Many Australians have been waiting for the release of the Australian Model 3 order page where buyers can configure their vehicle options. After having waited weeks without explanation as to why it’s still not live, we now have some information which is our best evidence yet.
The Motor Vehicle Standards ACT requires vehicle manufacturers to get approval to sell vehicles in Australia. Tesla only received this 2 days ago, Friday 24th of May and is now live on the Road Vehicle Certification System (RVCS).
If you’re not familiar with the RVCS, it allows vehicle manufacturers to electronically certify that the vehicles that they supply to the Australian market meet prescribed safety standards specified in the Australian Design Rules (ADRs). The system allows the lodgement of test data using electronic forms software and is administered by the Vehicle Safety Standards Branch (VSS).
Now the vehicle has the necessary approval, it would be reasonable to expect we see the order page go live this week in Australia.
If you do decide to buy a Model 3, please use the techAU referral link – https://ts.la/jason45054. If you haven’t already, make sure you check out our Tesla Hub for more Tesla news.
Given the Model 3 now has the required RVCS stamp of approval, there’s a page on the Department of Infrastructure, Regional Development and Cities website. This page reveals some great detail about the Model 3 variants and options for the car (Thanks to some avid Tesla watchers on the forums for the tip on this.)
First of all the car pictured in the top-left corner of the page is a used (dirty tyres) black model 3 from 2 angles. While it looks to be a RHD model in the photo on the right, it’s definitely possible this is just a flipped image, not an actual photo of the RHD variant.
Based on the weights of the vehicle, they correspond to the Long Range Rear Wheel Drive, the Long Range All Wheel Drive and the Performance variants on the Model 3 being available in Aus.
Recently Tesla announced a towing option in the UK market and it looks like Australia will get that as well. The fine print on that is that it looks like we’re limited to a maximum towing capacity of 750kg on a non-braked trailer or 910kg on a braked trailer. While that’ll get some IKEA home, it certainly won’t be towing any caravans.
Side note, the watermarks on the RVCS website are terrible, it may be the worst .gov.au website that I’ve seen so far and I’ve seen plenty of terrible examples. Time for an update there guys.
