Pretty smart looking car. Doesn't ape the Model S' look too much, clearly looks a little more compact, and the roofline makes it look both roomy and a little space-agey. From the front it almost has a Porsche Panamera look going on... Nice looking car. I wish Tesla good luck, though I don't think they'll need it.
They announced during the livestream that they already have 115k preorders. Pretty crazy considering that they were all made site-unseen (I guess barring Tesla employees that placed their preorder and knew what the car looked like).
True. But based on previous models which are all pretty smart-looking, I'd say it was a safe enough bet that this model would be as well.
It's funny too, I never thought about the price point they're actually selling it for. I can afford one, and might just get one for my wife (my car is still new-ish, and efficient enough).
The panamera is a very awkward car, I agree. But I get where the parent is coming from. I expected the 3 to look like a scaled down S, and a Tesla employee friend said to expect something between an S and an X (yes, he had seen it.. and no, comparison to the X is not a compliment).
I was pleasantly surprised to see the video footage of it, though I don't think it translates well to the stills/screen grabs we've seen.
The headlights-above-the-beltline look reminds me of the Roadster and the Panamera and maybe a touch like the Dodge Razor concept. it's very much not an S, while somehow being attractive in many of the ways the S is (and ugly in none of the ways that the X is). Overall I'm quite pleased with the looks.
Can't stand the front. Looks more like a Toyota than like a "premium car". But I don't like the Porsche Panamera too. I don't think we have the same taste in cars.
That's just a plastic part, so it's easy to change without a huge expense. As opposed to a metal stamping, where the dies are super expensive to make. Most manufacturers change the look of the bumpers during their mid-model refresh, just to make an older car look attractive again.
What I found interesting was how smooth all the panels are. Obviously for aerodynamics, but I suspect it also lowers their costs, as lots of ridges and dips mean more chance for a panel to be stamped wrong, or to not align with an adjacent panel. Same with the interior - no gauge cluster means a cleaner look and lower costs. Not sure what the DOT and NHTSA is going to say about it...
