Tesla Model S Hits 3 Million Kilometres – Here’s What’s Been Replaced

Most drivers will never put a million kilometres on a car. Hansjörg Gemmingen has now done it three times over in his 2013 Tesla Model S P85+, reaching 3,000,000 km, or for our friends down south, 1,864,113 miles.

The latest milestone comes more than four years after we covered Gemmingen reaching one million miles in June 2022. Before that, he crossed the one-million-kilometre mark on November 28, 2019.

#NeuesProfilbild pic.twitter.com/4Bd85vqM8p

— Hansjörg von Gemmingen – Hornberg (@gem8mingen) September 30, 2026

Of course, three million kilometres on the odometer does not mean every original component has lasted that long – getting there has required substantial repairs, particularly to the rear drive unit. By 1.8 million km the car had gone through 14 motors, most of them remanufactured Tesla units that failed from coolant-seal leaks.

At 1.8 million kilometres, an independent shop, EV Clinic, in Zagreb rebuilt the unit and the same motor has now added more than 1.2 million further kilometres, with only a shaft seal beginning to weep.

The car is also on its fourth battery pack. The current one, installed in 2023 at about 1.76 million km and the first the owner paid for himself, has also delivered impressive longevity. In March, he reported one million kilometres on that pack with 85% capacity remaining and no battery repairs during that period.

But as impressive as the total is, it raises an interesting question – how does someone find enough time to drive that much?

Using our June 17, 2022 report as the starting point, Gemmingen has added approximately 1.39 million kilometres since then. That works out to roughly 889 km every day, more than 6,200 km a week, or around 27,000 km a month.

To cover that daily distance at an average speed of 100 km/h would take nearly nine hours behind the wheel, before adding charging breaks or other stops.

His driving pace has also increased. Between the November 2019 milestone and our June 2022 report, he averaged approximately 654 km daily.

Even with those repairs, the distance remains remarkable. Three million kilometres is equivalent to nearly 75 trips around Earth’s equator. A driver travelling 20,000 km annually would need 150 years to match it.

And the Model S isn’t the only Tesla Gemmingen has spent serious time driving. Back in 2022, his original Tesla Roadster had also accumulated more than 650,000 km.