I went to Tesla to test their latest updates for the Model 3. What I found was that they're really interested in improving the vehicle's features. They were looking at ways to do an over-the-air update to improve controls, which is a great idea because even our car has gotten better since we first started testing it.

For example, originally you had to go through menus to adjust the speed on the cruise control, but now it's easier with the steering wheel. I was also told that they were considering ways to automatically adjust the vents and mirrors as you move your seat, which is a great idea for comfort and convenience.

One of the things that stood out to me was the lack of a physical key for the car. Instead, you use a card that's part of the app. This works well if you're using the app, but it's not ideal if you need to give the car to someone else or park it in a valet spot. The problem is that the card has a very narrow range and doesn't work well in certain situations.

I told Tesla about this issue, and they acknowledged that it needs to be improved. They said that they really need to provide a normal key for customers, so that they can use the app or just unlock and lock the car as needed. This would make things much easier and more convenient for users.

What's clear is that Tesla is listening to customer feedback and trying to improve the vehicle. We'll be keeping an eye on this and doing our own testing as the updates come out. We're excited to see what changes they bring, and we hope that it will make a big difference for Model 3 owners.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enour results of braking distances for the Tesla Model 3 and an exclusive response from CEO Elon Musk next on talking cars hi and welcome to this episode of talking cars I'm Jennifer stock burger I'm Jake Fisher I'm Gabe Shannara so this week we're gonna kind of depart from our normal format for a bit because we have some big news our own news we have completed testing of the Tesla Model 3 and it's not just the results of the testing winter news but Tesla's reaction to that testing so I'm gonna start with Jake kind of give us a synopsis of what we found on the car well I mean if you've been following the first look over the other vehicle um because obviously unless things the car does really well really it's fun to drive it's fast and obviously very efficient but we were really surprised some of the major deficiencies of that and most notably the braking distance so we recorded 152 feet distance from stopping 60 miles per hour and that is really long and I know 150 hey that mean anything that may not mean anything but in perspective in perspective I mean that's about ten feet no it's actually about 20 feet longer than the average for the class it's longer than Ford f-150 that in our test and it's really almost up there with like heavy-duty pickup trucks so we were really surprised and when we see a test result something like that we want as always it's just something wrong with our cars so what we often do is we get a second sample now look if you were testing a dishwasher you go buy another dishwasher even if you're buying a Honda you know testing another Honda Accord we could buy one and we have done that yes we've gotten second it's not so easy with the tesla model right with the waiting list and ordering it so we were kind of well we thought we had an issue but i think gave actually solved it for us right tell the story of how we got a second model three to confirm so fortuitously one of the recent weekend's i ran into a acquaintance of mine in town where i live and we I saw the hit the guy with a model three and who you met before you did acquaintance and a quick glance at the wheel and tire I realized it's exactly like ours and quick chat I gleaned how many miles on the car I thought perfect I told him I might need to borrow your car for a few days and I explained to him you know we we almost finished testing on model 3 and we found a few inconsistencies we just want to make sure that we our car isn't like a fluke I thought was funny cuz we didn't meet him he was really willing he was very interested in the results and really willing to let us use his car yes so he's he's one of those Tesla fans but also he's a Consumer Reports member and he was interested in contributing and and being part of a bigger thing helping us out good so the other part that's inherent to our protocols the second sample is what we do the other thing we do is before we publish we we like to give manufacturers an opportunity to want to explain the results and certainly comment if they have any on our results so that's really kind of the bigger second part of the story is is reaching out to Tesla sure so we reached out to Tesla we're going to talk about a results and try to figure out what results they were getting and also give them opportunity to to react in the story that we initially put out so we talked about you know our results and and well Elon Musk wound up tweeting a few things he speak what you may have seen what you may have seen I mean he did mention that in terms of the braking it appears that they were able to figure out what was going on and it looked like there was some kind of a software issue it seemed like that they may be able to actually update over over-the-air but anyways last night I wound up getting on the phone with him so I said kids be quiet you know keep it down with the video games I think they were actually using a Tesla in one of their video games yeah but I said but yeah we talked for almost an hour Wow and it was a very frank discussion about what we were seeing and what they were seeing and we got a lot of details about what was going on and you know first of all we talked about the braking issue it seems like they have seen it there they're trying to validate a change for right now that they would be able to push out over the air as and if they put out over the air they could actually lower those stopping distances and I could say that if those stopping distances are down to where we expect to see them around you know a normal car like about 130 or so yeah I mean this it would raise the score enough to to recommend the vehicle it could be very competitive in its class so that they're working on right now as soon as they work that out he said it could be as soon as this weekend Wow so really quick kind of responds well we'll see I mean certainly they need to validate it but as soon as we get the over-the-air update on our car will retest and and see if it's effective it's important we've had other CEOs here I think yeah Alan Mulally was helicopter into the facility so there's always been interest in our results the reaction time and his personal interest I think is is really great in this case and the reaction I think the other neat thing in this case is most people think when they think of braking they think of only hardware and this idea of being able to update a braking system abs has software related yeah but I mean teeth on face value I mean if you could over-the-air update your fleet of vehicles and have braking distances improved I mean that would absolutely be an industry-first I mean that's kind of amazing on face value obviously it hasn't happened yet but but that that is incredible but the but the reason it's it's not crazy is because yeah there's a lot of software that controls brakes it's not just about the clamping force and the wheels locking up every vehicle that's on sale right now has anti-lock braking system right and that is basically actively sensing whether or not that wheels locking up and depending on how that's programmed can have a huge effects on the braking distance so it seems like they have located something in that software that they potentially could update and and it isn't taking advantage of that piece right great and I should say that when we looked at kind of our individual results of our brake test yeah we were able to get a stop out of this car that was in that hundred and thirty feet range it wasn't repeated but what that says is the tires are good enough the tires have the ability to make the stop the brake pads themselves have the planting force but they're not consistent weight they're somewhere no one mentioned our braking distance is a function of multiple stops and not just a single occurrence that is the shortest distance right so that would explain so other publications have tested this car and their braking distance is reported braking distances are shorter and this is how I mean so a lot of other publications kind of like you know pick the fastest zero to say or whatever they don't do that we're looking for ability we're not competing with any well we're in the business of telling the truth and then in terms of read ability of the borrowed car operated the exact same thing it wasn't able to repeat those that that short stop right so that kind of wraps up the braking piece but there were other things in the model three results that weren't stellar all right so the stiff ride the elevated wind noise and the control system which initially we thought you know it's a matter of the display and it's but it it was almost like missing the point actually executing some tasks comment asking you do every day like micro adjustments of the mirrors or the air vents you have to dive into that so haven't been in it the Tesla Model 3 only has a screen so pretty much all the operations go through the screen so just I just want to clarify that so people know you don't get all this adjustability right so it has one single screen and the whole cabin is and the dash is pretty bare right the air vents for instance that is really distracting and takes a lot of time with eyes off the road and hand off the wheel but a typical car would take just a second going to retail do so in your conversation with you did you address any of the other things yeah I mean he was remarkably candid about things I mean obviously he he actually thanked us for bringing these things to his attention and said that you know we're helping to make of the car the car back um you know ultimately I think we're all in the same side we want better cars for consumers but he actually did share with me a lot of information that really I have not seen reported it seems pretty exclusive to us you know again you know talking about the division sees you know there's you know controls the ride wind noise rear seat we talked about I don't think there's any over-the-air update for the rear seat although we got the rear heated seats over the air that we did but it's not getting any bigger but yeah so he talked about first of all some of the changes that they have made in the last couple of months on the car so our car is it really an early production I mean they started delivering cars in July of last year our car was built in January January you know and we got it in February and we went right into to testing it but in the last couple of months they have made some changes to the vehicle so he had talked about in kind of the march/april timeframe they had changed made changes to the class to address were at wooden toys they had made changes to the suspension the dampers are this the shock absorber basically to address ride now it had all I've also seen and it's been reported that they had made changes to Springs early on the 2017 models but our car should have those ride comfort ride comfort yeah so our car has the latest Springs but there's other changes so isn't there increased tire pressure - yeah increased well not the tire so I mean our car on the door jamb the car has 45 psi is the tire pressure for the tires unusually high that's high you know and and an eland you know explain to look well you know to get the best range that's how you do it but certainly at lower tire pressures you know it was his opinion and I agree you'd probably give up a little bit of range you'd probably increase your your your ride and you'd probably also probably also increase your handling to probably improve a few things so make braking distances but I mean as long as it's certified and that's what it says on the door jamb I mean that's what you should that's what works and that's why we're gonna test you but there was several things like that now in terms of the controls you know I mean he was really interested in see what he can do to do an over the air update to improve controls and you know it's very interesting because even our car has improved as its at here right I mean originally in order to adjust the speed on the cruise control you had to go through the menus and now you I'm steering wheel yeah that was part of one of the old money seats so it's clear that he's looking for other ways to improve this vehicle and we talked about the vents you know he talked about ideas of well maybe as you move the seat it would automatically adjust the vents and the mayor's to suit you that's shorter personnel right exactly so I mean there's there's a lot of a you know I mean this is one of the cool things about Tesla is that they could keep on kind of refining this vehicle and certainly as they come up with updates we want to keep our scores updated so we will retest and if it does something to improve it we certainly will address it one of things that I highlighted to him which again we talked about in our story and we've written about is this key or lack thereof card yeah so when you have right so so there's no actual physical key for that comes with the Tesla Model 3 reddit chord the kind of thing was unless you have the app well major in oh look I mean the app the app works well right okay I mean I've used the app and it knows I'm there and it's that's you knows who I am and it sets everything that works great so it just senses my cell phone as I'm walking up and unlocks that's that's fine the problem comes is if you're giving the car to someone else and not that you're you're renting it to people but it's like what if you go to a valet or you go to a parking garage I live in the city and I gotta go give it to the guy I'm not sure if it's coming back and leaving it at a parking you know right exactly so it has this little credit card right and you have to kind of figure out where to put it right and you have to like put it a certain location and it's you know it doesn't work well and it's a very narrow location it's a very right it doesn't have much of a range and you know he admitted that's like yeah this isn't working too well and we really should do something better so so he I mean again I don't know if they're gonna do it or not but he he said yeah we really need to provide a normal key to those two to the customers of this car and I think that would help that would help I mean you know if you want to use the app that's fine yeah but you know if I'm someone who asked to put it into a parking garage every once in a while and I don't want to you know leave a note try and explain where to put the key card and this it's both for unlocking the car and for storing right right - okay so so I mean what's clear is that you know he's listening they're trying to make this car better and you know we're gonna do our part and just as the car changes and we've done this with those Model S right it's not just one test we keep on trying to update the test though the latest updates will we'll do our best to keep up right and I think it's important some of the changes the springs the glass that requires getting it that's hard that's hard we're so so you know I suppose at some point we'll buy another model three yeah I mean I mean certainly we want to tell our you know tell our members in tell everyone you know the latest so I we will rent a vehicle from them I want to experience the latest updates so we could certainly talk about them wolf the obvious just have to think about it because I don't want to we're not gonna do any testing on that borrowed vehicle right so a lot to do and and and certainly they're ibly follow-ups truly I mean from from just watching it unfold it's a consumer win if Tesla follows through with all that you talk to you on musk on the phone about it's a consumer win our results driving change quickly and model three owners potentially as late as early as this weekend will have a better car than they had before and we couldn't ask for better than that so as always thanks for watching see you next time youour results of braking distances for the Tesla Model 3 and an exclusive response from CEO Elon Musk next on talking cars hi and welcome to this episode of talking cars I'm Jennifer stock burger I'm Jake Fisher I'm Gabe Shannara so this week we're gonna kind of depart from our normal format for a bit because we have some big news our own news we have completed testing of the Tesla Model 3 and it's not just the results of the testing winter news but Tesla's reaction to that testing so I'm gonna start with Jake kind of give us a synopsis of what we found on the car well I mean if you've been following the first look over the other vehicle um because obviously unless things the car does really well really it's fun to drive it's fast and obviously very efficient but we were really surprised some of the major deficiencies of that and most notably the braking distance so we recorded 152 feet distance from stopping 60 miles per hour and that is really long and I know 150 hey that mean anything that may not mean anything but in perspective in perspective I mean that's about ten feet no it's actually about 20 feet longer than the average for the class it's longer than Ford f-150 that in our test and it's really almost up there with like heavy-duty pickup trucks so we were really surprised and when we see a test result something like that we want as always it's just something wrong with our cars so what we often do is we get a second sample now look if you were testing a dishwasher you go buy another dishwasher even if you're buying a Honda you know testing another Honda Accord we could buy one and we have done that yes we've gotten second it's not so easy with the tesla model right with the waiting list and ordering it so we were kind of well we thought we had an issue but i think gave actually solved it for us right tell the story of how we got a second model three to confirm so fortuitously one of the recent weekend's i ran into a acquaintance of mine in town where i live and we I saw the hit the guy with a model three and who you met before you did acquaintance and a quick glance at the wheel and tire I realized it's exactly like ours and quick chat I gleaned how many miles on the car I thought perfect I told him I might need to borrow your car for a few days and I explained to him you know we we almost finished testing on model 3 and we found a few inconsistencies we just want to make sure that we our car isn't like a fluke I thought was funny cuz we didn't meet him he was really willing he was very interested in the results and really willing to let us use his car yes so he's he's one of those Tesla fans but also he's a Consumer Reports member and he was interested in contributing and and being part of a bigger thing helping us out good so the other part that's inherent to our protocols the second sample is what we do the other thing we do is before we publish we we like to give manufacturers an opportunity to want to explain the results and certainly comment if they have any on our results so that's really kind of the bigger second part of the story is is reaching out to Tesla sure so we reached out to Tesla we're going to talk about a results and try to figure out what results they were getting and also give them opportunity to to react in the story that we initially put out so we talked about you know our results and and well Elon Musk wound up tweeting a few things he speak what you may have seen what you may have seen I mean he did mention that in terms of the braking it appears that they were able to figure out what was going on and it looked like there was some kind of a software issue it seemed like that they may be able to actually update over over-the-air but anyways last night I wound up getting on the phone with him so I said kids be quiet you know keep it down with the video games I think they were actually using a Tesla in one of their video games yeah but I said but yeah we talked for almost an hour Wow and it was a very frank discussion about what we were seeing and what they were seeing and we got a lot of details about what was going on and you know first of all we talked about the braking issue it seems like they have seen it there they're trying to validate a change for right now that they would be able to push out over the air as and if they put out over the air they could actually lower those stopping distances and I could say that if those stopping distances are down to where we expect to see them around you know a normal car like about 130 or so yeah I mean this it would raise the score enough to to recommend the vehicle it could be very competitive in its class so that they're working on right now as soon as they work that out he said it could be as soon as this weekend Wow so really quick kind of responds well we'll see I mean certainly they need to validate it but as soon as we get the over-the-air update on our car will retest and and see if it's effective it's important we've had other CEOs here I think yeah Alan Mulally was helicopter into the facility so there's always been interest in our results the reaction time and his personal interest I think is is really great in this case and the reaction I think the other neat thing in this case is most people think when they think of braking they think of only hardware and this idea of being able to update a braking system abs has software related yeah but I mean teeth on face value I mean if you could over-the-air update your fleet of vehicles and have braking distances improved I mean that would absolutely be an industry-first I mean that's kind of amazing on face value obviously it hasn't happened yet but but that that is incredible but the but the reason it's it's not crazy is because yeah there's a lot of software that controls brakes it's not just about the clamping force and the wheels locking up every vehicle that's on sale right now has anti-lock braking system right and that is basically actively sensing whether or not that wheels locking up and depending on how that's programmed can have a huge effects on the braking distance so it seems like they have located something in that software that they potentially could update and and it isn't taking advantage of that piece right great and I should say that when we looked at kind of our individual results of our brake test yeah we were able to get a stop out of this car that was in that hundred and thirty feet range it wasn't repeated but what that says is the tires are good enough the tires have the ability to make the stop the brake pads themselves have the planting force but they're not consistent weight they're somewhere no one mentioned our braking distance is a function of multiple stops and not just a single occurrence that is the shortest distance right so that would explain so other publications have tested this car and their braking distance is reported braking distances are shorter and this is how I mean so a lot of other publications kind of like you know pick the fastest zero to say or whatever they don't do that we're looking for ability we're not competing with any well we're in the business of telling the truth and then in terms of read ability of the borrowed car operated the exact same thing it wasn't able to repeat those that that short stop right so that kind of wraps up the braking piece but there were other things in the model three results that weren't stellar all right so the stiff ride the elevated wind noise and the control system which initially we thought you know it's a matter of the display and it's but it it was almost like missing the point actually executing some tasks comment asking you do every day like micro adjustments of the mirrors or the air vents you have to dive into that so haven't been in it the Tesla Model 3 only has a screen so pretty much all the operations go through the screen so just I just want to clarify that so people know you don't get all this adjustability right so it has one single screen and the whole cabin is and the dash is pretty bare right the air vents for instance that is really distracting and takes a lot of time with eyes off the road and hand off the wheel but a typical car would take just a second going to retail do so in your conversation with you did you address any of the other things yeah I mean he was remarkably candid about things I mean obviously he he actually thanked us for bringing these things to his attention and said that you know we're helping to make of the car the car back um you know ultimately I think we're all in the same side we want better cars for consumers but he actually did share with me a lot of information that really I have not seen reported it seems pretty exclusive to us you know again you know talking about the division sees you know there's you know controls the ride wind noise rear seat we talked about I don't think there's any over-the-air update for the rear seat although we got the rear heated seats over the air that we did but it's not getting any bigger but yeah so he talked about first of all some of the changes that they have made in the last couple of months on the car so our car is it really an early production I mean they started delivering cars in July of last year our car was built in January January you know and we got it in February and we went right into to testing it but in the last couple of months they have made some changes to the vehicle so he had talked about in kind of the march/april timeframe they had changed made changes to the class to address were at wooden toys they had made changes to the suspension the dampers are this the shock absorber basically to address ride now it had all I've also seen and it's been reported that they had made changes to Springs early on the 2017 models but our car should have those ride comfort ride comfort yeah so our car has the latest Springs but there's other changes so isn't there increased tire pressure - yeah increased well not the tire so I mean our car on the door jamb the car has 45 psi is the tire pressure for the tires unusually high that's high you know and and an eland you know explain to look well you know to get the best range that's how you do it but certainly at lower tire pressures you know it was his opinion and I agree you'd probably give up a little bit of range you'd probably increase your your your ride and you'd probably also probably also increase your handling to probably improve a few things so make braking distances but I mean as long as it's certified and that's what it says on the door jamb I mean that's what you should that's what works and that's why we're gonna test you but there was several things like that now in terms of the controls you know I mean he was really interested in see what he can do to do an over the air update to improve controls and you know it's very interesting because even our car has improved as its at here right I mean originally in order to adjust the speed on the cruise control you had to go through the menus and now you I'm steering wheel yeah that was part of one of the old money seats so it's clear that he's looking for other ways to improve this vehicle and we talked about the vents you know he talked about ideas of well maybe as you move the seat it would automatically adjust the vents and the mayor's to suit you that's shorter personnel right exactly so I mean there's there's a lot of a you know I mean this is one of the cool things about Tesla is that they could keep on kind of refining this vehicle and certainly as they come up with updates we want to keep our scores updated so we will retest and if it does something to improve it we certainly will address it one of things that I highlighted to him which again we talked about in our story and we've written about is this key or lack thereof card yeah so when you have right so so there's no actual physical key for that comes with the Tesla Model 3 reddit chord the kind of thing was unless you have the app well major in oh look I mean the app the app works well right okay I mean I've used the app and it knows I'm there and it's that's you knows who I am and it sets everything that works great so it just senses my cell phone as I'm walking up and unlocks that's that's fine the problem comes is if you're giving the car to someone else and not that you're you're renting it to people but it's like what if you go to a valet or you go to a parking garage I live in the city and I gotta go give it to the guy I'm not sure if it's coming back and leaving it at a parking you know right exactly so it has this little credit card right and you have to kind of figure out where to put it right and you have to like put it a certain location and it's you know it doesn't work well and it's a very narrow location it's a very right it doesn't have much of a range and you know he admitted that's like yeah this isn't working too well and we really should do something better so so he I mean again I don't know if they're gonna do it or not but he he said yeah we really need to provide a normal key to those two to the customers of this car and I think that would help that would help I mean you know if you want to use the app that's fine yeah but you know if I'm someone who asked to put it into a parking garage every once in a while and I don't want to you know leave a note try and explain where to put the key card and this it's both for unlocking the car and for storing right right - okay so so I mean what's clear is that you know he's listening they're trying to make this car better and you know we're gonna do our part and just as the car changes and we've done this with those Model S right it's not just one test we keep on trying to update the test though the latest updates will we'll do our best to keep up right and I think it's important some of the changes the springs the glass that requires getting it that's hard that's hard we're so so you know I suppose at some point we'll buy another model three yeah I mean I mean certainly we want to tell our you know tell our members in tell everyone you know the latest so I we will rent a vehicle from them I want to experience the latest updates so we could certainly talk about them wolf the obvious just have to think about it because I don't want to we're not gonna do any testing on that borrowed vehicle right so a lot to do and and and certainly they're ibly follow-ups truly I mean from from just watching it unfold it's a consumer win if Tesla follows through with all that you talk to you on musk on the phone about it's a consumer win our results driving change quickly and model three owners potentially as late as early as this weekend will have a better car than they had before and we couldn't ask for better than that so as always thanks for watching see you next time you\n"