Another vampire drain measurement on a refresh MS 90D

[Haxster]

My December 2016 MS 90D sat quietly in my garage for two days.

Settings:
Power Saving: Off
Always Connected: On (on home WiFi)
Smart Preconditioning: Off
Range Mode: Off

Over a period of 47 hours, it's estimated range went from 198.4 to 189.2 miles. The car appears to assume that I will be burning 309 Wh/mile.

So, ((198.4-189.2 miles) * 309 Watt-hours/mile) / 47 hours ~= 60 Watts

Sort of like having a 60 Watt light bulb burning in your garage 24/7 or an electric car that runs thru over 4 miles of energy per day while it sits in your garage contemplating it's existence.

For me, this is about equal to the total vampire drain of everything else in my house.

At my lowest tier electric rate of $0.183/KWh, this comes to about $8/month... or a couple cappuccinos.

 

[Maximapolak]

Maybe it had a 60W idea. I think you lose less when the battery is close to 50% full (at least in my short experience)

 

[Haxster]

think you lose less when the battery is close to 50% full (at least in my short experience)

It was at 64%...pretty close to 50%.

Any idea why the level of charge would make a difference in the vampire drain?

I could see a very low charge putting the car in to a lower energy state, but otherwise...

 

[tfung]

Temperature plays a huge role in vampire drain I believe... this month, my garage is around 30 degrees and I lose about 8-10 miles a day when just parked with the same settings as you... but during the summer, I might lose 2-3 miles a day only...

 

[Maximapolak]

This could be it too. It was warmer when I noticed the smaller drain while I was at about 50% battery.

 

[HX_Guy]

I assume there is a limit to "warmer is better"? What can I expect from my Model S when the garage interior temp is 130º?

 

[Haxster]

I assume there is a limit to "warmer is better"? What can I expect from my Model S when the garage interior temp is 130º?

Above 120º, the convecto-radiant thermogranetics will actually add about 0.2 miles per degree per day. Of course, this is based on our new administrations alternative science. YMMV.

BTW, my garage temperature probably ranged between 40-60 degrees over the measurement period.

 

[thegruf]

... convecto-radiant thermogranetics ...

I think you just made my flux capacitor obsolete

 

[hacer]

My December 2016 MS 90D sat quietly in my garage for two days.

Settings:
Power Saving: Off
Always Connected: On (on home WiFi)
Smart Preconditioning: Off
Range Mode: Off
...

How do you know it sat quietly? Did you watch it the whole time?
There are some things that can make it draw more power - if the key is nearby and moving the car can wake up and present the handles for example. This has been observed when I go into my mud room with fob in my pocket and the car is in the garage on the other side of the wall it does the handle present. So I've turned that setting off. I've read, but haven't verified, that if the climate control were turned on when you left the car, they will turn on if the car detects a key moving nearby, even if auto-present handles is turned off. It will turn off fairly quickly if the doors aren't opened, but it can still use a non-trivial amount of energy first. Even if the key is stationary, if something changes the RF path to the car (including reflected paths) it could be detected as key movement. So the fob could be sitting on a table and walking near it might have the same effect if it is in range of the car.

 

[Haxster]

@hacer

Well, yes. I walked by the car a few times over the 47 hours with my keyfob. So, maybe a few hundred Watts for a few minutes may have tainted my measurements slightly. A bigger error source was probably from the cars estimate of Watt-hours/mile.

Climate control was off, key fob was ~100 feet away, and the Always Connected setting was actually off (I checked it at the end of the 47 hours).

The lesson is: "Don't let it sit in the garage. Drive it!"

And driving it gets you to get your best ROI on energy cost... and enjoyment.

 

[theslimshadyist]

My December 2016 MS 90D sat quietly in my garage for two days.

Settings:
Power Saving: Off
Always Connected: On (on home WiFi)
Smart Preconditioning: Off
Range Mode: Off

Over a period of 47 hours, it's estimated range went from 198.4 to 189.2 miles. The car appears to assume that I will be burning 309 Wh/mile.

So, ((198.4-189.2 miles) * 309 Watt-hours/mile) / 47 hours ~= 60 Watts

Sort of like having a 60 Watt light bulb burning in your garage 24/7 or an electric car that runs thru over 4 miles of energy per day while it sits in your garage contemplating it's existence.

For me, this is about equal to the total vampire drain of everything else in my house.

At my lowest tier electric rate of $0.183/KWh, this comes to about $8/month... or a couple cappuccinos.

By any chance do you use Teslafi?

 

[sorka]

My December 2016 MS 90D sat quietly in my garage for two days.

Settings:
Power Saving: Off
Always Connected: On (on home WiFi)
Smart Preconditioning: Off
Range Mode: Off

Over a period of 47 hours, it's estimated range went from 198.4 to 189.2 miles. The car appears to assume that I will be burning 309 Wh/mile.

So, ((198.4-189.2 miles) * 309 Watt-hours/mile) / 47 hours ~= 60 Watts

Sort of like having a 60 Watt light bulb burning in your garage 24/7 or an electric car that runs thru over 4 miles of energy per day while it sits in your garage contemplating it's existence.

For me, this is about equal to the total vampire drain of everything else in my house.

At my lowest tier electric rate of $0.183/KWh, this comes to about $8/month... or a couple cappuccinos.

This about the same as my vampire drain was on my P85D when the 12 volt battery was good. Towards the end of the 12v batterie's first life, it went up to 70 watts. After the 12v battery was replaced, it went back down to 60 watts.

I thought the refresh models had a fraction of the vampire drain that the pre-refresh models had???

 

[K-MTG]

My X looses 15 miles per day in my 76 degree garage. Always connected is checked and energy saver is off

 

[Haxster]

By any chance do you use Teslafi?

No. But thanks for the suggestion. I was not aware of this app.

 

[Maximapolak]

My X looses 15 miles per day in my 76 degree garage. Always connected is checked and energy saver is off

15? It shouldn't be that much.

 

[ig_epower]

I would not discount the influence of data logging apps (like Tesla FI or Dashboard). Just as an example, I left my car out at the airport parking lot in Toronto (outside, around -3C to -6C) while I was on business. I put the Display setting on Power Save and Always Connected (unchecked).

Then, I used my Tesla App (only 1/day) and recorded my rated miles:

268 km. Monday, January 23, 2017
257 Tuesday, January 24, 2017
244 Wednesday, January 25, 2017 (Turned off Data logging)
240 Thrs, Jan 26, 2017
237 Fri, Jan 27, 2017

In the summer, I averaged about 3 km/day without any data logger functions on. So when I saw the results from Mon to Wed, I was surprised to see the vampire drain averaging 11 km/day.

On the Wed, I turned off the Data logging function (simply by changing the password) and the winter drain rate went down to 3.5 km/day again.

So my lesson learned is that even if the car settings are put into the misery power save mode, and I also limit remote access to the vehicle (in my case once per day), I have to consider that another provisioned app (like the Dashboard app) could also be waking up my car and pulling data from it. This caused my car to consume power unnecessarily when it wasn't moving.

Now that I am confident that the battery level will not drain to a point that I won't be able to get home, the next time I travel and leave the car in a public lot, I will only poll the car every 2 or 3 days and check if the drain rate is measurably less than the benchmark 4 km/day.