Thanks I will try and do better, will try out the AC cool down on Sunday morning.
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2023 M3 air conditioner using 70% of energy
The coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco
It doesn't really matter why the person wants it on LO. We have a numbers issue. The HVAC can only use a max of about 7kW so there is some other issue going on. Either there is something unknown wrong with the car, or there is a failure to understand the numbers if there is nothing wrong with the car.
Clearly we have a new owner that is not as well versed as we are about normal operation, through no fault of their own.
While the OP is not doing any favors with the tone of their posts, I am still open to the conversation as long as they are willing to provide data as requested.
Clearly we have a new owner that is not as well versed as we are about normal operation, through no fault of their own.
While the OP is not doing any favors with the tone of their posts, I am still open to the conversation as long as they are willing to provide data as requested.
If it is 80 to 90 in Phoenix (dry heat), it is normal for me to drive with no AC and windows down. (In Ohio, I could not do that at 80 degress.) This coming weeks temps in Phoenix will be 114+ with surface temps as hot as 160 degrees, then it turns into another world.
I will be posting more results in the morning with longer ranges. for you all to help me figure this out. I asked the wife to do her trip on LO outbound and at 67 degrees inbound to see how much difference that makes. The temp today is only 98 degrees, so not a great day for testing but will provide the data regardless, and will do again monday when 110 degrees, and next Sunday again when it is 114 degrees to see the difference. And just because I am trying to understand this data, does not mean that I do not greatly appreciate all the great advise about keeping the car cool, preconditioning , sunscreen for the top glass etc. - which I will certainly do. I still want to understand being a "new" owner in phoenix if the car has a problem or not, and if not - then what we should be setting the temp at to remain comfortable in phoenix to reduce this heavy consumption. And the only way I can really know if there is a car problem is to post all the results and then find out if others in hot climates have the same experience or if my car truly has some sort of electrical short or something else going on.
Gauss Guzzler
Safety Score = 42
It's likely that setting the climate to auto will be both more efficient and more comfortable since it can do more intelligent things with recirc and vent choices. But that has nothing to do with your concern and wouldn't make enough difference for you to even detect.
Again, city driving and max air conditioning use similar amounts of power. The computer doesn't know if you're towing a boat or driving thru a wildfire or why the car is using so much power - and it doesn't care. All it knows is that you're using this much power-per-mile right now, so it's trying to tell you how far that'll take you if you continue at this rate.
You can see from this chart that a 40-50km/h average speed will use about the same power as max AC, thus literally and figuratively cutting your range in half. Phoenix surface streets often run 60-70mph but you're still likely to average only 30mph across the entire trip once stoplights are factored in.
Again, city driving and max air conditioning use similar amounts of power. The computer doesn't know if you're towing a boat or driving thru a wildfire or why the car is using so much power - and it doesn't care. All it knows is that you're using this much power-per-mile right now, so it's trying to tell you how far that'll take you if you continue at this rate.
You can see from this chart that a 40-50km/h average speed will use about the same power as max AC, thus literally and figuratively cutting your range in half. Phoenix surface streets often run 60-70mph but you're still likely to average only 30mph across the entire trip once stoplights are factored in.
For what it’s worth, my model S was comfy inside with the AC on auto. 101 outside and very humid. Turned it to “lo” and the compressor and fans all went into jet engine mode.
Ditto when I tried our 3.
Ditto when I tried our 3.
JM:
I don't want to be a bore and keep repeating myself, but looking at percentage or miles both bring in the question of driving habits. The best way to attack this is to get speak in terms of amp hour used. We take out duration, speed, etc if you just focus on two things: 1) Is the unit performing correctly, and 2) What are the heat load variables. I"ve already told you the two things to check for #1. Get those, talk only in those, and this will come to closure very quickly.
Luck to you,
-d
I don't want to be a bore and keep repeating myself, but looking at percentage or miles both bring in the question of driving habits. The best way to attack this is to get speak in terms of amp hour used. We take out duration, speed, etc if you just focus on two things: 1) Is the unit performing correctly, and 2) What are the heat load variables. I"ve already told you the two things to check for #1. Get those, talk only in those, and this will come to closure very quickly.
Luck to you,
-d
My experience with my recently totaled 2018 Model 3 was around 1-2% energy use for AC even at 100F+ temps on highway trips. I used Scan My Tesla to monitor power usage. I do install my solar shades for the months where cabin heating is not required. We just picked up our new 2023 standard range two day ago so I do not know how the HVAC usage will compare with the heat pump.
Since I live in and travel in mostly arid locations, I have always set the AC controls to the following for all vehicles I have ever owned.
Turn AC on, turn off auto, set temp to <LO>, select recirculation and adjust fan speed for desired cabin temp. Given these settings the AC compressor should cycle on and off (I assume this should work the same with the heat pump equipped cars?). Running in Auto mode I have no idea what the HVAC system is doing, maybe it is smart enough to be as efficient as my method? The new cars with heat pumps and octi-valves is an engineering marvel but is very complex and certainly has multiple failure modes.Anyway try my method and see if power usage improves.
There could be any number of things that might not be working as designed in the HVAC system and without something like Scan My Tesla owner trouble shooting would be almost impossible. One possible problem could be that when you turn on your AC it is trying to cool down the traction battery even though it should not be required.
I have a lot to learn regarding the new heat pump equipped cars!
Good Luck!
Regards
E90alex
Active Member
Those settings would keep the AC compressor on constantly because the system will try to keep lowering the cabin temp instead of trying to maintain a temperature.
stopcrazypp
Well-Known Member
But from the scan tool results linked previously I think at least it does try to ramp the compressor speed based on the fan speed setting. For the OP though they had the fan speed at max, so everything was going full bore.
Well said, there is no way the compressor is running at max power usage constantly or I would have used way more that 1 or 2% as stated in my first post.
stopcrazypp
Well-Known Member
I think the only nit against your post is Tesla's compressor is not single speed like most ACs. When it is on LO, the compressor is always on, just that it varies the speed based on your fan setting. What you are doing only works to reduce power because Tesla is using a variable speed compressor, otherwise if the compressor only had one speed, it would be going full bore and the fan speed would make no difference.
If you want it to turn on and off like a regular AC, you do need to set a temperature.
E90alex
Active Member
Yes that may be true, but it would still be more efficient by setting a temperature and the system will cycle the compressor as needed.
Modern vehicle climate control works similarly to your home thermostat. You don’t set your home AC on to 60 degrees and adjust your fans and close vents to regulate the temperature. You set the desired temperature and the system will turn the AC on and off as needed to 1) quickly reach the desired temperature and then 2) maintain the desired temperature.
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Not sure how the heat pump differs from my former 2018 Model 3 but in Auto AC Mode with the temp set to 72F power was sent to the two PTC heater elements from time to time. I verified this, when the car was about a year old, using SMT and a DC current clamp around the orange power cable attached to the PTC heater elements. Did not think heat needed to be used when ambient temp was 90F+ and the humidity was 15% or less. My method might not be automatic but I saw almost no hit in range on my 2018 Model 3 running the AC with temps north of 100F and the cabin was comfortable. Things could have changed after my 2019 testing and the heat pump Tesla's probably work different. When I get SMT up and running on the new car, I will monitor power usage in both modes.
Thanks to all in this thread for posting valuable info.
Regards!
Ok, Saturday Morning, to recap , trying to figure out why my 2023 LFP battery M3 strandard range is drawing so much power when running the AC on LO Ssetting when the summer heat hit. (Fan on HI setting). We were loosing 200%+ of range . At 80 % charge it was difficult to even get 100 miles of range. We got our Car in November and but never experienced any issues until May & June heat hit. So now we are attempting to figure this all out with help from all of you.
And darn it, yesterday was the coldest day in weeks and did not even reach 100 degrees and plus we did not get out until later in the day, so my test results do NOT show what I experience on hot days. But after thinking about this, I am glad to have this cool day to level set with all the drivers that consider this to be hot and do not have any issues. Attached are the drives from yesterday with the time and temperatures. The LO setting when the temp is only in the 90's really did pretty good - no complaints - even with the AC on the LO setting the car did pretty good. But as I said this is a good bench mark for days in the 90's.please note the temperatures shown at the top of the screen capture, the next capture is of the Trips screen and always follow that order for all photos. Also note the AirConditioner setting for that trip is shown at the bottom of each screen print. I hope to evidence what I am saying on my next serious of screen prints on a hot day. For these for serious I am not going to precondition cabin and begin to not the starting cabin temperature on my next series on a hot day. I am going to post results again when the heat comes back and daily until I reproduce the negative results. We have hot days coming this week...109 to 110, then on Jul 2nd 113 degrees.
And darn it, yesterday was the coldest day in weeks and did not even reach 100 degrees and plus we did not get out until later in the day, so my test results do NOT show what I experience on hot days. But after thinking about this, I am glad to have this cool day to level set with all the drivers that consider this to be hot and do not have any issues. Attached are the drives from yesterday with the time and temperatures. The LO setting when the temp is only in the 90's really did pretty good - no complaints - even with the AC on the LO setting the car did pretty good. But as I said this is a good bench mark for days in the 90's.please note the temperatures shown at the top of the screen capture, the next capture is of the Trips screen and always follow that order for all photos. Also note the AirConditioner setting for that trip is shown at the bottom of each screen print. I hope to evidence what I am saying on my next serious of screen prints on a hot day. For these for serious I am not going to precondition cabin and begin to not the starting cabin temperature on my next series on a hot day. I am going to post results again when the heat comes back and daily until I reproduce the negative results. We have hot days coming this week...109 to 110, then on Jul 2nd 113 degrees.
Attachments
I have to repost, I accidentally hit the enter key by mistake before I cleaned up my wording...here it is again cleaned up so it is more readable.
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Ok, Saturday Morning - To recap , we are trying to figure out why my 2023 LFP battery M3 standard range is drawing so much power when running the Air Conditioner on LO Setting in the phoenix summer heat hit. (Fan on HI setting). We were losing 200%+ of range . At 80 % charge it was difficult to get 100 miles of range. We got our car in November and but never experienced any issues until May & June heat hit. So now we are attempting to figure this all out with help from all of you.
And darn it, yesterday was the coldest day in weeks and did not even reach 100 degrees and plus we did not get out until later in the day, so my test results do NOT show what I experience on hot days. But after thinking about this, I am glad to have this cool day to level set with all the drivers that consider this to be hot and do not have any issues. With the LO Air Conditioner setting, when the temp is only in the 90's, the car did pretty good . This is a good bench mark for days in the 90's..
Attached are the drives from yesterday with the time, temperatures and Air Conditioner settings shown . The screen captures are always in this order:. first is the “Energy App”, then the “Trips” screen for the same trip. For these trips we did not precondition the car.
We have hot days coming this week...109 to 110, then on Jul 2nd 113 degrees. . I hope to evidence what I am saying on my next serious when it gets hot.
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Ok, Saturday Morning - To recap , we are trying to figure out why my 2023 LFP battery M3 standard range is drawing so much power when running the Air Conditioner on LO Setting in the phoenix summer heat hit. (Fan on HI setting). We were losing 200%+ of range . At 80 % charge it was difficult to get 100 miles of range. We got our car in November and but never experienced any issues until May & June heat hit. So now we are attempting to figure this all out with help from all of you.
And darn it, yesterday was the coldest day in weeks and did not even reach 100 degrees and plus we did not get out until later in the day, so my test results do NOT show what I experience on hot days. But after thinking about this, I am glad to have this cool day to level set with all the drivers that consider this to be hot and do not have any issues. With the LO Air Conditioner setting, when the temp is only in the 90's, the car did pretty good . This is a good bench mark for days in the 90's..
Attached are the drives from yesterday with the time, temperatures and Air Conditioner settings shown . The screen captures are always in this order:. first is the “Energy App”, then the “Trips” screen for the same trip. For these trips we did not precondition the car.
We have hot days coming this week...109 to 110, then on Jul 2nd 113 degrees. . I hope to evidence what I am saying on my next serious when it gets hot.
E90alex
Active Member
Going by your “Trip B” with 245wh/mi, that is completely normal. That equates to approx 240 miles on a full battery which is expected.
The 273mi EPA rating at 100% is not realistically achievable and real world you can expect about 85-90% of that in normal driving and climate usage which right where you are.
The 273mi EPA rating at 100% is not realistically achievable and real world you can expect about 85-90% of that in normal driving and climate usage which right where you are.
The energy screen is telling you directly how much range you're losing by using LO instead of 72F. On a really hot day and a short trip it will be much worse. I see also that you exceeded 70mph on some of the short trips. At speeds above ~60mph range will fall faster than the range estimate, and above 70mph it will fall much faster. There's no indication of a faulty HVAC system, IMHO.
From what I can see, preconditioning whilst charging and setting the AC to ~70F will give you a fairly typical range result even on very hot days.
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