Solar Project Adds Solar Panels to the Top of a Tesla Model Y, But Will It Work?

Solar Array in Action

DartSolar

There is another attempt to create a solar-powered Tesla. DartSolar is pitching a drivable solar array to self-charge your car. Companies are experimenting with this concept, aiming to enhance the sustainability and self-sufficiency of EVs. A solar-powered Tesla would be amazing, no doubt. But it isn’t happening. That is not this writer's opinion, but the guy who may be the biggest fan of both solar and Tesla: Elon Musk.

A New Solar Addition for Tesla

Taking on the challenge is an ambitious company working on the "drivable solar array," currently in beta, designed to self-charge EVs. The company uses a Tesla Model Y test vehicle with nine large solar panels. The website states that “Beta One is light enough to be carried on the roof rack of your EV. It weighs less than 165 lbs. When expanded, it fits in a standard parking spot.”

Beta One features flexible solar panels without junction boxes, allowing for flat shipping and simple assembly into four sections. Projected to be priced at $4,000 USD and using nine 175-watt panels, Beta One claims to generate 6 kWh daily, providing about 20 miles (32 kilometers) of EV range with five hours of sunlight.

Payback on Investment

The amount of energy generated and range gained on an EV with these panels will obviously vary depending on the location, weather, and the vehicle, but how long would it take to recoup the initial investment? Without taking into account any range decrease due to the reduced aerodynamics and increased weight, owners would be looking at about $0.97 USD in daily savings (based on 16.21 cents per kWh average in the U.S.) when using these solar panels.

Before you even take into account the look of the vehicle, the added maintenance, and potential issues, owners would be looking at more than 11 years before making back their initial investment of $4,000.

That’s not to say this project doesn’t have its benefits and use cases. If you’re in a remote location with little access to electricity, this could be an interesting idea, however, it’s not going to make sense for most consumers. Solar requires a lot of space and right now it just makes more sense on a large open area instead of being strapped to the top of a moving vehicle. However, projects such as these continue to push innovation and outside-of-the-box thinking.

Teslas are popular vehicles for solar experiments as we’ve seen before with extendable range extenders.

Elon Musk's Perspective on Solar EVs

Musk recently posted on X: "Earth already receives about the same energy from the Sun in an hour than humanity consumes in a year. Solar panels just need to catch a tiny amount of it to power our entire civilization!" Despite acknowledging the immense potential of solar energy, Musk remains doubtful about its application in EVs due to limited surface area. In this video clip, he gives a simple explanation for his 2021 appearance with Joe Rogan.

Aptera's Solar Electric Vehicle: A Case Study

Aptera Motors continues to face the challenge of creating a solar-powered vehicle. The San Diego start-up has been raising funds for a few years to produce its unique, three-wheel sun-powered car. This vehicle can travel up to 1,000 miles on a single charge, up to 40 miles powered solely by solar energy.

Aptera's Solar Powered Car

Aptera

Aptera's vehicle is aerodynamically optimized and built with lightweight materials. Its unique shape and solar panel integration set it apart from traditional EVs, showcasing the potential of solar energy in transportation.

The integration of solar energy with EVs represents a frontier in sustainable transportation. While challenges such as surface area limitations exist, innovations like DartSolar’s Beta One and Aptera's solar electric vehicle may pave the way for a sunny and greener future.

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An In-Depth Look at Tesla's New Music Player in Update 2024.14 [Photos & Video]

One of the exciting new features of Tesla update 2024.14 is the improved media player for the Model 3 and Model Y.

Tesla's media player has gone through some drastic changes over the years, but this appears to be the best revision yet.

The previous media player had four states... yes, four. It made for a confusing experience, even for owners who used the car every day.

The four states included:

• The "default" state included a small player closest to the driver with some of the most used buttons

• The second state was the enlarged view when you dragged up on the media player that revealed additional buttons such as shuffle and search

• There was also its minimized state, which placed the music player’s icon in the dock and led to confusion

• And lastly, if you had a music service open fully on the right part of the screen AND minimized the media player, then the player would hop over to the top of the larger music panel on the right.

It created for an inconsistent experience and all of the players had their downsides. There just wasn’t a solution that worked all of the time. Thankfully the new music player addresses most of these issues.

Tesla used to have a media player that ran along the bottom of the right part of the screen

What’s New

The first thing Tesla did was reduce the number of states essentially down to two. You have a regular media player and a minimized player. You don't have to drag up on the player to access the shuffle or search functions and you can’t “lose” the player by minimizing it to the dock anymore.

One-Tap Access to Shuffle, Repeat and Search

What Tesla did was move all of the crucial media functions from the previous larger player directly to the main player. This now gives you one-tap access to functions like shuffle, repeat, search, playback speed, audio levels, and search.

Not only were these functions hard to access before, but they were hidden underneath the player, making discovery for new owners difficult.

Improved Progress Bar

The progress bar on the previous player was difficult to see since it was just a slim line at the bottom of the player.

The new player has a thicker progress bar that separates the top portion of the player, which houses the album art, song title, and a couple of functions, and the bottom portion, which contains more controls. Tesla also added a circle to the progress bar, making it more obvious you can not only scrub through the media but also lets you easily see your current spot.

Accessing More Functions

More music player options open to the right

Since the larger media player was removed, so was some of the functionality that it included. All the important items were moved to the main media player such as audio settings and search, however, the other functionality such as access to Favorites, Sources, Recent Songs, and Next, was moved to the larger music app.

If you tap on the new music player, it’ll open up the current music app on the right side that includes music controls, as well as access to your favorites, music sources, upcoming songs and more.

This is also the only way to view the elapsed and remaining times for the current selection, which is useful for longer median such as audiobooks or podcasts.

New Minimized Player

Although the music player doesn't minimize to the dock, it does feature a minimalist version that docks to the bottom of the screen.

When you slide down on the audio player, it'll be reduced to a simple "one-line" player. It simply shows a music icon, the name of the title being played, and an arrow showing you the player can be made larger. There is no longer a gray music icon that appears in the dock when the player is in its “minimized” state.

The new music player no longer minimizes to the dock

Modern UI

The player itself also looks more modern, it now features a translucent background, instead of a solid color like before. The new background lets vehicle animations subtly shine through, a lot like the effects used on modern operating systems.

What Models Will Support It

According to Tesla’s social media post on X, the ‘Visual updates’ in update 2024.14 are limited to AMD Ryzen-based Model 3 and Model Y vehicles, meaning only vehicles manufactured after about 2022+. The exact timeline depends on your vehicle and region, but you can check to see which processor your vehicle includes by navigating to Controls > Software > Additional Vehicle Information.

New Player in Action [Video]

DominicBRNKMN shows off the new music player in action below.

Will We See Intel Atom Support?

The new music player isn’t doing anything crazy in this latest iteration. We believe we'll see this updated player come to Intel Atom vehicles eventually. The Cybertruck already includes the new media player, among the other design changes, so when Tesla said only for “Model 3/Y with AMD chip” on X, they likely meant in this specific update.

There's nothing that’s more computationally intensive about this new player except for maybe the translucent background, however, that’s already being done on Intel-based vehicles for some of the navigation modules. There isn’t anything new that the slower Intel processor couldn't handle.

It’s in Tesla’s best interest to keep a common interface between vehicles. Tesla wouldn't want to drastically change the way a common item like the "radio" works between different Model 3 and Model Y years if they didn't have to. That would complicate issues with service and documentation. Tesla wants owners to have the same UI as much as possible, so we there’s a good chance that we’ll see the new media player apply to Intel in the future.

Hopefully, in an upcoming update, Intel owners will receive this streamlined music player. Update 2024.14 is currently rolling out slowly to some vehicles. 

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Tesla Vehicles are the Cheapest to Maintain and Repair According to Consumer Reports Study

Consumer Reports

Tesla cars are the cheapest to maintain and repair according to a new study by Consumer Reports. Elon Musk commented on the survey on X emphasising that Tesla is “the lowest car to maintain”.

The study, which includes data from thousands of car owners in the US, was recently published and shows that Teslas averaged only $580 in maintenance and repair costs over the first five years of ownership. From years six through ten, the costs increased to $3,455, which brings the total to $4,035 for the first ten years of ownership — the lowest of any vehicle tested. It’s worth noting that the average length of car ownership in the U.S. is about 8 years. 

Buick and Toyota fall right below Tesla (both at $4,900) with Lincoln and Ford closing the top 5 with $5,040 and $5,400 respectively for maintenance and repair costs in a 10-year ownership.

German premium automakers BMW, Audi and Mercedes-Benz are among the 5 most expensive on the list with 10-year costs reaching $9,500, $9,890 and $10,525, respectively. The trio is only surpassed by the luxury German automaker Porsche with an average cost of $14,090 and Land Rover closes the list at $19,250. 

Car Maintenance

Vehicles with internal combustion engines (ICE) require additional maintenance, not only oil changes, but drive belts, transmission oil changes, coolant flushes, and more. Not only that, but ICE cars have more moving parts that decrease the reliability of the vehicle and can cause additional repairs such as transmission issues, clogged fuel filters or injectors, faulty spark plugs and the list goes on and on.

Since electric vehicles use regenerative braking to slow the vehicle down, brake pads also last much longer, sometimes lasting over 100k miles. This reduces wear on the brake pads, and rotors and even reduces brake dust on your wheels.

“EVs are cheaper to maintain, look after, and certainly to service,” says Matt Cleevely, from Cleevely Motors to Wired magazine adding that EVs “have half as many moving parts and require no regular oil changes”.

In Tesla’s case, the automaker suggests Model 3 owners replace the cabin air filter and HEPA filter every three years, check brake fluid every two years, and clean and lubricate the brake calipers every year or 12,500 miles, in areas where the roads are salted during the winter.

Gas Savings

These maintenance savings are only a small part of the reason why electric vehicles are cheaper to use for daily driving. Another large portion of savings comes from fuel costs. Tesla often promotes their vehicles’ gas savings on their website. For example, the Model Y has an estimated gas savings of $6,000 in the U.S. over the first five years of ownership alone. The savings may be even greater in other parts of the world where gas may be more expensive. After taking those savings into account, the world’s best-selling vehicle in 2023 starts at $29,490 after gas savings and the U.S. federal tax credit — and that’s before you include maintenance cost and time savings.

Cheapest cars to maintenance and repair through 10-years of ownership

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