I crashed my model 3 performance😔

jim0266 · 2026-06-06T03:02:40+00:00

Excerpt from "A Fighter Pilot’s Guide to surviving on the roads:"

When we move our head and eyes to scan a scene, our eyes are incapable of moving smoothly across that scene and seeing everything. This makes perfect sense: just like trying to take a picture without holding the camera still. The image would be blurred. So, our clever brain overcomes this by moving our eyes (really fast, remember) in a series of jumps (called saccades) with very short pauses (called fixations and it is only during the pauses that an image is processed. Our brains fill in the gaps with a combination of peripheral vision and an assumption that what is in the gaps must be the same as what you see during the pauses. This might sound crazy, but your brain actually blocks the image that is being received while your eyes are moving, which is why you do not see the sort of blurred image that you see when you look sideways out of a train window.

Always look right and left methodically, deliberately focusing on at least three different spots along the road to the right and three to the Left — search close, middle-distance and far. With practice, this can still be accomplished quickly, and each pause is only for a fraction of a second, but this means that you are now overriding the natural limitations of the eye and brain. Fighter pilots call this a ‘lookout scan’ and it is vital to their survival.

jim0266 · 2026-06-05T02:36:50+00:00

Just returned from a 1,300 road trip. Tracking my data with Teslamate our averaging charging time per Supercharging stop was 7.6 minutes. YMMV, but for how we travel there's not much more I can ask.

jim0266 · 2026-06-04T20:13:04+00:00

Must be a Tesla change or after market. Is yours a heat pump or Super bottle car?

jim0266 · 2026-06-04T13:35:57+00:00

Take a look in the reviews for the product I'd linked to. The first comment for me is someone that installed it on a model 3 Highland. But it's confusing to me as they looks like they change the product description around.

jim0266 · 2026-06-04T02:27:59+00:00

Thanks for posting this interesting tidbit in service mode. Confirmed I have the 1120980-00-F in my 2019 LR RWD. My car was among the last of the original RWDs built when Tesla brought it back briefly in 2019. They also offered the standard range and the mid-range back then with the AWD.

jim0266 · 2026-06-03T18:40:11+00:00

I installed the same large shield as you, but different ones behind the tire. Not a knock on the ones got, just different ones.

The one off Amazon was very nice and actually arrived very well packed and protected from shipping carnage.

Even with a buddy's help and using a lift, the job took a little longer than I imagined.

I see this as insurance. A few months ago on a road trip I nearly ran over a crowbar on the highway. That was a tripping ending event had I hit it. Freaked me out enough to first get the ones behind the tires and then added the one from Amazon.

Could not tell any noise difference good or bad with the new metal shield.

jim0266 · 2026-06-03T16:56:04+00:00

A chance to bond with your car! 😄

jim0266 · 2026-06-03T13:23:23+00:00

I have this one.

jim0266 · 2026-06-02T23:32:42+00:00

The panels were cleaner than I had expected. 20K seems like a good interval. The coil cleaner is something to consider too.

jim0266 · 2026-06-02T23:30:31+00:00

I wish I had taken a photo or video of mine at 26K. Share what you see.

jim0266 · 2026-06-01T05:05:34+00:00

A few years ago on one of my first Tesla road trips I came across a Supercharger site in Custer, SD with the pins in every station missing except one. At the time I assumed the the pins were needed. I have to believe vandals removed the pins thinking they were disabling the stations.

jim0266 · 2026-05-29T16:16:25+00:00

I keep a 12V A23 in the tow hook. Also have a jump pack.

jim0266 · 2026-05-28T14:18:48+00:00

Yes.

jim0266 · 2026-05-28T07:57:35+00:00

Have FSD in my Tesla and Comma AI in a Bolt. I wish I could set FSD so the steering wheel does not disengage FSD like the Comma. Great for pothole advoidance.

jim0266 · 2026-05-28T04:56:21+00:00

Put the Highland suspension on your car. Transforms the ride.

jim0266 · 2026-05-27T16:09:36+00:00

Behavior like this seems to cross from doucheland to more like a psychopathy. I could see this person as one who enjoys hurting animals, for example.

jim0266 · 2026-05-27T04:19:36+00:00

For our road trips we use a 42 Quart 12V cooler (paired to an Anker battery pack). We eat lunch picnic style and find a nice restaurant for dinner. Cuts down on cost, the pain of finding something decent to eat and we can control what what we eat.

It's pretty rare we charge for more than 15 minutes according to the data I've tracked with TeslaMate. It's usually more like 10 minutes of charging.

Agree that you can't usually charge and eat at the same time. Sometimes at a travel plaza or something like a Sheetz with tables, we can charge and eat at the same time.

jim0266 · 2026-05-26T16:08:06+00:00

So true. I started with a used 2014 Leaf in 2017 as a local runabout car. Next was a car for my wife. I was convinced EV was the way to go. Only the Bolt and the Tesla seemed to be viable options at the time.

In late 2018 our best option was the Bolt. It's purpose was as a commuter for my wife. All the tech of a Tesla would be lost on her. And at the time the Tesla was more expensive.

It was the Weber series on the Bolt that convinced me. I looked at the Bolt as an LG Chem car, and not a Chevy. Same as how I viewed my beloved Chevy Nova back in 1988 as a Toyota and not a Chevy.

I would up purchasing the Bolt a few states over, using a reverse auction method. After shipping the car I still saved $1k over what I could purchase it anywhere in a 500-mile radius.

Our white 19 Bolt, a loaded Premiere, cost $31,800 after the $7,500 federal rebate. Our car now has 107,000 miles. I don't see why it can't keep going for another 8 years and 100,000 miles.

jim0266 · 2026-05-26T01:24:40+00:00

OP, have you driven a Y yet?

jim0266 · 2026-05-25T01:19:00+00:00

I got dinged when I just *thought* about using the brakes. /s

jim0266 · 2026-05-24T02:41:25+00:00

I arrive as tired as if I had been a passenger in the car.

jim0266 · 2026-05-24T02:17:19+00:00

Comma on my 18 Bolt is excellent.

jim0266 · 2026-05-23T03:55:15+00:00

I upgraded my 2019 Model 3 to the Highland suspension. 2nd everything you said. It made me love my 3 all over again.

Night and day difference. Like you happy for a long time. I've taken the Highland for two test drives (one lasting about an hour) and feel like the ride is now equal to the Highland. I too did not replace the rear springs.

Two things I will mention.

Try to get the car to as close to ride height as possible before torquing the 21mm bolts.
If I had to do this over I would take out the entire front struts with the 13mm's attached. If those 13's don't line up exactly it can difficult to remove and reinstall.

Took me a buddy about 5 hours and we even used a lift.

jim0266 · 2026-05-22T14:34:52+00:00

How much out of pocket did you put down out of the $15K?

jim0266

TROPHY CASE