Do you know that you must keep your battery charged?

[dsm363]

I agree it's more plausible in the Roadster but most Roadster owners charge with a UMC or HPC so less of an issue. Some do charge with the 120V cable though. If it's something that could potentially be a problem, could always have someone check on the car. Many people ask neighbors or relatives to swing by their house when they go on really long vacations to make sure no one has smashed a window...etc. Peoeple could do the same of they have early Roadsters and are really worried about it. An additional safety measure for those really concerned would be to simply charge in standard mode during vacation. You'd use less energy and not technically as good for the battery but if the power going out or a circuit tripping is a major concern then you'd start with a much higher SOC.

I was more referring to the Model S and X since it seems the main purpose of this guy's smear was to damage Tesla as a company and maybe hurt future sales. Since the Model S will have even less of an issue as they state in the new blog, is really isn't an issue.

 

[WhiteKnight]

yes, if you can't find power in 12 months, well a dead model s battery will be the least of your problems.

+1000 lmao!

 

[donauker]

I agree it's more plausible in the Roadster but most Roadster owners charge with a UMC or HPC so less of an issue. Some do charge with the 120V cable though. If it's something that could potentially be a problem, could always have someone check on the car. Many people ask neighbors or relatives to swing by their house when they go on really long vacations to make sure no one has smashed a window...etc. Peoeple could do the same of they have early Roadsters and are really worried about it. An additional safety measure for those really concerned would be to simply charge in standard mode during vacation. You'd use less energy and not technically as good for the battery but if the power going out or a circuit tripping is a major concern then you'd start with a much higher SOC.

Seeing the number of Roadsters being sold with low mileage, it is hard to determine how many owners used a HPC or UMC vs the included cable. If a Roadster is put into temporary storage as in the case in question it is highly unlikely that 240 volt charging would be available. It seems much more likely that the included 120 volt cable would be used.

Tesla has always stated that to store the vehicle for an extended period Storage Mode should be used. The owner is expected to disregard that recommendation?

In hot conditions what frequency of checking the car is safe?

I was more referring to the Model S and X since it seems the main purpose of this guy's smear was to damage Tesla as a company and maybe hurt future sales. Since the Model S will have even less of an issue as they state in the new blog, is really isn't an issue.

I am glad to hear that this possibility will be addressed on future models but where does that leave Roadster owners with $40,000 packs that will be more likely to go into extended storage for winter months when they have one of these newer models?

 

[NigelM]

Perhaps you'll become stranded in a foreign country during a coup....

It happened to me. Took me 4 days to get home. But that's a story for another day....

(I know I said I wasn't going to read this thread anymore, but Tesla's blog motivated me to see if anyone had posted it! Now Tesla gave us the answer, I'm REALLY going to stay off this thread...:biggrin

 

[WhiteKnight]

Taking A Victory Lap Here . . .

All of these problems happened on Roadsters 1-500.

Why do you not think given multiple years to work on this problem that Tesla has not completely nixed it with regard to the Model S?

The Model S pack has seen tremendous improvements over the Roadster pack. I am willing to bet big money that the "parasitic loss" on the Model S is a small fraction of the Roadster.

So if you can drive a Roadster down to 0 range and leave it unplugged for 2 weeks before the battery "bricks" then you can probably driver the Model S down to 0 range and leave it unplugged for 2 months and still it will be fine.

And whereas the Roadster has to be left unplugged for 11 weeks to "brick" the battery I'll bet the Model S can be unplugged for 11 months without bricking the battery.

Do we all think the engineers at Tesla are just playing video games all day? They didn't know that batteries were capable of "bricking?"

So it turns out you can drive to the airport with 50% charge and leave your Model S for a year!

I said 11 months, so all those people that bet me (you know who you are) had better pay up.

So are we done wasting our time talking about this now?

 

[dsm363]

In hot conditions what frequency of checking the car is safe?

There really is no formula or perfect system anyone can offer to answer. I'm grateful for the early Roadster owners who took the biggest risk but it sounds like there are less safety measures than the later Rooadsters (no GSM). You have to do whatever you feel makes you comfortable to leave your car in storage for a long time. They do recommend storage mode but I brought up standard mode only as an extra step you could take to give your pack more time if the power cut out. If I were going to store my Roadster for a few months, I'd install a outlet for a UMC.

I agree though. This is really all about the Model S. Sounds like this really isn't an issue there.

 

[dpeilow]

And here's the Jalopnik position on the new blog Twitter

 

[Norbert]

So it turns out you can drive to the airport with 50% charge and leave your Model S for a year!

I said 11 months, so all those people that bet me (you know who you are) had better pay up.

The new Tesla blog shows they have done a great job advancing the technology. My confidence in the quality of Model S has doubled. 12 months with 50% and 30 days with 0% are in my opinion mass-market capable values, and much more than I'd think is necessary to consider it a mature technology in this regard.

 

[AnOutsider]

The new Tesla blog shows they have done a great job advancing the technology. My confidence in the quality of Model S has doubled. 12 months with 50% and 30 days with 0% are in my opinion mass-market capable values, and much more than I'd think is necessary to consider it a mature technology in this regard.

Agreed, though anyone still shocked at the replacement costs? $40k (including labor)? The Model S should be cheaper, but by how much? Will it be $20k? $15k?

 

[smoothoperator]

Agreed, though anyone still shocked at the replacement costs? $40k (including labor)? The Model S should be cheaper, but by how much? Will it be $20k? $15k?

40k is the hookup price (Friends & Family) the normal price is probably a few k above that.... If I was the guy with the bricked roadster I would just wait for the price to come down with a higher capacity and then do the replacement....

 

[vfx]

...The "bricked" Roadster owner, identified by GreenCarReports.com and Wired.com as Max Drucker, and the blogger, Michael DeGusta, are business partners, ...They co-founded Steel Card, according to the company's archived website ...

I met Max at the very first Tesla Rally. Memorable because he has a wicked cool business card. It's steel.Ok, it's aluminum, but still cool.

 

[dpeilow]

Updated: Credit Report Scrub: Max Drucker: CEO, Whistleblower, and Idiot

Also, if Mr. Musk wants to give The Scrub a free Tesla Roadster for all the free publicity and for publicly defending his company against Mr. Drucker (even to the point of having an entire ream of negative information publicly available on him months before this s**t occurred), The Scrub promises he'll keep it plugged in and won't be a dick about it.

 

[Sergio Ochoa]

I think that any auto enthusiast that would purchase an electric car would know that you need to take care of the battery. This was one of the first thing I learned when I started working on cars and it really got indented in my brain when I had a motorcycle battery completely die out after I did not remove the battery for the winter.

 

[daniel]

The $40,000 figure surprised me because they charge $12,000 for the plan that gives you a new pack in seven years. Assuming an optimistic 5% interest, $12,000 now becomes $16,885 in seven years. Interest has to be 19% for 12K to grow to 40K in seven years. Granted, battery prices are expected to decline, and when they were desperate for capital they'd have offered a good deal. But still it seems like a large discrepancy.

Maybe they just figured that in seven years they'd be so big that they could afford to replace some batteries for half price, in return for some capital early on?

 

[dpeilow]

Almost certainly the latter.

 

[bonnie]

The $40,000 figure surprised me because they charge $12,000 for the plan that gives you a new pack in seven years. Assuming an optimistic 5% interest, $12,000 now becomes $16,885 in seven years. Interest has to be 19% for 12K to grow to 40K in seven years. Granted, battery prices are expected to decline, and when they were desperate for capital they'd have offered a good deal. But still it seems like a large discrepancy.

Maybe they just figured that in seven years they'd be so big that they could afford to replace some batteries for half price, in return for some capital early on?

The replaced battery isn't anywhere near depleted - even 70% of 53kwh has value. I'm sure that factors into this.

 

[stopcrazypp]

The replaced battery isn't anywhere near depleted - even 70% of 53kwh has value. I'm sure that factors into this.

I think that is the most likely explanation. They get a working battery in the replacement case; in this case they get a non-working battery.

 

[smoothoperator]

The replaced battery isn't anywhere near depleted - even 70% of 53kwh has value. I'm sure that factors into this.

Do you think Tesla assesses a sliding scale based on capacity when replacing battery packs for out of warranty Roadsters? Once the battery pack is completely depleted and will not take a charge then Tesla automatically assesses the 40k? I wonder what the warranty is on replaced battery packs?

 

[bonnie]

Do you think Tesla assesses a sliding scale based on capacity when replacing battery packs for out of warranty Roadsters? Once the battery pack is completely depleted and will not take a charge then Tesla automatically assesses the 40k? I wonder what the warranty is on replaced battery packs?

No idea. I just think that the reason that a bricked battery is so expensive is because there's likely nothing recoverable, whereas a replaced battery has to hold some value. I have the battery replacement option (one of the minority) and it's unlikely my battery will be that depleted when I replace it in 10 years. Other Roadster owners are experiencing a fairly slow degradation, I haven't experienced any after over 10k miles.

 

[smoothoperator]

No idea. I just think that the reason that a bricked battery is so expensive is because there's likely nothing recoverable, whereas a replaced battery has to hold some value. I have the battery replacement option (one of the minority) and it's unlikely my battery will be that depleted when I replace it in 10 years. Other Roadster owners are experiencing a fairly slow degradation, I haven't experienced any after over 10k miles.

Really? I have noticed slight degradation on my Roadster that has 12k miles. It still charges fine in standard to 186-187. I just notice that when I do the same trips that I have done before in that car , there is less remaining range when I get back (usually 40-60 mile drives)....