Tesla’s mass production electric vehicle — the Model 3 sedan is scheduled to start shipping in September. The automaker currently seems to be heavily immersed in testing the (almost) production-ready prototypes of its upcoming sedan. All of these vehicles have been spotted by passer-bys not far away from the company’s headquarters in Silicon Valley. These could be the final testing rounds before the vehicle goes into production in a couple months.
We’ve already received a couple of peeks at the Model 3 sedan when chief executive Elon Musk shared images and videos of one of the prototypes that were being tested in Tesla’s parking space. We had gotten a close look at the exterior of their production-ready vehicle back then. But, fresh close-up images of the interiors, especially the touchscreen dashboard, have appeared on the interwebs today for the very first time.
Thanks to Teslarati, who spotted a blue Model 3 in Tesla’s neighborhood, we now know have a good idea of how the dashboard design — minus the speedometer and heads-up display — will probably look within this vehicle. We have gotten an extremely close look at the interiors of the Model 3 prototype and believe this could be the final version of the dashboard. And from what it seems, the aesthetics of the dashboard are quite similar to those shown during the announcement.
As you can yourself witness in the images attached above, there is a large touchscreen infotainment system mounted at the center of the dashboard. You can ignore the second screen in these images because it is the Tesla engineer’s laptop, who’s most likely collecting data from the vehicle. The dashboard screen is just a single piece of screen with hard plastic bezels and no buttons around the edges.
This touchscreen would act as the primary command center for the Model 3 sedan — to display the speed, battery charge remaining, easter eggs, and the usual functionalities of the infotainment system. The space behind the wheel will remain clear of any clutter, as has already been suggested by Musk in a tweet earlier. The autopilot controls would also be surfaced on this mounted display.
@nickg_uk No
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 28, 2017
Musk has acknowledged the lack of the traditional instrument cluster and speedometer but countered the argument saying that the same becomes redundant when the vehicle can drive itself. And that’s particularly true because all the Tesla vehicles assembled after September come completely packed with self-driving hardware. They’re capable of Level 3 autonomy using the Autopilot but Tesla is presently working to enhance its capabilities. Still, you’d have to refer to the dashboard screen, which is placed quite near the wheel, to gain access to every small detail of the Model 3.
