Range Loss Over Time, What Can Be Expected, Efficiency, How to Maintain Battery Health

[Tam]

Does this mean Tesla could supply you with a used

Yes. It says so with euphemism without the word "used" in the warranty language:

"If your Battery or Drive Unit requires warranty service, Tesla will repair the unit, or replace it with a factory reconditioned or remanufactured unit."

or substandard battery ?

Substandard is defined by the warranty language, and not by us.

If my battery is dead at 90%, Tesla is only obligated to replace me with another one but also with 90% capacity.

However, to consumers, a brand new battery is rated at 100% capacity and not 90% so many would say replacement with 90% capacity is clearly substandard.

But that's not how the legal world works. Tesla defines what is standard and what is not substandard. Since it meets its terms of the warranty, that's standard and not substandard.

 

[Bouba]

Yes. It says so with euphemism without the word "used" in the warranty language:

"If your Battery or Drive Unit requires warranty service, Tesla will repair the unit, or replace it with a factory reconditioned or remanufactured unit."




Substandard is defined by the warranty language, and not by us.

If my battery is dead at 90%, Tesla is only obligated to replace me with another one but also with 90% capacity.

However, to consumers, a brand new battery is rated at 100% capacity and not 90% so many would say replacement with 90% capacity is clearly substandard.

But that's not how the legal world works. Tesla defines what is standard and what is not substandard. Since it meets its terms of the warranty, that's standard and not substandard.

Thank you that is really helpful.....but hopefully I will never be in a position to have to quote your words back to a Tesla representative

 

[Candleflame]

The range indicator on the battery bar is inaccurate that's why you should ignore it. Switch it to % and if you are on a road trip use the energy graph based on the navigation instead which is way more accurate and takes into account the roads and hills on the way to your destination.

the range indicator on the battery bar is HIGHLY accurate.
Please do not spread myths.

 

[Abyork]

I have a 2018 Long range model 3 which I just took in a road trip. At 75MPH the energy consumption was upwards of being 15% wrong on the navigation. The car says I am using 350KW/mi at 75MPH. This seems very, very high. Tire pressure at 43PSI, just my wife and I. Maybe 300 pounds together. 40 pounds of luggage. Even if I go 70MPH the range at arrival is still way off. Any thoughts?

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

the range indicator on the battery bar is HIGHLY accurate.

The range indicator on the battery bar is inaccurate that's why you should ignore it.

YES the trip planner is excellent. However…

The “range” indicator (not appropriate terminology - Tesla calls it an “Energy Display” - it is only correlated with range) is a highly accurate indicator of remaining energy. It’s not intended to provide information on your range, though it is useful for this purpose when comparing range on identical trip segments with different rated miles remaining. The direct relationship with energy in the vehicle is well described elsewhere on this site.

It is the best indicator known in the vehicle of the BMS’s estimate of capacity. Is the BMS always right? No. But if the BMS thinks you are out of energy, it is going to shut down, so its estimates are highly relevant. Also the BMS is usually quite accurate, within a couple % (there are occasional short-lived exceptions reported here).

Anyway, using % loses this information. It’s fine to use %, but if you wanted to know whether you could make a particular trip you made before a couple years prior under certain conditions, and you expect similar conditions, knowing that you have 10-15% less energy at 100% to make the trip might well be important, depending on how tight you are cutting it.

You will NOT know this if you exclusively use %, unless of course you use the trip planner in the car as you suggest (yes, it is very good). However, an end user might wonder why the trip planner said it could make the trip two years ago, but now it does not. The Energy Display will answer that question for the curious and help calibrate trip planning & expectations.

There is nothing wrong with using %, plus the trip planner, as you say. It may well be optimal. However, saying the Energy Display is inaccurate is not helpful. Because it is actually highly informative.

 

[KenC]

I have a 2018 Long range model 3 which I just took in a road trip. At 75MPH the energy consumption was upwards of being 15% wrong on the navigation. The car says I am using 350KW/mi at 75MPH. This seems very, very high. Tire pressure at 43PSI, just my wife and I. Maybe 300 pounds together. 40 pounds of luggage. Even if I go 70MPH the range at arrival is still way off. Any thoughts?

Was it windy? Did you have the heater blasting?

Try ABRP, abetterrouteplanner.com. You don't have to subscribe, but you do have to register your vehicle, so that the app can pull the data on your car and calculate a reference efficiency. At 65mph, I'm showing 235Wh/mile.

At 75-85mph, I would show about 274Wh/mile.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

. At 75MPH the energy consumption was upwards of being 15% wrong on the navigation.

I am using 350KW/mi at 75MPH.

Not clear if you have a RWD or AWD. Anyway, for an AWD, this value is completely reasonable for winter, when the air is thicker, it is breezy, and you are using the heat.

How close were the Trip Planner estimates to reality (it cannot account for wind)? As @KenC says, wind is a variable that is hard for the Trip Planner to fully account for (though it will try, I believe, basing its estimates and projections on recent efficiency at a given speed (in addition to the elevation and other factors it can easily account for)). At freeway speeds, a 10mph headwind increases power required to overcome the aero drag (which is about 150-200Wh/mi or so at 75mph) by about 45%! And unlike going faster, you don’t get there any faster, so you don’t get a reduction in force (Wh/mi) and total energy consumption to travel the distance to the normal 28% increase, as you normally would.

It also doesn’t help you as much as you’d expect with a tailwind.

 

[tabo]

Hi all, I have a new Tesla Model 3 (E5LD version, 82 KWh LG Pack). Some time ago I read that scheduled charging was not recommended because it was better to charge the car at home as soon as you arrived, so the battery is already hot. However, these posts are a bit old, when the model 3 didn't have a heat pump. My question is, does the scheduled charge heat batteries if necessary, just as scheduled departure does? This would be an important point to know to avoid battery degradation during daily recharging.

Thanks!

 

[jjrandorin]

Yes, the car will warm the battery as it performs any charging, if it thinks the battery needs to be warmed.

 

[Dave EV]

Hi all, I have a new Tesla Model 3 (E5LD version, 82 KWh LG Pack). Some time ago I read that scheduled charging was not recommended because it was better to charge the car at home as soon as you arrived, so the battery is already hot.

It really depends on the temperatures we're talking about and how fast you'll be recharging.

Level 2 / AC charging (10 kW or less) - temperatures can get pretty cold without charging speed being affected.

DC charging (> 25 kW or more) - temperatures have to be a lot warmer.

Charging at very cold temps can lead to lithium plating and capacity loss - but one would think that Tesla would heat the battery enough to avoid this.

In general, unless it's very cold (near freezing and colder) - I would not worry about AC charging while the battery is still warm. Or maybe just delay charging a bit. It's still better for battery life to keep the battery cool and average SOC low, but if it's cold enough to hit temps where AC charging speeds are limited, it's probably cold enough that average SOC matters a lot less.

 

[hamm]

Hey is ABRP’s degradation number accurate? I’ve had my car since end of August and I’m being told 3.1% degradation already. I only have 2800km on it

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Hey is ABRP’s degradation number accurate? I’ve had my car since end of August and I’m being told 3.1% degradation already. I only have 2800km on it

Depends on the vehicle. You can calculate what they are assuming for original nominal full pack by selecting a car, setting degradation to zero, selecting a segment which uses most of the pack, looking at the consumption per leg details on kWh and %, and extrapolating to 100% (and be sure to account for the 4.5% buffer so divide the result by 0.955). This has been off previously, and I just checked again, and it still seems inconsistent and incorrect by several kWh.

Here's a plan which you can swap out vehicles on, with degradation set to 0%, etc.:

ABRP

ABetterRouteplanner is the world's most popular consumer EV routeplanner - both for beginner and experienced EV drivers. And of course for anyone curious about EVs.

abetterrouteplanner.com

You can see that the numbers just don't work out right. The only vehicle that is really correct is the older 2021 LR AWD (assumes it starts at about 79kWh which is fairly close, though perhaps a little high). The 2021 LR AWD with 82kWh will show too much degradation in ABRP (because it seems to be assuming the pack is 84kWh or so, lol), and the 2021 Performance will show too little (assumes 79kWh, but these vehicles must have 80.6kWh or so to show the full rated range).

So for your car a 2021 LR, it depends which battery you have. If it is the 82kWh battery I’d expect ABRP to say it’s got higher degradation than it actually does. But I guess it depends whether for this calculation they choose a value consistent with their route planner.

 

[AAKEE]

​

KyleConner said he charges his model 3 to 50%. Any idea why?

Battery longevity, but 50%?

This has been said/posted a lot of times by me. I guess some is about to get tired of seeing the same graph.

- The first years of a battery life, calendar aging is the very dominant part.
- The higher the average SOC when the car sleeps, the more degradation.
-Calendar aging lessens with time. After the first year degradation from time it will take another four years to reach the double degradation(from time), and to double again after five, twenty years will be needed.
-If the average SOC is high, specially with high ambient temperatures, the calendar aging can be as high as ten times(or more) than the cyclic aging.
- For the first three-five years or so, the mileage do not have a noticeble scientific impact on the degradation as the calendar aging might be 10% and the cyclic aging might be 1-2% or so.

If you look at this graph( taken from a research report), 9.6 months at 25C causes a capacity loss of about 5% for a SOC of 60% or more. This graph should be read as *The time my car spends at a given SOC*, or average SOC when the car isnt in use.

There’s a sharp step at 55 to 60% where calendar aging increases much. Staying below this literally cut the calendar aging in half( at least).

Theres one thing more that is good with low SOC: the lower a cycle is in the SOC range, the lower the cyclic aging is. From research we know that a small cycle around 70% causes five times higher degradation than the same size of cycle at 30% (600 Full Equivalent Cycles) caused 10% degradation when cycled around 70% but only 2% when cycled around 30%. The battery can do five times more miles if cycled at low SOC than at high SOC. And still use the same size of the cycle, so the only thing changed is were in the SOC range it takes place.
This still counts for a quite small part of the total degradation so it isnt the main reason to stay at low SOC when possible.

I have found lithium battery technology interresting since 2006 or so, and have read research reports since and buting a Tesla didnt change this. I have followed my knowledge but not that much that it makes the electric car ownership a PITA.

After 11 months and 29.000km my car still shows full range, and the BMS calculated battery capacity is 80.5kWh, which points to about 2% degradation(coming from 82.1kWh Full Size When New).
In my own precalculated degradation I would be at 2.5% by now. Despite this, I have Supercharged whenever needed( about 4000km or 14% is by SuC) and I have charged it full when needed.

Keeping the calendar aging low means it lessens much faster so I will probably sit with 4-5% total degradation after five years instead of maybe 10-20% if I had used high SOC.

 

[Dave EV]

This has been said/posted a lot of times by me. I guess some is about to get tired of seeing the same graph.

- The first years of a battery life, calendar aging is the very dominant part.
- The higher the average SOC when the car sleeps, the more degradation.
-Calendar aging lessens with time. After the first year degradation from time it will take another four years to reach the double degradation(from time), and to double again after five, twenty years will be needed.
-If the average SOC is high, specially with high ambient temperatures, the calendar aging can be as high as ten times(or more) than the cyclic aging.
- For the first three-five years or so, the mileage do not have a noticeble scientific impact on the degradation as the calendar aging might be 10% and the cyclic aging might be 1-2% or so.

If you look at this graph( taken from a research report), 9.6 months at 25C causes a capacity loss of about 5% for a SOC of 60% or more. This graph should be read as *The time my car spends at a given SOC*, or average SOC when the car isnt in use.

There’s a sharp step at 55 to 60% where calendar aging increases much. Staying below this literally cut the calendar aging in half( at least).

View attachment 738269
Theres one thing more that is good with low SOC: the lower a cycle is in the SOC range, the lower the cyclic aging is. From research we know that a small cycle around 70% causes five times higher degradation than the same size of cycle at 30% (600 Full Equivalent Cycles) caused 10% degradation when cycled around 70% but only 2% when cycled around 30%. The battery can do five times more miles if cycled at low SOC than at high SOC. And still use the same size of the cycle, so the only thing changed is were in the SOC range it takes place.
This still counts for a quite small part of the total degradation so it isnt the main reason to stay at low SOC when possible.

I have found lithium battery technology interresting since 2006 or so, and have read research reports since and buting a Tesla didnt change this. I have followed my knowledge but not that much that it makes the electric car ownership a PITA.

After 11 months and 29.000km my car still shows full range, and the BMS calculated battery capacity is 80.5kWh, which points to about 2% degradation(coming from 82.1kWh Full Size When New).
In my own precalculated degradation I would be at 2.5% by now. Despite this, I have Supercharged whenever needed( about 4000km or 14% is by SuC) and I have charged it full when needed.

Keeping the calendar aging low means it lessens much faster so I will probably sit with 4-5% total degradation after five years instead of maybe 10-20% if I had used high SOC.

This post needs to be turned into a sticky / wiki post somewhere.

Getting off-topic, but it will be interesting if Tesla ever starts shipping "1-million mile" batteries which can be stored at high SOC with minimal capacity loss.

I also wonder how the CATL LFP cells fare in comparison, too.

 

[Bucks]

Hello all. First day on this forum.
I have an Ohme charger and it’s set up with the Tesla app for various things below

1. 80% charge every day at 7am
2. preheat cabin
3. There are no other apps connected, to make sure the car sleeps
4. its a 2021 model 3 standard - 3 months old.

The car usage at the end of the daily commute is about 40% so charges up to 80% over night.

what I’ve noticed is the car draining after the Ohme charger turns off the charge when it hits 80%, and as of this morning (it’s was 0 deg C) was that the battery had drained to 71%. This is bonkers its not the money as it only costs £1 at worst for the 40% to 80% charge on my octopus go rate, it’s the fact I’ve rosy 9%.

I cannot believe that preconditioning the cabin would take 9% of battery as it is only coming on for 15mins to heat the cabin before the commute.

any thoughts?

regards Chris

 

[jjrandorin]

Hello all. First day on this forum.
I have an Ohme charger and it’s set up with the Tesla app for various things below

1. 80% charge every day at 7am
2. preheat cabin
3. There are no other apps connected, to make sure the car sleeps
4. its a 2021 model 3 standard - 3 months old.

The car usage at the end of the daily commute is about 40% so charges up to 80% over night.

what I’ve noticed is the car draining after the Ohme charger turns off the charge when it hits 80%, and as of this morning (it’s was 0 deg C) was that the battery had drained to 71%. This is bonkers its not the money as it only costs £1 at worst for the 40% to 80% charge on my octopus go rate, it’s the fact I’ve rosy 9%.

I cannot believe that preconditioning the cabin would take 9% of battery as it is only coming on for 15mins to heat the cabin before the commute.

any thoughts?

regards Chris

If I had to guess, I would say that your battery drain is coming because your car is not sleeping for some reason. Examine why that might be. Cabin overheat protection, Sentry mode, third party apps interacting with the car, you checking it on the tesla app, etc.

 

[KenC]

Hello all. First day on this forum.
I have an Ohme charger and it’s set up with the Tesla app for various things below

1. 80% charge every day at 7am
2. preheat cabin
3. There are no other apps connected, to make sure the car sleeps
4. its a 2021 model 3 standard - 3 months old.

The car usage at the end of the daily commute is about 40% so charges up to 80% over night.

what I’ve noticed is the car draining after the Ohme charger turns off the charge when it hits 80%, and as of this morning (it’s was 0 deg C) was that the battery had drained to 71%. This is bonkers its not the money as it only costs £1 at worst for the 40% to 80% charge on my octopus go rate, it’s the fact I’ve rosy 9%.

I cannot believe that preconditioning the cabin would take 9% of battery as it is only coming on for 15mins to heat the cabin before the commute.

any thoughts?

regards Chris

Something's not right. Your car lost 9% between 7am and whenever you leave for work? Did your car drive somewhere when you weren't looking?

Besides putting a security cam to watch your car to make sure it's not driving off, take screenshots of your Tesla app as it drops 9%. I'd even consider installing TeslaFi for its 14 day trial to understand what is happening with your issue.

 

[Bucks]

Something's not right. Your car lost 9% between 7am and whenever you leave for work? Did your car drive somewhere when you weren't looking?

Besides putting a security cam to watch your car to make sure it's not driving off, take screenshots of your Tesla app as it drops 9%. I'd even consider installing TeslaFi for its 14 day trial to understand what is happening with your issue.

It charges to 80% my set target and finishes its charge at some time in the early hours don’t always check but I remember seeing it at 4;30 or even earlier 4 am etc. So it may be 3+ hours until 7am and the start of the commute. This drain started in the last couple of week getting into the car with 79%, then seeing 78% and I thought ‘change in weather’ but 71% last night is bonkers. I’ve increased my charge level to 85% tonight so expecting to see 76ish tomorrow morning as it’s already 1deg C.

 

[Candleflame]

im having further degradation. Now sitting on 16%. great. No slowdown in sight, just linear degradation.
66.4kwh full pack and 434km according to SMT and teslafi....its really getting to the point now where it affects my driving and it just sucks. Like the car is barely 2 years old. and has only done 44000 kms.... Completely beyond me why tesla isnt forced to do a battery recall for the initial australian 2019 batteries. All of these cars seem to degrade so heavily.

At least theres still 2 cars with less range than me on teslafi. probably also australian...

 

[razec001]

I am not sure if this was already discussed but I just want to get your guys opinion on this. I just picked my 2022 M3 Long Range exactly 7 days ago. As per Tesla website the estimated range is 358 miles on a full charge. I know these numbers are relative and reality I should expect at least 30% less than that but I feel like my range is way lower than that.

I did some range tests recently and here are my results:
First of all I live in Pittsburgh PA which can be hilly in some areas and the temperature during my test was between 30- 45 degrees Fahrenheit
I charged the car to 90% and I was planning to see how many real miles not expected I will get between 90% and 20%.

So far with 40% battery left I drove 113.5 miles, with 30 kWh used and 266 Wh/mi which in my opinion is low. I feel like these numbers should be close to the SR + model.

I guess my questions are:
Are these numbers ok ?
Is the battery calibrating or something during the first months?