14 Hours to cross 800Km with SR+...[complaint about range in winter]

[Abyssin3]

I wanted to share my bad experience with a Model 3 SR+.

Up to now, I was completely satisfied - although the real autonomy during winter (~10°c) is rather around 260Km, instead of the official 410Km.

But a week ago, coming back to home in France (800Km) with 4 persons in the car, weather at 5°c (+/-1°c), I was seriously disapointed. I scheduled a travel of 12 hours but:
- We can count on 150Km maximum when on the highway (130Km/h), and it's even challenging: speed must be reduced.
- Consumption was around 210Wh/Km, and no climatisation or strong heating (only the minimum required).
- When following the GPS, any change in the map is problematic: highways in France have paying stations, so exits are rare, at a distance of 20-30Km. Understand +40-60Km to come back if you miss the exit (= out of range), this happened 2 times, because of roadworks...
- Fortunately I had a non Tesla charging network to avoid the battery is under 5-10%, but such charging stations are between 11Kw and 50Kw (+30 minutes at least to jump to the following Tesla supercharger)

I am a bit confused to say that I needed 14h to do 800Km because I chose a Tesla car. By chance, the mileage predictions is relatively exact at +/- 5%. It avoids a catastrophic situation, but the cost was the same than with fuel (Tesla has increased the price of SC).

The autonomy is supposed to be reduced - not falling down... I am very curious to know the exact autonomy at 0°c of the SR+, LR, or even the new LR with improved energy savings.

And I'm struggling to understand WHY Tesla did not create a "Winter mode" in addition of the "Comfort mode" (limiting acceleration). Maybe such a winter mode could avoid to heat the battery, and improve mileage when at cold temperatures (<10°c), with similar effect on performance than comfort mode.

 

[GSP]

I wonder if Bjørn Nyland has done a 1000 km challenge with the SR+? I don’t recall seeing one, but has driven 1000 km in less than 10 hours in a long range Model 3, and under 11 hours for several other Tesla models.

I would suggest using A Better Route Planner to compare the SR+ to other EVs, and try different trip plans to see what stops work best for the car. I like to try a few different plans to get the charging times to match when I will need a meal or bathroom break. I also like to charge to 100% just before leaving in the morning, and preheat the car fo 60 minutes when it is below freezing.

GSP

 

[camalaio]

Alright, I'll try to address these point by point. I have a lot of winter frustrations too.

Consumption of 210Wh/km:

• You were going 130km/h. This was more about the speed than the cold. I can get decent Wh/km at maybe 110km/h, but any faster than that and it really starts to hurt efficiency.
• Unfortunately in my experience, the amount of heating matters less than if you're using the heat at all. For example if it's 5C outside and you have the target temp at 19C (cold, in my opinion), it needs to deal with a 14C temperature difference (19 minus 5). If you set it to 22C (quite comfy), it's a 17C temperature difference. While that would indeed require more energy, it's not a huge amount more. So if you have the heat on at all, you may as well be at a comfortable temperature instead of trying to freeze yourself to get range.

Long-distance travel time:

• Charging does take more time than expected, yes. You can optimise for charge time (i.e. by arriving with as low percentage as possible, which charges faster for longer), but this conflicts with maintaining sanity and less stress on the trip.
• Detours for charging also add time, of course, compared to fewer gas stops that are generally slightly less of a detour from your route.
• Having to use slower 50kW CHAdeMO/CCS stations is part of many people's reality. Nearly everything I use on road trips are 50kW CHAdeMO, sometimes only 25kW. Depending on these stations definitely slows things down, but at least makes it possible with an EV.
• Winter does especially suck, since strangely I never find the battery preconditioning sufficient for maximum charge speeds, so it ends up charging slower than marketing suggests, or even A Better Route Planner would say (though I would highly recommend using A Better Route Planner in winter, it's amazingly accurate when you put in realistic values for temperature and such).

A "Winter mode":

• While driving, it's usually not actively heating the battery (almost never). It just uses waste heat from the motors. This is good.
• While en route to a Supercharger, it will actively heat the battery. You want it to do this most of the time, because it will increase charging speeds. The exception is on CHAdeMO/CCS stations around 50kW, where the heating is less necessary and a bit of a waste (and since it heats during charging too, does slow down charging at these stations).

New models with heat pump:

• These are only lightly more efficient, and more around the 10C temperature mark. At 0C or colder, they're not expected to be any more efficient than previous models.
• IMO Tesla has over-stated the efficiency gains with the heat pump model, but it's a complex thing to communicate as well.

Finally, this is the table I generally post, to my recollection (and bad weather can make it worse, of course):

• Around 10C: 20% reduction in range
• Around 0C: 30% reduction in range
• -10C or colder: 40% reduction in range

Regarding all future replies of optimising for range/time and such: these usually aren't reasonable for the average laid-back road-trip.

 

[Abyssin3]

Thank very much for the feedback.
Regarding the speed, I did a similar travel (500Km and return) on higway also, same weight in September.
The consumption was rather around 165Wh/Km - Temperature at 15°c (no heating in the car) and summer tires.
One of my conclusion is to avoid highway to save time on small chargers, or avoid long distance in SR+...

 

[GtiMart]

Input all the information in A Better Route Planner before you leave. You'll see how it should go. It's very accurate if you give good settings for your particular situation.

 

[subieworx]

What is the supercharger network like in France? In the midwestern US one can be found about every 80-90 miles. This leaves me plenty of range to go fast (85-90mph) and still make it with plenty of charge remaining. I also stop at every supercharger along the way and charge for a very minimal amount of time (5-10 minutes). As long as I keep stopping frequently I can travel just about as fast as I can in a standard ICE car.

 

[KenC]

I wanted to share my bad experience with a Model 3 SR+.

Up to now, I was completely satisfied - although the real autonomy during winter (~10°c) is rather around 260Km, instead of the official 410Km.

But a week ago, coming back to home in France (800Km) with 4 persons in the car, weather at 5°c (+/-1°c), I was seriously disapointed. I scheduled a travel of 12 hours but:
- We can count on 150Km maximum when on the highway (130Km/h), and it's even challenging: speed must be reduced.
- Consumption was around 210Wh/Km, and no climatisation or strong heating (only the minimum required).
- When following the GPS, any change in the map is problematic: highways in France have paying stations, so exits are rare, at a distance of 20-30Km. Understand +40-60Km to come back if you miss the exit (= out of range), this happened 2 times, because of roadworks...
- Fortunately I had a non Tesla charging network to avoid the battery is under 5-10%, but such charging stations are between 11Kw and 50Kw (+30 minutes at least to jump to the following Tesla supercharger)

I am a bit confused to say that I needed 14h to do 800Km because I chose a Tesla car. By chance, the mileage predictions is relatively exact at +/- 5%. It avoids a catastrophic situation, but the cost was the same than with fuel (Tesla has increased the price of SC).

The autonomy is supposed to be reduced - not falling down... I am very curious to know the exact autonomy at 0°c of the SR+, LR, or even the new LR with improved energy savings.

And I'm struggling to understand WHY Tesla did not create a "Winter mode" in addition of the "Comfort mode" (limiting acceleration). Maybe such a winter mode could avoid to heat the battery, and improve mileage when at cold temperatures (<10°c), with similar effect on performance than comfort mode.

Sounds awful. Unfortunately, it does not appear that the French supercharger network is spaced very well for SR+ with cold-limited range. Just looking at an example trip in ABRP from say, Tours to Zurich, 790km, with your extra weight, temp and speed, there are only 5 stops, but some stops require you to charge from 10% to 98%. That's going to take forever, 45mins, just for that one stop, and then you can only drive 157km to the next stop when you'll be back at 10% SOC.

At 5C, it's easy to lose 20% of your range. Then you add extra weight, and drive up to 150km/h and you wind up with lots of charging, and barely making it to supercharger stops.

Unfortunately, it's the worst of all combinations. Cold, weight, speed, plus long spacing between superchargers that make for inefficient charging. For a SR+ in the cold, I think optimal spacing would be about 120km between superchargers, based upon your efficiency and battery size. Unfortunately the French SC network seems to have SCs spaced up to 160km apart. Just too far to be practical, in my opinion.

Here's my temp vs efficiency chart if it helps, but in my opinion, you need a LR, not a SR+ to avoid catastrophic trips. The SC network spacing seems optimized for LR models. It shouldn't take you 14hrs to do a 800km trip. That would drive me insane. Plus, you need to try ABRP, A Better Routeplanner, to work out your trips ahead of time. They're based in Europe, so presumably, their real data should be good.

 

[Akikiki]

Thank very much for the feedback.
Regarding the speed, I did a similar travel (500Km and return) on higway also, same weight in September.
The consumption was rather around 165Wh/Km - Temperature at 15°c (no heating in the car) and summer tires.
One of my conclusion is to avoid highway to save time on small chargers, or avoid long distance in SR+...

Don't blame Tesla. Or you might as well blame all EV manufacturers. However you can blame physics, its a real world problem.

 

[Gasaraki]

I wanted to share my bad experience with a Model 3 SR+.

Up to now, I was completely satisfied - although the real autonomy during winter (~10°c) is rather around 260Km, instead of the official 410Km.

But a week ago, coming back to home in France (800Km) with 4 persons in the car, weather at 5°c (+/-1°c), I was seriously disapointed. I scheduled a travel of 12 hours but:
- We can count on 150Km maximum when on the highway (130Km/h), and it's even challenging: speed must be reduced.
- Consumption was around 210Wh/Km, and no climatisation or strong heating (only the minimum required).
- When following the GPS, any change in the map is problematic: highways in France have paying stations, so exits are rare, at a distance of 20-30Km. Understand +40-60Km to come back if you miss the exit (= out of range), this happened 2 times, because of roadworks...
- Fortunately I had a non Tesla charging network to avoid the battery is under 5-10%, but such charging stations are between 11Kw and 50Kw (+30 minutes at least to jump to the following Tesla supercharger)

I am a bit confused to say that I needed 14h to do 800Km because I chose a Tesla car. By chance, the mileage predictions is relatively exact at +/- 5%. It avoids a catastrophic situation, but the cost was the same than with fuel (Tesla has increased the price of SC).

The autonomy is supposed to be reduced - not falling down... I am very curious to know the exact autonomy at 0°c of the SR+, LR, or even the new LR with improved energy savings.

And I'm struggling to understand WHY Tesla did not create a "Winter mode" in addition of the "Comfort mode" (limiting acceleration). Maybe such a winter mode could avoid to heat the battery, and improve mileage when at cold temperatures (<10°c), with similar effect on performance than comfort mode.

Understand your frustration but as I tell everyone who asks me, the range on the LR is the MINIMUM i recommend for people. The SR range is just too short. It is good for "local" use. Why? The stated range on the SR looks decent, plenty for most people even. However you must take in to account of tons of other factors that cut in to that range. That range is the best case scenario. Elon himself said that 300 miles (~500km) range should be the minimum and I agree with him.

OK, here are the things that cut in to your range.

The age of car
The speed you drive
How loaded you are with passengers
How windy it is outside
What size wheels you have
What's the temperature outside
How warm you keep the cabin inside
What kind of tires you have
Do you drive on highways (autobahns) or mostly local roads?
Is it raining outside?
You want to keep the battery between 10-90% charged (better 20-80%). No one is using 100-0%.
No one is charging to 100% even on a Supercharger, takes too long.
etc, etc

Every little thing cuts in to your range that is stated. I think in the future 300 miles (500 km) needs to be the new SR and 400 miles (~650km) the new LR range for the Model 3 and other cars. Trucks (ie. Cybertruck) obviously would need 500 miles or higher if they are to be pulling and hauling stuff so their actual range while doing that would still be usable.

The SR is not a good road tripper especially in the winter time. Obviously it's doable but it won't be pretty and people shouldn't be complaining about it. It's like buying an i3 and complaining that it can only 80 miles in the winter and you have to stop so often to charge. Yeah.

That's why I laugh when the new Mach.E has a ~250 mile range for an SUV. Yeah, you won't see me looking at anything under 300 miles (500km) range.

 

[Akikiki]

@Gasaraki, everything you just said is accurate and makes good sense. It is just common sense too. Anyone that buys a car with range and complains later was either just naive or didn't do their homework before they choose their car. There will be few sympathetic ears to their complaints. There's too much information available now that people can use to help make the best selection for their requirement and if they are not, - its on them.

 

[KenC]

Personally, I think Tesla needs to do a better job selling people the right-sized battery for their needs. The Tesla website isn't adequate for people to decide. Nobody understands charge tapers, and charger spacing, and anything else that affects range, until they actually own an EV.

Maybe a battery swap option before 30 days are up. Of course, that'll cost money, more than if they bought the right-sized battery to begin with, but at least people won't get stuck with a car that doesn't meet their needs, which leads to lots of bad-mouthing Tesla and EVs.

 

[Akikiki]

Personally, I think Tesla needs to do a better job selling people the right-sized battery for their needs. The Tesla website isn't adequate for people to decide. Nobody understands charge tapers, and charger spacing, and anything else that affects range, until they actually own an EV.

Maybe a battery swap option before 30 days are up. Of course, that'll cost money, more than if they bought the right-sized battery to begin with, but at least people won't get stuck with a car that doesn't meet their needs, which leads to lots of bad-mouthing Tesla and EVs.

Do people that bought a 4 cylinder engine get a do over and swap it for a 6 or V8 after they have owned the car/truck for a couple of weeks.

Please be realistic. You get to think whatever you wish, but that does not make it practical or affordable to do what you suggest.

If less informed people are buying a tech that they have insufficient experience with, that's not on the seller. Its on who? Yep - remember this? Buyer beware ?

 

[Shirt4878]

I wonder if Bjørn Nyland has done a 1000 km challenge with the SR+? I don’t recall seeing one, but has driven 1000 km in less than 10 hours in a long range Model 3, and under 11 hours for several other Tesla models.

I would suggest using A Better Route Planner to compare the SR+ to other EVs, and try different trip plans to see what stops work best for the car. I like to try a few different plans to get the charging times to match when I will need a meal or bathroom break. I also like to charge to 100% just before leaving in the morning, and preheat the car fo 60 minutes when it is below freezing.

GSP

He did test an SR+ and he was pretty impressed with the results:

Results were 10 hours 30 minutes at avg of 5.5C

 

[GtiMart]

Yeah, thing is, the LR costs so much more than an SR+, people cannot decide by range only. Here the sr has govt incentives whereas lr doesn't (price is too high). That makes a 10000$ difference become a 23000$ difference. That's almost a second car.

Now, I agree that people must first learn about range and how various factors affect it. You know, if you just make one trip per year, why not rent a car (ice?) for that one time instead of paying thousands more on your car for that one time...

 

[KenC]

I generally advise people not to buy more than what they need, and in particular not to buy the truck when they only use the bed once a year. That kind of thing. But, it's just my opinion that Tesla should make it easier for people to understand which model to buy. Nobody wants to make a $40k to $65k mistake, and yet they do. Tesla's trip planner should be better at helping people simulate real trips they regularly take. Why do people need to go to a 3rd-party site like ABRP to simulate real trips to get accurate results?

Not everyone is going to do tons of research before they buy, like those of us on TMC. I know I ran tons of simulations on ABRP. I thought about buying a Model S back in the day, when my state had zero Superchargers. I'd have to drive into New Hampshire to hit up the Supercharger there, to get to Boston and back. That would be an additional half hour to my normal trip time. Absurd! I obviously didn't do it.

I waited until it was a practical replacement for my ICE, and I ran simulations to figure out whether a MR would work for me. Of course, it could with some time sacrifices. I didn't want to compromise, so I chose the LR, and I'm happy with my choice. Nor everyone will do that.

My idea to allow battery swaps within 30 days, is not a painless do-over for the buyer. If you notice, it'll cost the buyer more than if he had bought the larger battery to begin with. I don't want it to be a money loser for Tesla, but a money maker. Those less than 30 day old batteries can be re-used/re-purposed as warranty replacements, and for Powerwalls. This only works if it's a profit center not a cost center for Tesla. If it could be a profit center, then why not do it?

 

[LargeHamCollider]

New models with heat pump:

• These are only lightly more efficient, and more around the 10C temperature mark. At 0C or colder, they're not expected to be any more efficient than previous models.

This not correct, Bjorn has seen significant benefits from the heat pump at temperatures well below 0C, Tesla has also stated that the effective temperature range of the heat pump has been extended by pre-warming circuits.

 

[camalaio]

This not correct, Bjorn has seen significant benefits from the heat pump at temperatures well below 0C, Tesla has also stated that the effective temperature range of the heat pump has been extended by pre-warming circuits.

I haven't watched anywhere near all of Bjorn's videos on the subject. The one I recall was not below freezing, but was near it in the morning. If you could link to a specific example, that would be greatly helpful.

But don't confuse "pre-warming circuits" with more efficiency. Yes, it'll be more efficient during the drive, but energy was used up front to make that happen. The trip meters in the car won't show energy used for preconditioning (annoyingly, even though he had ScanMyTesla, this is what Bjorn used in one of the videos to show it was "more efficient" - to be fair, it would've been a lot more work to do anything else in his case).

 

[user212_nr]

- When following the GPS, any change in the map is problematic: highways in France have paying stations, so exits are rare, at a distance of 20-30Km. Understand +40-60Km to come back if you miss the exit (= out of range), this happened 2 times, because of roadworks...
- Fortunately I had a non Tesla charging network to avoid the battery is under 5-10%, but such charging stations are between 11Kw and 50Kw (+30 minutes at least to jump to the following Tesla supercharger)

How many hours would you say were lost to issues with the navigation rather than the car itself?

Some have mentioned SC distance and your being in a SR+, and that is a factor adding maybe 3-4 hours.

Take 7 hours for the trip in an ICE car, add 3 for charging, that's 10 hours. You're only looking at MAX 4 hours above what is expected and reasonable.

And I'm struggling to understand WHY Tesla did not create a "Winter mode" in addition of the "Comfort mode" (limiting acceleration). Maybe such a winter mode could avoid to heat the battery, and improve mileage when at cold temperatures (<10°c), with similar effect on performance than comfort mode.

The car is temperature aware and automatically switches to "winter mode" without explicitly calling it by that name. As mentioned already, winter is not the right term, specifically it is the battery pack temperature that is significant. There is also the cabin heating, but that is user-choice.

 

[Candleflame]

I wonder if Bjørn Nyland has done a 1000 km challenge with the SR+? I don’t recall seeing one, but has driven 1000 km in less than 10 hours in a long range Model 3, and under 11 hours for several other Tesla models.

I would suggest using A Better Route Planner to compare the SR+ to other EVs, and try different trip plans to see what stops work best for the car. I like to try a few different plans to get the charging times to match when I will need a meal or bathroom break. I also like to charge to 100% just before leaving in the morning, and preheat the car fo 60 minutes when it is below freezing.

GSP

he has, and there isnt much difference in travel time. its mainly mediated by the 150km boost you get initially....

 

[Brock-WI]

Just throwing in what we have experienced. We have a 600 mile or 965 km round trip we have done 5 times now in varying weather. This is from Green Bay, WI to Minneapolis, MN to drop off, pick up or visit our son in college there and then driving home the same day.

Sep 06 - 243wh/mi - 74F - 1:06 charge - 10:20 trip
Nov 28 - 286wh/mi - 39F - 1:43 charge - 11:13 trip
Dec 18 - 318wh/mi - 33F - 1:50 charge - 1:21 trip (snow tires)
Jan 01 - 335wh/mi - 20F - 2:20 charge - 11:33 trip (snow tires)

Now that we have done the trip I am guessing I could get the charge times down when it is warmer picking when to charge and how much as the first few trips I was getting to the chargers with 20+% and later we get there to the charger with 5-10%