[anjan_c2007]

The owner of a 2019 Tesla Model 3 has given his impressions about the car's maintenance costs and the minus and plus points. The car has crossed 30,000 miles and is near the 40,000 mile mark on the odo ( now 35,984 miles), during the 20 month ownership. Some of the maintenance costs are of the contingent kind and came from nowhere, unexpected. Maybe, other owners do not face the hassle from such 'bolt from the blue' spare replacement costs.











The owner says that the actual savings in service costs is turning out to be quite minimal and could set aside the myth that electric cars are cheaper to maintain. No oil change is desired, but in areas where road salt is used during winter months, brake calipers require lubrication once a year or every 12,500 miles, costing the owner $ 432 for three such services, incl. tyre rotation, equal to the price for oil change. The owner's BMW M340i required $ 539 and the Kia Telluride $728. The savings works out to between $6 and $15 a month over the course of two years of ownership, which would be barely noticeable in an owner's budget.

The pricey fixes included a stone chip landing in the glass roof that set him back by $1200 for a new one. An amount of $1100 was spent for a new windshield for the same reason.

Tesla owns all of its service centers and maintains tight control over its parts, there are fewer options to shop around for service in cases like these than for most other cars, as the owner quips. This is very, very surprising in a consumerism driven and free market country like the USA.

Although not included in our official tally of regular maintenance or normal wear, we've had some pricey fixes as well. For example, a stone chip in the glass roof set us back $1200 for a new one, and we paid $1100 for a new windshield for the same reason. And, since Tesla owns all of its service centers and maintains tight control over its parts, there are fewer options to shop around for service in cases like these than for most other cars.

Coming to the tyres, we are in here for another surprise - rapid tyre wear due to 20 % less tread depth when new!

By 30,000 miles, the original Michelin Primacy MXM4 tires were shot. We often get twice as many miles on all-season tires, but rapid tire wear is something that's a common topic on Model 3 owner's forums. At least part of the issue is that the Tesla version of these tires start with 1.5 32nds of an inch less tread depth than the off-the-shelf MXM4s. Although it might not sound like much, that's 20 percent less usable tread depth.

We have just replaced those with the other factory Model 3 fitment, Michelin Pilot Sport 4 summer tires, and we look forward to seeing how much these might improve braking and cornering performance during our final test session at 40,000 miles. A side benefit is that the summer tires were no more expensive than the all-seasons, but a still substantial $1157 has been added to our normal wear tally.

And coming to the bright side of the story, the owner says that no hassles were faced while running the car, as three Teslas "swept the podium" in a EV 1000 rally, as it has the leadership in DC fast charging where other brand EV owners face rush/occupancy at, or non functioning of charging facilities.

In his words:-

Although we haven't strayed too far from our little corner of the Midwest, we've still managed to accumulate as many as 3500 miles in a month, a testament to Tesla's leadership in DC fast charging. That was one of the clearest takeaways from our recent EV 1000 rally, where the three Teslas swept the podium, with zero issues of nonfunctioning or occupied chargers that many other teams encountered.

That means it hasn't been difficult to put miles on our Model 3, even if the savings in maintenance costs has been minimal.

The full article makes an interesting reading with the 10,000 and 20,000 mile reviews, wherein some more gremlins are elaborated and can be accessed here:-

https://www.caranddriver.com/reviews...y-maintenance/

[carthick1000]

I would take this Cost analysis with a pinch of Salt for the following reasons:

1. It does not provide a whole picture of TCO (Fuel, taxes, depreciation etc. missed)
2. The comparison with a relatively similar prized / sized / specced ICE car costs is also not specific. It is just a whole lot of text with minimum details about costs. I would love to see a proper table with all details in such a comparison. Their headline seems to be sounding more 'Oil lobby'-ish . They have a lot of cars in their long term fleet. They could easily compare 2 similar models with similar mileage and post the exact bills. Somehow they missed it?!

By the way, I have a Tesla model 3 which has done about 33500kms from 2019. The following are the only things done in the last 2 years:

1. Fixed a broken sunvisor clamp (Tesla fixed for free under warranty)
2. Extra set of winter tyres - Nokian 235/45 R18 900EUR (Incl. back to back replacement for 2 seasons)
3. Once some one rear ended the car, which is fixed by other person's insurance.

Other than the summer>winter and winter>summer tyre replacement (which I do at a 3rd party garage), I have never been to the Tesla service centre once.

Some differences with US: In NL, it won't snow that much and even if it snows only for a few days. So barely a month or 2 of salty roads the vehicle encounters. And the road conditions are much better than in USA. But stone chip damage and other things are not very common, but also not rare either.

I have just checked with a colleague who also picked up model 3 around the same time as mine. He has never been to the service centre for maintenance, but once for picking up Tesla wall charger. Since it is not mandatory to have winter tyres in NL, he didn't care to have them either. He has spent literally 0EUR on maintenance, except for the home charger he bought.. He has clocked around 40000kms and is still on his first set of tyres from Tesla.

Both me and my colleague have never spent so low on maintenance in any of our past cars.

So I think car and driver can claim whatever they want, but I would just let it rest.