If you fast charge, Tesla will permanently throttle charging

[tga]

I've once heard that it's not good to charge a batttery fully, and then let it sit at high SOC. With owners reliant on SuC, I can imagine this might be unavoidable to them. They charge then they have time, and might not always be able to time it beffore a ride? Would a battery sitting at 100% for a day affect its range more, and how would that relate to charge speed?

Prior to setting up charging in my garage, I was relying on local J1772's and the local Supercharger as needed. I never charged past 90%. It wasn't until I had charging at home that I range charged prior to a trip (I could bump up the charge setting on the app while the car was plugged in in the garage).

One thing that did change in my usage once I set up home charging was that I tended to do more frequent, smaller charges (charge to 60%, run down to 40%, then back to 60%), vs charge to 90%, run down to 20%, then charge to 90%.

 

[anticitizen13.7]

I know that the 90 kWh batteries contained a different chemistry with silicon additive in the battery anode, and this is the suspected reason for lowered SC rates.

From the recent revelations, is there any similar effect on 75 kWh and 100 kWh batteries?

 

[Zythryn]

@tomas I made no comment on that by including it in the summary - I just tried to be thorough. It was a much discussed piece of commentary.

Here are a couple of more for @sorka to consider to get a quick feel for the thread...

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark: If you fast charge, Tesla will permanently throttle charging #745

Calculations about how many posts by each member: If you fast charge, Tesla will permanently throttle charging #802

Anything I missed?

Yes, you missed the numerous replies indicating the subject line of this thread, and most of your links are flat out lies.

Let's take it slowly.

"If you ..."

This opening is addressing the reader, which in my case, would be me.

"...fast charge..."

I do fast charge.

"...Tesla will permanently throttle charging"

Tesla has not throttled my charging.

Did this happen to the OP, yes, it sure sounds like it. What isn't mentioned in all the headlines you post is that he OP uses D.C. Charging almost all the time, and drives a lot more than most.

I agree it would be nice for Tesla to be more transparent. But considering my wife and I have over 150,000 miles on Tesla vehicles and have used SCs with most of them, and have experienced no throttling, I have no anxiety over this.

 

[tomas]

@tomas I made no comment on that by including it in the summary - I just tried to be thorough. It was a much discussed piece of commentary.

Here are a couple of more for @sorka to consider to get a quick feel for the thread...

Something is rotten in the state of Denmark: If you fast charge, Tesla will permanently throttle charging #745

Calculations about how many posts by each member: If you fast charge, Tesla will permanently throttle charging #802

Anything I missed?

Oh about 1,000 posts. Your summary will certainly be your summary.

I'd put it this way: owner who almost exclusively D.C. Charged for 2 years noticed they were not peak supercharging above 90kW. Fact noted that impact of this is ~5 minutes for a 10-90% supercharge. Noise and opinions. Owner posted service bill indicating this was imposed by BMS to protect battery. More noise and opinions. Tesla exec posted statement confirming, and that this only occurs in <1% of cars - cases of very high D.C. usage. More noise and opinions. Crowd divided. Some feel this is example of Tesla being intentionally opaque and trying to screw people, some think Tesla can do no wrong. Most understand and are not terribly bothered by limit, but would prefer Tesla to communicate such things so we know. Along the way several news outlets jump on it and write articles with THEIR summary of this thread. Some more factual than others.

 

[JohnnyCakes]

my XP100D is brand new.

first time i charged, i was down near 30kWh. slow as hell.

so much for your theory.

 

[AnxietyRanger]

I agree it would be nice for Tesla to be more transparent. But considering my wife and I have over 150,000 miles on Tesla vehicles and have used SCs with most of them, and have experienced no throttling, I have no anxiety over this.

Would you be willing to report on your Model X 90D roughly:

1) Total miles on the X
2) Total percentage Supercharged/CHAdeMO (vs. other) on the X
3) Peak Supercharging kW currently on the X

I understand if you don't, just asking since 90 kWh seems to be the interesting data point and you may have a higher mileage (above 30,000 miles) one. Thank you for considering.

 

[bro1999]

my XP100D is brand new.

first time i charged, i was down near 30kWh. slow as hell.

so much for your theory.

Yes, because 1 single data point can legitimately disprove a theory. #armchairDataScientistFTL

 

[alcibiades]

Yes, because 1 single data point can legitimately disprove a theory. #armchairDataScientistFTL

New theory: all SC's are now limited to 30kWh. #informalfallaciesarefun

 

[Doug_G]

my XP100D is brand new.

first time i charged, i was down near 30kWh. slow as hell.

so much for your theory.

There are many reasons that could happen. Most likely you plugged into a Supercharger stall that was shared with another car. Each Supercharger unit has two stalls, and if you're the second one to plug in you will get lower current until the first one ramps down.

Tip: if a car is plugged into 1A, avoid plugging into 1B and use a different unpaired stall if you can.

 

[No2DinosaurFuel]

my XP100D is brand new.

first time i charged, i was down near 30kWh. slow as hell.

so much for your theory.

Sounds like congested or faulty supercharger.

 

[No2DinosaurFuel]

I think the 75KWh battery are also affected. There are some here saying they use to get over 100KW, now less than 100KW.

As for the 100KWh pack, it might be more resilient because of the higher capacity. But I suspect eventually even the 100KWh pack will show this problem just at a later time.

 

[MikeBur]

There are many reasons that could happen. Most likely you plugged into a Supercharger stall that was shared with another car. Each Supercharger unit has two stalls, and if you're the second one to plug in you will get lower current until the first one ramps down.

Tip: if a car is plugged into 1A, avoid plugging into 1B and use a different unpaired stall if you can.

Additional tips: (the pairing is a big one)

If hot outside, SpC rates can be reduced (park in shade if possible)

If cold/freezing outside, SpC rates can be reduced, though will increase as battery warmth does. This is less of an impact if driven significantly previously.

If SpC still charges at very low rates then move to another non-contended stall. Bonus points for reporting bad stall to [email protected] if moving addresses it. Double bonus points for reviewing this and leaving feedback on bad stall number in PlugShare.

If still not acceptable then call Supercharger telephone number (printed on stalls) for immediate help/feedback.

 

[msnow]

Remind me again why we paid that extra 6 grand?

We paid $3k for that 85-90 upgrade.

 

[Saghost]

I think the 75KWh battery are also affected. There are some here saying they use to get over 100KW, now less than 100KW.

As for the 100KWh pack, it might be more resilient because of the higher capacity. But I suspect eventually even the 100KWh pack will show this problem just at a later time.

This puzzles me, because I've never seen 100 kW on my 75 - it peaks at about 97-98, and always has. I always figured that was the 14% difference in voltage coming back on a current limited connection. Do we have actual documentation (image/video) of a 2015+ small battery car exceeding 100 kW on Supercharging?

 

[supratachophobia]

We paid $3k for that 85-90 upgrade.

Whew, glad it wasn't six.

 

[boonedocks]

You guys are lucky to be at SC's that allow you to see the degradation and slowdowns. We took 6 trips requiring Superchargers in our 85D, now sold, and every stop said "Approximately 20 Minutes", as an example, and we were there at least 40 minutes or double the time estimated because of slow Superchargers. We never got anywhere close to the rates of charge you guys are seeing even with battery degradation.

 

[AnxietyRanger]

New theory: all SC's are now limited to 30kWh. #informalfallaciesarefun

Given how Tesla removed the Ludicrous counters by limiting everyone, that theory has some precedence.

 

[TexasEV]

my XP100D is brand new.

first time i charged, i was down near 30kWh. slow as hell.

so much for your theory.

You obviously have a lot to learn about supercharging. Were you starting from an almost empty battery or an almost full battery? Was there another car charging on the paired stall? Did you try changing to a different stall to see if there was a problem with the one you were using?

 

[raphy3]

Oh about 1,000 posts. Your summary will certainly be your summary.

I'd put it this way: owner who almost exclusively D.C. Charged for 2 years noticed they were not peak supercharging above 90kW. Fact noted that impact of this is ~5 minutes for a 10-90% supercharge. Noise and opinions. Owner posted service bill indicating this was imposed by BMS to protect battery. More noise and opinions. Tesla exec posted statement confirming, and that this only occurs in <1% of cars - cases of very high D.C. usage. More noise and opinions. Crowd divided. Some feel this is example of Tesla being intentionally opaque and trying to screw people, some think Tesla can do no wrong. Most understand and are not terribly bothered by limit, but would prefer Tesla to communicate such things so we know. Along the way several news outlets jump on it and write articles with THEIR summary of this thread. Some more factual than others.

Well at the end of the day the implications go a bit farther than people thinking it's nbd or not. People buying a used Tesla are going to worry now. "Is my supercharging going to work well on this used car? Who knows what kind of charging they've done. " that means resale value drops. People buying CPOs like me who weren't told about this anywhere will feel cheated.

You don't need to take away much to make someone feel cheated. Just intentionally hide information from people and then modify the FAQ when people start asking questions, and not that the FAQ answer is different from advertised behavior. People start wondering, OK what else are they hiding. Trust is eroded.

 

[JRP3]

The 21mm dia cell is harder to core cool than the 18mm. It will run hotter at the same C rate as the 18mm cells and the battery array will be smaller due to envelope and cost restriction.

Not necessarily. Yes, on it's own, a larger cell is harder to cool, but there are ways to construct a cell for a higher C rate, (higher number of thinner layers). Yes that will reduce potential capacity but if they have improved chemistry with better density they may be able to trade off some density for C rate. Also I think Tesla may have an improved cooling architecture for the 3. Bottom line, I don't think the Model 3 will charge at a slower rate.