Outfitting the Tesla

Written By CD Henderson

Dry Run Road Trip - Entry #2

Before Ben and I could embark on our journey, the vehicle would need to be outfitted for sleeping.

By day, the Tesla Model 3 looks like most other cars in its class. It’s a four-door sedan with a trunk. Fold the rear seats down, though, and the rear passenger area and the trunk space - an impressive 15 cubic feet - combine to form a larger area, an area fit for sleeping during a road trip.

Or, as Tesla owners refer to it: #TeslaCamping.

Sleeping under the stars, courtesy the clear glass roof?

Sleeping in relative comfort, courtesy the vehicle’s climate control and special ‘camp mode’?

It is, by many accounts, the perfect vehicle for sleep. Or camp.

Now, to make it more comfortable…

Mattress Choices

The first challenge would be outfitting the Tesla with a mattress.

I expected this would be easy. Just go online and search for “Tesla mattress”, no? With the number of Model 3 and Model Y owners I’d seen using their vehicles as a tent on wheels, there must be one, or more, that came recommended, no?

In reality, there are dozens, in all manner of materials and styles. Memory foam… inflatable… some made especially for the Tesla vehicles, and others for cars or SUVs, with names like DreamCase, TesMat, and TesCamp.

After thoroughly researching, reading dozens upon dozens of reviews, I decided on the TesMat. It looked comfortable - sleek, almost - and, had great reviews. Best of all, it folded into pieces for storage into the subtrunk. I liked the idea of being able to carry this mattress anywhere without impacting the amount of storage space the trunk normally offered. Being able to unfold my mattress anytime, anywhere, and just spend the night under the stars?

Problem: the TesMat proved to be very popular. As a result, it was backordered, with an ever-increasing date for expected delivery. At first it was mid-June - perfect for our dry run road trip. But I was still trying to decide between it and several other mattresses at the time. It soon moved to late-June, a date that might still work depending on how late was “late”. Before I could decide, though, it had moved to mid-July. That would be too late for this trip. I decided to hold off and look at other options, options that would be available sooner.

I moved on to trying to decide between the TesCamp and an inflatable mattress.

I felt like the TesCamp, while a decent choice, might be disappointing due to its two-inch thickness as opposed to the TesMat’s three inches. I liked the fact that it came with a carrying case, but it appeared to be too large to fit in the subtrunk. I knew I wouldn’t keep it in the car if I had to let it take up a big portion of the trunk real estate. This, I was fairly certain, wouldn’t be a mattress I’d be happy with in the long-term. It was nearly $100 less than the TesMat, but the extra $100 would be worth it if it meant a mattress I’d be happy with.

Inflatable mattresses, on the other hand, left a lot to be desired. Most had negative reviews. Previous purchasers reported that they needed to be re-inflated every few days - some even more frequently. They were prone to popping. Excess weight? Pop! Trunk closes on one corner? Pop! I knew that, if I went with an inflatable, I’d wind up using it for this trip, and then buying something else, anyway. With finances tight to begin with, why purchase something I’d probably never use again?

As I was in the midst of making my decision, I spotted a mattress in a storage area that housed a number of items from my brother’s recent move. It appeared to be tailored to fit his camper van. Surely it was too large for the Tesla?

After measuring, it appeared to be approximately the same size as the TesMat, albeit with an additional inch or two of thickness. Could this be the mattress I was looking for?

RoadTrip-Mattress.gif

Turns out it would be.

Best of all, it would fold just enough to fit into the trunk, leaving us the front and back seats for use when we weren’t sleeping, and a little trunk space as well.

The TesMat remains a future purchase goal. But for now, an old camper van mattress, repurposed for the Tesla, would serve as our bed for the dry run…

Privacy Screen

In the weeks leading up to the trip I’d have a chance encounter with a fellow Tesla owner at the Supercharger in Liverpool, NY. He was a young man with a Model 3 performance edition. With its dark tint and chrome delete kit, our cars could have been twins in appearance.

He’d followed me out of the Kinney Drugs next door and struck up a conversation. We’d talked for a few minutes before another Tesla owner pointed out that I was having a conversation with someone who was barefoot, on a hot day, on the scorching-hot pavement. I realized that this kid had been in the drugstore without shoes, as well. He explained that he spent as much time as possible barefoot. Free spirit? I loved it.

He’d been on a road trip of his own for a few weeks, heading up from the southern states back to his home city, Chicago. He invited me to come over and check out his car. He’d outfitted it with a TesMat, a mattress he highly recommended. (This solidified my choice to buy one in the future).

He also recommended removing the rear seat while traveling. Sure enough, his own seat cushion was in the car beside him, ready to be replaced whenever the car was put back into its original condition.

“Does that give you more room?” I asked him.

“Guys our height are going to have enough room, regardless,” he told me. “Add a few more inches, and you’re not going to have a lot of room for your feet.” He explained that removing the seat made the car more like a bed, with less of an incline. I made a mental note to try to figure out how to do it later.

I asked this kid a ton of questions about his trip, and he patiently answered them.

Where did he spend the night? He’d avoided staying in hotels, sleeping in the car most nights and with people he’d met along the way on occasion.

Where did he shower? He admitted that this was the biggest challenge on his trip, even apologizing for any funk I might have detected. He’d mostly showered in peoples’ homes along the way, people he met on his road trip. I was sorry that I wasn’t heading home for another day, because I would have offered him a shower and a place to sleep on the boat.

The kid told me that he hoped to one day do a longer road trip that mirrored the trip I was planning later. For now, he was headed back home to Chicago.

“If you ever make it out my way, let me know if there’s anything I can do - I’d love to help,” he told me. I promised to do that. Unfortunately, I didn’t get his info. I had just had my cards for the trip printed, so gave him one of those…

The last tip he offered was one on privacy. He suggested the TesMat privacy curtain, which he said made your presence in the car virtually undetectable and blocked out light, making it easier to sleep in places not normally reserved for spending the night in a vehicle.

“Without the screen, I probably would have been visited by law enforcement a few times,” he told me, laughing. “And I sure wouldn’t have slept as well.”

I resolved to purchase the privacy screen for my trip. It arrived just in time for our departure.

CD Henderson
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