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Driving north - south Is 75 enough?

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About to press the button on a model s before the price goes up, and having a last minute re-consider of the battery size.... was going to get a 90d, but perhaps 75 is enough? My most demanding use-case is driving between the highlands of Scotland and London. According to evtripping.com, I'll have the same number of charge stops, and the same charge time with either pack. But my margin of safety will obviously be bigger in the 90.
Is it worthwhile paying extra for the 90? Have you bought a 75 and wished you'd got the larger pack? If you have a 90, how often do you use the last 20kwh?
 
About to press the button on a model s before the price goes up, and having a last minute re-consider of the battery size.... was going to get a 90d, but perhaps 75 is enough? My most demanding use-case is driving between the highlands of Scotland and London. According to evtripping.com, I'll have the same number of charge stops, and the same charge time with either pack. But my margin of safety will obviously be bigger in the 90.
Is it worthwhile paying extra for the 90? Have you bought a 75 and wished you'd got the larger pack? If you have a 90, how often do you use the last 20kwh?

I've read quite a few threads over the last year or two relating to this. The majority from owners who suffered range anxiety and bought the bigger pack, but with real world use realised it made little tangible difference to their driving and charging pattern. If you are driving in Scotland and to give maximum flexibility you'd definately be advised to get a CHAdeMO adapter.

I should add I have no personal experience as my car is still in transit from the factory.

Good luck whichever route you go :)
 
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The 75 is ample. It actually has more capacity than the older 2013 85's. Better battery packs.
Also, all the 85's built were actually 81's.
I can go further with my 75 than my 2013 85. I can max out at 407 km as opposed to the 85's 395 or whatever it was when I traded it in.
I drive a lot between Montreal and Toronto, 550 km each way and no problem using the Superchargers and worrying about distances.
A lot of destinations, out of the way, also have charging for overnight as well.
Save your money and get an 75. You'll be happy you did.
 
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Good morning from Manchester.

My answer will also cover temperatures, cruising speed and distance.

I've had my 90D since March 16, and chose the upgrade from an 85 pack. I agree the useable kWh from the 90 pack is most certainly not 90kWh.

However I am pleased I paid the extra at the time. I make the Manchester-Glasgow journey return in a day quite often, it is 420 miles. Planning, driving and pausing for charging is much easier in summer.

If you are a motorway driver who is happy to cruise along at 60 or 65 mph you'll be fine with the 75 car.

However my real life experience I'd say a winter day, say some sleet and wind, driving up the M6 at say 80mph average I might reach Abington SC, which is 170 miles, my car will have used 98% of the charge, starting with full electrons.

That's with range mode, but heater on, poss steering wheel heater plus seats on - a cold day.

If I cruised at say 66mph I'd get say 210 miles on a cold day. Much more in summer. (Same as an ICE car - cruise at 50mph you get much better mpg)

So it is multifactorial.

Then say getting home on this long journey - if you are happy to reach home with say 5%, then charge overnight, the 90 pack may allow you to avoid a final charging stop.

Tests by owners have shown that overall journey times are less by driving faster, short SC stop then drive fast to the next SC. Maybe this supports the case for the 75 pack!

I think all this is part of the learning curve EV owners have. I read forums for months as you are, but then your own real life experience will add to this knowledge.

This will all be outweighed by the pleasure of using the car, the acceleration, the attention from other road users, the updates to the car and the good fellowship of fellow owners.

Good luck!

Tony
 
Have you bought a 75 and wished you'd got the larger pack?

Not quite ... but ... :)

I ordered the 85. The 90 was available at the time, but the "extra cost" for the 5 kWh, which amounted to only a few miles, seemed huge. (OK, so I now know that the 85 was actually overstated, so it turns out to be a bit more than 5, but i didn't know that back then)

During my build-wait the 85 was discontinued and I was given the options of early delivery, upgrade to 90, or refund to 75. Despite my earlier thought process of "not worth the extra cost" I decided to take the 90.

Of course, now, the extra cost is forgotten :) What I have is a bit of extra range. I have only once arrived home with 1% charge, and I clearly would not have made it in an 85. Car was charged to 100%, its a journey I do often (177 miles round trip), but I was late leaving that day so I drove at 80 to make up time. I arrived with 51% battery, which I thought was absolutely fine as I was in no rush on the way back, that journey normally uses 90% battery. Weather turned dreadful, really heavy rain, I didn't think too much of it, drove home on TACC at a steady 70 and then as I got closer to home and range dropped I eased off more, creeping home the last few miles.

(I checked the same journey in previous months (normal driving!) November wet journey = 400 Wh, Oct = 386 Wh, Sep = 358 Wh)

My consumption figures show that I am using more in Winter (as expected, but now I have actuals logged)

1820 miles @ 323 Wh/mi Aug
2963 miles @ 347 Wh/mi Sep
2614 miles @ 371 Wh/mi Oct
3308 miles @ 407 Wh/mi Nov
1150 miles @ 417 Wh/mi Dec

Daily commute is 40 miles (one way) mostly on dual carriageway, so time for battery to warm up etc.

Post your data logger stats!

On any day where my journey is more than 160 miles I charge to 100%, to have extra buffer.

Apart from that one, critical, journey the only thing I can say about the larger battery is that I have come home without worrying about range more often. "Not worrying" means not reducing speed, unexpected foul/cold weather, being able to make a detour (which has happened a couple of times), or not having some other "Sorry, I can't do that I don't have range" type event.

If I had to make the decision again I would favour range over cost. The cost, per total mile, of the battery upgrade is acceptable, but the "Only a few 10's of miles more for £ nn,000" is a painful way of viewing it.

I'll have the same number of charge stops, and the same charge time with either pack

I was surprised to read that. Assuming you start with 100% charge (I would, whenever I make a long journey) and set a sensible "safety buffer" for arrival you should clearly need (90 - 75) = 15 kWh less charge, overall. At a Supercharger that isn't much time, of course.

Note that a key factor is that the car charges faster from 10% to 80% than above. 10%-80% in a 75 is less "range" than in a 90, so on a long journey, with multiple re-charges, you spend more time charging in that sweet-spot in a bigger battery car.

(pedantic point, but a "safety buffer" of 10% on both 75 and 90 is about 5 miles more on the 90, so might be worth setting safety buffer to, say, 11% on a 75)

I had a go with EV Trip Planner

Glasgow London (direct) : S75D 411.9 miles, Driving Time 6:09, Energy 149.0 kWh @ 362 Wh/mile
Glasgow London (direct) : S90D 411.9 miles, Driving Time 6:09, Energy 176.3 kWh @ 428 Wh/mile

using Supercharging option added 4 stops (different ones for each vehicle. I removed the charger stops and got it to recalculate from just Start/End points each time)

Looks like getting to the Birmingham supercharge requires a small detour off the direct route, whereas the Northampton charger is just off the M1 so that, shorter overall, route is favoured.

S75D 431.6 miles, Driving Time 6:42, Charging time 1:39, Energy 155.3 kWh @ 360 Wh/mile (Birmingham route)
S90D 413.8 miles, Driving Time 6:39, Charging time 1:31, Energy 173.5 kWh @ 419 Wh/mile (Northampton route)
S90D 431.6 miles, Driving Time 6:42, Charging time 1:36, Energy 183.9 kWh @ 426 Wh/mile (Birmingham alternative route)

Interesting that the 75 is considerably more efficient than 90 on the same journey.

Checking the STEPS it seems that Abington has been added on both routes, but is not actually needed, so its only 3 stops. I expect that "highlands of Scotland", for you, is some way North of Glasgow :) so you'll need Abington or, if you are somewhere up near Inverness, a detour via Dundee charger.

S90D (Northampton):

Charge at Abington Supercharger from 226 RM to 226 RM (There's no need to charge here)
Charge at Gretna Green Supercharger from 158 RM to 236 RM (28 mins)
Charge at Warrington Supercharger from 28 RM to 205 RM (44 mins)
Charge at Northampton Supercharger from 28 RM to 117 RM (19 mins)

S90D (Birmingham):

Charge at Abington Supercharger from 226 RM to 226 RM (There's no need to charge here)
Charge at Gretna Green Supercharger from 158 RM to 205 RM (15 mins)
Charge at Charnock Richard Supercharger from 28 RM to 196 RM (41 mins)
Charge at Birmingham - Hopwood Park Supercharger from 28 RM to 193 RM (40 mins)

S75D:

Charge at Abington Supercharger from 182 RM to 182 RM (There's no need to charge here)
Charge at Gretna Green Supercharger from 126 RM to 169 RM (17 mins)
Charge at Charnock Richard Supercharger from 23 RM to 158 RM (41 mins)
Charge at Birmingham - Hopwood Park Supercharger from 23 RM to 157 RM (41 mins)

I would charge to the start of "taper" as a minimum at each stop, so maybe longer at all-but-last charge and arrive with a safer buffer. Only at the last charge would I charge to the absolute minimum safe-buffer to reach my destination. I think EV Trip Planner favours charging so only-just-enough for next leg.

So, having done all that Geeky Stuff :), I agree with @Drone Flyer that 75 is fine, which surprises me. My caveats would be that there are convenient chargers en route, and both the "safety buffer" on journeys, and the "Supercharge range added before taper" are both better with a larger battery.
 
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I don't have any direct experience of the 75, but I can offer my opinion and experience of the 85 vs the 90.

I owned an 85 for 3 years (March 2013-April 2016) and decided to upgrade to the 90D in 2016, primarily to get the autopilot features. I drove 69,500 miles in the 85 and have 17,000 miles on the 90D. I have driven a lot of long distance trips in the US and Canada - I'm #2 on the 'Superchargers Visited' ranking:

Superchargers Visited

The extra 30 miles of range on the 90D made an enormous difference in the experience on long trips. We rarely had to spend extra time getting a full charge, whereas we often had to do that on the 85; the Supercharging seemed to be much faster; on the 90D we've never had to worry about keeping our speed down in order to make it to the next charger; making additional side trips during the journey or at the destination is much more possible. On the whole it's just been a much better experience, so definitely worth the extra cost.
 
Tests by owners have shown that overall journey times are less by driving faster, short SC stop then drive fast to the next SC. Maybe this supports the case for the 75 pack!

On the contrary, that's a large part of the case for the larger pack. Whatever size of pack, you need to depart with enough charge to reach your next stop. With the smaller pack, the same amount of absolute charge (hence miles of range) is a larger percentage of the total, hence with the smaller pack you will more often be charging towards the higher percentages when it gets very slow.

My most demanding use-case is driving between the highlands of Scotland and London.

Really, when thinking about this, it's not necessarily your most demanding use-case that matters, it's your most common use-case(s).

Almost any journey in the UK can be made in a '75 (or a '60 for that matter), it's a matter of convenience. If that long drive is one you make once in a blue moon and it takes you all day anyhow, then it doesn't really matter if it takes a bit longer. What does matter are the journeys you do regularly - which might by good or bad luck on the exact details of the journey, placement of superchargers etc. be either no discernable difference between the two cars or a huge drag of having to hang around charging for an extra 20 minutes at the end of the day when you are tired.

My general experience is that it's not the really long journeys that are stressful for charging anyhow: you can plan your route to suit charge stops, and you were probably going to stop for refreshments anyhow. Much more trouble are out-and-back day trips (or worse, multi-stop visiting clients sort of trips), where the one way distance is much shorter and so much less choice of route, and you've had all the coffee you can drink at the destination(s). Individual routes can be significantly different - a Supercharger in just the right place (say 50 miles from home on the way back) can mean just a 10 minute stop with a near-empty battery, but if you can't quite make it there and you need to stop outbound or stop at Ecotricity instead then it can be significantly different for just a few miles extra distance (or the few miles difference between the two cars).
 
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Good points @arg, as always.

For my MS P90D:

100% Charge out-and-back range in bad weather = 170 miles, fine dry Summer's day = 220 miles.

A single, ideally positioned!, Supercharge from 10% to 80% takes 40 minutes and increases range in bad weather to 290 miles, good weather 375 miles.

Checking back through my (TeslaFi) logs my longer out-and-back days have been 250 - 325 miles once or twice most months, and all of them had just one supercharger stop.
 
I hate to worry. Thus, I will always get the most battery capacity I can buy without financial distress. Particularly in areas that have hills, sleet, rain, wind and the odd snow precise range is unpredictable, as is the major crash a few miles ahead. (I recall sitting on a nasty cold day for more than an hour just North of Milton keynes on my way to Northhampton, no way to exit, just sitting there thinking about Aston Martin (so near, yet so far). I admit that an MS-60 can go anywhere in the UK, and that with a CHAdeMO adapter you've decent insurance everywhere. But, extra range reduces worry. Thus, I'd go with a 90D unless 100D becomes available before build starts, then I would do that.