Model 3 Battery Range Recovery

[rvyay]

I see lots of posts worried about range and battery degradation. I, too, worried about it a lot watching this degradation take place using Stats. Around 25k miles I even asked Tesla to look into the HV battery during a service visit for an unrelated issue. (Service Center was great, btw, and has always been quick to help) They ran a report and said my HV battery was fine and within spec. That was last around Q3 2019.

I took what they said with a grain of salt and just decided to watch, wait, and trust.

So for all of you in a similar boat, I wanted to make a positive post. I think for a two year old car with 33k miles, this is pretty good. At 100% charge, the car reports 308 miles range. 325/308 = ~95% of original capacity.

I'm not sure if the range increase is due to the warmer months, software updates, or both, but I'm no longer worried about the HV battery.

I usually charge between 20 - 80. Mostly on L2 until Covid came along and I lost access to the L2 chargers at work. I've been using the superchargers about once a week for what limited driving I do now working from home.

So, hopefully, this will ease some people's worry.
This is a 2018 LR...VIN 19500ish ...240 Wh/Mile Lifetime...18" aeros on.

 

[Vines]

I have also noticed some range recovery over the last 4 months or so. I just crossed the 50k mile mark, at about 18 months of ownership.

Charge at new was 310 out of 310, I typically charge to 90% on L2, after charging to 80% the first 9 months or so. I also drive very hard at times and have gone to a few Tesla Corsa Track Days

At its worst, my 90% number was 257 (extrapolates to 285.5 miles) a loss of about 8%. With the warmer summer months its charging more fully, and I see 266 these days at the same 90% a total loss of about 5%

 

[djgarrett21]

~32k miles and I'm at 290. Mine has been fairly inconsistent.

 

[camalaio]

I'd say that's pretty clearly a temperature-influenced prediction from whatever app you're using. "Stats" I think? But I'm happy it's gone up to ease your worries. To be fair, the car's reported range is always temperature-influenced as well (temperature of the battery, not the air - it's not a range-due-to-weather prediction, but an energy capacity@temperature calculation), which is fair and accurate but not helpful for understanding true degradation. I suspect these services just try to match what the car would show so as to not sow distrust due to discrepancies.

I wish they had graphs where the bottom was months instead of odometer for this reason. Maybe they do? (I don't use these services, no idea).

 

[djgarrett21]

I'd say that's pretty clearly a temperature-influenced prediction from whatever app you're using. "Stats" I think? But I'm happy it's gone up to ease your worries. To be fair, the car's reported range is always temperature-influenced as well (temperature of the battery, not the air - it's not a range-due-to-weather prediction, but an energy capacity@temperature calculation), which is fair and accurate but not helpful for understanding true degradation. I suspect these services just try to match what the car would show so as to not sow distrust due to discrepancies.

I wish they had graphs where the bottom was months instead of odometer for this reason. Maybe they do? (I don't use these services, no idea).

I think I understand where you are coming from but I don't believe this is how the range calculation works.

A car charged to 100% will display the same rated range regardless if the battery is at 0 F or 72 F.

 

[KenC]

I think I understand where you are coming from but I don't believe this is how the range calculation works.

A car charged to 100% will display the same rated range regardless if the battery is at 0 F or 72 F.

Stats, and I believe Teslafi, both use the SOC api that is temp-dependent. It's not the same SOC api that the car is using. Why? Dunno. Here's a screenshot of the Tesla app and Stats showing different SOCs. Normally, the difference is just 1%, but on a blue snowflake day, it can be alot more, 6% in this instance:

It's hard to tell, but my Rated Range data varies with the ambient temperature.

 

[rvyay]

Unfortunately, you can't change the data on the X axis to months. I know stats isn't quite as accurate as something you'd get from the OBD port, but I see it usually match up with the range displayed on the car itself when I flip it form % to range.

I agree that there is something temperature dependent going on. I don't get freaked out about reduced range on blue snowflake cold days, but as you can see in the plot, that trend line takes a drop out below 310 miles rated range between around 18k and 28k miles. I have an insurance estimate from March 2019 when the odometer was at 9k. And I have a service invoice from 1/20/20 when I had the battery checked during a visit for new sway arms. The odometer was 27k then.

So in those 10ish months we see the range bounce around from ~315 miles to ~290. During the summer of 2019 the range continued to drop. And the recovery started around Feb 2020 when it was still winter.

I'm not suggesting Tesla did anything during the visit to fix the HV battery. I'm just using it as a data point that the range began to trend up and level out during the winter. So I think something else is going on...software most likely. It'd be nice if stats could overlay where and when firmware updates were installed.

And again, in my case, it's not even "bad". But when you don't have the benefit of hindsight watching the range drop (even in the summer) it was a little distressing wondering if the downward trend would continue "forever". Now that I have hit the floor and see the range popping back up...I'm happy.

@Ken, I'm jealous of how stable your battery plot is.

 

[jpfive]

Winters are mild in Pensacola. My range has been well above the fleet average, as reported in TeslaFi, until recently. Two things happened. First was a coast-to-coast trip, through the Mojave and Sonora deserts, in late June. Since then, 100* days sitting in my driveway in Pensacola - with window tint and reflective windshield screen. My range has dropped 2% since June 1st. As of this morning, 11149 miles, range value 300. Down from 318 miles at 1900 miles (Early Feb). Most of that plunge since the advent of warmer temperatures in May.