Normal? My rated range and start of decrease....

[russman]

Normal 90% charge has been 240 miles. Car is just over 2 months, with about 3,300+ miles on it.

Rated range at 90% is now 238 miles.

Also, when people usually ask me how many miles can you go, I conservatively say around 200 miles. However, this past usage, I ran the car down to it's lowest for me, with no spirited driving in CA tempered weather.

I started with 90% with 240 rated miles. I conservatively put a buffer of 20%. After 163.2 travelled miles using 53.4 kwh energy with an average of 327 wh/mi, the car had 16% left with a rated of about 44 miles and the battery gauge was in yellow.

I wouldn't quite say I had range anxiety, but I was a little disappointed that I don't think the car would have gotten to 200 actual miles with the 20% buffer already provided and I didn't have any hard accelerations and an average of 327 wh/mi seems kind of low. My total average over the 3,300 is about 340 wh/mi. All of this in mild CA weather, with some good portions driving in traffic, which kept my wh/mi lower.

Not sure if I have a question other than are these two things normal? The 2 mile drop after 3k miles and the concern of not even getting to 200 miles in CA weather.

 

[David99]

There are many lengthy discussions about this subject. What you are seeing is less than 1% which is well within the margin of error of the battery capacity calculation the car does. There are many factors that affect battery capacity and range. Temperature, how the battery was used on the last drive, how long it has been since the last charge (the car needs some power just sitting so you lose some when the car is parked). Regerative braking will recharge the battery but not show up as rated miles unless it over a certain amount. If I understand the statement of Tesla correctly, when the battery is charged only partially and then the car is driven again and then charged partially again and so on, the capacity (remaining rated miles) is based on a mathematical model that tries to interpret all available factors. But it's not perfect. Seeing a 1% variation is mostly probably not actual battery aging, but just margin of error.

I'm surprised you are using 340 Wh/mile on average. That seems high to me. I'm driving about 140 miles every day around Los Angeles and I use the AC a lot. My average is 302 Wh/mile after 8k miles.

 

[Mario Kadastik]

Also, if you don't range charge the battery will slowly go out of balance. That kind of slowly losing 1-2 miles every month or two is normal if you don't range charge. If you really need the range the best is to range charge to 100% and let the car sit there for a while to balance the pack. Once the charging is complete you can go off driving and it's good if you can run it down to ~20% region and then range charge again. That should balance the pack nicely and most likely give you back the "lost" range.

Tesla ranger concretely recommended me to charge to 100% and keep the car there for 10+ hours to let it balance as much as possible and to do it multiple times in row. It's counterintuitive and not what is generally recommended, but if you have an imbalance, then it's the right thing to do. I did it over 3 days period and went from 496km of range to 505km of range gaining back 9km (~5-6 miles after 6 months of ownership). With .106 firmware that dropped to 498km again, but that may be that they changed the algo that does the estimation again (*sigh*) because I doubt I lost 7km of range overnight

 

[AmpedRealtor]

Also, if you don't range charge the battery will slowly go out of balance. That kind of slowly losing 1-2 miles every month or two is normal if you don't range charge.

I'll be the lone dissenter... I have not experienced any loss of range on my display and only charge between 50% and 60% regularly. I 100% charged only once in the last 9 months, otherwise I keep it in the 50%-80% range depending on where I'm driving that day. The one time that I range charged about 3 months ago, I went to 301 ideal miles. Currently under 5.9, my 50% charge is 150 miles (ideal). I don't think range charging is necessarily required, at least not based on my own experience.

 

[lloyds]

Normal 90% charge has been 240 miles. Car is just over 2 months, with about 3,300+ miles on it.

Rated range at 90% is now 238 miles.

Also, when people usually ask me how many miles can you go, I conservatively say around 200 miles. However, this past usage, I ran the car down to it's lowest for me, with no spirited driving in CA tempered weather.

I started with 90% with 240 rated miles. I conservatively put a buffer of 20%. After 163.2 travelled miles using 53.4 kwh energy with an average of 327 wh/mi, the car had 16% left with a rated of about 44 miles and the battery gauge was in yellow.

I wouldn't quite say I had range anxiety, but I was a little disappointed that I don't think the car would have gotten to 200 actual miles with the 20% buffer already provided and I didn't have any hard accelerations and an average of 327 wh/mi seems kind of low. My total average over the 3,300 is about 340 wh/mi. All of this in mild CA weather, with some good portions driving in traffic, which kept my wh/mi lower.

Not sure if I have a question other than are these two things normal? The 2 mile drop after 3k miles and the concern of not even getting to 200 miles in CA weather.

Seems to be well within range and the drop may just be the pack unbalanced. Do yo supercharge frequently?

 

[russman]

No supercharging yet. I'll be curious to see how this goes as I've read all the rated range discussions and understand the variables. I am curious about my average wh/mile. I have 19" wheels, don't use AC much. Drive in tempered weather, so kind of curious as to how people are getting down into the low 300, let alone below 300. Every charge I'm looking at the power usage after last charge and it's always in the 320-380 area.

 

[David99]

No supercharging yet. I'll be curious to see how this goes as I've read all the rated range discussions and understand the variables. I am curious about my average wh/mile. I have 19" wheels, don't use AC much. Drive in tempered weather, so kind of curious as to how people are getting down into the low 300, let alone below 300. Every charge I'm looking at the power usage after last charge and it's always in the 320-380 area.

I don't think Supercharging has a noticeable negative effect. It is actually not crazy fast considering the battery capacity and it quickly reduced charge current as the battery gets charges. And the battery is cooled well. Elon said that Supercharging is actually pretty conservative compared to what the battery would be capable of, but they want to be on the safe side. So I wouldn't worry about using Superchargers.

Regarding your energy usage, I think what seems 'normal driving' is very subjective. I have driven with people that to have an aggressive driving style but they honestly consider it normal. Or just things like they accelerate down a road despite seeing light coming up is red and then then step on the brakes late.

I think my 302 Wh/mile average is on the lower side when looking at the discussion where people post their life time averages. I think most people are in the 330-340 range. I just mostly stay around the speed limit and I overall tend to drive with saving energy in mind. It's not slower, just looking a little further ahead and adjust.

 

[gregincal]

It seems strange to me that you didn't range charge. That would have gotten you a lot closer to 200. As far as wh/mile the biggest factor is how fast you drive. Slow down and it will be lower (not that you have to drive that way all the time, but if you are trying to drive far then that's the way to go).

 

[aviators99]

You need to be watching the rated range display at the moment charging finishes (or the app, or programmatically using the API). Once it is done, it settles down pretty quickly. If you're not watching it at the exact moment, you cannot use the number you happen to see to compare what you had at some other random time. This is putting balancing issues aside. In order to truly compare one's battery performance from one charge to another, you must range charge and you must use the number at the very end.

 

[Mario Kadastik]

I concur with Aviators99, here's what I get from VT logs for example:
1401218316318 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 233.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 23.0 C_AMP 2.0 C_BAM 2.6
1401218444331 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 232.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 22.8 C_AMP 2.0 C_BAM 2.4
1401218568906 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM -0.1
1401218708711 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM 0.0
1401218805745 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM 0.0
1401218934971 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM -0.1
1401219067117 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM -0.1
1401219190476 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM -0.2
1401219313723 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.46 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM -0.7
1401219419209 C_SOC 100.0 C_VLT 0.0 C_EST 309.04 C_ROC 0.0 C_AMP 0.0 C_BAM -0.5

So you can see the estimated range dropping already after just a few updates (I think it is polled every 1.5 minutes)

 

[Blaze]

Okay, here are my numbers. Over 7k miles. No noticible range reduction. Get 270 range on full charge. Average 288 kW/ mile. Drive highway in L A traffic. Use the AC as needed. Drive 120 per day, and once per week drive 255 on trip to Santa Barbara. I get home with about 6 to 18 miles remaining in the tank. Charge every night and have 242 to 239 each day. Not sure why not the same each morning. I just assumed the my adjustment could vary slightly.

 

[taraquin]

I'll be the lone dissenter... I have not experienced any loss of range on my display and only charge between 50% and 60% regularly. I 100% charged only once in the last 9 months, otherwise I keep it in the 50%-80% range depending on where I'm driving that day. The one time that I range charged about 3 months ago, I went to 301 ideal miles. Currently under 5.9, my 50% charge is 150 miles (ideal). I don't think range charging is necessarily required, at least not based on my own experience.

I have the exact same experience! With a few rare exceptions I never charge more than 60%, Usually 50%. My battery is almost always about 35-65%. I have never charged more than 91% and have not experienced any loss in rated range etc. I only have 3000 miles on ODO though...

 

[Yodda]

My friend has 60 kWh version and he gets about 350 wh/mile. fuel economy.gov supports that figure