A lot going on here

[SammichLover]

I was doing toughly 275wH/mile at 60mph on level ground but this varied a lot with drizzle strength. Basically driving through a cloud here, the whispy parts had a lot less impact, mostly wet pavement issues is my guess. When it got closer to rain I couldn’t get 275 at 55mph.

Going to budget 300Wh/mile plus the elevation climb. It’s a little over 600m to Custer from my current location, just need to figure out if there is a higher pass ahead, so I don’t tapout on a high point.

<edit> Plus post-charge HVAC.

I have 35% battery right now, getting 7.7kW. I’m only 85 miles out, just need to not get greedy.

 

[timk225]

OP - go for it! No charging along the way, the screen says you'll make it with 5% to spare! Live a little!

 

[SammichLover]

OP - go for it! No charging along the way, the screen says you'll make it with 5% to spare! Live a little!

Have I got a story for you! It isn’t done yet, so I can’t spoil the ending, but you definitely should go back to the start and read it all the way through.

 

[Darren S]

Custer is shortly after a Pass but don't bank on gaining much range after the Pass. You can see this better if you zoom into the elevation graph.

Give me 15 minutes and I'll let you know. You can see the drop in the elevation plot or possibly on your energy graph too.

"Oh give me a home ... "

 

[jerry33]

Happy green T achieved!

Question, is Custer at the top of the hill or am I coming through a pass?

It's been four years since I drove the Tesla there, but I believe it's close to the top of the hill.

 

[Darren S]

I was doing toughly 275wH/mile at 60mph on level ground but this varied a lot with drizzle strength. Basically driving through a cloud here, the whispy parts had a lot less impact, mostly wet pavement issues is my guess. When it got closer to rain I couldn’t get 275 at 55mph.

Going to budget 300Wh/mile plus the elevation climb. It’s a little over 600m to Custer from my current location, just need to figure out if there is a higher pass ahead, so I don’t tapout on a high point.

<edit> Plus post-charge HVAC.

I have 35% battery right now, getting 7.7kW. I’m only 85 miles out, just need to not get greedy.

I would bank on more like 400 Wh/mi just to be safe.

I just got to the highest point and it is about 3-4 miles from Custer.

 

[SammichLover]

Looks like the airport is the top, once you made that you’re golden.

Only 200’ down from there into Custer, so not too bad a hump.

 

[SammichLover]

I would bank on more like 400 Wh/mi just to be safe.

I just got to the highest point and it is about 3-4 miles from Custer.

Yeah rain could pick up. I was thinking of with 12% battery buffer. In absolute 400 is about the same.

Either way, it’s about 52-55% SOC. I’ll have that by 2pm.

 

[Darren S]

Yeah rain could pick up. I was thinking of with 12% battery buffer. In absolute 400 is about the same.

Either way, it’s about 52-55% SOC. I’ll have that by 2pm.

That is definitely enough with buffer. I just drove the same 90 miles from Chadron and used 29.8 kWh if that helps. It should have used closer to 35 kWh but I had to manage the range since I didn't stop to charge.

227 miles (from Sidney) on 253 miles of range and used all but 2 miles of it because it was +1,950 ft up from Chadron and cold and a little rainy.

You'll be just fine with your charge. Enjoy the drive through scenic Hot Springs.

 

[Darren S]

I did end up making it to Custer with just 2 miles or 1% remaining. Fun times and I knew I wanted to challenge myself.

​

 

[Nocturnal]

Don't worry. If it dies just leave it in Drive and push it a few miles to regen the battery.

 

[Darren S]

Don't worry. If it dies just leave it in Drive and push it a few miles to regen the battery.

That doesn't work (don't ask how I know).

 

[Nocturnal]

That doesn't work (don't ask how I know).

It actually does! Somebody tested it by towing the car and it regen-ed quite a bit. Super inefficient of course, but it works. (pushing a 4k car yourself any major distance would be very very hard of course)

 

[Darren S]

It actually does! Somebody tested it by towing the car and it regen-ed quite a bit. Super inefficient of course, but it works. (pushing a 4k car yourself any major distance would be very very hard of course)

Was the car they were towing NOT already completely out of battery power though?

 

[Nocturnal]

Was the car they were towing NOT already completely out of battery power though?

I don't recall for sure, but I don't think it was completely dead.

 

[Darren S]

I don't recall for sure, but I don't think it was completely dead.

In case you wondered... these are the alerts on an S. I'm not proud but have an excuse why it ran out on me.

 

[PLUS EV]

In case you wondered... these are the alerts on an S. I'm not proud but have an excuse why it ran out on me.

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I got a couple of those alerts but was able to drive through it. Living dangerously! My situation was a little different. Was low on charge and late for a game, couldn't find a parking spot with a functioning L2 charger so I parked with like 4% remaining and went to the game. Ambient temp was in the 40s. When I got back to the car a 3 hours later, I got all those warnings but decided to gamble and drove to the nearby L2 charger anyway. It was only a couple blocks away and this reliable L2 charger was blocked before the game because the garage was already full and they closed the entrance with no attendant in sight.

When I got to the charger and plugged in, it showed 0 Rated Miles, but it was apparent based on the charging that the battery was actually at something like -5%. So I had to sit there for a little over an hour to get it up to the +5% or so that I needed to make it home. For future reference, if this happens to you, the way to figure out how far negative your battery is is to enter a destination in the Nav. In this case, I navigated home which was about 10 miles away and it said that I would arrive with -9%. Slowly as I charged, that figure changed to -8%, -7%, etc., all while the battery remained showing 0 Rated Miles. Once it got to the point where the arrival charge showed something like -4%, the battery finally clicked up to 1 Rated Mile and then upward from there. Without the nav trick, I would have been pulling my hair out trying to figure out if the battery was really charging for like 40 minutes, but the Nav reassured me that some charging was taking place.

I also once had another similar experience where I parked at a game with something like 30 Rated Miles left. This time the ambient temp was ~80F so I didn't expect much of a problem. A few hours later after the game, I was driving to the nearby supercharger with about 15 Rated Miles left when it immediately dropped to 0 Rated Miles. Strangely I didn't get any warning, but obviously disconcerting to look down and see 0 RMs remaining. I was on a long bridge in the Tampa area to boot. I was only about 3 miles from the supercharger though, so I just held my breath and I did make it fine.

The moral of these stories is to not park your Tesla with <10% remaining for anything more than a few minutes. Even L1 charging would have saved me in these cases.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

View attachment 408878

Send it!

My confusion is why you can only go 261 miles with a net elevation gain of 2100 feet (~3.4kWh/14 miles, assuming 4300 pounds...maybe 5% more....) in a Model 3 AWD? Were you driving fast on the prior leg (it looked like maybe 257Wh/mi on prior leg)? Can’t remember what tires you have...

I have heard “everyone” say it is no problem to do less than 250Wh/mi with PS4S, so now I am just confused. (I think people are trying to gaslight me on that, and it might be working. ) In any case I figured for sure with MXM4s, this leg would be super easy, tons of margin...

 

[jerry33]

My confusion is why you can only go 261 miles with a net elevation gain of 2100 feet (~3.4kWh/14 miles, assuming 4300 pounds...maybe 5% more....) in a Model 3 AWD? Were you driving fast on the prior leg (it looked like maybe 257Wh/mi on prior leg)? Can’t remember what tires you have...

I have heard “everyone” say it is no problem to do less than 250Wh/mi with PS4S, so now I am just confused. (I think people are trying to gaslight me on that, and it might be working. ) In any case I figured for sure with MXM4s, this leg would be super easy, tons of margin...

It depends on how fast you are going up the hill and whether or not you are paying attention to the displayed information. It's really pretty simple. 1. Start slow and end fast. 2. If you are dropping below the estimate in the trip graph, slow down. I did many trips before the trip graph was created, and there wasn't ever a problem because I watched how I was doing.

 

[SammichLover]

My confusion is why you can only go 261 miles with a net elevation gain of 2100 feet (~3.4kWh/14 miles, assuming 4300 pounds...maybe 5% more....) in a Model 3 AWD? Were you driving fast on the prior leg (it looked like maybe 257Wh/mi on prior leg)? Can’t remember what tires you have...

I have heard “everyone” say it is no problem to do less than 250Wh/mi with PS4S, so now I am just confused. (I think people are trying to gaslight me on that, and it might be working. ) In any case I figured for sure with MXM4s, this leg would be super easy, tons of margin...

Here’s a leg until I Tesla-camped for the night near NE/KS border, heading north of Colby.

That’s including post-charge HVAC losses, a bit of road through Colby, then 70mph EAP. Temp 25C (in the dark obviously), elevation delta was less than -50m I think. I’ll look up when I get home.

Wheels are PS4S (not Tesla OE) in Aero rims. 45psi for trips, they were 47-48psi hot on this leg.

That elev to Custer is 3.6kWh raw physics number, about 4kWh in practice. <edit> That number might be elev from the RV? But it’s similar, almost everything is Hot Springs to Custer, over last 30 mi. Nice climb.

I’m going to post numbers/pic after RV park to Custer later in the week, but basically it was standing water + pseudo rain that killed the attempt. Car returned to expected numbers when i got onto grooved concrete + no drizzle.