This was my first long road trip in our 2023 MYLR since we purchased her in December. We started in Boise, ID and drove to Helena, MT and back over three days, about 1100 total miles. A few things to preface this trip. We took the freeway the entire way as we have always done that in the past and we find it easier than the normal two-lane road. The speed on most of the freeway is 80 and we tend to do a few miles over. Roads were pretty good except for a few spots where we slowed down due to snow on the roads. Idaho and Montana in general do not have the greatest charging infrastructure. On this trip there were 6 SC locations not counting our destination with some gaps of 100+ miles between chargers. Only two of those are V3, the others are older V2. Being our first road trip and not knowing what to expect we planned for an arrival SOC of 20 because we knew speeds and temperature would decrease that. Temps were 34 to 7 F in general. We can usually make this trip in about 8 hours with one stop for gas and a few restroom breaks.
Trip Summary
Boise to Helena - 559 miles - Drive time 7:49 - Used 201.81 kWh - Avg 361 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 95% Ending SOC 39%
Charge in Helena - 0:38 to 80%
Helena to Boise - 565 miles - Drive time 7:58 - Used 197.74 kWh - Avg 350 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 72% Ending SOC 19%
Charge in Boise - to 80%
Some things I learned:
-Josh
"Tesla Model Y Front View" by Monotoan is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Admin note: Images added for Blog Feed thumbnail
Trip Summary
Boise to Helena - 559 miles - Drive time 7:49 - Used 201.81 kWh - Avg 361 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 95% Ending SOC 39%
Charge in Helena - 0:38 to 80%
Helena to Boise - 565 miles - Drive time 7:58 - Used 197.74 kWh - Avg 350 Wh/Mile - Charging time was 1:50 - Starting SOC 72% Ending SOC 19%
Charge in Boise - to 80%
Some things I learned:
- Range anxiety is an understandable thing and it got better with each drive segment. I'm sure once I figure out how much roughly I need for the segments, I will feel better. Looking at the energy graph was a big help in determining if I could speed up some or if I needed to keep it closer to 80.
- Planning is kind of a pain in Tesla or ABRP, I used a combination of both to figure out what I needed to start with when we left. In general, I just used Telsa's in car guidance to determine when to stop charging. Most of the time the app was pretty good but a few times it was off by a bit. ABRP seemed farther off, but it may be I just didn't have the setting correct.
- When travelling in the winter, bring a snow shovel. Our stop in Lima, it had recently snowed and they plowed in the direction of the super chargers. There was a big berm in front of them. Luckily on the way up there was one spot that was packed down and we used it. On the way home the same spot was available, but as we were getting ready to leave three other Tesla's showed up. They all had shovels but had to dig out places for two to charge.
- We used FSD for 95% of the trip it did pretty well. There were a few things it did have issues with. 1. We had a couple of times where when passing and the vehicle behind us, it tried to move back over into the slow lane too quickly, I intervened when this happened. 2. The car doesn't want to slow down in clearly marked curved, there are places in the freeway where yellow signs indicate to slow down to 55 or 65 for a curve, FSD didn't slow down, I hope this gets fixed. 3. My car thinks it's a truck. We have speed limit signs that say Speed Limit 80 and below that Trucks 70. FSD seems to see these at two speed limits and numerous times the car slowed down to 70 in an 80 zone, no fun.
- If I'm being honest, I was surprised by the total time, like I said earlier we usually make the trip in 8 hours. I was hoping around 9, but it turned out to be 10. We tried to time bathroom/food stops as best we could with charging but it wasn't always possible. In the future, I am going to try to get into the charger closer to 10 or 15% and I think that will help some. In most cases I was in 16-20% range when I arrived, I could have shaved off a few minutes adjusting things. 10 hours in the car is a lot, we had a few stops where we stayed in the car while charging, in the future we will get out and walk around, stretch our legs.
- Speed and temperature kill range. I'll make this same trip in May and I'm curious to see how or if things change. I don't anticipate fewer stops, but maybe less time at the stops.
- TeslaFi is awesome and tells me way more data that I need, I won't need it normally, but for these road trips it's great to see all the data.
-Josh
"Tesla Model Y Front View" by Monotoan is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Admin note: Images added for Blog Feed thumbnail