Older Teslas limited to 90kW Supercharging

[Vger]

5.8... but will try to get back to Gilroy with low miles remaining and see what it can do. May not be till early next week.

So my April 29 delivery (and built in April cuz that's when the reds started - label says T13D which we believe to mean April 2013) is considered an 'early model' according to the note from Tesla? I doubt it - I think we need more investigation as to the assumption A or B indicates the charge level.

You are clearly a very interesting case, and one that can support or question our label decoding hypothesis. But until you supercharge under conditions ideal for >90 kW, I will stand pat. :wink:

- - - Updated - - -

or is this a P85 vs S85 issue? Do we have any P85s with type 'A' battery? The theory I'm grabbing at here is that P85 needs a greater power draw, so perhaps they were given priority on the 2nd generation battery packs if they were safer for larger discharge rates....actually looking at Turbofroggy's his is a P85 too so that theory is shot...

My car is P85 with an "A" battery, so is Doug_G, so is Nickjhowe, ...

Production order and VIN number aside, we still have no evidence that I have seen that any "-A" part number 85 kWh packs can charge above 90 kW.

 

[markb1]

But I see that his whole part number (1020422-00-A) is completely different, so it is possible that 60 kWh packs have their own "A", "B", ... suffix sequence. All evidence is that all 60 kWh packs can charge above 90 kW (up to ~105 kW), so they seem to be a different case, built from the first with the fast-charge cells and electronics. He did not post a photo of his label, so his case does not fully bear on my "label code" (left side) hypothesis.

I did post my left-side code, though:

1011721-00-B

 

[Jason S]

One more data point.
Took delivery Dec. 3, 2012, VIN 1267, if I'm following things correctly, "J" means October battery manufacture.

Just took a picture of mine and my SN is 799 but otherwise identical (including PN) to yours.
Took delivery on Oct 31, 2012. Imagine that; the SN is soo similar... makes me think R77 was actually made before my P586.

And I think this also confirms that the P85 doesn't have a different battery pack.

 

[ken830]

Seems like all April-manufactured 85kWh packs are type A. Musterion and I somewhat established this many pages back based on our own cars.

 

[wycolo]

MS built 7Dec2012

Battery replaced Aug2013 type 'BB'

Under 4.5 charge 90kw max: 16 miles to 220 miles took 60 min.

Under 5.8.4 " " " " 120kw max: 0 miles to 200 miles took 41 min.
~222 miles took 50 min.
--

 

[qwk]

Seems like all April-manufactured 85kWh packs are type A. Musterion and I somewhat established this many pages back based on our own cars.

Nope. Vin#9230 has a B pack.

Serial #T13D0010698

 

[dirkhh]

Nope. Vin#9230 has a B pack.

Serial #T13D0010698

What's interesting is that here the delta between Vin and SN seems quite big - 1468. We really should create a wiki where people can enter their VIN, SN and PN plus dates to get a better overview for what's what.

 

[dirkhh]

We really should create a wiki where people can enter their VIN, SN and PN plus dates to get a better overview for what's what.

Putting my money where my mouth is... I started such a Wiki Page and filled it with some data from the last dozen or so pages in this long thread.
Maybe others can add to it to get a more complete picture.

 

[markb1]

Putting my money where my mouth is... I started such a Wiki Page and filled it with some data from the last dozen or so pages in this long thread.
Maybe others can add to it to get a more complete picture.

Great idea! Thanks! We should keep track of the number on the left side of the label, too.

 

[Odenator]

Ok, so how do we input the data without messing it all up?

 

[Fedderman]

wraithnot recently posted a nice chart over on the Finally 120KW Supercharging! thread, post#208: http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/showthread.php/23180-Finally-120KW-Supercharging!/page21 (not sure how to get the direct post link).

Now, if someone can superimpose the equivalent "best case" curves for a 90kW-limited 85kWh vehicle ('A' battery), we can use this to validate the estimated charge time difference between any two SOC levels, for 'A' vs. 'B'.

 

[dirkhh]

Ok, so how do we input the data without messing it all up?

It's a wiki table. Insert a row (sorted by Vin) and enter your data. If you can't get it to work at all just part the data here and I'll edit

 

[gimp_dad]

Yesterday, I was going to toss the fact that faster recharging for some means lower wait time for all, but I stopped short because I knew the response, so I'll throw it out there now to devils advocate.

"most of the time when I get to a supercharger it is empty, so this doesn't affect me, but the fact that my car charges slower does slow me down."

very true, especially at a lot of superchargers. I'd say that over 75% of the time I've been able to charge at a spot where there was no wait time.

This is virtually the same argument as arose against the fact that 120 helps out by allowing more charge to split from 2 cars in stalls that share one supercharger.

I guess the key here is individual vs group mentality. Tesla is pretty much saying 120kw was not introduced to speed up the charging time for individual cars, it was done to improve the overall charging speeds of the group. Which might be why they never addressed it as an upgrade pertaining to individual cars, but instead that it was an upgrade to the hardware of the supercharger. This doesn't necessarily agree with the advertisements showing how fast 120 can charge a car (the 80%in half an hour), but that marketing was already misleading and victim of tesla math to start with.... So now it also doesn't jive with teslas reasoning for 120. That being said, it's just a marketing figure.

quite frankly, it'd be best if they just took that marketing piece off their website and state 120kw allows for faster charging times when the supercharger is busy.

I didn't ever find a comment that went to the next step on this: 120kW actually does not allow for charging more cars per day. I noticed this immediately but hadn't seen an official announcement so was waiting to comment then. I guess enough time has gone by that the email passed around the community is now the defacto official communication to the owners who care about this topic. The total output per car pair is 120kW whether 90kW limited or 120kW limited cars are charging. If the superchargers are full, each car will charge at an average of 60kW (until the taper goes below 60kW but that should be a small component). If the superchargers are not full then the station is not the limit on throughput. Maybe there is some unrealistic case of cars showing up in alternating groups of 4 and 8 cars where this assertion would be true but that's not even worth a feeble attempt at using to justify the statement.

I think it's time to just be straight with us. We can take it. We bought in early and knew it.

This is still the most magical car I have ever owned. I have to be careful about thinking too much about the future super car as I might die of anticipation given what they accomplished in a 5 to 7 passenger 4700 lb car. I simply can't feel bad about what I have. I only feel bad about being kept in the dark.

 

[Dave EV]

I didn't ever find a comment that went to the next step on this.

I came to the same conclusion the other day:

Older Tesla's limited to 90kW super charging - Page 65

 

[gimp_dad]

I came to the same conclusion the other day:

Older Tesla's limited to 90kW super charging - Page 65

Oops. Sorry about trying to take credit drees! I guess I missed your post (out of the 800 out there) :smile:.

Still interested to see if they come clean and just admit the truth. I'm not fond of this word of mouth approach. I know, I for one, can live with the truth.

 

[Dave EV]

Oops. Sorry about trying to take credit drees!

No worries, thanks for bringing it up again for discussion.

Still interested to see if they come clean and just admit the truth. I'm not fond of this word of mouth approach. I know, I for one, can live with the truth.

+1

 

[chickensevil]

Coming as someone who has followed the company for a number of years, and has now only just recently placed the order... I have to say I am shocked by this. I plan on getting much more active over these forums now that I will be an owner and keeping better tabs, because this appears that this is not the first time something like this has happened and I doubt it will be the last.

I feel like all of this (as other's have stated) boils down to poor communications. Poor communications which has lead to either misleading or at the very least a misunderstanding of what would happen. "entitled" or not (which I wouldn't feel entitled about this, so you guys shouldn't either), the way the statements were made about this (and other things) lead people to believe it was something they would get having already bought the car.

Even if it is purely just a marketing ploy on the supercharge, they have stated before that getting down to a 5 minute charge (the end dream) is possible (and no, not talking about battery swapping as a "charge"). I take it that anyone that buys the car today or in the near future should not ever expect this to come to their car.

I think the big take away for me, has been, not to expect anything better from this company in terms of service than any other. Will this make me go back to another company? No. But it certainly just lowered my joy of this company and potentially will drive others from every coming to the light.

 

[JRP3]

Certainly no one should expect an existing car to get 5 minute charging, current cell physics do not allow it. Frankly I don't expect a full charge to ever be 5 minutes, nor does it need to be. 10 is plenty fast enough, and it's long enough that it should discourage "locals" from using SC's instead of charging at home.

 

[Doug_G]

Certainly no one should expect an existing car to get 5 minute charging, current cell physics do not allow it. Frankly I don't expect a full charge to ever be 5 minutes, nor does it need to be. 10 is plenty fast enough, and it's long enough that it should discourage "locals" from using SC's instead of charging at home.

Yeah right. We had a guy using our level II charger for two hours a night, every night, sitting in his car late at night. And it was a Ford Focus that was only capable of 30A. 10 minutes is hardly a deterrent. Some people go nuts when they hear "free".

 

[chickensevil]

Certainly no one should expect an existing car to get 5 minute charging, current cell physics do not allow it. Frankly I don't expect a full charge to ever be 5 minutes, nor does it need to be. 10 is plenty fast enough, and it's long enough that it should discourage "locals" from using SC's instead of charging at home.

Yeah right. We had a guy using our level II charger for two hours a night, every night, sitting in his car late at night. And it was a Ford Focus that was only capable of 30A. 10 minutes is hardly a deterrent. Some people go nuts when they hear "free".

Sorry, might have been a bit of an exaggeration, but I think this goes back to the perception they gave during the announcement (specifically the March 2013 announcement), which was: "See look what we have done, we increased the charging time FOR ALL CUSTOMERS". Which has the implication of past and future... not just future. Sure there will be a point where you will likely need new tech to take advantage of the change, but I don't think myself or others imagined that you were already buying outdated tech to that extreme.

I have no issue at some point in the future paying for a faster charge if it is reasonably priced (say close to, or the same as the national... or at least that locations, cost of electricity... say .11 per KWH) But I do think that for long distance trips you will need to get that speed to full to be quite a bit faster. My long trips are to go visit family two states away, and I generally hate lengthy drives so want to get there as fast as I can. This means my 6-7 hour trip involves 1 stop for gas, drinks, and potty which is a maximum of 10 minutes. I am usually very time limited (only get a couple days off from work) and would rather spend every spare minute enjoying time with family and friends, than waiting at the halfway point on a recharge.