Elon "About to end range anxiety"

[RiverBrick]

Is the Nav with topography-minded range already out?

Yes, version 6.1 of the software estimates energy consumption to your destination. Pre-trip, it does a good job of taking into account elevation changes en route, but doesn't factor in very cold weather, wind, and driving over the speed limit.

After you're 20 miles or so into the trip, it will have updated to reflect your true consumption and the new estimate will be very accurate, unless conditions change.

 

[tomas]

Ending range anxiety is probably a bit of an over-the-top statement, but here are my thoughts:

1) Hypermilers often pulse their engines to stretch range. Apply a pulse input of power, then shut the engine off. We know that AC Induction motors require current to induce the magnetic field to enable the rotor to spin--so currently, when cruising on the highway, power is being continuously used.

Laptops are able to microsleep--essentially put processors to sleep for very short periods, when able--leading to significant battery power savings.

Based on what they've learned with the Ds, perhaps they've found a way to pulse the motor when significant changes in power are not required (such as when cruising on the highway) to improve efficiency. A way to torque sleep or microsleep the motor, even if you have just one. Perhaps it could potentially lead to "real" highway miles of 300+ for an 85?

(Of course, this would not *end* range anxiety--just a thought).

2) A much later Supercharger taper is a possibility, if the battery chemistry has been found to be able to handle it.
.

^these. Todd, you beat me to it. 20% more highway miles in Eco mode, improved taper for quicker SC, and nav to SCs for those who have nav. All firmware. Affects all of fleet, some more than others.

its either that or inductive charging by laser from spacex satellites.

 

[gg_got_a_tesla]

A wild guess here: maybe, Tesla has figured out some sort of algorithm/heuristic about torque sleep with the Ds that they can now "idle" the motors in all flavors of the Model S at such a millisecond precision that you'd never notice. But, the range jumps by a significant percentage all around, across 85/60/40, RWD/AWD.

Physically possible?!

Edit: Todd got it!

 

[loganss]

Maybe an update to limit/control max instantaneous energy usage?

 

[jerry33]

Plugshare? Really? Is that even useful? Can't remember the last time I needed to use a public charger to reach my destination. J1772 is soooo slow in an MS85. For my LEAF of course I use Plugshare all the time, it's great. Not for a Tesla.

I'm guessing you don't login and disable the public chargers, leaving only the high power and residential chargers. If you don't login, you're correct. If you login then there are a number of kind Tesla owners.

 

[liuping]

Plugshare? Really? Is that even useful? Can't remember the last time I needed to use a public charger to reach my destination. J1772 is soooo slow in an MS85. For my LEAF of course I use Plugshare all the time, it's great. Not for a Tesla.

If you've never needed a public charging station, you probably don't have a lot of range anxiety.

I think showing all the charging options available all around them will go a long way to relieving any anxiety people may have.

 

[dsm363]

Must be related to limiting rate of supercharger to 60 kW? Jk

Too soon?

 

[patn]

Remember those graphs showing projected range by speed, etc. (http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/05/graph1.jpg) What if they have refined a way to dramatically extend the range by limiting speed and extraneous power consumption when the battery is very low... e.g. suppose when the you get down to 5-10% of battery the car becomes extremely limited in speed (say dropping progressively down to something really low like 25mph) but you could eek out an extra 100 miles in "find a plug mode" that way? (Don't believe it's possible? Well, the chart shows that if you drive your 85kWh at 25mph you could in theory get close to 500 miles range).

That would be an OTA update that would affect all cars and would, IMHO, do a lot to end range anxiety.

 

[redox]

Maybe making superchargers free......Wait, they already did that :biggrin:. However, the entire fleet doesn't have Supercharging.

Yes, it's "free" after a $2,500 nominal "free access fee".

-- Greg

 

[Torpedo Ted]

It's pretty obvious that the new firmware will seamlessly integrate SC and other public chargers while calculating the route, and display exactly how long you need to charge, if you are able to do the round trip without charging etc. I wouldn't be too caught up about the words "entire fleet", 99% have navigation and SC enabled, so that's basically the entire fleet.

It's also possible that the FW includes a noticiable increase in energy usage effeciency, making the range even better.

 

[Mercury]

My wild guesses:

1) OTA update to turn roof (regular, body, AND pano) into solar cells. Yes, the engineers are that good.

2) Integration of ChargeGuy into Tesla's servers. He didn't mention the OTA update for your iPhone that installs Android. Har har.

All seriousness aside, the hyperbole is a bit much. I'm a little to numb to it already, but Elon should know that any casual readers are likely to be disappointed when the reveal comes. Unless it truly is one of the groundbreaking range-extending tricks discussed here, of course. If it's just that I can leave the SC 15 minutes earlier, it's not exactly an end to all range anxiety.

 

[point1]

Remember those graphs showing projected range by speed, etc. (http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/autopia/2012/05/graph1.jpg) What if they have refined a way to dramatically extend the range by limiting speed and extraneous power consumption when the battery is very low... e.g. suppose when the you get down to 5-10% of battery the car becomes extremely limited in speed (say dropping progressively down to something really low like 25mph) but you could eek out an extra 100 miles in "find a plug mode" that way? (Don't believe it's possible? Well, the chart shows that if you drive your 85kWh at 25mph you could in theory get close to 500 miles range).

That would be an OTA update that would affect all cars and would, IMHO, do a lot to end range anxiety.

Sounds like a good way to be hazard to everyone and yourself if you end up driving 25 mph on the highway.

 

[Beckler]

I'm just going with much improved navigation software. Once it knows your destination, it can route you optimally, telling you exactly where to stop for charging and for how long. It could even factor in temperature and traffic, and also other cars already at or being routed to superchargers. This would be significant.

 

[santana338]

are you saying that 40kw engines cannot access super chargers at all? Apologies if so - I did not know that. Maybe with a software upgrade they now can! Or is it something hardware related that makes them ill equipped? Increasing the amount of SC's will help get them into range.

40s are 60s with software limited max charge (about 66%) without supercharging enabled. The supercharging hardware is there, but to get it you have to also upgrade from a 40 to a 60. So it is $10K for the 40 to 60 upgrade and $2.5K for the supercharger hardware activation.

 

[russman]

I'm going to say there is a hidden reserve of batteries for an additional 100 miles of range that will now be released and available.

 

[FatSal]

I'm just going with much improved navigation software. Once it knows your destination, it can route you optimally, telling you exactly where to stop for charging and for how long. It could even factor in temperature and traffic, and also other cars already at or being routed to superchargers. This would be significant.

I think Beckler has it.

 

[yobigd20]

perhaps Tesla is going to announce their own proprietary tire that recharges the car while driving (like goodyear recent showings).

I know many months ago there was some insider info that leaked out saying that Tesla has a big team working on tires - perhaps now is the time for that announcement.

- - - Updated - - -

I think Beckler has it.

improved navigation software is not significant enough to 'end range anxiety'. the only end to range anxiety is an enormous amount of more range or a way to recharge the car while driving.

 

[RDoc]

I'm with the people that think this will be better navigation/range estimation which takes into account things like weather, hills, and traffic.

Eliminating range anxiety IMHO means the driver is confident that the range the car can actually go on a specific trip is what is expected, generally that would be the car's range estimate. If you know that the range actually might turn out to be 20% less than the estimate due to weather, hills, etc., that's a pretty good source of anxiety. Extending the range, faster charging etc. are all great, but if you can't believe what the car is estimating for range it doesn't help.

While better information about non-supercharging charge points would also be a good thing, I'm doubtful many people would be happy with the idea that their trip might get extended 2 or 3 hours because they couldn't make it to the next supercharger.

 

[deonb]

perhaps Tesla is going to announce their own proprietary tire that recharges the car while driving (like goodyear recent showings).

I know many months ago there was some insider info that leaked out saying that Tesla has a big team working on tires - perhaps now is the time for that announcement.

Would be quite the neat trick if Tesla figured out a way to change your tires via an OTA update.

And they knew it all along.. hence why we don't have spares!

 

[bp1000]

I think it's got to be an evolution of torque sleep. Something a long the lines of continuously adjusting power and pulsing the power on and off at the millisecond level to save power. This would work with all motors. I'm sure it could be aggressive too like a super Eco mode where the peddle might be a big mushy to inputs.

Its a logical goal to strive for higher efficiencies.

Dont see why it has to be limited to highway either, just throttle position.