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Fire and Smoke (and air filter test)

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Lots of wildfires in California lately and over 100 in the Santa Cruz area this year so they’ve closed many of the county parks to try to reduce the risk.  This one a couple of weeks ago (the Rincon fire) was quite visible from my place but happily they were able to get it under control in a couple of days:

 

After seeing someone test the air filtration of Tesla’s Model X and its “biodefense mode” against the heavy smoke we’re getting from our wildfires this month, I decided to pick up an inexpensive air quality sensor to test my home’s air as well as my Model 3’s more mundane filtration system.  (The Model 3 doesn’t have the Model X’s fancy “biodefense mode” or huge HEPA filters.)

With the PM2.5 sensor reading 150 μg/m3 (unhealthy) in the San Jose area (due to smoke from the Camp Fire that burned through Paradise, CA), I found that the Tesla Model 3’s air filter would bring things down to the 20’s in the cabin in just a few minutes when recycle air was turned on.  Later, I stopped and made a video to record it falling from 135 to 5 μg/m3 in less than 10 minutes. It climbed back up to the 80’s pretty quickly though when I turned off recycle air and let it bring in fresh air:

This video was even picked up by Teslarati (“Model 3 protects owner…“) and re-tweeted by Elon.

Hi, Elon!  But they didn’t pick up on my follow-up test to compare the Tesla to a Toyota:

Comparison with Toyota RAV4 EV

I decided to repeat the test with my 2013 Toyota RAV4 EV.  This time the starting air quality wasn’t nearly as bad as my initial test but both the Tesla and the Toyota were able to filter the cabin down to a reading of zero from a start of 50 μg/m3 with recycle air turned on. At full fan speed, the RAV4 took about 10 minutes and the Model 3 was able to do it in about 3-4 minutes.

With recycle air turned off (fresh air intake on), the PM2.5 reading in both cars climbed up again. The Tesla was able to hold it around the low to mid 30’s but the RAV4 went up to essentially the outside reading of 50 μg/m3 again.  So the Model 3’s system does work better.

One other thing of note is that the RAV4 ended up with a much higher concentration of TVOC (total volatile organic compounds), even though the vehicle is five years old. Presumably this is off-gassing of some of the materials in the cabin.Oh, and I forgot to turn off A/C in the RAV4 for the test – hence the temperature drop.

Here’s more detail in screenshots – RAV4 start and finish with recycle on:

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Model 3 start and finish with recycle on:

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On a subsequent four-hour drive to Tahoe in the Model 3, I encountered much worse air along the way (San Jose, Central Valley, Sacramento, etc). I’d guess the PM2.5 count was easily at least 150 μg/m3 and probably much higher in places, but I avoided opening the windows to test it. I kept the air on recycle and saw that the particle count held down around 20 but sometimes climb to the 30’s. Not bad, given how bad it was outside.

If you’re interested in buying a Tesla, using someone’s referral link will give you a discount (the amount varies over the years) and grants redeemable credits to the person who referred you.  Here’s my Tesla referral link.

Finally Got Our Teslas!

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I’ve been waiting for a mid-size, long range, all wheel drive electric car ever since I got my first taste of EV’s at Nissan’s LEAF test drive event in 2010.  I was so taken by how it felt to drive electric that I ended up putting a reservation down for Tesla’s still-under-development Model S soon after since Nissan was no longer taking reservations for the LEAF.  As it turns out, I ended up snagging a LEAF in 2011 before even getting to test drive the first Model S in 2012.  I decided to pass on the Model S (too big for my tastes) but eventually brought home “half a Tesla” in the form of Toyota and Tesla’s joint RAV4 EV effort in 2013 – as did Darlene when I sold my old LEAF out from under her.

When Tesla finally revealed the prototype of the smaller Model 3 in early 2016 and opened up reservations, Darlene and I and Dave and 450,000 other “friends” all jumped on it – and began the long wait as Tesla started development.

Well, here they are – we both finally got ours this past weekend (and Dave got his a few weeks ago):

  

And, oh boy, are these amazing and fun to drive – over 300 miles range on a charge, access to Tesla Superchargers all across the country, over-the-air software updates, incredible “spaceship-like” interior design with lots of customization controls, among the safest vehicles on the road and blah blah blah… okay, yeah, yeah….

Anyway, here’s the obligatory “Tesla launch” video:

Custom “Stealth” Look

I decided to get some detailing work done to give mine a more custom look.  I had XPEL Stealth self-healing paint protection film applied over all the painted surfaces to give it a satin matte appearance, a speckled dark gray 3M vinyl wrap applied to cover all of the chrome exterior trim pieces as well as the gloss black interior console, a Ceramic Pro hydrophobic ceramic coating applied over the body, windows and wheel covers for easy cleaning, a mild tinting (Huper Optik) applied to the side windows to give a nice contrast between the body and the glass portion and the front and rear chrome badges painted black.  Elite Auto Films in San Jose did the work and while it did take a couple of weeks and several follow-up visits to finish everything up, it came out looking great.  The satin effect is fairly subtle, particularly in photographs, but it looks quite sharp in person!  Darlene also had Elite Auto Films do some paint correction work and had a Ceramic Pro coating on hers.

Click through for more pictures in the full gallery:

      

If you’re interested in buying a Tesla, using someone’s referral link will give you a discount (the amount varies over the years) and grants redeemable credits to the person who referred you.  Here’s my Tesla referral link.

Another Pre-Movie Gaming Day

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Roland, Clay, Mark, Steven, Troy and I gathered for another gaming day and movie night (Blade Runner 2049) this past Sunday:

  • We managed to escape the singularity after many hilariously haphazard gravitational maneuvers in Gravwell.
  • We cleverly dodged almost certain disaster on K2 by decisively turning away from the mountain entirely.
  • We successfully secured pirate booty aplenty in Libertalia despite the efforts of many mutineers among us.
  • Although many boats were violently smashed by whales, many swimmers torn apart by sharks, and several refugee-laden ships utterly destroyed by sea monsters, a handful of survivors made it to shore to tell the tale of Survive: Escape from Atlantis.

It was indeed a day of many adventures.  (And a good movie, too!)  Thanks, guys!

Click through for the full gallery:

    

Home Theater Upgrade: 4K/HDR with the JVC RS640 Projector

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I’ve been waiting to go to 4K/HDR until high-performance, laser source projectors became reasonably affordable, but it looks like that’s going to be a while yet.  (Similar to the wait for high def projectors in the early 2000’s.)  So, here we go, it’s the JVC DLA-RS640U projector (full specs here) and it’s quite the nice jump up from my older JVC RS55U projector, from early 2012.  By the way, I recommend contacting AVScience for a purchase – they offer steep discounts from the retail prices and are great to work with.  I’ve purchased from them multiple times over the years.

Both my old and new projectors are able to display video at 4K (3840 x 2160 pixels), but the RS640 can take 4K input sources while the old RS55 could only take HD content (1920 x 1080) and upscale it.  More importantly though is the ability of the RS640 to display high dynamic range (HDR) content, giving a much wider range of colors and shadow and intensity.  In addition, the RS640 provides even higher contrast ratio, even tighter spacing between pixels, more lumens, better motion enhancements, better 3D display and a low latency mode for gaming (yay!).

Read more “Home Theater Upgrade: 4K/HDR with the JVC RS640 Projector”

Vermilion Cliffs / Paria Canyon

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The Vermilion Cliffs / Paria Canyon National Monument in northern Arizona and southern Utah includes a huge area of amazing rock and sandstone formations, including what may be the longest slot canyon in the world, Buckskin Gulch (15 miles!).  During my October road trip, I got to experience a little taste of the canyon from the Wire Pass trailhead but it would take an overnight trip and gear to do the whole thing.  (Here’s some details on what it involves.)  I would definitely like to come back and do that as well as try to get a permit to go visit “The Wave” (restricted to 20 people per day via a lottery system) and some of the other formations in the Coyote Buttes area.  I tried to get out to the White Pocket formations but the road turned out to be too sandy for mountain bike access, too far for day hiking and certainly too much for the current incarnation of the Traveling Cat Adventure Vehicle.  Some serious 4WD required.

 

Another cool multi-day adventure trip in the area is backpacking all the way through Buckskin Gulch and following the Paria River Canyon out to Lees Ferry and the Colorado River over 4-5 days.  This whole wide area is a really cool region to explore and there’s plenty to come back and see.

Click through for the full gallery, including hiking a canyon wash above Soap Creek (and losing my drone!), visiting Lees Ferry and the start of the Grand Canyon at Marble Canyon, checking out Horseshoe Bend and Glen Canyon Dam and a couple of little detours into Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.