150kW Supercharging for Model 3

[Zoomit]

An 'A' for effort.
Great ;-)

@Zoomit,
The data is getting too noisy for me. How about using error bars ?

All of this charge data is collected with an inherent selection bias so it's not appropriate to use it to define a lower bound for any given charge profile. Our charge sessions from yesterday are a great example. I didn't include them because they didn't represent extreme cases. Basically, this is a small sample size, non-randomized dataset that's not useful for statistical analysis.

This begs the question of why I was interested in collecting the data. The abetterrouteplanner data on charge sessions were surprisingly variable. I hoped that the On-Route Battery Warmup would standardize the charging profiles and I was curious to use the new profiles to update my optimized charging models. I'm sure ORBW helped but the charging profiles obviously still vary quite a bit. I'll still create an generalized charging profile, but the batteries remain finicky.

It's fair to pull some trends from the 11 samples:

• There's frequent "stair stepping" when starting at low SOC. For LR batteries, that starts at 60 kW and later at ~110kW.
• It appears the maximum power is stall power limited not battery amperage limited. This is consistent with faster charging possible in the future on V3 Superchargers. This is based on many of the sessions plateauing at a constant power.
• The plateau levels are likely lowered from 150kW due to accessory power use in the car. Battery thermal management and HVAC are the two most likely high consumers. We could guess that 2-6kW is typical and that sounds about right.
• It appears there are at least two somewhat-distinct taper profiles from high power, both are similar taper rates but separated by ~5% battery level. One might start around 40% and the other at 45%. The V3 profile might have the same 45% initial taper point but a slower taper rate.
• All the profiles seem to converge around 75%.

 

[Zoomit]

Hello, first time posting here but wanted to share my experience.
....
Max power reached 110kw (best I have seen on SR+) but for very brief moments, most of the time was at 104-105kw with small peaks(that is when I took my pictures so the data is overestimating the speed) before tapering.
....
unfortunately I was at the bathroom when it started tapering…

Welcome to TMC! This is the highest I've see with an SR+ battery as well. It looks like the taper (at least 51-59%) overlaps with the previous examples. Next time, data first--then bathroom! Just kidding, this is interesting data. Thanks for sharing.

 

[SageBrush]

We know that the LR can accept up to 250 kW. Scaling down the battery SR/SR+ size suggests that the ~ 110 kW peak on V2 Supercharger is an imposed limit by Tesla. They should peak at ~ 2/3 of 250

 

[Zoomit]

We know that the LR can accept up to 250 kW. Scaling down the battery SR/SR+ size suggests that the ~ 110 kW peak on V2 Supercharger is an imposed limit by Tesla. They should peak at ~ 2/3 of 250

Sure, but consider what’s being done today. 110kW into an SR pack is a higher c-rate than 150kW into an LR pack. The SR pack remains the fastest charging on a per kWh basis.

 

[SageBrush]

Sure, but consider what’s being done today. 110kW into an SR pack is a higher c-rate than 150kW into an LR pack. The SR pack remains the fastest charging on a per kWh basis.

I anticipate that when V3 is rolled out the SR/SR+ models will be uncorked to accept up to 2/3 of 250 kW = 166 kW. Since the extensive V2 network is charger limited to 150 kW the current charger advantage that LR models have over their smaller brethren will be narrowed, at least until V3 is more widely deployed.

The advantage for supercharger hopping will still sit firmly in the LR's battery for either version of supercharger due to the range that can be reached before tapering below 120 kW kicks in.

 

[Zoomit]

After reviewing my assumptions for the differences between the LR and SR batteries, I needed to update my optimistic SR/+ charging models. I did this independent of what SR+ owners are seeing from Superchargers today. I updated them in the chart below, shown as the dotted gray lines. Notice that the relationship of the current SR+ profiles to the optimistic profile is very similar to the current LR profiles as compared to the V3 demo profile (dashed gray lines). This gives credence to the current SR+ taper point being near it's limit. So expect the SR+ taper to start at or before 40% if it's charging at 105kW.

The @Legen---dary SR+ session (red line) took 52 minutes to charge from 8% to 90%. Under ideal conditions with the optimistic V2 profile, that would reduce to 40 minutes. The difference between V2 and V3 is immaterial (<30 sec), assuming the V2 stall is not sharing power.

 

[timk225]

Not all superchargers are now 150 KW capable. I was looking at SC listings in my 3 on the screen, and it showed a SC location near Wexford that was installed a year ago as being 150 KW, whereas the Cranberry superchargers a few miles away that have been there since 2014 are still listed as 120 KW. I went to the Cranberry SC last week and it didn't get over 110 KW, with 70 miles in the battery.

 

[Zoomit]

Here are a couple of recent YouTube videos. Both charge sessions seem pretty typical of what to expect with the latest charging curves, although DAerik's appears to be an example of what happens when someone plugs in on a paired stall. The power immediately reduced from 139kW to 101kW.

 

[mcl627]

I tested this charge rate feature the same night I installed the 2019.12.1.1 update on 4/29/19.

The peak charge rate I achieved was 143 kW, which maxed out at 500 mi/h.

3 days later I installed the 2019.12.1.2 update, which appears to charge at equivalently high rates.

 

[mike123abc]

I was disappointed in the peak kW today, it was fluttering around 144-145-146 at the supercharger. I charged to 50% then went to the office to plug it in to charge more (few blocks from supercharger). The car at the office was showing 233-237 volts, mostly around 235. So, I suppose the afternoon heat is stressing the power company and the voltage has dropped. I checked inside on our computer line filtering and it was running 116-118...

 

[Big Earl]

I was disappointed in the peak kW today, it was fluttering around 144-145-146 at the supercharger. I charged to 50% then went to the office to plug it in to charge more (few blocks from supercharger). The car at the office was showing 233-237 volts, mostly around 235. So, I suppose the afternoon heat is stressing the power company and the voltage has dropped. I checked inside on our computer line filtering and it was running 116-118...

In what world is 144-146 kW disappointing?

 

[HyperionMark]

How "normal" should these charging curves be? The other day on two different occasions (starting around 30%) I went up to 120 kW and then slowly tapered off the rest of the time. Was even down into the 80's by about 50%. (I'm on 12.1.2 and have a LR AWD) This has happened multiple times and have yet to see above 140kW after 12.1. FWIW I never heard the A/C crank up trying to cool the pack either.
(had driven a full hour before both session and navigated to the station)

 

[Zoomit]

How "normal" should these charging curves be? The other day on two different occasions (starting around 30%) I went up to 120 kW and then slowly tapered off the rest of the time. Was even down into the 80's by about 50%. (I'm on 12.1.2 and have a LR AWD) This has happened multiple times and have yet to see above 140kW after 12.1. FWIW I never heard the A/C crank up trying to cool the pack either. (had driven a full hour before both session and navigated to the station)

This is a great question--How predictable is the new charging curve? Theoretically, ORBW should make it more predictable by increasing the chance of having an optional battery temperatures going into a charge session.

But your examples highlight that there are apparently many factors that limit the session that we can't pin down. Even if you were at 120kW stations, it should have maintained 120kW for much longer than you saw. Maybe the stalls were too hot or faulty in some way, basically that you got unlucky? I doubt that as you saw it repeatedly. My bet is that your battery wasn't warm because ORBW wasn't working as designed or that the car was unable to warm the battery for some reason. Maybe there's a ORBW bug triggered by factors that we can't see?

All I can add is to keep trying and see what happens. If possible, please report back if you (or others!) are able to isolate what allows, or disallows, the full charge rate.

 

[Big Earl]

How "normal" should these charging curves be? The other day on two different occasions (starting around 30%) I went up to 120 kW and then slowly tapered off the rest of the time. Was even down into the 80's by about 50%. (I'm on 12.1.2 and have a LR AWD) This has happened multiple times and have yet to see above 140kW after 12.1. FWIW I never heard the A/C crank up trying to cool the pack either.
(had driven a full hour before both session and navigated to the station)

Plugging in above 30% seems to result in a lower and much shorter period of peak power. For best results, plug in between 10% and 15%.

 

[JuiceBx]

Just a data point: Mid-Range on 2019.16.2 received a max charging range of 121kW from 18%-36% before the charging rate started to taper off.

 

[Zoomit]

@JuiceBx Great to see some rare MR data! I plotted it with my optimistic projection for an MR car on a V2 Supercharger. It's important to note that I don't expect the currently public profile to reach these values. The dotted line is what I think the MR will be able to do when the Tesla engineers unleash the V3 profiles for all Model 3s.

A 121 kW peak is right in line with what I expect now. Assuming the MR has a 37 cell brick, we can ratio down the 150 kW seen on the LR 46 cell brick. That equals 120.6kW, so the current MR profile allows a similar c-rate as the LR cars at 150 kW. Under ideal conditions, an MR car today might be able to charge at ~121 kW up to ~44% SoC though.

 

[Zoomit]

There's some scuttlebutt that the 2019.15.11 software version is testing a V3 charging profile. This comes from a greentheonly tweet without evidence. However, there is also a report of a car on 19.15.11 showing 622 mi/hr at 146 kW. This comes from reddit: thread, image. With the wider-released software, that display has been limited to 500 mi/hr, which is an indication 19.15.11 could in fact be a V3 charging profile. 19.15.11 is in about 2% of the fleet, according to TeslaFi, so the numbers are pretty small.

If 19.15.11 is really a V3 profile, there's a good chance the taper is later than seen previously in this thread. I'd be particularly interested in seeing the charging power between 50-80%, if anyone is on this version and Supercharges.

 

[Zoomit]

u/SpellingJenius came through with data on a charge session that could be a draft V3 charging profile. He's on 19.15.11 and was obviously limited by the V2 Supercharger. This profile looks to be a different flavor than what we have seen in 19.12.1.x. The taper is obviously later, more concave instead of convex if you will.

It's still a bit lower than what I'm holding as an optimistic V2 profile. We definitely need to see more 15.11 charging sessions, and then see what profile Tesla rolls out to the whole fleet.

 

[JuiceBx]

@Zoomit here's a better MR charge cycle Data set: 7%-87%
ambient temperature 99°f 1513hrs cabin set to 72° auto

7% 50kW
12% 70kW
13% 117kW
14% peak at 126kw for .1 second settled at 121kW up
41% 110kW fans running medium speed
45% 103kW
47% 97kW
50% 90kW
55% 76kW
60% 65kW
65% 57kW
69% fans slow down
70% 49kW
75% 40kW 1545 hrs
76% cooling fans off or slow
80% 31kW
85% 25kW
87% 22kw
87% stopped +49kWh 1558hrs

 

[Zoomit]

@Zoomit here's a better MR charge cycle Data set: 7%-87%
ambient temperature 99°f 1513hrs cabin set to 72° auto

7% 50kW
12% 70kW
13% 117kW
14% peak at 126kw for .1 second settled at 121kW up
41% 110kW fans running medium speed
45% 103kW
47% 97kW
50% 90kW
55% 76kW
60% 65kW
65% 57kW
69% fans slow down
70% 49kW
75% 40kW 1545 hrs
76% cooling fans off or slow
80% 31kW
85% 25kW
87% 22kw
87% stopped +49kWh 1558hrs

So it was at 121kW between 14 and 40%?