Guessing your extreme cold is pretty much only an occasional issue, similar to hear in Colorado, and your electricity is included with the garage rent, I really wouldn't worry about it, plug it in and it will charge when it's warm enough. Plus installing a 240V would either be not allowed or a lost expense, since it's an apartment garage.
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Charging Tesla in Extreme Cold (SD, ND, MN, Canada) with 110V - Battery Heating Time at -20°C (-4°F)?
- Thread starter farmerinnorth
- Start date
Maybe not. Many apartments in cold climates are set up for block heaters which draw a lot of current, so they generally provide dedicated circuits for each spot.
Check to see what kind of receptacle you actually have. It could be a 15A or a 20A circuit. The 20A circuits have a horizontal blade like this one. If you have a 20A circuit, you could be fine since it gives you about 42% more useful energy going in the heater/battery (yes, more than a 33% increase you would think, please don't make me explain). All you would need is the Tesla NEMA 5-20 adapter to make this work with the Mobile Connector.
For a pre-heat pump car, this is true. My 2014 S would pull 6kW to pre-heat the cabin only (without battery heating). It's much lower on the heatpump cars. I see around 5A @ 240V to preheat my new Y w/ heatpump
Eric33432
Member
When you said "detached garage" I assumed you meant a detached garage for a single family home. If it is part of a parking garage for an apartment building, that is a whole different animal and I suggest you speak with the building's maintenance staff about the circuit you are using, if it is dedicated or as davewill cautions there might be other receptacles on the same circuit, and so on. If you can't make it work using the suggestions on this thread perhaps you can install a dedicated circuit. Many apartments/condos are doing that nowadays, but that is not a DIY project and requires professional advice and installation.
Is that the case in extreme cold? My understanding is the system will likely switch to motor heat instead of compressor heat when conditioning the battery in extreme cold.
It would also be important to know if the car was also doing battery heating when you measured its power consumption, or if it was satisfied with the battery temperature and not actively heating it.
Where he lives, there may very well be a separate circuit per parking space for an engine block heater. If so, if the management approved it could probably be converted to 240V for EV charging.
Just adding my three cents. A 2018 M3 LR (that's a pre heat pump design) when plugged into an outlet in Maryland, outside temperatures at 20F or so, wouldn't charge. Period. 1.44 kW was being drawn, right. But that wasn't enough to get the battery warm enough to charge.
To the OP: Just so you understand what's going on here with Power, and what your options are:
Standard practice in the US is to have split phase power attached to the main breaker panel. This consists of three wires:
If one wants a 120 VAC circuit, then the a breaker is clipped to Hot #1 or Hot #2, and has a wire coming out of the breaker, normally colored black. A white wire is connected to the Neutral bus bar, and this neutral, and the hot, goes off to power lights and standard 120 VAC wall sockets and such.
If one wants a 240 VAC circuit, a duplex, ganged breaker that covers two, count 'em, two slots is used. Each of the two breakers (this is for HVAC, electric ovens, and the like) has a single wire coming out: Those two wires have 240 VAC between them, and are routed to the load, which can be hard-wired (for HVAC air conditioning compressors and the like), or a socket (NEMA15-50 or the like) for an electric stove. Usually, but not always, a Neutral and a Safety Ground will go along with these wires.
Here's the chart for NEMA sockets, courtesy of Wikipedia:
So, suppose that your garage has a NEMA5-15, 120 VAC, single 15A breaker. Looking at the chart, it's got a Hot, a Neutral, and the pin has the green safety ground, and is good for 15A peak, 12A steady state (as in a Tesla).
In principle, with management's agreement, one could go to the breaker panel, remove the 15A single phase breaker and disconnect the hot and neutral wires; let's say one is black and one is white.
Over at the other end in the garage, remove the NEMA5-15 outlet and put in a single NEMA6-15 socket, using the white and black wires on the two hots and the safety ground on the ground pin.
Back at the breaker panel, connect the white and black wires to the duplex breaker.
At this point, you now have a 240 VAC, 15A circuit, that can supply 12A steady. That will provide 2.88 kW to the car, double the power you've got at 120 VAC.
The only thing you need at this point is to spend $15 over at Tesla to get the NEMA6-15 adapter.
Now, it's just possible that the outlet in your garage is a NEMA5-20, capable of 20A peak, 16A steady state, and the breaker presently in the panel is a 20A, not a 15A breaker. You can tell this because of that funky slot in the socket in the garage that has that right-angle blade. If that's the case, you can do the above stuff, but use a 20A duplex breaker, rather than a 15A duplex breaker, a NEMA6-20 in the garage, and the Tesla adapter for a NEMA6-20. This would give you 16A at 240 VAC, 3.84 kW, which would be better for your purposes.
None of the above involves pulling wire to the detached garage.
Now, you can get much better charging rates if:
People will pick some of the above apart, especially as there are always Details. Best bet, if you're going this route, is to check Tesla.com for a list of electricians that do this kind of work in the area and get several quotes.
Finally: Remember what you're paying the local utility for is energy, not "voltage" or "current" per se. Let's say you've got a 72 kW-hr battery in the car, it's half-empty at 36 kW-hr, and you want to charge it to 72 kW. So, you need 36 kW-hr. Whether you get that at 1.44 kW (12A at 120VAC) which takes 25 hours, or at 11.52 kW (48A at 240VAC) which takes 3.125 hours, you're paying for the same amount of energy. Plus or minus bits about having to get the battery warm, first.
To the OP: Just so you understand what's going on here with Power, and what your options are:
Standard practice in the US is to have split phase power attached to the main breaker panel. This consists of three wires:
- Neutral. Connected to a ground stake at the building power entrance, and, at the main breaker panel, also connected to safety ground. Connected to the Neutral Bus Bar in the breaker panel.
- Hot #1. 120 VAC when measured between Hot #1 and Neutral. This is connected to the First Hot Bus Bar in the breaker panel.
- Hot #2. When measured between Hot #2 and Neutral, one also sees 120 VAC. Now, the tricky bit: Both Hot #1 and Hot #2 are sine waves. When one is going up, the other is going down and vice versa. A voltmeter connected across Hot #1 and Hot #2 shows 240 VAC. This Hot is connected to the Second Hot Bus Bar in the breaker panel.
If one wants a 120 VAC circuit, then the a breaker is clipped to Hot #1 or Hot #2, and has a wire coming out of the breaker, normally colored black. A white wire is connected to the Neutral bus bar, and this neutral, and the hot, goes off to power lights and standard 120 VAC wall sockets and such.
If one wants a 240 VAC circuit, a duplex, ganged breaker that covers two, count 'em, two slots is used. Each of the two breakers (this is for HVAC, electric ovens, and the like) has a single wire coming out: Those two wires have 240 VAC between them, and are routed to the load, which can be hard-wired (for HVAC air conditioning compressors and the like), or a socket (NEMA15-50 or the like) for an electric stove. Usually, but not always, a Neutral and a Safety Ground will go along with these wires.
Here's the chart for NEMA sockets, courtesy of Wikipedia:
So, suppose that your garage has a NEMA5-15, 120 VAC, single 15A breaker. Looking at the chart, it's got a Hot, a Neutral, and the pin has the green safety ground, and is good for 15A peak, 12A steady state (as in a Tesla).
In principle, with management's agreement, one could go to the breaker panel, remove the 15A single phase breaker and disconnect the hot and neutral wires; let's say one is black and one is white.
Over at the other end in the garage, remove the NEMA5-15 outlet and put in a single NEMA6-15 socket, using the white and black wires on the two hots and the safety ground on the ground pin.
Back at the breaker panel, connect the white and black wires to the duplex breaker.
At this point, you now have a 240 VAC, 15A circuit, that can supply 12A steady. That will provide 2.88 kW to the car, double the power you've got at 120 VAC.
The only thing you need at this point is to spend $15 over at Tesla to get the NEMA6-15 adapter.
Now, it's just possible that the outlet in your garage is a NEMA5-20, capable of 20A peak, 16A steady state, and the breaker presently in the panel is a 20A, not a 15A breaker. You can tell this because of that funky slot in the socket in the garage that has that right-angle blade. If that's the case, you can do the above stuff, but use a 20A duplex breaker, rather than a 15A duplex breaker, a NEMA6-20 in the garage, and the Tesla adapter for a NEMA6-20. This would give you 16A at 240 VAC, 3.84 kW, which would be better for your purposes.
None of the above involves pulling wire to the detached garage.
Now, you can get much better charging rates if:
- Your breaker panel has additional capacity that can support, say, an additional 50A or 60A load. An electrician does a load analysis to figure this.
- You or someone is willing to lay wire that's good for 50A or 60A from some breaker panel or other to the garage.
- Ideally, you'd like to have a Tesla Wall Connector, good for 48A on a 60A circuit in the garage (it's cheaper to do it this way than play with high-quality sockets and GFCI protectors) (48A, which is the most any Tesla does these days, gets you 11.52 kW, which is more than enough to warm up your car and charge it in the dead of winter.)
People will pick some of the above apart, especially as there are always Details. Best bet, if you're going this route, is to check Tesla.com for a list of electricians that do this kind of work in the area and get several quotes.
Finally: Remember what you're paying the local utility for is energy, not "voltage" or "current" per se. Let's say you've got a 72 kW-hr battery in the car, it's half-empty at 36 kW-hr, and you want to charge it to 72 kW. So, you need 36 kW-hr. Whether you get that at 1.44 kW (12A at 120VAC) which takes 25 hours, or at 11.52 kW (48A at 240VAC) which takes 3.125 hours, you're paying for the same amount of energy. Plus or minus bits about having to get the battery warm, first.
Great post that covers the available options, @Tronguy! My only quibble is with the last paragraph—you very much will pay for differing amounts of energy when comparing 120V, low-power vs 240V high-power circuits. The latter is far more efficient, and that’s before considering the much lower wasted energy for heating the battery when using a high-power charger.
Good points - I'll try to remember to report back in a month or so if we finally get real cold weather (I've only had the car since Sept).
In the Tesla Model Y active battery warming is performed via stator heating using the motor stators within the front (if AWD) and rear drive units. When parked, after driving, the Tesla Model Y can use the heat pump to move heat energy from the already warm passenger cabin into the battery pack. Stator heating is also used when Preconditioning the battery pack for Supercharging.
Not an accurate guess. I did a two week shift in Thief River Falls, MN, and it never got above -20F the entire two weeks.
Colorado has cold patches and snaps. The US Canadian border gets straight up cold soaked.
Having lived in Massachusetts (including growing up there in the 60's), the answer for New Hampshire is, "it varies".
Down by the coast it can get cold down into the 20's or touching 0 from time to time for a week at a whack: But even back in the 60's, that was rare. Like most coastal communities, it bops up and down around freezing during the winter.
Inland is a different story with serious, thick snow and good, below-zero freezing, especially in and around the White Mountains. It's warmer up there now than it was back in the 60's but I imagine people in Concord get smacked with the cold pretty bad.
It was 11F this morning when I turned on climate control. Battery heating came on as well. The car maxed out my 30A circuit (drawing 24A), and appeared to be drawing additional power from the battery (SoC dropped ~1-2%). It took 8 minutes to bring the cabin to 68F in 8 min.
So it does look like it will use stator heating in colder weather to create heat for the heat pump to then transfer to the cabin/battery.
8 minutes is not enough time (at 11F(-11.6C)) for stator heating to fully warm the battery. My understanding is that a volume of coolant will be maintained within a loop and continue to circulate between the drive unit motors and the battery until the battery has been sufficiently warmed. Once the desired battery temperature has been reached then some of the warm coolant will be directed from the battery to the cabin heat exchanger to help warm the passenger cabin. Until the desired cabin temperature has been reached the heat pump will continue to scavenge heat from the outside air.
Didn't mean to imply that the battery was warm in 8 min, just that the cabin was up to temp. I disconnected the power and drove off after the cabin was warmed. I was interested in my comfort, not the battery's.
Living here in Winterpeg! 2 winters with model 3 , 1 with model Y! 120 volt charging is what my kids use for model 3 ; challenging; need to skip some drive days ( 1 in 10 when -20 C or less) ! Model Y much more challenging ! (1 every 5 days on those cold days) ! The old times they go to supercharge for top up ! Parking outside !!
I switched to 240 16 amps in unheated garage! Perfect !!!
Have read this thread with a lot of interest as I live in winter frigid Alberta and am contemplating purchase of a MY. I do wish Tesla would publish some definitive information on the topic of cold weather charging and heating as there appears to be a lot of contradictory evidence and opinions on the topic.
I called Tesla Canada today for information on the topic but was left with really not much more than what Tesla states in the owners' manuals (plug it in in cold weather and don't leave it unplugged at -30 for more than a day).
I called Tesla Canada today for information on the topic but was left with really not much more than what Tesla states in the owners' manuals (plug it in in cold weather and don't leave it unplugged at -30 for more than a day).
Here's the best advice I have:
1) Make sure you have home charging (240V)
2) Whenever driving extended distances when your next stop will be a Super charger. Always use the Tesla navigation to navigate to that Super Charger, this will enable the veicle to preheat for efficient FAST charging.
3) Range will be less by as much as 40% possibly depending on road conditions and temperatures. This only really means something when taking a road trip. If your commuting to work for the day and running some errands, this is a non issue (so long as you have home charging).
4) and Most important. Enjoy the vehicle they are really great and nothing beats preheating your Tesla MY in the garage before leaving on a cold morning.
Even if you don’t remember to preheat, the newer teslas have heat pumps and they give you immediate cabin heat as opposed to ICE which take quite a while to warm up.
I second the 240V home charging recommendation for cold weather. Get a Tesla Wall Connector.
I second the 240V home charging recommendation for cold weather. Get a Tesla Wall Connector.
cteomd
Member
Try at least to heat the garage then so the car will continue to charge even with a 110 outlet.
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