I tracked a Tesla model 3

This weekend I had the opportunity to track a model 3 performance on the short course at lrp and set a timed lap. It was Very very good. Tesla have really improved the dynamics of their cars since the last ones I drove on track (p85ds). The active yaw and stability management in track mode are so so much more exploitable. You can actually drift pretty effectively, and yaw is adjustable via throttle pretty accurately. I qualified for the axis series finals with my timed laps just for fun and although times have not yet been posted it looks like I set a top 5ish lap for the year. I did a 18.91 and brushed a cone with an 18.7 on Michelin pilot 4s tires with a somewhat wet surface (first time in the car aside from a few demonstration laps with the owners), the fastest time this year is an acr extreme with an 18 flat in the dry (I’ve seen that same car/driver combo deep in 17s previous years). I think that’s impressive as Berkeley. My impression was that with tires and coilovers it would be very in the hunt if not better. Iirc the outright record lap is a 17.5. I’d say with some seat time in the stock 3 on a dry surface, maybe a 18.1-2 is possible stock.

Pretty gd impressive in my opinion. 

Carbon said:

This weekend I had the opportunity to track a model 3 performance on the short course at lrp and set a timed lap. It was Very very good. Tesla have really improved the dynamics of their cars since the last ones I drove on track (p85ds). The active yaw and stability management in track mode are so so much more exploitable. You can actually drift pretty effectively, and yaw is adjustable via throttle pretty accurately. I qualified for the axis series finals with my timed laps just for fun and although times have not yet been posted it looks like I set a top 5ish lap for the year. I did a 18.91 and brushed a cone with an 18.7 on Michelin pilot 4s tires with a somewhat wet surface (first time in the car aside from a few demonstration laps with the owners), the fastest time this year is an acr extreme with an 18 flat in the dry (I’ve seen that same car/driver combo deep in 17s previous years). I think that’s impressive as Berkeley. My impression was that with tires and coilovers it would be very in the hunt if not better. Iirc the outright record lap is a 17.5. I’d say with some seat time in the stock 3 on a dry surface, maybe a 18.1-2 is possible stock.

Pretty gd impressive in my opinion. 

I've always been curious how these would do on track.  Sounds like pretty good performance, though 18sec must be a REALLY short track.  

How long do you think you could run it before that battery is dead/overheated?  How much of a typical 5 - 20 min session track day do you think it could handle?   Could it handle 20 straight minutes?  I'm not trying to be a wisea$$ or criticize the car...  legitimately curious...

Lrp... Lime rock?  So the autocross course?  Which i know isnt really a typical autocross.

You need to provide us some more information. What sort of course features sub 20 second times?

Yes, limerock park’s autox coarse (which yes you are correct, is not very well described as an autox course, more of a mini roadcoarse). They do a summer “autox”series there where you drive it in several different configurations and at some point in the day they set up a short version which is a modified oval with a chicain on each straight  to do timed laps to qualify for a shootout at the end of the year on the full “autox “ track. They call this series “axis” (for autox invitational shootout). It’s a hoot. If you guys are local, you should absolutely check it out. The guy was lapping all day long, hard to say how long of a track session you could do but I have zero doubt whatever that you could do full lap sessions. We were doing 5 min session literally all day long. At one point we did 3 in a row with just driver changes like a pit stop in between sessions, it didn’t skip a beat but you could smell brake pad for sure at the end. 

Was just wondering how well tuned my butt dyno was. 

My guess was 450whp/500ftlbs

Survey (internet) says.  

463/496 at wheels. 

1) they rip

2) I think it’s pretty well calibrated.

That's fast!  As a point of reference, my best time on the Lime Rock lower autocross course was an 18.788 with my 2000 M Roadster in 2016.  I've been in the axis shoot out twice in 2015 and 2016.

http://limerock.com/autocross-days

killeen_john said:

That's fast!  As a point of reference, my best time on the Lime Rock lower autocross course was an 18.788 with my 2000 M Roadster in 2016.  I've been in the axis shoot out twice in 2015 and 2016.

http://limerock.com/autocross-days

 

 

Hey! I remember you! How’s it goin man? Where you been? That was on re71s right? Man you could wheel that car. (To everyone reading this, this guy is No slouch, he’s a seriously great driver). 

Carbon said:

Was just wondering how well tuned my butt dyno was. 

My guess was 450whp/500ftlbs

Survey (internet) says.  

 

463/496 at wheels. 

1) they rip

2) I think it’s pretty well calibrated.

I have suddenly gone from idle curiosity to intentful interest.

Knurled. said:

Carbon said:

Was just wondering how well tuned my butt dyno was. 

My guess was 450whp/500ftlbs

Survey (internet) says.  

 

463/496 at wheels. 

1) they rip

2) I think it’s pretty well calibrated.

I have suddenly gone from idle curiosity to intentful interest.

I’m sayin. $55k to start though. +$8k if you want autopilot according to the guy with the 3

Carbon said:

Hey! I remember you! How’s it goin man? Where you been? That was on re71s right? Man you could wheel that car. (To everyone reading this, this guy is No slouch, he’s a seriously great driver). 

Thanks for asking, I'm doing well and very busy with kid #2.  Yes, I run a square set of 255/40-17 RE-71R's .  I try to hit a Lime Rock autocross once per year to knock the rust off but, haven't been too competitive the last few seasons.  I always enjoyed running with your MR2 and Lexus SportCross wagon.  Let me know if planning to attend another LRP Autocross lapping day this season and I'll try to join you.

Knurled. said:

Carbon said:

Was just wondering how well tuned my butt dyno was. 

My guess was 450whp/500ftlbs

Survey (internet) says.  

 

463/496 at wheels. 

1) they rip

2) I think it’s pretty well calibrated.

I have suddenly gone from idle curiosity to intentful interest.

I just went through that same revelation this past week. Tesla had a used Model S that was listed for $58k and a 2.8s zero to 60.

Carbon said:I’m sayin. $55k to start though. +$8k if you want autopilot according to the guy with the 3

How much performance will $55k buy you in any other car, though?

$55k will buy a used Audi RS3...

Knurled. said:

Carbon said:I’m sayin. $55k to start though. +$8k if you want autopilot according to the guy with the 3

 

How much performance will $55k buy you in any other car, though?

 

$55k will buy a used Audi RS3...

Or a C7 Z06. :)

Tesla has made great strides with the model 3 on track -- a model S was fast, but would barely manage 1 lap before it overheated the batteries and lost most of the power.  The challenge with a model 3 (or any EV, really) if you're interested in track days is how to charge it.  There's a guy who brings one to track days around here, and the battery is good for something like 40 minutes of track time before it's out of charge -- running at track speeds he was getting about 1 mile of track per 5 miles of estimated "range" on the car.  He was charging it using the RV outlets in the paddock, but it wasn't putting juice back in at anything approaching the kind of rate you'd need to be able to sustain a typically 1-group-out-of-4 track day.

Some back-of-the-envelope math suggests that to do this you'd need to tow a trailer with a 40kw generator and a supercharger on it, and run it flat out in the paddock during all of your downtime.  The infrastructure just doesn't exist for EV track days.

In reply to codrus :

And it probably never will, given that tracks are generally far away from infrastructure, and the kind of development that brings beefy infrastructure also generally gets the track shut down.

But as a street car, that'd be rad as berk.  Point-and-squirt like a boss.

Told my wife already that we’ve already purchased our last IC engine vehicle.

motorcycles don’t count.

Limerock has a whole bunch of superchargers. 11.7 in the 1/4 (model3) is faster than the 12.2 that a rs3 runs And the 11.9 that a c6z runs. Not that I’m trying to sell anyone on a model3. I’d rather have a z06 but not even slightly interested in a Audi/vag problem myself. 

Also, I just read in an article that a Tesla model 3 just broke the electric cannonball run record. Mostly on autopilot. Like 45 ish hours? Average speed was just below 60 mph. 

When traveling with the fam I'm not sure we average 60 mph.

I really don't know how anyone is buying a new car that isn't a Tesla these days. I don't want a car payment, and I don't buy new cars on principal, but damn.

Was at a Genesee Valley Chapter BMWCCA track day event at Pineview Run the other weekend and a guy brought out a Tesla Model 3 Dual Motor that was stock down to the tires. His lap times weren't crazy impressive because he was a novice and the tires were holding him back, but he would come out of this series of very slow S-curves and onto the front straight and that thing would just go to warp speed. Everyone who wasn't driving would gather along the front straight just to watch that thing go charging down the front straight. Never seen anything accelerate like that.

The next day, I was at an autocross with CNY SCCA at Oswego County EVOC and another Tesla Model 3 (non-dual motor) showed up. Again, stock down to the decidely non-performance-oriented tires. With a very skilled driver, it was down in the 67-second range. For reference, my hairy 245whp Miata, with me driving my brains out, was in the 63 second range and the Street class was won by a FiST in the 65 second range. So, put some RE71Rs or Rivals on it, and it would be a force to be reckoned with.

codrus said:

Or a C7 Z06. :)

Tesla has made great strides with the model 3 on track -- a model S was fast, but would barely manage 1 lap before it overheated the batteries and lost most of the power.  The challenge with a model 3 (or any EV, really) if you're interested in track days is how to charge it.  There's a guy who brings one to track days around here, and the battery is good for something like 40 minutes of track time before it's out of charge -- running at track speeds he was getting about 1 mile of track per 5 miles of estimated "range" on the car.  He was charging it using the RV outlets in the paddock, but it wasn't putting juice back in at anything approaching the kind of rate you'd need to be able to sustain a typically 1-group-out-of-4 track day.

Some back-of-the-envelope math suggests that to do this you'd need to tow a trailer with a 40kw generator and a supercharger on it, and run it flat out in the paddock during all of your downtime.  The infrastructure just doesn't exist for EV track days.

 

Or if you had several batteries waiting, you could swap them in the pits.  Keep them on rotation on the charger.  

Pocono raceway is surrounded by solar collectors that are owned by the track. Plenty of KW available. Track management has also been extremely co-operative during testing and development of the EVSR electric race car. It runs there 100% carbon neutral.

I believe the batteries are quite heavy, IIRC, from watching the Rich Rebuilds videos.

Hot swapping might be a tad bit tougher than refueling.

They are- hot swapping can be done in 20-30 minutes, but you need a lift for the car and motors and a second lift while you slide the pack out and replace it. Tesla had a center in Cali that did that for S'es but shut it down in 2017 or so.

I seriously cannot wait for the Model 3's motor and inverter to be cracked. Last I heard they can hold around ~400HP from something the size of my head.

Robbie said:

I really don't know how anyone is buying a new car that isn't a Tesla these days. I don't want a car payment, and I don't buy new cars on principal, but damn.

Where I live (SF Bay Area), Teslas are everywhere.  I know many people with them, and based on the stories I've heard I won't be buying one anytime soon.  LOTS of build quality issues.  Not just the panel gaps that are all over the internet, but more squeaks and rattles than a 90s Mustang, electric gadgets that randomly won't turn on, or fail to recognize each other and disable various features.  And the dealer network doesn't care, they deny that problems exist, claim they've fixed them when they did nothing, anything to try to get the customer to leave them alone.  I wouldn't accept that kind of treatment on a $20K Ford, let alone an $80K+ "luxury" car.

infinitenexus said:

Or if you had several batteries waiting, you could swap them in the pits.  Keep them on rotation on the charger.  

Swapping halfway through the day would probably be fine, but as has been mentioned it's really not practical with existing designs.  It's possible to design a car for fast battery swap but it needs to have been built-in to the design from day one, it's not something you bolt on later.