We recently purchased a Model 3 SR+ for more development work and to get Jesse off of gasoline-burning automobiles, and were pretty impressed with how quick this little lightweight was! Sure enough with some dyno testing we came to realize the reason for that – it has almost as much power as a Long Range Model 3 at higher speeds!

What we suspect is happening is that Tesla put in a little bit of extra effort to give a broader speed range over which the SR+ has a nearly flat peak power. So while the Long Range car has a bunch more power at low speed (up to 60mph), once the Long Range runs out of battery voltage and falls into field weakening, both the LR and the SR+ have very similar power levels when comparing at the same SOC.

Since the SR+ is around 10% lighter, the SR+ ends up actually being the faster car above 65mph! In the graph below you can see exactly what we are talking about.

Now to see how SOC influences power. In the next graph below you see some fairly interesting trends – below 60% SOC the power starts falling off fairly rapidly, but there is almost no difference in power between 100% to 75% SOC!

Watch the little video we put together below for some dyno pulls and further speculation about what Tesla might be up to with the SR+.

We have to say, 275 horsepower at the wheels is no slouch, and it is faster than just about any base level non-performance sedan out there (don’t quote us on that), especially when you factor in the fact that the electric drive gives you 100% of that peak power instantly when you put your foot down, no gear changing or spooling of turbos required.

We haven’t gotten the SR+ on the scales yet, but if it is a 300lb+ weight difference as advertised then this little baby Tesla is a pretty good option for a fun track day car!

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