May be Returning to Dead Car

[DopeGhoti]

I kind of wish the API allowed us to directly see the consumption of cabin overheat protection. I have mine set to "No A/C Mode But Still Use The Fans Please" but don't have a clear indication of just how much juice it takes to cool the car down once it gets above the threshold.

 

[vickh]

I kind of wish the API allowed us to directly see the consumption of cabin overheat protection. I have mine set to "No A/C Mode But Still Use The Fans Please" but don't have a clear indication of just how much juice it takes to cool the car down once it gets above the threshold.

What's the COP temp threshold? I'm going to turn it off now that it's cooler.

 

[DopeGhoti]

I believe it's 45.5C / 105F.

 

[rrolsbe]

With all the important stuff off (Sentry, cabin over temp) I was seeing drain of about 1 to 2 miles a day when I left my car parked in an airport parking lot for 9 days. I was really impressed that once I turned that stuff off the car was pretty solid. Temps were cold, but not sub zero. I think we were like 60 in the days and down to low or mid 30s at night, with maybe one or two times dipping into the 20s. So if the battery needs to heat, I think it's below 30 and maybe in the 20s.

I also left my app in the background most the time, but I did make sure stats was a force close and don't use any other apps, the car was in deep sleep most the time.

It is my understanding that the traction battery will never be actively heated or cooled unless it is either actively charging, not just plugged in, or being driven. If the car is plugged in and the charge level drops by around 3% below the set threshold it would heat before and while it adds around 10 miles of range. The manual states to not expose the car to temps below -22F or above 140F for more than 24 hours. If the temps were below -22F, the approx 4KW max? the traction motor draws to heat the traction battery would deplete the 75KW battery in less than one day anyway. I am no thermodynamics expert but I could see where it could take the entire 4KW of heating capability just to keep the traction battery above -22F?? Maybe someone who lives in a very cold climate can chime in to confirm or correct my statements above.

 

[vickh]

It is my understanding that the traction battery will never be actively heated or cooled unless it is either actively charging, not just plugged in, or being driven. If the car is plugged in and the charge level drops by around 3% below the set threshold it would heat before and while it adds around 10 miles of range. The manual states to not expose the car to temps below -22F or above 140F for more than 24 hours. If the temps were below -22F, the approx 4KW max? the traction motor draws to heat the traction battery would deplete the 75KW battery in less than one day anyway. I am no thermodynamics expert but I could see where it could take the entire 4KW of heating capability just to keep the traction battery above -22F?? Maybe someone who lives in a very cold climate can chime in to confirm or correct my statements above.

Would the cabin heating up to 140+ cause the battery to be actively cooled?

 

[rrolsbe]

Would the cabin heating up to 140+ cause the battery to be actively cooled?

Good question! If you have enabled the AC option in the Cabin Overheat protection, the traction battery charge will be used to run the AC to keep the cabin temp from not going over 105F. There is more than one glycol loop, so I am not sure if it would also cool the traction battery but it certainly could if programmed to do so. When the traction battery gets down to a SOC of 20% and below, my understanding is the cabin overheat protection will no longer function.

 

[rrolsbe]

It is my understanding that the traction battery will never be actively heated or cooled unless it is either actively charging, not just plugged in, or being driven. If the car is plugged in and the charge level drops by around 3% below the set threshold it would heat before and while it adds around 10 miles of range. The manual states to not expose the car to temps below -22F or above 140F for more than 24 hours. If the temps were below -22F, the approx 4KW max? the traction motor draws to heat the traction battery would deplete the 75KW battery in less than one day anyway. I am no thermodynamics expert but I could see where it could take the entire 4KW of heating capability just to keep the traction battery above -22F?? Maybe someone who lives in a very cold climate can chime in to confirm or correct my statements above.

Forgot to mention why I want to understand this topic concisely, I sometimes travel to the mountains of Colorado where the temps can be below -22F for more than 24 hours (although rare). If the the battery could be damaged or ruined due to extreme cold temps and my previous assertions are correct, I would take evasive actions (find a heated garage, drive to a warmer location, etc...).

 

[Sophias_dad]

Out of curiosity, for this data point, were you running TeslaCam, or was the drive removed from the USB port? I've never been able to accomplish this sort of drain level for an extended period (my recent experiment with all known vampiric features disabled was spoiled by Smart Summon Standby).

The drive was still in the USB port. Its a samsung endurance microSD in a usb adapter. It was parked in the garage with sentry mode GPS auto-disabled.

 

[vickh]

The drive was still in the USB port. Its a samsung endurance microSD in a usb adapter. It was parked in the garage with sentry mode GPS auto-disabled.

why would it matter if still in port if sentry gets disabled?

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

why would it matter if still in port if sentry gets disabled?

It's been reported that not disabling the TeslaCam before leaving the car can lead to elevated drain (by an extra 1-2 miles per day). I have not had a chance to really investigate, but there are those who have, who swear by pressing and holding the camera icon (until the red dot turns off) before leaving the car if you want low drain.

 

[Smitty79]

I got back to the car and found it at 15%, 46 miles. I found that I was 50 yards from a free L1 charger. I put a few miles into it while I was waiting for my girlfriend to get off work. All is good with the world.

 

[SSedan]

Thank you for share.

"The rest of the story"

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I think you’ll show up to a car with about 12-15% battery left. Your car should hit 20% by around day 12.5, and then you’ll have another 5.5 days standard drain from there.

I got back to the car and found it at 15%, 46 miles.

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!

Thanks for the update. It all makes sense; totally predictable.

 

[drtimhill]

it's probably Standby Mode for Advanced Summon ... the same thing happened to me on a trip last month.

I do know that the car will turn off this mode when battery gets to 20%, so at that point the car should have the MUCH lower vampire drain. But you will have to plan getting to a charger when you return to the car.

EVERYONE WHO READS THIS: Please consider asking Tesla to add an on/off toggle for Standby Mode to the phone app so we can turn it off when its accidentally left on like this. I've already got customer support to forward the request to development, but squeaky wheels and all that!

--Tim

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

so at that point the car should have the MUCH lower vampire drain.

I was hoping in this case that it would show some evidence of a low vampire drain when it got to 20%, but it does not look to be the case - the same 1% loss or so per day was observed here. I would have thought Tesla would have automatically dumped some of those other things (like the TeslaCam, data sharing, etc., WiFi, etc., which seem to impact vampire rates for unknown reasons) once you get below 20% and get to the 1-2 miles (about 0.5%) per day that is ultimately possible for people who really try to kill their vampire drain (with considerable inconvenience). But apparently not to be.

 

[Smitty79]

I think I was running 5% a day for almost 2 weeks and then dropped to 1% a day. While waiting for my girlfriend to get off work, I put about 10 miles into it on an L1 Charger in the airport parking lot. I found a free Volta L2 by the restaurant and put in 40 more miles. All together, it worked out great.

 

[drtimhill]

I think I was running 5% a day for almost 2 weeks and then dropped to 1% a day. While waiting for my girlfriend to get off work, I put about 10 miles into it on an L1 Charger in the airport parking lot. I found a free Volta L2 by the restaurant and put in 40 more miles. All together, it worked out great.

When I got stuck in the same situation (Standby Mode) I measured 0.236% drain per hour on my M3, which tallies well with your 5% per day. If the OP was getting 1% then that's just normal vampire drain I think.

 

[Trevor EV]

We take delivery of our Model 3 in the new year and not long after will be parking our car at the airport for two weeks. During that time should I leave the Sentry Mode on to record any events while parked, or is the battery drain too great?

 

[Runt8]

We take delivery of our Model 3 in the new year and not long after will be parking our car at the airport for two weeks. During that time should I leave the Sentry Mode on to record any events while parked, or is the battery drain too great?

Sentry mode will use roughly 1 mile of charge per hour. It will turn off when the battery drops below 20%. So at some point during your trip (you didn’t specify which model you have) sentry mode will be disabled and the battery drain should slow.

Personally, I wouldn’t be comfortable coming back to that low of a charge. I would turn off sentry mode unless you’re able to plug in during your trip.

 

[Trevor EV]

Sentry mode will use roughly 1 mile of charge per hour. It will turn off when the battery drops below 20%. So at some point during your trip (you didn’t specify which model you have) sentry mode will be disabled and the battery drain should slow.

Personally, I wouldn’t be comfortable coming back to that low of a charge. I would turn off sentry mode unless you’re able to plug in during your trip.

Its a Model 3 SR+
It will be stored at a hotel near the airport while we are away so won't be pluged in