SoCal LEAF & EV Gathering - Sixth Year Ended - 20 Aug 2016

[garygid]

Speaking of rarely seen vehicles, I was gathering a few kWh at the Burbank
Tesla Supercharger yesterday afternoon, all 6 stalls full, when I noticed one
without a nosecone. As I switched my attention to the couple in the car,
the driver said that he just took delivery the day before. I checked the
VIN (006nn), and noticed the different lower windshield design, very
clean, was my impression, so I think that the windshield wipers were
not visible at all. The paint was a brilliant deep red, with a beautiful
metalic glitter in the sunshine. Perhaps like the original Signature Red?

I notice the triangular Tesla badge on the side, just in front of the driver's
door, and then the two Tesla style recessed silver door handles adjacent
to each other ... and it finally dawns on me that I am seeing my first real live ...
Tesla Model X.

The driver said that they had to transport many kids, but that getting them
in and out was slow, because of the slow doors. He apologized that he did
not yet know how to open the gullwing doors from the driver's seat. I reached
over a few inches away and gently touched the nearby silver gull-door handle,
and it seems like the whole side of the car starts moving. Rather quickly, I thought,
a gaping hole reveals the 5 rear seats. The very impressive double-hinged door
design seems massive and solid, yet quite fluid in motion. Over the opening, on
the thick ceiling "door jam", are the large letters "Model X", perhaps to help
aliens better recognize the vehicle type, that Boomer would instantly recognize
from 2 blocks away, with one eye closed, and the local college marching band
and cheerleader squad doing acrobatics in between him and the car.

But, even for a somewhat slow alien, it was exciting to have that gullwing
door open just inches away. For me, a lifetime First, at least as far as I can
remember (big grin).

So, when will we get one at our EV Gathering?

End of the Year tonight, so it looks like good probabilities for me living into
2016 ... and possibly even substantially beyond. Happy New Year to all.

 

[Boomer23]

That's very exciting, Gary. Well reported! I got a glimpse into your excited reaction.

Happy New Year to you and Nancy , and to all of our friends.

 

[abasile]

Thank you, Gary, for the Model X sighting report! Our family still gets excited every time we see a Tesla S on the road. Watching the Falcon Wing doors will be very, very cool. One day.

May everyone here have a blessed New Year, full of joy and hopefully good health.

 

[tbleakne]

Hi Gang,
Holiday report, including White Christmas,:
I drove my red Tesla, MegaJoule, up I-5 for first time, to my cousin's house in Atherton, near Stanford. Despite temperatures in 40s, I was able to maintain Rated Miles efficiency at 70+ mph. While charging at Harris Ranch I met a nice couple who appeared to be healthy 80ish driving their brand new Tesla from Portland OR to Rancho Mirage. I was able to show them how to adjust their GPS voice setting.
The next day I rode with my cousins in their SUV up to their mountain 2nd home at Northstar, near Truckee.
Family included 2 sharp boys, ages 8, and 10, who helped with the cooking and could recite their recipes. They each got a major Lego project gift from me. When they opened them on Christmas Day, they stopped all activities for an hour or two while they each built their project. One was Arctic Rescue Helicopter and the other was Treasure Hunting Submarine. I was interested to see that the instructions are quite clear, with no words, only step-by-step diagrams.

Originally I was going to drive the Tesla up 395 directly to Truckee, but the threat of snow was just too intimidating, given that the Mammoth SC is not quite finished, the route includes three 8K ft passes, and despite good efforts from Tesla Burbank, they were not able to get a set of snow tire cables shipped from back east until just after I had left town.

Temps at Northstar dipped to -2 F overnight, but we got some beautiful snow over Christmas; view outside front door:

On return trip down I-5, Supercharging at Gilmore and Harris Ranch was almost full, but no waiting, but Tejon Ranch, with just 6 stalls, was busy, with 2 Teslas waiting ahead of me. Almost only time in 2 years of Tesla driving that I had to wait for a charge stall (about 15 extra minutes). To relieve this congestion, Tesla has started construction of another Supercharger location at Buttonwillow, about 30 miles north.

Upon my return Karen and I saw the Frank Gehry exhibit at LACMA of the models from his world wide projects, and later we saw Riverdance on Jan 1 at Segerstrom Center. On Jan 2 Karen had to prepare school work, but I went to the viewing of the Rose Parade floats.

 

[Boomer23]

What a fun and very active break you had, tbleakne! Your trip sounds like a ver fun adventure.

Thanks for a very nice report. Well done.

 

[tbleakne]

On this nice rainy day I just got around to reading about the Nissan IDS Concept car from last Oct, with the 60 kWh battery pack, including the long thread at:
http://www.mynissanleaf.com/viewtopic.php?f=55&t=20832&hilit=nissan+ids+concept#p441700

There is a lot of very familiar discussion about the 60 kWh battery vs Tesla, etc, but I wanted to share with you all my interest in the autonomous features illustrated in several videos. With no budget limitations, the IDS Concept has 12 cameras, 5 radars, and 5 lidars. The videos also feature prominently that the car will signal to pedestrians when it sees them and confirms "after you." One comment makes the point that the current Tesla implementation with one radar, two cameras, and some short range sonic sensors is "half blind," which I agree with.

Video is essential for seeing signs, road markings, and color, but I don't believe video alone is sufficient, especially for range-rate. Good phased array radar with much better discrimination and resolution is rapidly moving toward single-chip affordability, but it doesn't image soft-tissue humanoids, pets, or critters very well. Lasers do well with these, but their single unit cost of $70K on the Google cars will have to come down two orders of magnitude, which is not on the near-term horizon.

I think 5 cameras + 5 radars, arranged 3 front, 2 rear, together with one low-performance forward-looking lidar to capture pedestrians and other smaller objects should be sufficient and affordable in two years. These sensors can feed a sensor-fusion computational engine such as the NVIDIA Tegra Drive PX 2processor. The Tesla has an older, lower performance Tegra processor. See NVIDIA'S announcement at CES just yesterday, with Volvo onboard for 2017:
http://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2016/01/04/drive-px-ces-recap/

 

[garygid]

Perhaps some lingering showers on Saturday, but apparently not too much.
So, in 3 days minus 18 minutes, our first Gathering of 2016, in Cerritos.

The Hometown Buffet is 2 blocks East of the 605 freeway, just North of South Street,
and it opens for breakfast at 8 AM. We are usually there until at least 11 AM.

See you there.

 

[abasile]

Thanks, Tom, for the posts and the wonderful photo. Glad you had a good Christmas with family! Up here, we got a bit of snow overnight, and are expecting another foot or more today and tomorrow.

I agree that the current AutoPilot hardware on new Tesla vehicles is comparatively limited, though perhaps justifiably so given the costs. My prediction is that, within the next year or two, there will be a significant AutoPilot hardware upgrade and a number of owners, particularly recent buyers, will be disappointed because they are "stuck" with the older hardware. ;-)

Personally, for my family this year, I'm still thinking it'll make the most sense to buy a 2WD used Model S for $40K-$50K and skip the AWD and AutoPilot for now. Then perhaps wait a few years and buy a used Model X with those features, and keep two Teslas. Being an early adopter is great, but patiently waiting and buying used sure saves money.

Regarding used EVs, we now own the domain name EVBuySell.com. Hopefully we can turn it into something this year. Existing sites like AutoTrader and others are well behind the curve in terms of supporting secondhand EV buyers.

 

[Boomer23]

We will have a special guest for this coming Saturday's breakfast meetup.

A kindred spirit of ours, Brian, has been setting records by driving his red and impressively be-stickered 2013 Leaf across country from NY State, trying to hit as many states as possible on his way, and planting trees as he goes. His project is called The Negative Carbon Road Trip.

He's been literally zooming up and down the West Coast since Thanksgiving, trying to set some records for Leaf miles in a day and generally having a ball.

I offered to buy him breakfast and provide a group of appreciative wide- eyed EV lovers for companionship. I'm sure you folks would be happy to be the appreciative group.

Maybe we can even be some of the latest to sign his car.

 

[JeremyW]

I'll be there Saturday, with a 98% chance of the GF in tow!

 

[garygid]

Planning ahead for February and March,
I am suggesting the following dates for our Gatherings...

------ 67th month Gatherings ------
Gathering #67a: 5 Mar 2016 at the HTB in Cerritos for breakfast.
Gathering #67b: 19 Mar 2016 at the HTB on 17th in Santa Ana for breakfast.

To avoid Easter weekend, and

------ 66th month Gatherings ------
Gathering #66a: 6 Feb 2016 at the HTB in Cerritos for breakfast.
Gathering #66b: 20 Feb 2016 at the HTB on 17th in Santa Ana for breakfast.

to avoid Valentine's Day weekend.

Any comments, suggestions, etc?

 

[91040]

After seeing a lot of EVs in the Netherlands, I didn't run across any on the street in Valencia or Barcelona. Found some car brands that I didn't know. Used PlugShare to locate a Charging Station in Barcelona. Finally saw a Leaf displayed at the Barcelona airport.
Photos are at: http://www.quodlibet.shutterfly.com

Too lazy to calculate the time until the meeting tomorrow...I'll let Gary do that.

 

[tbleakne]

After seeing a lot of EVs in the Netherlands, I didn't run across any on the street in Valencia or Barcelona. Found some car brands that I didn't know. Used PlugShare to locate a Charging Station in Barcelona. Finally saw a Leaf displayed at the Barcelona airport.
Photos are at: http://www.quodlibet.shutterfly.com

Enjoyed your pictures from Netherlands, 91040. Surprised Spain has so little EV presence, considering their big commitment in solar until recently.

Great breakfast turnout this morning. I will let Gary post the official count of cars and folks, but it was good to see some of the members of our group who have been absent for a while, including Jeremy and his girl friend Jennifer, Eric who works for SCE, Sparky with his RA PWR Tesla, as well as many others. For the first time we also had Bryan (or Brian) in a LEAF with NY license plates, 2013, 100K miles with almost no battery degradation, on his way to visit every state.

Gary handed out some 2016 Tesla calendars with a mixture of Model S and Model X photos for each month. As he posted above, the differences in appearance between the Model S and Model X are quite subtle. The Model X has no nosecone on front, a little spoiler surface on the rear, and the front and gull wing door handles on the side are very close together. Hard to see how much extra height and headroom, but it can't be much, especially for the 3rd row. I fear that some folks who have ordered a Model X expecting a full-sized SUV are going to be disappointed.

 

[garygid]

Approximately 22 bodies, including at least 7 ladies, was a great turnout.
EVs included Tesla S, Rav4EV, iMev, Honda FitEV, LEAF, BMW i3, and ???

The first 3 were there by 8:03, and the last left at about 1:30, a long
gathering, with stories of Europe and LEAFing across the USA.

Our next Gathering is on 23 January, in Santa Ana.

 

[garygid]

I am working on getting a real live Tesla Model X for us to see
at our next Gathering in Santa Ana on January 23rd. It is not
yet certain, but if it does happen, the viewing time would most
likely be limited, probably from 8:30 to 9:00 AM, since this MX
needs to be in Anaheim by roughly 9:30.

Who would like this, and could make this time window?

More info as soon as I get it.

 

[garygid]

Sparky, thanks for the IR camera link.
With the price at $250 for Android, I will
most likely wait for a sale. Let us know
if you see one.

Cheers, Gary

 

[garygid]

Good-News Flash:

Mark's Tesla Model X to visit our Gathering on 23 January, 2016. ...
assuming everything goes as planned.

From 8 AM to roughly 8:40, we will be eating and hearing Mark's
delivery saga, and around 8:40 (to approximately 9:00) go outside for
the animated demo and viewing, but ... with no entering or even
touching this virgin vehicle please, unless specifically invited by Mark.
This beautiful Signature Red MX sparkles in the sunshine, and was
just detailed and partially wrapped. It should be magnificent.

Note that, if you arrive after 9, the MX will most likely be gone, on its way
to the Anaheim Packing House, where it should be on display for
something like the rest of the morning, after 9:30. So, late arrivals
might want to go to the Anaheim Packing House first, see the MX,
and then join us at Hometown Buffet in Santa Ana.

Cheers, with some excitement, Gary
(aliens love to see a plan come together)

 

[garygid]

Our next Ev Gathering is one week from this coming Saturday,
on 23 Jan, 2016, at the Hometown Buffet on 17th Street in
Santa Ana, just 2 blocks East of the I-5 freeway.

Thanks to Mark Z...
this Gathering will feature a viewing of a new Signature Red
Tesla Model X, from roughly 8 AM to 9 (see previous post).

After about 9:30 this beautiful vehicle will be on display
at the "nearby" Anaheim Packing House, as part of an
informal meeting of the Orange County Tesla Group.

Cheers, Gary

 

[garygid]

Our next EV Gathering is One Week and 24 minutrs from Now.

 

[garygid]

Tomorrow we Gather our EVs again, at the Hometown Buffet on 17th Street
in Santa Ana, just 2 blocks East of the I-5 freeway. Breakfast starts at 8 AM,
which is just 25 hours and 5 minutes from now.

From 8 to 9 AM we will have a special event, provided by the kind
extra efforts of a long-time Tesla owner, Mark Z, He will show his
brand new, Signature Red, gullwing door, Tesla Model X to us.

Please, remember that this vehicle is on its way to be displayed
in the Anaheim Packing House parking lot at 9:30. So, no touching
or entering the vehicle, unless specifically prepared with booties and
invited by Mark.

If we ask nicely, he might even be willing to relate some of his
delivery adventures, and visit us again to tell us about his earlier
model Teslas.

See you there ... I should arrive by about 7:55 and reserve a two-space
spot in the West-side parking lot (with cones) for the Model X.