Leaving on a trip in the middle of the day

[AmpRage]

Basically driving to work, doing a half day, then driving home to load the car up.

Work is a 40-mile round trip. I’m charging to 100%, going back and forth from work, charging to 100% again(I’m only home for 2 hours) and then leaving.

If I started my day with 90% there’s no way I’d be able to get to 100% in the time I’d have to charge.

Is this bad for my battery? As in, enough that I shouldn’t be doing it?

 

[aliengar0]

Unless you need to be at 100% you shouldn't charge to it. Even then - you shouldn't leave the car at 100% and time charging to reach 100% right before you need it.

There are numerous battery threads on here already.

 

[purplewalt]

Generally speaking, totally charging to 100% is unnecessary, especially if you can use Superchargers on your trip.

Unless you are going somewhere that is completely out of Supercharger range or at near Max Range, I would almost never charge to 100%.
That wasn't always a viable Option 5 years ago, but it certainly is now in Fall 2018.

Note: When car is at FULL charge, it does drive differently: Regen does not operate, so the braking of the car will be unique until there is some capacity in the pack for the extra generated charge.

Part of the beauty of Supercharger Network is to arrive with some (adequate) state of charge, and recharge to adequate capacity (with added buffer) for your next destination.

Have a great trip!

 

[TexasEV]

It’s fine if you need that much range.

 

[Birdman325]

I know it is a generalization, but there are times when that charging to 100% is necessary, even if superchargers are available. For example, Last week I drove from Toronto to London, Ontario and back to Toronto the same day. The trip is about 202 km each way. I charged to 100% and left shortly after in the morning. The full charge, enabled me to drive all the way to London, drive around London, and then make 1 stop at the SC on the way home for about 18 minutes and get home with about 35% SOC.
Had I not charged to full, it is possible I would have had to make a longer stop. Just my $.02

 

[Abstrakt1]

Basically driving to work, doing a half day, then driving home to load the car up.

Work is a 40-mile round trip. I’m charging to 100%, going back and forth from work, charging to 100% again(I’m only home for 2 hours) and then leaving.

If I started my day with 90% there’s no way I’d be able to get to 100% in the time I’d have to charge.

Is this bad for my battery? As in, enough that I shouldn’t be doing it?

It's fine. It isn't healthy for the battery to do it regularly but the occasional 100% charge for a road trip isn't going to kill the battery. They wouldn't have the road trip option to go to 100% if they didn't expect people to use it from time to time.

 

[animorph]

The general feeling on the forum has been it's OK to charge to 100% when you need to, providing you don't let the car sit at 100% for very long. That's more about generic battery tech than Tesla batteries specifically. You can search on Tesloop here. They charged to 100% every day and put 100's of thousands of miles on their cars with pretty reasonable degradation. So maybe even this advice is a little conservative.

Charging to 100% just before leaving for work, driving 40 miles immediately, parking for a few hours (at about 90% which is fine), and then driving home and filling back to 100% just before leaving on a long trip fits nicely within those guidelines. I wouldn't worry about it.

 

[ewoodrick]

It's a random trip. It not only is okay, but it is what the car is designed to do.

Why would you build a car that can do 310 miles, it you weren't allowed to do 310 miles?

 

[SMAlset]

Keep in mind that charging to 90-100% if not needed will take you longer to get those extra % miles as the charging will taper off at the end than let's say you charged with enough to get to your next Supercharger (add a comfort amt beyond) and then add more range at the next Supercharger. Think of it as kind of a splash and go approach. You'll find more threads and info on the forum on this and there are apps to help with the planning.

 

[Saghost]

I know it is a generalization, but there are times when that charging to 100% is necessary, even if superchargers are available. For example, Last week I drove from Toronto to London, Ontario and back to Toronto the same day. The trip is about 202 km each way. I charged to 100% and left shortly after in the morning. The full charge, enabled me to drive all the way to London, drive around London, and then make 1 stop at the SC on the way home for about 18 minutes and get home with about 35% SOC.
Had I not charged to full, it is possible I would have had to make a longer stop. Just my $.02

Certainly it's appropriate to use your discretion and charge when you think you need it - but I don't see how your example proves you needed 100%.

Your consequence if you hadn't charged to 100% is that the Supercharger stop you were already making might have had to be longer??

 

[Birdman325]

Certainly it's appropriate to use your discretion and charge when you think you need it - but I don't see how your example proves you needed 100%.

Your consequence if you hadn't charged to 100% is that the Supercharger stop you were already making might have had to be longer??

Yes, that is exactly my point. But even if the aggregate charging time would have been the same (which it would not be) had I left the house with less than 100%, depending on the SOC when I left, I might have had to stop before I got to my destination to top up, which I did not want to do or even stop before I got to my destination, to provide me with sufficient charge to get there, drive around to do what I needed to do, and then get far enough along on the way back to reach a supercharger.

How does that not show that in this particular case, given this particular set of circumstances, I needed 100%?

 

[eladts]

I know it is a generalization, but there are times when that charging to 100% is necessary, even if superchargers are available. For example, Last week I drove from Toronto to London, Ontario and back to Toronto the same day. The trip is about 202 km each way. I charged to 100% and left shortly after in the morning. The full charge, enabled me to drive all the way to London, drive around London, and then make 1 stop at the SC on the way home for about 18 minutes and get home with about 35% SOC.
Had I not charged to full, it is possible I would have had to make a longer stop. Just my $.02

What was the SOC when you arrived at the supercharger? I would argue that if it was more than 20-25% charging to 100% was not really necessary.

 

[Birdman325]

You can argue that (although I can’t imagine why you would) but when I arrived at the supercharger it was 15%.