Battery Upgrade in Future??

[wehearttessla]

i have a mx75d. I was just curious if it is feasible that in 8 or so years that I could swap my battery pack out for something with more range/capacity.

I know the battery technology will hopefully get better and the batteries will get cheaper but I didn’t know if there are limitations (size, power, etc) that make a larger battery upgrade impossible.

I know it is just speculation at this point

 

[ItsNotAboutTheMoney]

No.

Edit: let me qualify that.

No, unless it's done by somebody who can hack the firmware. Tesla will not offer an upgrade.

 

[wehearttessla]

No.

Edit: let me qualify that.

No, unless it's done by somebody who can hack the firmware. Tesla will not offer an upgrade.

What will happen to all the Tesla’s that are 10-15 years old and need new batteries?

 

[BerTX]

If there is a market, someone will make a product for it. Right now, there isn't much of a market since all the Model S and later are still in warranty. As stated above, it is currently possible, but you have to be willing to give up some things. Other electric and hybrid vehicles have had people come up with replacement batteries in the past, so likely there will be some options. Right now it is mostly people with salvage cars needing new batteries and people who don't care about the warranty, so a fairly limited market.

 

[xyeahtony]

In 8 years i suspect you'll wanna buy a new tesla or balk at the upgrade cost. In 8 years, i seriously doubt your battery will degrade enough to warrant a change unless you just wanna upgrade to increase your range. In which case, it would still be a waste of $$$ to spend possibly tens of thousands of $$s to increase ur drivable range by 40-50 miles.

 

[KJD]

What will happen to all the Tesla’s that are 10-15 years old and need new batteries?

I would be willing to bet that a 10 year old Model S 85 will still have more range and functionality than a 2018 Nissan Leaf.

If you read the salvage car thread you will find that people are already doing battery swaps. It is not a trivial task, but it can be done. As stated above Tesla will not be offering battery upgrades.

 

[wehearttessla]

Thanks everyone!

 

[joninmelbourne]

In old Elon interviews he said that if a new battery technology comes along in the future it would be possible to retrofit them to existing Model S’s. (This was before the X). So sounds like he is open to upgrade if new tech comes out.

 

[_jmk]

Well, if tesla is serious about being green, they have to sell the batteries eventually. Keeping the cars on the road is the best thing to do for the environment.

 

[Gary and Rachel]

If I recall correctly. We received a message from Tesla saying if we wanted to upgrade our MX P90DL battery for the new 100 battery pack we could. The cost would be, 2 years ago, $20,000.oo

I have 41k miles on our 3/24/16 and when new a 100% charge gave 252 rated miles. Just this week we did 100% charge and got 240 rated miles. So we have lost 4 miles a year on this pack. So if this decline continues at this level after 8 years We should see a loss of around 32 to 36 miles. We have warranties for 8 years and maybe by then looking into a new upgrade from 90 to 100 pack will look good. Just hoping that the price will be lower or the overall pack will be larger like 120.

 

[Fiver]

Way back when dinosaurs roamed the earth, the first Toyota Prius came out.
Car people and media freaked about how the replacement battery costs were pushing $10,000. "Who would ever pay that?" "What a waste of money!" "You aren't going to save anything by buying a Prius if you need to spend that much replacing the batteries!" It was going to destroy the brand for sure.

Then for 10 years no one needed to replace the batteries outside of edge cases covered under warranty. Once the packs were actually genuinely wearing out and the cars out of warranty, the replacement cost had plummeted to a fraction of what it was when the cars were first released.

So, once it's actually a problem for Tesla's, I suspect the same will be true and pack costs will be much lower. But for the moment, yea, they are super expensive.

 

[GuNyO]

There is a high chance for a battery upgrade option for S/X. They were offering upgrades for roadster too. Roadster 3.0 Battery Upgrade . I did hear that upgrades will come but will only support cars with AP 2.5 or above.

 

[goneskiian]

If I recall correctly. We received a message from Tesla saying if we wanted to upgrade our MX P90DL battery for the new 100 battery pack we could. The cost would be, 2 years ago, $20,000.oo

I have 41k miles on our 3/24/16 and when new a 100% charge gave 252 rated miles. Just this week we did 100% charge and got 240 rated miles. So we have lost 4 miles a year on this pack. So if this decline continues at this level after 8 years We should see a loss of around 32 to 36 miles. We have warranties for 8 years and maybe by then looking into a new upgrade from 90 to 100 pack will look good. Just hoping that the price will be lower or the overall pack will be larger like 120.

It won't continue. I'd be willing to bet on it.

So far the evidence shows that there is an initial loss of about 5% then the degradation levels off and rarely degrades more than a few more percent.

Tesla battery degradation at less than 10% after over 160,000 miles, according to latest data - Electrek

There is a high chance for a battery upgrade option for S/X. They were offering upgrades for roadster too. Roadster 3.0 Battery Upgrade . I did hear that upgrades will come but will only support cars with AP 2.5 or above.

I wouldn't count on it. They did that for original Roadster owners to reward them for their early loyalty. Beyond the upgrade offered to the P90DL owners when the P100DL came out shortly after, there hasn't been any other upgrade offers that I've heard of.

 

[_jmk]

I did hear that upgrades will come but will only support cars with AP 2.5 or above.

Source would be nice. Where did you hear that exactly?

 

[SilverSp33d3r]

i have a mx75d. I was just curious if it is feasible that in 8 or so years that I could swap my battery pack out for something with more range/capacity.

I know the battery technology will hopefully get better and the batteries will get cheaper but I didn’t know if there are limitations (size, power, etc) that make a larger battery upgrade impossible.

I know it is just speculation at this point

My guess is when they have excess batteries. Right now it seems that’s the bottleneck for production of cars/power walls. Maybe once tesla comes out with their own battery tech/ open a mining business.

I’d love to upgrade my s60 battery to something larger...

 

[_jmk]

The new engine, charging speed improvements etc all came to the current base design. It would be a miracle if the new battery wouldn’t, too.