Crashnburn80's Tesla Model 3 Performance Longer Range Build

Probably my favorite color available right now. How’s your Tesla keeping up, @crashnburn80 ?

 

Well the 22 was doing absolutely great, but traded it in for the Highland Performance Insane model. Stripped the 22 Tesla of mods to transfer to the new one. As a gearhead I can't help but be drawn to the new Performance having unique front and rear exterior, new deep bucket performance seats, unique interior, adaptive suspension, better aero, lighter weight, actual light weight staggered forged wheels, more power and just plain quicker over the previous model. The previous performance was pretty much the same as every other Tesla, other than a bit more power and bigger brakes, this car feels like a more comprehensively thought out performance vehicle.

And way more high end power, no longer falls off on freeway speeds.
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a62640173/2024-tesla-model-3-performance-quicker-acceleration/

 

How’s it going with no indicator stalk? Getting used to it or a PITA?

 

No indicator stalk is just dumb. Shifting on the screen isn’t nearly as good as the stalk, but I’d not call it a deal breaker. Problem is many stalk functions are now buttons on the steering wheel, like indicators, wipers, high beam, even voice command moved from the roller ball to a button. But none of the buttons on the steering wheel have tactile identification feeling, it’s all just a smooth surface so you must look at the steering wheel to use the feature (at least at this point in the learning curve). It’s just dumb, though still wouldn’t call it a deal breaker for the car. I don’t feel it is quite as bad as many make it out to be online, but not a fan. I have a kit to add the stalks back that I’ll be installing next week, after Tesla adds HomeLink.

 

didn't realize there was a kit like that. Hope it works out

 

The new 3 Performance came with summer performance tires just like the last 3 Performance. The stock Pirelli P-zero performance tires have a minimum temp of 42 degrees below which can cause tire cracking. Needless to say they had to be immediately replaced for the winter.

I temporarily put on my previous wheel/tire combo on the new car while I pulled the OEM Warp wheels to get the tires changed out at the tire shop. Yes, I have trust issues like that and take my wheels loose to the shop, not the car.

19" T-Sportline 19" TSS wheels in space grey


While the pre-Highland Performance took 235/35 R20 tires front and rear, the new Highland performance runs a staggered setup. Same tire size up front with 9" wide front wheels and 10" wide rears with 275/30R R20s out back. Finding matching staggered front and rear low profile winter performance tires is a real challenge. The Pirelli Sottozero 3s I ran previously do not come in a compatible rear tire size. Interestingly Tesla lists the Sottozero 3 as a winter tire performance option for 2025 using 19" wheels and 265/35 R19s (not yet available from Pirelli). Sottozero 3s are the only performance winter tire that is EV tuned.

Comments on Tesla's wheel choices.
My 2022 M3P had the 20" Uberturbines. Very unique looking wheel, but dumb. The wheels were crazy heavy at 32+lbs. Not a performance part, and why put the heaviest wheels on the performance car?! The Uberturbines immediately got kicked to the curb. The Highland Performance has Tesla's new Warp wheels, forged wheels with aero inserts. Forging is the strongest and lightest wheel manufacturing process and by far the most expensive. The Warp wheels weigh an impressively light weight 22lbs while being aero optimized. So while the Uberturbines were immediately removed, I am going to keep the Warp wheels, it will be crazy money to beat their performance.

Keeping the same wheels, I also wanted to keep the staggered tire setup.

Winter tire options available in both 235/35 R20 and 235/75 R20
OEM Performance summer tire Pirelli Pzero. Speed rating 186mph. 22lbs front, 25lbs rear.
-Nokian Hakkapelitta R5 EV - Winter tire designed for EVs, not a performance tire. Speed rating 118mph. 27lbs front, 28.7lbs rear.
-Pirelli Winter 270 Sottozero S2 - High performance winter tire, front tires would need to be imported from Italy as the tire is discontinued. Speed rating 168mph. 26lb front, 28lb rear.
-Hancook Winter I Sept Evo 3 - Not a performance tire, backordered nation wide.
-Michelin Pilot Alpin PA4 - High performance winter tire offered as OEM for Porsche and Corvette. Not an EV tire. V speed rated to 149mph. 23lbs front, 27lbs rear.

Given the 4 options for a staggered setup, this was a pretty easy choice. Michelin Pilot Alpin PA4s all the way. Lightest tires, while also being a high performance tire capable of a decent speed rating. Only thing they do not have is the EV noise absorbing form like the Pirelli Sottozero 3s. Discontinued tires like the Sottozero S2s are always a risk, if you damage one you might not be able to replace it.

Swapping the all steel single piece straight vein rotors.


Mountain Pass performance 2pc rotors installed, once again the outside brake pad wear indicator had to be cut off as it interfered with the rotor hat. Reduced rotational weight and massively improved cooling with 30% gains by utilizing directional 2pc rotors. The thick aluminum hats also add +4mm of stance.



I can't explain how much I love fresh performance rubber.



Competed the install with the Unplugged performance titanium lug swap. Of course did not take a finished product picture.

To do the rear brakes I put the car in service mode, this is needed to release the rear parking brake system to remove the rear caliper. Service more allows access to more than you would see otherwise, I noticed the car had errors in service mode. Not reported in the general UI, but the car seems to be freaking out about no stalks. So many of these errors in service mode not visible in regular drive mode.



Tesla is coming out Tuesday to install Homelink. I'm going to ask about these errors. I'm concerned because when I add the steering stalks back in my aftermarket kit, I don't want to be blamed for this pre-existing issue.

 

Interested in the steering stalk mod to come! No stalks is a bit over the top IMO.

 

Annnd the Tesla is now lit like a Christmas tree, flood of all the error lights. ABS failure, Emergency Braking failure, Traction Control failure, Stability Control failure, Regen Failure, Auto hold braking failure (car now only free rolls, including backward), Camera vehicle detection failure, FSD failure, car now mildly accelerates on its own when foot is not on the accelerator. Cascading errors blew up pulling away from a stop light at non-warp speeds. Double scroll reboot did not resolve the issue.



Immediately scheduled service in the App, the most local centers were booked a ways out but Seattle (inconvenient) said next day. Booked Seattle, 2 hours later appointment confirmation says next available service appointment is 3 weeks out. WTF. Messaged Tesla back to see what a human can tell me vs Tesla's automated systems. Definitely not happy about a week old car eating shit and the next available service to resolve it being 3 weeks out.

 

Yesterday had some interesting developments. My Tech enabled some new features on the car not enabled by default, including rear fogs that are selectable in the lighting menu.



Also interesting, rear lower tails + signals/flashers.


The lower tails and flashers only enable when the trunk is open, which makes so much sense. With Tesla's move to one piece tails on the Highland, the entire light assembly now lifts up when the trunk is open whereas the earlier models had split rear lamps where half of the lamp remained on the rear body while the other half elevated with the trunk. With the entire lamp elevating with the trunk on the Highland, there is no longer any rear facing safety lighting should you open your trunk on the shoulder of the road. Hence aux safety lighting engages to make sure the vehicle is seen.

While the rear fogs were definitely not available before Tesla turned them on, I'm less certain about the rear tails and flashers. They 100% should be enabled given the 3s tail light design.

Lots of 3 vs 3 highland comparison photos on the internet, but I had the chance today to park next to an earlier one that was also grey (the grey for highland is a new darker color) and figured I'd take a comparison pic.

 

Damn. Makes me happy my simple, yet slow, 2015 Leaf “experiment” is dumb enough that I can just disconnect the 12V for a few min and it all comes back up fine.

Hopefully it’s resolved soon and that’s the only “Xmas tree” you get in the car.

 

Oh you have crash’s ‘15 and a ‘15 Leaf? Twinsies. I want both.

That was a good year for vehicles.

 

Double scroll wheel hold + brake pedal hold is the hard reboot, I had previously done the double scroll wheel only reboot. Doing the former cleared the errors and returned the car to normal operation.

Tesla responded first thing in the morning saying I can bring the car in at my earliest convenience, no need to wait 3 weeks for an appointment with that state. However with the reboot clearing the errors and restoring normal function they advised not to bring it in if the car is currently functioning normally.

 

Most annoying thing to me on the highland is a passenger front interior rattle, when hitting short irregular surfaces such as a manhole cover, pothole, etc. Finally took the time to trouble shoot it today.

Tesla upgraded most all the Highland interior surfaces to be soft vs the previous gen hard plastic. However, the seat buckle and side seat lower base frame are both hard plastic and with the right jostling of the car they vibrate together and rattle.

Super simple fix, one side adhesive foam applied to the lower side of the seat pictured below so the buckle doesn’t rattle against it.


Tesla did apply padding to the outside of the buckle to prevent it from rattling against the carpeted console, which doesn’t seem like it would be an issue. Odd they didn’t do the same to the inside of the buckle.

Interestingly the driver side buckle and seat frame sit apart vertically differently so they do not make contact.

Ironically, the reason I have single sided adhesive foam is from it being the recommended fix for the previous gen 3 to address the driver side front fender liner rattle (not an issue on the highland).

 

First I've seen, a plug and play Tesla aux light controller using a control module run off the headlight plug. Looks really slick. Wish there was a version to run fogs, however it appears setup for aux high beam only.
https://www.bilkomponenter.no/en/products/extra-light-tesla-model-3-lazer-elite-12-linear

 

Turns out this solution will be worthless as soon as the matrix headlights are enabled and run high beam near full time.

This Valo solution allows tapping the canbus and programmatically running a wireless relay off a variety of OEM canbus signals, including rear fogs and high beams among many others. Meaning it would be possible to add real performance fogs and run them off the touch screen controls to automatically activate with the OEM rear fogs. Many other lighting possibilities available.
https://www.valostore.com/en/product/auxiliary_light_relay_xbb_obd_dongle_powerunit

Available canbus signals off the 3 highland to utilize
https://www.xbb.se/xbbTable/bilmodeller.php




Of course they do not ship to the USA, meaning the need to setup a european international mail forwarding service, unless you know someone in one of the designated shipping EU countries that would be willing to lend a favor.

 

Let me see… I have contacts in Sweden.

 

I actually used my CSS to Tesla adapter! Only took 2.5 years.



All the talk of range issues from the anti-EV crowd when I bought my first Tesla led me to pickup a CSS to Tesla adapter for high speed level 3 charging at 3rd party chargers. Very quickly I realized this pricey paperweight and would never be needed. The Tesla charging network is exceptional, but if looking for max charging options it can be an insurance policy. Spending 7.5 hours of highway driving without returning home for a long weekend of select travel baseball, I was only using 12A level 1 charging while staying with family. These L3 chargers were located at the baseball fields which were an hour away from where we were staying. I didn't need to charge here. The car estimated we'd make it home with 9% charge, with plenty of superchargers along I5 to not be an issue. Being I had existing charging credits with ChargePoint and an opportunity to use the fancy adapter, I added 8kw for $2.50.

 

The other week I was using summon to back the car out of a large deep puddle so everyone could get in without getting their feet wet. It was dark and it was the first time I stood outside the car while it was reversing. The reverse lights don't illuminate much, which typically isn't a major issue as the high resolution cameras compensate for the dark just fine. But it did get me curious what backup lighting upgrades were available, I found this one that looks pretty slick:
https://hamphi.com/en/products/tesla-strong-backlight-extra-light-2-pack

 

You've used yours one time more than me. I fell prey to the same anti-EV BS. I'm now at 45K miles of road trips and never once have I needed a CCS adaptor. But, I drag that and the mobil charger around with me on road trips. They're like my comfy blankie.

 

My local L2 public charger was vandalized and the owner isn’t going to fix… so my Leaf small battery experiment may be coming to an end. Ioniq 5 is at the top of the list.