P85D motor hp controversy starts also to show in U.S. media

[eloder]

I still think that Tesla should design a brand-new sedan, that can only be swapped out to those unhappy with the horsepower.

This new sedan would actually hit the advertised horsepower on the dyno, but it would also go 0-60 in 4.5+ seconds because it'd mimic a gas car of four doors and similar weight and only have the advertised horsepower on a dyno at sea level at a specific rpm number. It could still reach the advertised 0-60 in 2.8s, but only if you've been running the battery at high speeds for an hour at sea level to make sure the motor is at optimal. The software dynamically reconfigures itself to the dinosaur expectations of a gas car owner.

The new sedan would dynamically slow itself down as you increased in atltitude, just so the purists' expectation of performance matches traditional horsepower numbers.

The new sedan would be far less aerodynamic, because clearly horsepower is the most precise measurement of how well a car performs, and not actual performance stats. Why not put a .5 CD on the car? The horsepower is all that matters!

This new sedan would have far less advanced traction control, and will be prone to spinning off the start. Because horsepower, yo.

I think Musk shall call this wondrous new car the Model ICE.

 

[vgrinshpun]

And it seems you've missed that many of us don't care about what that regulation may or may not say. What we care about is what Tesla allowed us and the world to believe about the car. All the magazines were writing about 691 HP. All the buzz was about 691 HP. Tesla wasn't yelling, "Wait, wait--it's motor HP. It's not what you're thinking!" They were sitting back, counting the money, and letting their customers buy the car with the wrong expectations.

That's really off the chart wrong. I absolutely did not miss that you don't care about ECE R85. I brought it up because the fact that you really did not care about properly investigating Tesla 691hp claim, including ECE R85 is actually contributing to your misunderstanding of P85D specifications.

But keep supporting them, and keep telling us all how we're wrong to feel like we didn't get what we paid for, and how we should have done more research.

Yes, I believe that you got exactly what you paid for, the problem is that what you *thought* you were getting was not the same thing as actual Tesla specifications.

 

[Andyw2100]

I still think that Tesla should design a brand-new sedan, that can only be swapped out to those unhappy with the horsepower.

This new sedan would actually hit the advertised horsepower on the dyno, but it would also go 0-60 in 4.5+ seconds because it'd mimic a gas car of four doors and similar weight and only have the advertised horsepower on a dyno at sea level at a specific rpm number. It could still reach the advertised 0-60 in 2.8s, but only if you've been running the battery at high speeds for an hour at sea level to make sure the motor is at optimal. The software dynamically reconfigures itself to the dinosaur expectations of a gas car owner.

The new sedan would dynamically slow itself down as you increased in atltitude, just so the purists' expectation of performance matches traditional horsepower numbers.

The new sedan would be far less aerodynamic, because clearly horsepower is the most precise measurement of how well a car performs, and not actual performance stats. Why not put a .5 CD on the car? The horsepower is all that matters!

This new sedan would have far less advanced traction control, and will be prone to spinning off the start. Because horsepower, yo.

I think Musk shall call this wondrous new car the Model ICE.

Your imaginary car wouldn't quite live up to the standards that Musk set for the P85D at the D launch when he said that everything improved with the addition of the second motor.

 

[vgrinshpun]

They all described the car with the term "691 HP" (or bhp for the overseas publication.) How much more evidence than that do you need?

In case you missed my point (which I very much doubt) describing car with the term"691hp" is *not* the same as saying that it "delivers 691hp"

 

[EK123]

Complete agreement with Jallum.pa.us
delays in autopilot
poor nav, basic voice commands, poor phone integration
no car play, android auto
irregular answers from service
inability to start webcasts on time

i love my car. But I was a lot more excited about tesla a year ago.

 

[Andyw2100]

In case you missed my point (which I very much doubt) describing car with the term"691hp" is *not* the same as saying that it "delivers 691hp"

One of your points has been that on the Tesla website it never said (except in Denmark and perhaps some other countries) 691 HP. There was always that "motor" word thrown in--691 Motor HP. You've been suggesting for a long time that that makes all the difference, and that anyone who bought the car should have known that 691 Motor HP did not mean 691 HP.

For purposes of this discussion only, I'll go along with you on that for now. My point, then, is that all those magazines were describing the cars as, in one way or another, "Tesla's 691 HP Model S P85D." How was anyone supposed to think the car was capable of producing anything less than 691 HP when the magazines were referring to it as the 691 HP P85D?

THAT is my point.

 

[Jallum.pa.us]

It appears that you've missed quite a few posts that show that the car specified to have 691 motor horsepower, as defined by the one and only pertinent regulation, ECE R85. It defines how to rate EV drivetrain and the method does not include any consideration of the battery possibly limiting the total output of the battery-drivetrain system.

Naw, sport. I get the difference between "potential" and "actual". The thing is, though, that but for a component or two, the actual could just about achieve the potential. The motors can make their numbers if fed the right amount of juice - we can all agree on this? - they're just not able to realize this potential in my car because there are devices in between them and said supply of juice that won't let them: fuses and contactors in the 85kw pack, revision "E". One of those two things will probably melt (or at least smell funny!) if we tried to run enough amps through them to produce their combined ECE R85 rating. I'm pretty sure the Fremont folks did this enough times realize it wasn't going to end well. So, we're left with a technicality, which probably wouldn't be a big deal for anyone - the parts can't be that expensive to procure - except, for where they live. See, buried in my battery pack as they are, it's not going to be easy or fast to dig them out and pop new ones in. If it were, this whole thing would be a non-issue, and they'd most likely eat the cost. As it stands, it's obvious that the parts aren't the expensive bit. I'd happily pay the labor -- it's just hard to swallow $7500.

I'll tell you why. A P90D bought today is different from my car (or a P85D bought today) in no important ways, but the battery pack that's in it and a badge on it's butt. The fuse and contactor live in the battery, we've established. The cost difference is $3000, and that covers not just the fancy fuse and contactors, but higher capacity batteries as well. It's been observed that a P90D "L" and it's non "L" little brother have the same battery pack, with the same part number. Let that sink in: Deduction is telling us that the only physical difference between the P90D and the "L" is a strip of chrome under the badge. It's not the motors, tires, suspension, etc.

$10k, for a software unlock that brings the "actual" just about to the "potential" when ordering today, or $7500, to do the same thing to my used car (well, and actually dig around in there to change out a couple of parts, so in some respects, it seems like a less-horrible deal). I'm not sure who should be more moody about all this... but can you see why people might think that the ECE R85 rating is a bit beside the point?

 

[flathillll]

One of your points has been that on the Tesla website it never said (except in Denmark and perhaps some other countries) 691 HP. There was always that "motor" word thrown in--691 Motor HP. You've been suggesting for a long time that that makes all the difference, and that anyone who bought the car should have known that 691 Motor HP did not mean 691 HP.

For purposes of this discussion only, I'll go along with you on that for now. My point, then, is that all those magazines were describing the cars as, in one way or another, "Tesla's 691 HP Model S P85D." How was anyone supposed to think the car was capable of producing anything less than 691 HP when the magazines were referring to it as the 691 HP P85D?

THAT is my point.

You were not supposed to know. You have been programmed by living in an ICE world. "THAT " is the point.

If the combined HP of the P85D was well known many(most?) would not have upgraded.

"How was anyone supposed to" know combine HP is a meaningless metric when dealing with a dual motor electric car? Even now you still will not believe anyone that tells you it is a meaningless metric. I expect it will take years for many of you to be reprogrammed.

 

[darthy001]

I'm pretty sure the numbers you post are different as posted by others. It does not make sense for the big motor to have less power than the small one. I will have to dig it up.

For example, the EU certificate of conformity has 193kW for the small motor (same as your manual) and 350kW for the big one (different from the 145kW in your manual).


Edit: here's a link to the screen shot of the manual that says the same as the EU certificate of conformity, as it should:

http://www.teslamotorsclub.com/show...91HP/page155?p=1144859&viewfull=1#post1144859

My screenshot is from my own owners manual downloaded last night from Mytesla.... I can PM it to you if you'd like...

And the whole point is it doesnt make sense. Its been argued here and in other threads that I should have read the owners manual before taking delivery since it refers to ECE R85. Well,, there it is. Seems like Tesla isnt sure themselves....

 

[stopcrazypp]

My screenshot is from my own owners manual downloaded last night from Mytesla.... I can PM it to you if you'd like...

And the whole point is it doesnt make sense. Its been argued here and in other threads that I should have read the owners manual before taking delivery since it refers to ECE R85. Well,, there it is. Seems like Tesla isnt sure themselves....

I'm not doubting your specific manual may say that (meaning I'm not implying you edited the picture to different numbers). Rather your manual obviously has the wrong numbers (looks like the big motor section just had the base small motor's numbers pasted into both versions). Like the Denmark "hk ydeeve" case, that could be a localized error, but the fact remains the ECE R85 numbers appear to be 193kW front and 350kW rear from the EU certificate of conformity and this matches with the English version of the manual at least.

- - - Updated - - -

I'll tell you why. A P90D bought today is different from my car (or a P85D bought today) in no important ways, but the battery pack that's in it and a badge on it's butt. The fuse and contactor live in the battery, we've established. The cost difference is $3000, and that covers not just the fancy fuse and contactors, but higher capacity batteries as well. It's been observed that a P90D "L" and it's non "L" little brother have the same battery pack, with the same part number. Let that sink in: Deduction is telling us that the only physical difference between the P90D and the "L" is a strip of chrome under the badge. It's not the motors, tires, suspension, etc.

$10k, for a software unlock that brings the "actual" just about to the "potential" when ordering today, or $7500, to do the same thing to my used car (well, and actually dig around in there to change out a couple of parts, so in some respects, it seems like a less-horrible deal). I'm not sure who should be more moody about all this... but can you see why people might think that the ECE R85 rating is a bit beside the point?

I totally get this perspective as it implies the Ludicrous hardware is far less than $3k in parts value. However, as brianman points out in another thread, we should be careful about assuming that the P90D and P90DL packs will remain the same indefinitely. Tesla has been known to use the same part numbers initially and then diverge later. It could totally be a short term thing to decrease the number of configurations temporarily.

 

[30seconds]

On the plus side it seems that we can all agree that the motors have room for more power if someone can find a way to reliably supply it first to the motor and second to the ground.

My personal view is that the company is moving fast, ran & reported the test as spec'd, figured out "holy sh*t this thing is fast", and didn't try to hard to correct the reports of 691hp as hp is actually a fairly crappy way of measuring performance and it gave everyone a number to talk about.

Loose? Yep. Loose in the world of performance cars? Maybe not so much. Would I like Tesla to do this the right way? Yes. Did they? Not really.

 

[sorka]

Again, anyone who was paying attention should have easily recognized that it wasn't going to have to top end equivalent to other sports cars with similar power and weight. If it kills the other cars at 0-60 but then crosses the 1/4 at basically the same time, then you should know that it's not accelerating up top like the other car. The other car has to catch up somewhere along the way. Maybe my background in fast cars and 1/4 miles made that obvious to me but not to other people. I just don't understand the surprise.

It's performance for the power it makes, 555hp at 90% SOC is just fine. It's 50-70 and 70-90 passing speeds on my VBOX are exactly where they should be for a car with that power and weight. The low end torque gives it much better performance from a start than any other car that makes 555 hp but when it heats peak power it's just like any other car that makes that power with that weight.

- - - Updated - - -

The reference to ECE R85 is in the Manual, where it actually belongs.

And why would it only be in the manual for consumers to discover *after* they buy the car and on the off chance that they ever even look at the manual.

Tesla advertised 691 hp. Tesla can't secretly mean something else without disclosing in their advertising literature that "691 hp" doesn't actually mean that because the appended "motor power" to the end of it. Most consumers do and did believe this meant 691 hp at the motors. If tesla didn't want to mislead the general consumer public that this wasn't really the horsepower then they would have either list the actual horsepower or they would have had a disclaimer that the 691 number wasn't the actual horsepower. If they listed 555 hp, then sales wouldn't have bee anywhere near as good. I wouldn't have gone near it. I know that a 555 hp 5000 car is going to accelerate form 70-90 slower than many other performance sedans that cost a lot less. If they simply stated it wasn't the actual power, then they'd get pounded by consumers asking them to disclose the actual power. The thing they did was the one thing they could do to say 691 hp without actually meaning it.

Also note:

• Nowhere in ECE R85 does it say you can add the motor ratings up into one combined number and advertise that as available hp.
• The owners manual, where it states it used ECE R85, doesn't combine the performance front and rear motors together into a single number. 691 never appears anywhere in the manual.
• The owners manual lists 350KW and 193 KW for the rear and front motors which adds up to 728 hp. If they were adding up ratings , why doesn't it add up to 691 hp?
• The advertising literature and their websites which said 691 hp motor power didn't specify that they were using a European standard. You only know that from the owners manual, not from the sales literature or published specs. I've shown a photo of that page to dozens of people and asked them what they thought that meant. They *ALL* think it means the car produces 691 hp and can't understand why it would say that if it really only produced 480 to 555 hp (daily driving SOC 30% to 90%).
• If they were going to list a combined horsepower number, they had an obligation to list the power that the P85D actually makes. In addition, since the P85D is the only Model S to lose power as the SOC declines in it's normal daily driving range, they should have clarified that the 555 hp is only at 90% SOC or greater and that below that, power will decline as charge declines. This is not true on the other Model S variants until you get much deeper in to charge state.
• They ignored repeated multiple letters and emails over MONTHS asking for clarification about the horsepower rating. We get responses for everything else we ask but those that inquired about this got nothing. If they were being so above board about this with nothing to hide, how come they refused to respond to the question of "why is my car only making 480 to 555 hp (depending on SOC) when it was advertised at 691 hp"?
• If "motor power" meant something other than horsepower at the motor, why wasn't that at least clarified in the literature? Why were we supposed to know it meant "not actual horsepower" when it wasn't defined anywhere?

- - - Updated - - -

In case you missed my point (which I very much doubt) describing car with the term"691hp" is *not* the same as saying that it "delivers 691hp"

I've never seen the term "delivers <x> hp". In this country, when an auto manufacturer lists "<x> hp" they mean it produces x hp at the motor shaft or flywheel. It's been that way since 1972.

 

[darthy001]

I'm not doubting your specific manual may say that (meaning I'm not implying you edited the picture to different numbers). Rather your manual obviously has the wrong numbers (looks like the big motor section just had the base small motor's numbers pasted into both versions). Like the Denmark "hk ydeeve" case, that could be a localized error, but the fact remains the ECE R85 numbers appear to be 193kW front and 350kW rear from the EU certificate of conformity and this matches with the English version of the manual at least.

I actually believe my original 6.2 manual said the numbers you quote here a few months ago, but now it clearly doesn't.... Main point is that even at this point in time Tesla isn't able to get this right... They mix the two motors and they now have new numbers even.

Are you still suprised that we as customers didn't get this back in October of 2014? Tesla still isn't able to provide proper documentation on such a simple level. Especially when seeing the next part of my post here:

The reference to ECE R85 is in the Manual, where it actually belongs.

I have dug up the owners manual that was on Mytesla when I ordered the car.. Thankfully I saved it as I downloaded it on my Ipad as something to pass the time with while waiting for my car to arrive.

*drumroll*

Guess what?

-NO REFERENCE TO ECE R85 what so ever.
-No reference to any form of KW-rating or HP-rating what so ever actually in the entire owners manual.


Still think I should have figured this out on my own?

 

[lolachampcar]

Jallum,

I get where you are coming from. The only place where we differ is that a car company offering me dyno numbers (no matter what they are based on) only starts the conversation for me. The important point then becomes "what does the product actually do?" which was provided in the form of a 0-60 and 1/4 mile time. Tesla then delivered that level of performance. My basic understanding of BeVs told me the P85D was going to behave in a similar fashion as my P+ at higher speeds. Sure, it may be a bit better but long range BeVs are stamina limited. There were zero surprises when I took delivery in January including that the high speed acceleration was not ICE like.

Going back to the dyno numbers, it would appear the numbers provided by Tesla would provide similar 0-60 and 1/4 mile numbers on an ICE of the same weight with AWD. When doing an arms length analysis, the power numbers are not unreasonable.

You've thought through this and only you know how you feel. What I would ask you to consider is what, if anything, did Tesla really do wrong to not deliver the experience they advertised? I have a hard time wanting to burn them at the stake (you are not suggesting this but others are on a witch hunt) for what they have done.

Now, if you do want to go after someone for egregious behavior, try going after Ferrari. They are notorious for doing press days on the launch of a car where the cars they provide are significantly more potent then the cars they deliver to the public. This is an intentional effort to defraud their customers. I simply do not see Tesla's actions here as anything close to that.

 

[MuppetOwl]

Going back to the dyno numbers, it would appear the numbers provided by Tesla would provide similar 0-60 and 1/4 mile numbers on an ICE of the same weight with AWD. When doing an arms length analysis, the power numbers are not unreasonable.

2015 Audi RS7 do the 0-60 mph 0.1 sec slower and the 1/4 mile on the same time. It weight 4493 lbs and have 560 motor hp. Dyno result show it has 460 whp. It also have to shift gears and the engine does only produce the max power at a much smaller power band.

If P85D does performance like a 700hp 4wd ICE car the 337 lbs extra weight should be possible to move faster with 140 motor hp more and the Tesla should also have less drivetrain loss?

AudiRS7 times and weight from Motortrend
Luxury Super Sports Sedan Comparison - Audi RS7, Mercedes-Benz CLS63 AMG S, Porsche Panamera Turbo - Motor Trend All Pages


And compared to the P85D Motortrend weight and times
2015 Tesla Model S P85D First Test - Motor Trend

 

[lolachampcar]

Going by the online calculators..... I should have included that part.

 

[dsm363]

mod note: one post moved to
snippiness

 

[Luclyluciano]

Let me put the cards out on the table. MOTOR HORSEPOWER IS PHONEY AND NOTY REAL.... Just because the motor may be capable of producing a certain power equivalent doesn't mean Tesla should advertise it to sell the cars. An ICE may be capable of 1000 HP so what?! Cars are not sold that way. It is just as dishonest as VW cheating on emissions. It is not real. Then motor in this car does not produce this power. Period.

 

[yo mama]

True. But as long as the vehicle performs the 0-60 time as advertised, I wouldn't care if Tesla expressed the metric in Hamster Power.

 

[MuppetOwl]

True. But as long as the vehicle performs the 0-60 time as advertised, I wouldn't care if Tesla expressed the metric in Hamster Power.

It does not. Must buy the Ludicrous upgrade to do 0-60 in 3.1 not using 1 ft rollout cheating.