Older Teslas limited to 90kW Supercharging

[Discoducky]

That's almost word-for-word what the letter said, right?

Yep, with the operative part being 4 minutes, which appears to be the ideal scenario. But is consistent with Tesla's quotes for supercharging.

Hi Larry! I'm definitely raw and reactive over this topic so that was probably not my best post
But, while it may be technically accurate, it's not at *all* reflective of my true-world supercharger-to-supercharger road tripping. I have to spend 75 minutes at a supercharger in order to make it to the next. And Tesla can't have it both ways -- either 120 kW is awesome or it's "only 4 minutes" ... I'm mostly miffed at their very dismissive attitude over this whole thing. It's like they've forgotten the customer on this topic. I'm getting close to writing a harsh blog post about it -- though it'll require a lot of time as there are a LOT of facts involved which will require time to put together into a cogent argument.

Hope you're well!

Sorry cinergi, what is your scenario again? 75 minutes deserves attention in going from one supercharger to the next.

 

[JRP3]

I guess the statement is true, but hardly encompasses reality. To wit, the earliest Signature delivery was June 22, 2012. I received my S85 nearly one year and 10000 cars later, on May 4, 2013. But unbelievably, it has the same pack-limited A-type battery, even with thousands of B-type batteries delivered before. I have the dubious distinction of having the youngest such specimen reported thus far.

Since a Tesla spokesperson has implied that this situation was limited to only early sigs, which you do not have, it would seem to open up the door for them to address the issue in some way. Or not.

 

[Larry Chanin]

Hi Larry! I'm definitely raw and reactive over this topic so that was probably not my best post
But, while it may be technically accurate, it's not at *all* reflective of my true-world supercharger-to-supercharger road tripping. I have to spend 75 minutes at a supercharger in order to make it to the next. And Tesla can't have it both ways -- either 120 kW is awesome or it's "only 4 minutes" ... I'm mostly miffed at their very dismissive attitude over this whole thing. It's like they've forgotten the customer on this topic. I'm getting close to writing a harsh blog post about it -- though it'll require a lot of time as there are a LOT of facts involved which will require time to put together into a cogent argument.

Hope you're well!

Thanks Ben,

I'm doing well. Apart from this issue I hope you are as well. :wink:

I agree that many have become reactive over this topic and as I have noted earlier there certainly was a distinct change in tone from Elon's remarks of reducing charging time in half to Jerome's 4 minute difference.

It seems that based on the current implementation we are only losing an insignificant number of minutes. So, personally I can't get work-up about that.

However, the real issue that Ron alludes to is the taper. Currently the taper is virtually identical between 90 and 120 kW implementations, but Elon said that the new taper would reduce charging time in half. So the big question is when and if Tesla intends to implement a difference in taper in the future.

Maybe I'm naive, but if and when Tesla implements the new taper I'm betting that they'll give the owners of the older battery packs the option of implementing the same taper, but perhaps with some disclaimer.

Regards,

Larry

 

[cinergi]

Sorry cinergi, what is your scenario again? 75 minutes deserves attention in going from one supercharger to the next.

Arriving with 20 miles of rated range and charging to 220 or more. I have to do that to comfortably get between the east coast SC's. I consistently arrived with 20 and needed 220+ to get to the next.

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Thanks Ben,

I'm doing well. Apart from this issue I hope you are as well. :wink:

I agree that many have become reactive over this topic and as I have noted earlier there certainly was a distinct change in tone from Elon's remarks of reducing charging time in half to Jerome's 4 minute difference.

It seems that based on the current implementation we are only losing an insignificant number of minutes. So, personally I can't get work-up about that.

My "real world" numbers are more like 15-20 minutes's difference.

However, the real issue that Ron alludes to is the taper. Currently the taper is virtually identical between 90 and 120 kW implementations, but Elon said that the new taper would reduce charging time in half. So the big question is when and if Tesla intends to implement a difference in taper in the future.

Maybe I'm naive, but if and when Tesla implements the new taper I'm betting that they'll give the owners of the older battery packs the option of implementing the same taper, but perhaps with some disclaimer.

Regards,

Larry

I think the thing most worth noting is all the original promises around how long it would take to charge the car. It was an unqualified 30 minutes for 150-180 miles. While that's a little clearer on the website now, most of the sales staff still doesn't get it and is *amazed* when I tell them what it's really like to use the SC. And all of this is assuming you aren't load-sharing with another car (at which point kiss everything goodbye 'cuz now you're gonna wait for 2 hours).
Tesla is taking reality and twisting it in major ways for marketing purposes and it's getting really old. That includes the 300 mile range they keep telling everyone in the showrooms.

(BTW I'm not ignorant at the relative impact of the SC technology in the market, the amazing car itself, the fact that SC'ing is free, etc.)

I really should stop posting before I get myself into trouble

 

[Fedderman]

Since a Tesla spokesperson has implied that this situation was limited to only early sigs, which you do not have, it would seem to open up the door for them to address the issue in some way. Or not.

And many of us have non-sig 85's with 'A' batteries, so it seems it opens the door for us also. Or not.

What I really want is transparency. For my typical SC needs (~20 to 200 miles) is it only 4 minutes, or as much as 10-15 minutes based on empirical data way back on this thread? Tesla can do a lot by simply publishing the charging curves for 'A' and 'B' 85kWh batteries and 60 kWh batteries on the same graph, using rated miles instrad of % to eliminate ambiguity.

For me, even a 15 min difference is not huge as half the time I use SC's my intended stay exceeds the time it takes to get the charge I need. That said, I am unhappy with how Tesla has communicated (and not communicated), which has left customers uninformed (hence the speculation) and fueled the desire for empirical data that we can trust.

 

[dennis]

That's almost word-for-word what the letter said, right?

In politics this is referred to as "staying on message". We should expect that all Tesla spokespeople have been thoroughly briefed on the party line and will mouth it whenever the question is raised so that it becomes the new reality of 120kW supercharging.

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And Tesla can't have it both ways -- either 120 kW is awesome or it's "only 4 minutes" ... I'm mostly miffed at their very dismissive attitude over this whole thing. It's like they've forgotten the customer on this topic.

I could not agree more!

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I think the thing most worth noting is all the original promises around how long it would take to charge the car. It was an unqualified 30 minutes for 150-180 miles. While that's a little clearer on the website now, most of the sales staff still doesn't get it and is *amazed* when I tell them what it's really like to use the SC. And all of this is assuming you aren't load-sharing with another car (at which point kiss everything goodbye 'cuz now you're gonna wait for 2 hours).
Tesla is taking reality and twisting it in major ways for marketing purposes and it's getting really old. That includes the 300 mile range they keep telling everyone in the showrooms.

I realize I am repeating myself, but this over hyping of what is already an amazing advancement in making EV road tripping practical for the average Joe and Jane really bothers me. Tesla is risking both a customer and marketplace backlash if "The Truth About Supercharging" gets publicized. Do you think Elon will have an advance team for his cross-country trip making sure there is at least one A/B pair completely clear when he arrives at each Supercharger?

 

[Larry Chanin]

Arriving with 20 miles of rated range and charging to 220 or more. I have to do that to comfortably get between the east coast SC's. I consistently arrived with 20 and needed 220+ to get to the next.

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My "real world" numbers are more like 15-20 minutes's difference

Yes, wraithnot's data shows that the charging profiles are essentially the same when you are over 40%. So currently the largest difference in charging times occur at charging from low states of charge. Might I ask how you determined that this was costing you a 15-20 minutes?

Larry

 

[dhanson865]

Do you think Elon will have an advance team for his cross-country trip making sure there is at least one A/B pair completely clear when he arrives at each Supercharger?

Do you think maybe they'll remote limit whoever plugs in as the B to his A? Pause their charge with a software command to let him charge quicker?

 

[daxz]

Hey Daxz,

Could you break this down a bit. Are you using my numbers to compare the A vs B via SOC only (20-90%), in which case 5.3 minutes was instead 6 minutes slower for me but, here is the key, about I also received about 15 fewer miles during that longer time. Once I re-baseline my numbers to account for the differences is battery capacity, that becomes about 11 minutes for equivalent batteries charged SOC 20-90%.

Peter

I used one representative data point for each of the different packs:
85 Type A = cottonwood's Older Tesla's limited to 90kW super charging - Page 113
85 Type B = wraithnot Finally 120KW Supercharging! - Page 21
60 kWh = islandbayy 60kW Pack Supercharge from 0 to 90% Shows Maximum 105kW Rate and Charge Curve

I took the data and graphed kWh vs minutes (eliminated any zero/zero values) and fitted with an exponential curve in excel (type A didn't fit as nice as type B's on the end of the curves and 60kWh was even worse so I just used a polynomial(5) approximation for it). Saying they started in zero state of charge or "empty" is not quite right either - so the graph may need to be shifted but in comparing A to B that shouldn't matter much unless the zero miles is that much different. And this maybe why there is a difference in the number of miles you're seeing?
You summed it nicely before

0% SOC != 0 miles, and 90% SOC != (Max Range) * 0.9

The upper end of the curves don't really fit the exponential approximations really well and with only 1 data point, I was just trying to show that the numbers aren't that different. Based on what I see in trying to fit it into a nice curve there are some variables not being taken into account. I think islandbayy's comment in the video of warm batteries, warm chargers and cooling everything while charging influences charging rates especially on high end of SOC. I wouldn't be surprised if my numbers weren't off by a few minutes in either direction and even worse near upper end of SOC. With the drastic taper, Tesla is not intending charging above 75% unless you are at the end of the line and need every kWh (or maybe you have a 60kWh).

Below is %full vs minutes to charge in Type A Type B and difference of A-B (assuming 0miles = 0kWh & %= kWh/85kWh)
To get the 20-90% I took Time to charge to 90% from "empty" and subtracted amount to charge to 20% (76.6-12.6) - (65.4-6.8) ~ 5.3

Full	A	 B	Diff
5%	8.7	4.3	4.5
7%	9.2	4.5	4.6
9%	9.7	4.9	4.8
11%	10.2	5.2	5.0
14%	10.8	5.5	5.2
16%	11.4	5.9	5.4
18%	12.0	6.3	5.6
20%	12.6	6.8	5.8
22%	13.3	7.2	6.1
24%	14.0	7.7	6.3
26%	14.8	8.3	6.5
28%	15.6	8.9	6.8
30%	16.5	9.5	7.0
32%	17.3	10.1	7.2
34%	18.3	10.8	7.5
36%	19.3	11.6	7.7
38%	20.3	12.4	8.0
40%	21.4	13.2	8.2
42%	22.6	14.1	8.5
44%	23.8	15.1	8.8
46%	25.1	16.1	9.0
49%	26.5	17.2	9.3
51%	28.0	18.4	9.5
53%	29.5	19.7	9.8
55%	31.1	21.1	10.0
57%	32.8	22.5	10.3
59%	34.6	24.1	10.5
61%	36.4	25.7	10.7
63%	38.4	27.5	10.9
65%	40.5	29.4	11.1
67%	42.7	31.4	11.3
69%	45.1	33.6	11.5
71%	47.5	35.9	11.6
73%	50.1	38.4	11.7
75%	52.8	41.0	11.8
77%	55.7	43.8	11.9
79%	58.7	46.9	11.9
81%	61.9	50.1	11.8
84%	65.3	53.6	11.7
86%	68.9	57.2	11.6
88%	72.6	61.2	11.4
90%	76.6	65.4	11.2
92%	80.7	69.9	10.8
94%	85.1	74.7	10.4
96%	89.8	79.9	9.9
98%	94.7	85.4	9.2
100%	99.8	91.3	8.5

The curves I used were:
A t = 7.5971e^(.0303a)
B t = 3.5809e^(.0381a)
where "a" is number of kWh's and "t" would be number of minutes

 

[chickensevil]

I realize I am repeating myself, but this over hyping of what is already an amazing advancement in making EV road tripping practical for the average Joe and Jane really bothers me. Tesla is risking both a customer and marketplace backlash if "The Truth About Supercharging" gets publicized. Do you think Elon will have an advance team for his cross-country trip making sure there is at least one A/B pair completely clear when he arrives at each Supercharger?

Its true, I don't even have the car yet and I am already trying to properly set people's expectations of my new car. I still fully expect it to be a totally fantastic car, better than anything currently on the market. But at the same time, I accept that it is far from perfect. I do thank all the REALLY early adopters (I consider myself an early adopter, coming in under the first 40k made, but I got nothing on a lot of you!) for going through a lot of the early hardships in that even with my car, I will have benefited from some of these things and will get an even better product!

 

[apacheguy]

Yes, wraithnot's data shows that the charging profiles are essentially the same when you are over 40%. So currently the largest difference in charging times occur at charging from low states of charge. Might I ask how you determined that this was costing you a 15-20 minutes?

Larry

I'm going to bud in here for cinergi. It takes him 75 minutes to get 220+ miles from 20 miles. Wraithnot's 120 kW curve began at 16 rated miles and reached 225 miles at 55 minutes. I easily see a 15-20 minute difference here.

 

[bluetinc]

I'm going to bud in here for cinergi. It takes him 75 minutes to get 220+ miles from 20 miles. Wraithnot's 120 kW curve began at 16 rated miles and reached 225 miles at 55 minutes. I easily see a 15-20 minute difference here.

To add to this just a bit, I just reworked my data (over in the 120kW charging thread) to account for my loss in capacity. My conclusion is that if two battery packs, one A and one B, each charge to 262 rated miles, there is about a 9 minute difference in charge times between them when charging from 20%-> 90% SOC. If you take into account the extra time necessary due to the degradation I have seen (I'm at 248) and that I'm on a A pack, I too see the 15-20 minute differences during charging.

Peter

 

[Larry Chanin]

I'm going to bud in here for cinergi. It takes him 75 minutes to get 220+ miles from 20 miles. Wraithnot's 120 kW curve began at 16 rated miles and reached 225 miles at 55 minutes. I easily see a 15-20 minute difference here.

Yes, thanks.

Larry

 

[joefee]

But only for a few seconds. Big difference.


Loaners are sold so they are not limited to local trips only.

That is the problem...you can't get a P85+ loaner...if they had "used A pack loaners" maybe they would not sell so fast!

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@wycolo reached 196 miles at 47 minutes with his B battery, a difference of 13 minutes, not 4!



Jerome's claim of a 4 minute difference was for going from 20% SOC to 90% SOC, cleverly avoiding most of the charging above 90kW on the B batteries and their improved ramp when the battery is almost full.

4min 10min 13min = All bad when you multiply by 10-20-30 for a 500 to 3000mi road trip. This dog will not hunt!

 

[Gear]

That is the problem...you can't get a P85+ loaner...if they had "used A pack loaners" maybe they would not sell so fast!

The whole point of the P85 loaner program is to hopefully sell them. Why would Tesla want them to not sell as fast?

 

[gg_got_a_tesla]

Older Tesla's limited to 90kW super charging

I guess the statement is true, but hardly encompasses reality. To wit, the earliest Signature delivery was June 22, 2012. I received my S85 nearly one year and 10000 cars later, on May 4, 2013. But unbelievably, it has the same pack-limited A-type battery, even with thousands of B-type batteries delivered before. I have the dubious distinction of having the youngest such specimen reported thus far. I think for me and others in the same situation, it would be great if Telsa gave a consistent explanation, but it can't be consistent if the explanation is only tied to the earliest cars. If I were buying the car now and with current knowledge, I'd still buy the car, but I would be down on the floor by the front right wheel with a flashlight checking the battery sticker on delivery before accepting the car. In fact I would say this is now the most important thing to check on any new delivery, as it is the most expensive part of the car and currently won't be exchanged except for failure. The Delivery Checklist just got very simple: check the battery part number. Everything else can be fixed.

Musterion, ken830 and I wonder how many more folks there are who are not "early Signatures" and who may not be on these forums and who may end up ascribing not getting > 90 kW (if they care, that is) to myriad other variables (stall splitting, if they know about that one), SoC at the beginning of the supercharge session and so on: to all of you, I'm really sorry; all this feels terribly wrong and I hope Tesla wakes up, sticks their head out of the sand and sorts this out.

I may have missed it but, has anyone tried reaching out to Elon himself by email/twitter? The upcoming earnings call - if it's possible for non-analysts to get a question in - maybe a public opportunity too.

 

[Jason S]

That is the problem...you can't get a P85+ loaner...if they had "used A pack loaners" maybe they would not sell so fast!

The whole point of the P85 loaner program is to hopefully sell them. Why would Tesla want them to not sell as fast?

Heh, if there is any car that shouldn't need faster supercharger performance, it is a loaner!

But they'd prolly sell just as fast with either battery. The 'A' vs 'B' thing is not going to impact it that much, imho.

 

[apacheguy]

Taper Curve is Different!

Ok, timeout. Did we conclude there is no difference in the taper curve for 90 kw vs 120? When I overlaid Wraithnot's excel data over mine, I came out with this:

Even below 90 kw I am noticing consistent differences. Here are some data points below 90 kw that demonstrate a significant difference:

Wraithnot: 104 rated miles, 89 kw Apacheguy: 103 rated miles, 76 kw
Wraithnot: 127 rated miles, 76 kw Apacheguy: 127 rated miles, 67 kw
Wraithnot: 163 rated miles, 57 kw Apacheguy: 166 rated miles, 51 kw
Wraithnot: 179 rated miles, 52 kw Apacheguy: 181 rated miles, 43 kw

I don't know about you guys, but I'm seeing quite a large difference here.

Since I know someone is going to ask - my data was collected on FW 5.8 in Atascadero Dec 2013 and I was the only car charging for that supercharging stall #.

 

[dennis]

I may have missed it but, has anyone tried reaching out to Elon himself by email/twitter? The upcoming earnings call - if it's possible for non-analysts to get a question in - maybe a public opportunity too.

I believe that is a very important point. The only one who can change Tesla's position on this issue is Elon. Jerome is unlikely to back away from the position he has taken with the owners who have contacted him, and that party line is now being parroted by the rest of the organization. Somebody who knows Elon needs to makes sure he understands the customer dissatisfaction this issue is creating among many early adopters and long time Tesla supporters.

It would be best IMO if this was done privately, not in a public forum where he may feel compelled to speak the party line (if he is aware of it!).

 

[wormhole]

And Tesla can't have it both ways -- either 120 kW is awesome or it's "only 4 minutes" ... I'm mostly miffed at their very dismissive attitude over this whole thing. It's like they've forgotten the customer on this topic.

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