This story first appeared in the June issue of AutoTalk – CLICK HERE to download the magazine FREE
Zero to 100 in 2.9 seconds, Tesla’s staffer says as we poke the nose out of a tight backstreet in Cremorne, trying to concentrate on some muppet approaching in their nondescript bucket.
The first thing you wonder in the moment is where the nearest Bugatti Veyron is to embarrass the former fastest production car worth a squillion dollars second-hand, some 13 years after its launch.
With great power comes great responsibility, as Spiderman taught me as an 11-year-old queasy in the cinema as CGI Spidey swung from New York skyscrapers.
The same rules apply with a Tesla Model X, only with the fear of certain death hanging over you should you bin it.
Having said that, in much more sedate circumstances, like trundling up and your own driveway, you still have to be bloody careful with this very expensive, wildly powerful, yet reassuringly tranquil place to sit, helm and generally move about in.
Before gushing over what is the second most expensive vehicle I’ve ever driven, let’s get some housekeeping out of the way.
The Tesla Model X, seen here in P100D galaxy-class variant – thanks to Tesla Australia for its five-day loan – is not perfect.
There feels like a frailty to door handles, the cockpit’s signature 12-inch screen controlling the majority of functions remains immensely distracting because simple tasks like adjusting temperature, fan speed, etc, asks the eyes to search rather than remain scanning the road, and the Model X’s bulky dimensions – particularly over the wheel arches – can make it difficult to judge where the wheels are in low-speed maneuvers.
Plus, the girders used to engineer the impressive centrepiece falcon wing doors make for trunk-like A-pillars.Of course, these gripes are merely that.
Idiosyncrasies that probably take longer than AutoTalk’s five-day loan to grow into, work around or adapt your brain to.
The spring-loaded centre console lid, however, feels flimsy and ready to break on a $170,000 hyper-SUV at the first sign of a child.
But when you look beyond the flaws, of which every vehicle has many, including the biggest brands in the business, you start to appreciate what a truly epic device the Model X really is.
You can spend far too much time playing with all the tricks and toys like the crackling fireplace replacing the LCD display, which then offers Atari gaming flashbacks and can turn the screen into a Kesel run homage.
The immortal Whoopi Cushion reminds you of school-day pranks on the teacher and the push of a button can crank the booming base of Wizards of Winter by Russian glam rock group Trans-Siberian Orchestra to make the neighbours peer from their curtains wondering if the electric car next door is possessed.
Watching the Model X flap its falcon wing doors in time with a thumping, catchy Christmas rock ballad, the mind boggles at the level of engineering.
Making those big doors animate quickly enough with motors powerful enough to cope, while ensuring structural integrity for one of the highest crash ratings in North American testing, without becoming an ungainly, monstrous hulk with protruding bulkheads and stress-cracked welds, is incredibly impressive.
In the name of objectivity and honest reporting, the Model X wasn’t in high or very high suspension mode when exiting the palatial driveway and a light bluestone inscription was etched into the scuff panel forward of the left-rear.
It’s proof that no matter how much automation and intelligence gets built into one of the cleverest cars on the road, nothing is infallible.
It needs to be said about the Model X that without this step forward it’s fair to say the world would likely never have reached this point of consumers even considering an electric car.
This whisper quiet tech giant screams about the possibilities offered by simplicity of design and Tesla itself has moved the automotive conversation to a place laughed about in carmaker board rooms for a century.
The first taste of Tesla was in a Model S back in 2015 when Ludicrous mode pulled my brain against the back of my skull and make me feel ill, and four years later having driven several with healthy skepticism always lingering in the back of the mind; I genuinely want an electric car, even to install a charger in the garage.
What got me over the line was that 2.9 second start.
Plenty of innovative car brands have come and gone in 150 years, few have rocked the foundations like the big T.
We’re at the point of no return, this is the automotive industry’s Interstellar moment; we can’t look back and mustn’t stop pushing for progress, or the momentum of going electric will wane.
Tesla’s future may be questioned on a daily basis, but few cars have wound the clock forward like the Model X and no brand has changed the course of the automotive continuum quite like Tesla.
