2021 Tesla Model 3 SR+ Cold Weather Range and Capacity Test

[aschulz90]

Hi All,

Long time lurker however recent poster, owner and youtuber. I made as scientific a range test as I could and had scan my tesla reporting data periodically from a bluetooth ODBii reader. The test is documented here in this video:

I tried to account for wind, temp, range and elevation in this test as best as possible. I did run into a couple issues for example I only managed to charge the vehicle to 255/262 rated miles (all is mentioned in the video). I ended the test at 3 miles rated. The car drove 205 miles (more like 204 at 70 mph / 110 kph). I probably talk excessively about temps during the video but hopefully this serves as evidence of the test at the very least.

Conclusions:

It SEEMS like, and correct me if I'm wrong, this battery is larger than other people have said their previous gens SR+ is? The 55.4kWh when new number / 53.4 kWh nominal useable when new seems large. Again please correct me if I am wrong. The range seems theoretically like 219-220 miles: (204/0.97 dSoC / 0.955 incld. buffer =220 miles) 83.6% of EPA rated range.

 

[Nickage87]

Your range calculation is too good, 1 - you preheated it, 2 - your heater was set to 60 instead of normal 68-72.

Normal driver gets in a car and drives it. You make it too complicated to compensate for better range and lower consumption.

 

[aschulz90]

Your range calculation is too good, 1 - you preheated it, 2 - your heater was set to 60 instead of normal 68-72.

Normal driver gets in a car and drives it. You make it too complicated to compensate for better range and lower consumption.

That’s a fair criticism I suppose. My goal was to get the most ideal number possible. I decided to go for the most optimal conditions I could as you aren’t going to beat this number. There’s one million and one ways to get to worse efficiency like you suggest and there are only a few ways to get to optimal.

Next time if people think this channel is useful I’ll go for suboptimal most likely as you suggest.

 

[Nickage87]

That’s a fair criticism I suppose. My goal was to get the most ideal number possible. I decided to go for the most optimal conditions I could as you aren’t going to beat this number. There’s one million and one ways to get to worse efficiency like you suggest and there are only a few ways to get to optimal.

Next time if people think this channel is useful I’ll go for suboptimal most likely as you suggest.

Ideal numbers would be during mid season, late Spring or early Fall, I think. Time when neither battery or interior heater/ac are on. I was able to get sub 200wh/mile for long distances.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

It SEEMS like, and correct me if I'm wrong, this battery is larger than other people have said their previous gens SR+ is? The 55.4kWh when new number / 53.4 kWh nominal useable when new seems large. Again please correct me if I am wrong. The range seems theoretically like 219-220 miles: (204/0.97 dSoC / 0.955 incld. buffer =220 miles) 83.6% of EPA rated range.

Your numbers seem pretty good, I had a little bit of a hard time reading the exact numbers from your video at the end of your initial charge, but it sounds like you started with 255 rated miles at 98%? (Are both those number 100% correct, for sure? - you swapped to % and checked to make sure it was at 98% and not 100%?)

From video: You traveled 205.5 miles at 239Wh/mi, and went from 255 rated miles to 3 rated miles, as far as I could tell. Is that also correct?

So I would conclude from that (assuming all of that is correct):

205.5mi*239Wh/mi / (255rmi-3rmi) = 195Wh/rmi discharge constant (implying about 195Wh/rmi/0.99/0.955 = 206Wh/rmi charge constant - but you can give that exact charge constant value to us with the Energy-> Consumption screen image at a reasonably high SoC, capturing the relevant three numbers (remaining range, projected range, recent efficiency (average))).

That would imply a battery capacity (including the buffer) of 206Wh/rmi*260rmi = 53.6kWh. Seems to align pretty well with SMT's results.

And for your theoretical range at this efficiency it would be 53.6kWh/239Wh/mi = 224 miles (indicated - if the odometer is off, obviously have to scale by that error). At 239Wh/mi. Driving until the vehicle stops in the middle of the road.

Seems pretty good. And about what we would expect for the 2021 SR+ based on EPA. It is an increase from 2020 AFAIK. By about 1kWh.

So: It does appear the starting capacity of the 2021 SR+ is higher than the 2020. And the (unrealized) "Full Pack When New" value in SMT (it's just a hard-coded value read back from the car, which sometimes aligns with the actual Full Pack When New, but isn't required to) is also higher than prior years, I think. It does make one wonder if they used the new denser cells in the SR+ as well (which doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense since they were allegedly capacity limited on these cells so why put in the SR+?). But it's 31 cells per brick rather than 46 per brick, so with the 77.8kWh of the LR, that would extrapolate to just 52.4kWh - there's no way they could get to 55.4kWh. If they were to go to 55.4kWh that is "claimed," that would be a 6% increase in density! Hmm...

So I have no idea what is going on here. They're either pushing the cells more in the SR+ than in the LR AWD non-P, or they've got denser cells in there.

The way to tell is to go in behind the front right wheel with the wheels turned to the left and take a picture of that pack label. And compare to a 2020 label. Battery Label Procedure

If it has a -0L- or similar in the suffix, that would be suspicious (would match the denser pack suffix used on the 2021 Performance).

 

[aschulz90]

@AlanSubie4Life Thanks for the reply, I learn like 3 new things every time you do.

Your numbers seem pretty good, I had a little bit of a hard time reading the exact numbers from your video at the end of your initial charge, but it sounds like you started with 255 rated miles at 98%? (Are both those number 100% correct, for sure? - you swapped to % and checked to make sure it was at 98% and not 100%?)

So yeah the max rated range was 259mi heading to the level 2 charger but went up to 262mi in the phone app when the battery got warm (that's the variable that changed is my guess). NOTE: I just checked the footage on the timelapse and it actually says 256 miles rated at the start of the test. The screenshot above was from minutes before departing for test and as you can see charging was still going slowly. I wish I had gotten the decimal place for the SoC but I didn't think to check the more raw can-bus readings.

""you can give that exact charge constant value to us with the Energy-> Consumption screen image at a reasonably high SoC, capturing the relevant three numbers (remaining range, projected range, recent efficiency (average))).""

I'll try to get this info tomorrow, not sure I fully understand.

pulled into supercharger pics:


Finished with 1.18% reported by SMT and 49kWh used (49.11kWh according to trip meter miles*consumption)

Odometer error:
Google says the trip was 204 miles so 204/205.5 = 0.8% error or negligible.

 

[chrisf60526]

I consistently lose about 30% on my SR+ in cold weather. In fact, its about 29%-32% off the top. Its exactly what I was told when I bought the car and it holds true.

Cool video though.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

@AlanSubie4Life Thanks for the reply, I learn like 3 new things every time you do.


View attachment 621983
So yeah the max rated range was 259mi heading to the level 2 charger but went up to 262mi in the phone app when the battery got warm (that's the variable that changed is my guess). NOTE: I just checked the footage on the timelapse and it actually says 256 miles rated at the start of the test. The screenshot above was from minutes before departing for test and as you can see charging was still going slowly. I wish I had gotten the decimal place for the SoC but I didn't think to check the more raw can-bus readings.

""you can give that exact charge constant value to us with the Energy-> Consumption screen image at a reasonably high SoC, capturing the relevant three numbers (remaining range, projected range, recent efficiency (average))).""

I'll try to get this info tomorrow, not sure I fully understand.

pulled into supercharger pics:
View attachment 621979
View attachment 621980
Finished with 1.18% reported by SMT and 49kWh used (49.11kWh according to trip meter miles*consumption)

Odometer error:
Google says the trip was 204 miles so 204/205.5 = 0.8% error or negligible.

So I guess we could adjust that starting/ending point to 256 rated miles and 3 rated miles. Tiny adjustments to above. That 0.99 is a bit of a fudge factor. Sometimes it is a bit closer to 1.

This is the picture you would need, seems like it might work out to be about 204Wh/rmi for your car, and I think somewhere around here it was reported at 203Wh/rmi with such a screen capture...might be somewhere in between these values...:

Would be great to get the battery pack label too. It's awkward but not that difficult.

 

[aschulz90]

Would be great to get the battery pack label too. It's awkward but not that difficult.

didn’t see this message till the am. Yeah I have a jack and a camera I’ll take a picture sometime this morning and edit this post with it. Also the pack voltage at 100% is 402ish volts if that helps count cells.

 

[aschulz90]

I'm sorry this isn't clearer but it's the best I could get this morning. might try again later:

 

[aschulz90]

Code reads:
(?) T012033700MDJ
(F) 110442B-00-T

 

[GretaRocks]

This is a great thread to help those of us who are not so technical. Keep up the good work and thanks to aschulz90 for diving in.

 

[aschulz90]

Hi All, I previously did a range test at as optimal conditions for the car in the winter as possible (pre-heated battery, 32F, 70mph, no heater)

On Saturday I did 2x out of 3 suboptimal (faster + heat on):

Details:
75-77 mph cruise control setting. (Some traffic, construction, onramps off ramps, view video with overlayed graph for a good sense of speed. I think avg speed was 73-74mph for the data reported), 32F out (warmer than last test), had heat set to 68-70F the whole time.

optimal condition:
I charged at a supercharger which did preheat the battery to 39C. Honest truth for why this is is I ended up getting coffee before the range test and could not fully recharge the battery at home until I got below 93% (did not know that was a problem). I only have 120V charging and I wasn't going to wait that long.

Results:
I drove 181.4 miles on 95% dSoC (charge) at an efficiency of 268 wh/mile. That implies a 191ish mile range. If you include the buffer below 0% that's how you get to the clickbaity theoretical 200 miles.

Overall I think the heatpump driven heating system took only 6-7 miles of real world range which I think is going to be obviously worth it to everyone who has relatively mild winters like we do in the northeast of the USA.

I don't know if I'll be doing too many more range tests as they put alot of miles on the car!!! I hope this video is helpful for people figuring out what range to expect from the bigger battery SR+ w/ heatpump!


(moderator note: moved new thread into existing thread on range tests created by this OP)

 

[RichAZ/CapeCod]

Aschulz90, temperature and speed really does a job on EV range. I've seen the results of two range tests for MY LR AWD vehicles, done at 70 mph and during moderate temperatures (summer-like temps). Range reported varied between +250~270 miles.

Rich

 

[aschulz90]

Aschulz90, temperature and speed really does a job on EV range. I've seen the results of two range tests for MY LR AWD vehicles, done at 70 mph and during moderate temperatures (summer-like temps). Range reported varied between +250~270 miles.

Rich

I think in this circumstance as the car has the very efficient heat pump which is why we're seeing only a mild hit to range due to climate control, less than 5%. Speed is of course always going to be killer, can't change the physics of moving air out of the way!

 

[sa012]

What speed are you running the fan for the heat?

 

[aschulz90]

What speed are you running the fan for the heat?

just auto. I used my wife as a non-scientific standard (she was filming). If she said it was hot, temp went down, if she said it was cold, temp went up. we never went below 68F or above 70F.

 

[KenC]

Hi All, I previously did a range test at as optimal conditions for the car in the winter as possible (pre-heated battery, 32F, 70mph, no heater)

On Saturday I did 2x out of 3 suboptimal (faster + heat on):

Details:
75-77 mph cruise control setting. (Some traffic, construction, onramps off ramps, view video with overlayed graph for a good sense of speed. I think avg speed was 73-74mph for the data reported), 32F out (warmer than last test), had heat set to 68-70F the whole time.

optimal condition:
I charged at a supercharger which did preheat the battery to 39C. Honest truth for why this is is I ended up getting coffee before the range test and could not fully recharge the battery at home until I got below 93% (did not know that was a problem). I only have 120V charging and I wasn't going to wait that long.

Results:
I drove 181.4 miles on 95% dSoC (charge) at an efficiency of 268 wh/mile. That implies a 191ish mile range. If you include the buffer below 0% that's how you get to the clickbaity theoretical 200 miles.

Overall I think the heatpump driven heating system took only 6-7 miles of real world range which I think is going to be obviously worth it to everyone who has relatively mild winters like we do in the northeast of the USA.

I don't know if I'll be doing too many more range tests as they put alot of miles on the car!!! I hope this video is helpful for people figuring out what range to expect from the bigger battery SR+ w/ heatpump!

You can run ABRP, and it'll calibrate efficiency for your vehicle at 65mph.

 

[jjrandorin]

(moderator note: OP you have this existing thread on your testing, so moved your newly created thread in here. Feel free to post more videos on your range testing but they need to go in this existing thread, vs creating a new one for each. thanks)

 

[aschulz90]

@jjrandorin, understood. Apologies. Will keep any future range tests, should there be more, in here.