Is that a kitchen sideboard?
Ahead of its production release later this year, the Tesla Model 3 has been spotted testing in California, and offers us the first clear shot of the interior. Found on Facebook, the Model 3’s cabin reveals most, and shows us that not much has changed since we first clapped eyes on the achingly-minimalist concept last year.
Our previous reports have covered things like the release specs, driving range, and dimensions of the Model 3, but we really have never seen the interior before. Concurring with a tweet that CEO Elon Musk sent out some time ago, the Model 3 does without a traditional instrument binnacle, and survives with just one centrally-mounted screen, that appears to float freely from the dash. That screen will display things like climate control and car settings, as well as the usual driver-related information that would usually be housed in the instrumentation.
There’s little doubt that you hadn’t noticed the air-conditioning vents, or lack of. This concurs with reports made in the past saying that it was going to ditch traditional vents, and instead pipe cool air around the cabin via openings in the dashboard. While this is all very swish (and should offer pleasant ‘ambient’ cooling), we can’t help but feel that the dashboard really could use some features, if just to break the horizontal monotony.
Tesla has also said that it will forgo testing for the Model 3, and instead put it straight into production in July of this year. While this may raise eyebrows among industry stalwarts, the first units of the Model 3 will be delivered to employees, and not to the general public. This should give Tesla an opportunity to identify and resolve any issues that present themselves in the first batch of 3’s before rolling them out to paying customers.
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