In late 2020, I bought a Tesla Model Y because at the time it was the best combination of things to meet my needs in a vehicle that got halfway decent fuel economy. That whole discussion occurs here. I'd say I had 2-3 years of very few regrets about that purchase. But we are now midway through year 5, and well, I probably should have sold it about 2.5 years ago when they were having supply problems and people were paying nearly what they cost new for lightly-used models.
The status report at 65K miles:
- I'm on my third set of tires. The first ones lasted to almost 40K, the second wore out in less than 20K, and addressing that cost me another $4k on top of a new set of tires because apparently there are some design flaws in the Model Y's suspension that result in it wearing out the bushings (apparently the gutters for the windshield result in water being dripped directly on the control arm bushings) making them loose and squeaky, and even after they're replaced with OEM parts, being almost impossible to get the camber settings back in spec. My mechanic thinks that this is because as other parts of the suspension wear, it changes the overall geometry just enough that there isn't enough adjustment range in the control arms and it eats up the inner edge of the tires due to the excessive negative camber. So after a bunch of research, he fitted a set of aftermarket control arms with more adjustment range.
- It's now out of warranty. Drivetrain is still covered for a while yet, but all the ancillaries are not.
- My indicated range at full charge has dropped from 315 at new to about 285, which I think is a combination of Tesla revising the calculations that make the projections and actual capacity loss. 10% at 5 years isn't terrible, but it's not great either.
- Self-driving still isn't, but it is useful if you operate within the significant limitations of the system.
But that's not why I'm writing this post. I need to address the Elonphant in the room, or more accurately, the n4zi at the bar. I hadn't realized until recently what a nice thing it is that we barely know the names of the overwhelming majority of CEOs at major automakers, and if we know anything about their controversial opinions, it might be something along the lines of whether they should still make cars with manual transmissions or where they stand on CAFE and the transition away from fossil fuels, maybe some light thoughts about union-busting. But I know way more about the shitty opinions of Tesla's CEO than I care to, which unfortunately means I have to reconcile those against owning one of their products and what that potentially says about me. Looking at this in hindsight, I was never really a True Believer in his cult of personality, but seeing his unmasking, through generic juvenile edgelord, to anti-trans bigot, to radical right-wing ideologue actively trying to swing the results of the election to benefit himself and his fellow oligarchs, to actual n4zi means that my red line for "I don't want to be associated with anything that benefits him" was crossed probably 2 years ago and it just keeps getting harder to ignore.
My problem comes when looking at what I can actually do about this. The obvious bit is not to support any of the companies he's associated with - vote with your wallet. That really only works with Twitter and Tesla, because I don't personally have much influence on my tax dollars going to SpaceX, and this unfortunately doesn't seem to be a problem for most of the folks that do. But I'm already pretty much there - I bought the Model Y rather than leased it, my low-interest financing is not through Tesla, and I have a bit more than a year left until it's paid for, so they've already gotten their money from that. I'm paying for the data connectivity, and supercharging when I'm on trips. Neither of those are more than rounding errors in terms of the overall money I've handed Tesla, and I only use actual Tesla service when there's no other option. Similarly, for many reasons I wouldn't replace it with another Tesla if I had to replace it tomorrow.
But it's a lot more complicated when thinking about whether I should get rid of the one I currently own on principle, and it's something I've gone back and forth with myself about for a good portion of at least the last 18 months, with the last week bringing the angst about this back to the surface in a major way. The car is depreciating like crazy both because of lots of other people unloading theirs for much better options and because the guy in charge has made the brand completely toxic. Looking at the values right now, which likely don't reflect the significantly heil hellish last week or so yet, I could still trade it in for more than I owe on it, but that would mean taking on either a lease or even if I buy something used, a car payment for another number of years, which seems like a bad plan with a kid about to enter college and the new admin speedrunning piloting the economy into the side of a mountain. Selling it also doesn't send a message to Tesla in any real way. So it's down to what random people on the internet with Opinions on such things or people who don't know me well enough to know where I stand on this think of me while I continue driving it. I don't think either of those rate highly enough to cause me to do something different here, other than to put a few stickers on the car that make it a little clearer what I think. I wish I had the luxury of "f--- you money" where I didn't have to be pragmatic about this, especially because the Walter Mitty in me has some ideas of ways to make a clearer statement about the whole situation, but instead, I guess I'll just admit this is a pretty privileged problem to have in the first place and conclude my whining on the internet about it.
