How low have you gone?

[Rocky_H]

I'm intrigued by that - in the first place because in my experience, since 2013, range is on the one hand optimistic (you need to add 20% or 30%) but on the other hand predictable - if you're e.g. consuming 120%, it will stay that way (all external things being equal), and not suddenly go berserk, so indeed you can go down to 1km or even 0k by sticking to the 120% or 130% "rule".

Does anyone have an 'anthology' of reports of the car shutting down with a couple of miles still showing?

Someone created a poll thread to collect stories of this. It's rare, but 6 people responded "yes" on the poll that their car had shut down with positive miles still left on the display.
Has your car shut down before it hits zero?

 

[moorelin]

I'm intrigued by that - in the first place because in my experience, since 2013, range is on the one hand optimistic (you need to add 20% or 30%) but on the other hand predictable - if you're e.g. consuming 120%, it will stay that way (all external things being equal), and not suddenly go berserk, so indeed you can go down to 1km or even 0k by sticking to the 120% or 130% "rule".

Does anyone have an 'anthology' of reports of the car shutting down with a couple of miles still showing?

Also a 2013 S85 owner. Range is obviously unrealistic at higher speeds, but I agree 100% that it is quite predictable once you get the hang of it. On longer trips my goal is to come in to the next supercharger with 20 miles or so to maximize charging rate, and once you know you can make it you can speed it up. I have been below 10 miles on multiple occasions without concern (but paying attention).

Last weekend we ran into the pretty obvious problem with this, namely the unexpected road closure or other factor. Coming back on a Houston to Brownsville road trip, the same highway that we took down (US 77), was closed at night for repairs. Long detour was managed OK with expectation of coming in with several miles left. But additional late detour caused us to make it into the Victoria supercharger about 0.2 miles past zero.

I would definitely have been more worried if I knew about the potential for shutdown with miles still showing (!), but that did not happen to us. Newly updated software.

 

[FlyingCookie]

I passed the exit for a SC I should have stopped at 5% SOC... no exit for another 10 miles... Slowed down to 50 and made it to the SC at 3% SOC. That's the closest i've cut it, so far...

 

[Charliek]

I have found that working from miles left is too unreliable as conditions and driving speeds and climate control really make things too variable to go too low. In mileage view mode you might go up a hill and get shut down . I use percentage now it seems more reliable indicator if I’m losing the battle on range. I Have a S90D and for me the battery percentage stays “green” till 15 Percent it turns yellow at 10 or 11 and below 6 percent it turns red like my iPhone. It warned me if it got any colder I was not going to be able to get home on my commute of 20 miles . I put range mode on, turned climate control 0ff. It started to speed limit me the last few miles from home got back with 2percent . Charged it back up to 90 percent the next morning and All was right with the world I pretty much now recharge when it gets to 30percent or just a bit lower. Just to eliminate any anxiety . I learned my lesson when I was nervously tooling around at 7 percent in a town with no fast chargers and only a couple of 30amp level 2s

 

[Charliek]

Just wanted to add the nav prediction of SOC at destination is really accurate. I took several long distance trips and it was spot on to within less that one percent (in percentage mode) .acurrate enough I always trust the running prediction of the charge level at destination now. It is great! Takes away any remaining anxiety on what will be left when you get there and is it worth vectoring to an SC or other fast charger

 

[FlyingCookie]

Just wanted to add the nav prediction of SOC at destination is really accurate. I took several long distance trips and it was spot on to within less that one percent (in percentage mode) .acurrate enough I always trust the running prediction of the charge level at destination now. It is great! Takes away any remaining anxiety on what will be left when you get there and is it worth vectoring to an SC or other fast charger

You must do the speed limit... it’s reliably off by about 10% for me because i do 80-85MPH. It’s still very solid, though, and I can trust it to be within 1% after the first 20 miles of a trip. (Although sometimes that may be as much as 25% lower than the original estimates if its extremely cold and I’m driving fast)

 

[dgpcolorado]

Just wanted to add the nav prediction of SOC at destination is really accurate. I took several long distance trips and it was spot on to within less that one percent (in percentage mode) .acurrate enough I always trust the running prediction of the charge level at destination now. It is great! Takes away any remaining anxiety on what will be left when you get there and is it worth vectoring to an SC or other fast charger

For my car it depends on speed. In my experience the nav system is pretty good at low freeway speeds of 60 to 65 mph but always underestimates the energy needed at high freeway speeds of 70 to 80 mph; the speed limits in the states around here are all in the 75 or 80 mph range. In mountain driving at lower than freeway speeds, nav tends to overestimate the energy needed to make a trip and I do better than the nav prediction. However, when driving at the speed limit at high freeway speeds I lose energy significantly faster than nav predicted originally.

Nav also does not take altitude into consideration. If driving at relatively high altitude, say 6000 feet or higher, I do a bit better than nav predicts even at 70 mph. (High altitude greatly reduces aerodynamic drag compared to sea level.) On Saturday I drove a 180 mile trip leg with nav telling me to slow down below 60 mph right from the beginning almost to the end of the trip. The trip leg was mostly at 7000 feet elevation and I knew that nav was being overly conservative so I drove it mostly at the 70 mph speed limit. The reason for the discrepancy between the nav prediction and my actual energy usage was the lower air density at altitude. Trying to do a 180 mile trip leg in a car with a 97% charge and a 100% battery capacity of 186 RM can be a bit challenging. I did it by keeping an eye on the charge expected at the destination and it stayed between 6% and 4% for the entire trip, so I knew I was doing fine, despite nav telling me to slow down the whole way! In such cases, experience helps.

I find the energy plot and estimated energy at destination tool exceedingly useful. I'd be reluctant to push the range of my small battery car without it. With it I have used Superchargers more than 168 times, all of them on long road trips.

 

[Tevvy]

Drove 6 miles at 0 range yesterday. Never done it before, and was totally bad planning on my part. Sweating like a good'n and drove at 15 mph for the last 3, windows steaming up as I daren't put the heater on, turned brightness turned down to 5%.

I really wonder how much further I could have done.