with that. Right. So, yep. I think that’s a fair bit of chunk of money. Right. So, now we’ve been looking at depreciation and for the past half an hour, I mean, pouring over Auto Trader and mainly trying to keep Tim off it from looking at what was that car? Alpine A110s. Alpine A110s. Desperate to buy one. But what we’ve been doing is we’ve been looking through um Tesla Model 3s. Um so we’ve been looking at uh any car compared to a Tesla Model 3. I’ve narrowed it down to an Audi A4, BMW Series 3 and a VW Pat, similar kind of size. Um £38,000 uh purchase uh price when new three sorry 6 years old and uh 100,000 miles. And in short, the depreciate depreciation of the Tesla is very comparable to those other cars. For instance, I’ve got depreciation on average for the Teslas is around about 60 to 65%. The VW Patat 60 to 70%. Uh BMW series 3 55 to 60%. So BMW depreciates less and Audi A4 around about the same as the BMW. So depreciation is pretty much on par with say of Volkswagen Passet, I’d say. And lastly, we’re going to cover off general running cost if you like. So we’ll start with tires. We’ve had two sets of new tires. Obviously, three sets overall because there was tires that came from factory. Um so two sets of tires. I looked up in the um folder at home last night. £1,200 for tires. Road tax. Now road tax. We’ve had 5 years of free road tax cuz this is electric car. This is the first year we’ve had to pay road tax. Um cuz the taxation has changed. £195 and that was for this April going forward I think it was. How much is your road tax on your lowest? No. Nearly £400. £400. Yeah. Why? I think it’s something to do with the emissions isn’t it? All the emission numbers on it. So road tax for this is £195 currently per year. What else would there be? Service cost. So it’s gone for one service last year, end of last year. And I looked at the figures last night. It was £340, I think it was. Um, as far as what it covered, the only thing I can remember, there was some kind of filter on it. I think it was either pollen filter or something to do with the uh air con or heater filter. But um yeah, £340 total servicing costs over 6 years and that’s pretty much it. Um that’s running costs. Obviously, we covered the parts cost before with the um suspension um uh arms I replaced, but yeah, that’s pretty much it. So, what’s that? 1,00 I say 1,2 plus uh 200. So that’s £1,04 plus uh servicing of say4567 £1,750 running costs for 6 years. That’s considerably less than a a petrol car cuz you’d be looking at an annual service. Yeah. Plus your tax. They’ve been paying tax as well, wouldn’t they? Yep. Tires would probably be about the same. And I mean, I think tires use a little bit more with an EV. I mean, this is the same weight as uh BMW Series 3. This isn’t a heavy EV. Um, but it has got a lot of low down torque, which um and Pam does use that torque now and again, don’t you? I know you’re watching. Um, so the tires probably use a little bit more than an average petrol uh or diesel car. Um, brake discs and pads absolutely fine still at 100,000 miles because obviously with an EV use a lot less braking because you got the regenerative braking of the motor. So, yeah, I think that’s pretty good as far as running cost for a car. 100,000 mi in 6 years, 1,750. I’m happy with that. Now, Tim posed me a question earlier, which is, do I regret buying this Tesla Model 3 6 years ago for my wife? And the answer is a definite no. I do not regret buying it cuz it’s been such a fantastic reliable family car. It handles great. It’s got really good safety features in it. Um performance is amazing. So no is the answer to that. And we would definitely buy another Tesla Model 3 if it came to it. But the numbers don’t lie either. So when we’ve done this exercise in the last few days and we’ve crunched the numbers now um it’s quite shocking how much a car costs over 6 years whether or not it is a Tesla Model 3 or an equivalent petrol or diesel car. So here are the numbers. I’ve totaled them up. So we’ve totaled up the fuel costs for this car over the six years has been £8,100 and some odd depreciation around about £25,000. running costs around about £2,000. So in short, we’re looking at something around about £35,000 this car has cost us over six years. That’s a lot of money, but if you compare it to an equivalent petrol or diesel car, that’s where the numbers start to get scary. So, fuel costs for a petrol equivalent car, it would be £21,000. Depreciation, as we uh said before, it’s pretty much similar around about £25,000. Um running cost. So, I gave Tim a little bit of homework to do the other night, which was and because I know Tim is very fidious and he collects all his receipts and puts them in a really neat little folder. Don’t you? I wish. But you had them all, didn’t you? Had all the numbers. Yeah. So, I asked him to total up for his um Vauxhall how much that car cost him as far as running costs are concerned over the past six years. and he came up with a figure of £4,100. That was including servicing, tires, parts. What parts have you had to do on that car? Not a great deal. It’s been pretty good, but it’s had a few little bits. Wheel bearing, drop link, suspension, mag. So, £4,100 was the number you came up with. So, if you total that all up, you need to be sitting down for this, mate, because I know what you’re going to do. You’re going to get you’re going to turn this number into what car you could have bought. So, fuel costs plus depreciation plus running costs, uh, equivalent petrol car would have cost £50,000 over the 6 years. That’s quite scary, isn’t it? £50,000 to run a car for 6 years. Wow. So, what car could you have afforded for that? Well, yeah. What’s the car you want? Alpine. How much are they? About £50,000. There you go. So, £50,000 for an equivalent petrol car over six years. £35,000 for the Tesla. So, what’s that around about £15,000 cheaper to run the Tesla Model 3 uh over those 6 years and 100,000 mi? Now, is that a surprise to you guys out there? Um, and it’s a question to all you you EV owners, no matter if you got a Tesla or whatever EV, are you seeing similar like figures? Are you getting similar savings per year? or if you crunch those numbers back, are you seeing similar things? And petrol diesel owners that haven’t yet converted to EV, are you shocked by that? You do you think we’re, you know, slightly high, slightly low somewhere? Let us know in the comments below. We always read your comments and it’s always interesting to do so. So on that bombshell, as they say, I think it just leaves us to thank our sponsors for this week’s episode, Mouser Electronics. Go to mouser.com for all your electronic components needs and to AMS OSAM. And I hope you enjoyed this episode and we’ll see you on the next one. [Music]
After 6 years and 100,000 miles it’s time to take stock and review what it’s been like to own a Tesla Model 3.
We look at how much it’s cost us in fuel, depreciation, maintenance and parts over those 6 years and compare it to a similar petrol car. The results may shock you.
We also look at any issues we’ve had over those 6 years and how reliable it’s been. Has the interior been rugged enough to cope with a young family and dog over 100,000 miles?
What has been the battery degradation after 6 years and 100,000 miles?
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