Phantom / Vampire Drain on Model 3

[nvx1977]

I haven't checked for vampire drain in a while. Last night I saw I was at 163mi. This morning, about 10 hours later, I was still at 163mi. Woohoo! Previously I would lose around 2 miles in that timeframe.

Wondering if latest firmware had something to do with it. I got 2018.18.3 yesterday.

 

[dhu1]

Just set limit on charge screen - eg 70% - charge up to this and then just leave car plugged in charging for a couple more hours.

Leave your car plugged with 70% as the limit or after two hours change the limit up to 90% to continue charging?

 

[bartlettpsj]

My vampire drain is down to next to nothing(max 3 miles a day -- usually 1 mile) after 9-10 miles per day. In addition to the things I mentioned earlier, I have also disabled Tezlabs. I changed the password on my Tesla account so it can no longer Poll my car. The Tesla service guy said if that is polling the car frequently you will get drain. I do know that Tezlabs made some changes last week that might have helped too. Anyways, I'm not risking it for now. I did install 2018.18.3 yesterday and I dont know what impact that has yet, but last night I lost 0 miles. But we all know the vampire - he seems to creep in from nowhere.

Are others finding Vampire Drain is getting better now?

 

[EVDRVN]

Using miles as a measure is a highly inaccurate way to measure and make comparisons between days and/or comparison to others, results it's simply useless as a metric since miles varies based on driving habits. Any measures of loss should be measured in SOC only. I'm pretty confident that may people are also polling their cars repeatedly. Lastly. anyone with concerns over parasitic looses should use a battery tender. This will reduce the battery cycling and the higher associated loads of the systems that come on to support the 12V system, this will further reduce 12V charge cycles and give higher net gains regardless of other triggering variables and power use of a proper battery tender. This will also significantly increase 12V battery life.

 

[EVDRVN]

My vampire drain is down to next to nothing(max 3 miles a day -- usually 1 mile) after 9-10 miles per day. In addition to the things I mentioned earlier, I have also disabled Tezlabs. I changed the password on my Tesla account so it can no longer Poll my car. The Tesla service guy said if that is polling the car frequently you will get drain. I do know that Tezlabs made some changes last week that might have helped too. Anyways, I'm not risking it for now. I did install 2018.18.3 yesterday and I dont know what impact that has yet, but last night I lost 0 miles. But we all know the vampire - he seems to creep in from nowhere.

Are others finding Vampire Drain is getting better now?

USE percent, miles is useless for all metrics in an EV. If you drive fast all day and the next day you have 8 miles lost it is a reflection of your habits. The next day if you drive down a mountain road and regen or use little power your miles lost will be significantly lower. I have never used miles on ANY display of any EV I have ever owned, it's a bad metric to use and get used to.

 

[Nathanael]

FYI the recent update significantly improved my vampire rates. Overnight I used to drop 3-4 km, but since update its only been 1km.

 

[jsmay311]

Using miles as a measure is a highly inaccurate way to measure and make comparisons between days and/or comparison to others, results it's simply useless as a metric since miles varies based on driving habits.

USE percent, miles is useless for all metrics in an EV. If you drive fast all day and the next day you have 8 miles lost it is a reflection of your habits. The next day if you drive down a mountain road and regen or use little power your miles lost will be significantly lower. I have never used miles on ANY display of any EV I have ever owned, it's a bad metric to use and get used to.

That's not how it works in a Tesla. The range as displayed in miles does not factor in recent driving behavior like most other EVs do. So whether you use percent or miles, it should be the same reflection on the battery SoC.

 

[Boondoc]

Recently I left my car unplugged for a long weekend. In 3.5 days I lost 45 miles. I'm losing more than 10 miles per day, and this was with the Tezlabs off. This is a significant drain, as more than 10% of the charge, and if this continues will be a significant expense in owning the car.

 

[CRWJumper]

I got my M3 on Thursday and have been losing about 5 miles per hour while it's parked. How would I approach Tesla to have this looked into?

 

[RayK]

Before you escalate, verify the following:

1) Is cabin overheat enabled? Located in Safety & Security. Being in FL I would imagine that this could be a major drain on the battery.

2) Are you running any apps on your phone, other than the one from Tesla, which communicates with the car? It may keep you car from fully going to sleep.

 

[slipnslider]

I just downloaded 28.2 last night and today I'm still losing 2 miles of range PER HOUR. No overheat protection, no tesla apps on phone. This seems to be the energy it must be using to keep the batteries cool or something. That seems excessive doesn't it?

This is like an ICE car having a hole in its gas tank.

 

[SageBrush]

That seems excessive doesn't it?

Yes, along the lines of a car completely awake with cabin air conditioning active

 

[Dmagyar]

So in effect it’s “Tesla sleep apnea”.

 

[babk]

I suggest disabling Wi-Fi and making sure it stays that way. I lost 20% over 72 hours when I was traveling with Wi-Fi on last weekend. Ever since, I’ve been manually disabling Wi-Fi, both at the start of the drive and at the end, and the drain normalized to a couple miles and 0% overnight. The problem with Wi-Fi in the current version of the software is the somewhat arbitrary on switch and the lack of the option to turn it off completely, kinda like the iOS shortcut menu. So, every evening it’s brush my teeth, take out my contacts, disable Wi-Fi, tuck my girlfriend in. For clarity, I charge at work and don’t have the car plugged in at night and I’m on 26.3

 

[CAM#3]

FWIW I had issues with Vampire drain of about 0.4 mi/hr. After service center did a Battery Mgt system loader update and day with update to firmware 26.3, I am now way way better -- loose only 1 mi per 24 hrs when car parked in garage (with no third party apps).

 

[SageBrush]

I still lose up to 3 miles a day on 26.3, but I'm very glad to hear that progress is being made overall.
This problem is slowly going away for the fleet.

 

[Dmagyar]

Not sure I’m reading my app that says we’re on version 28.2, just watched it the battery drop 2 miles in a few hours in the garage. Just for the record leaving the app on, in the background will kill my phone (different issue) overnight, till I changed the WiFi connection (per someone’s reply).

 

[SoCalMom]

We upgraded to 28.5 about a week ago. Ever since then the drain has been massive.
At first we thought it was the cabin overheat protection. My husband parks outside at work and it's been high 80s maybe low 90s. He lost about 30 miles a day.

However, today he charged it up at home in the garage and unplugged at 6pm. We took it out in the driveway for a wash an hour later at 7pm and we had lost 6 miles! The kids sat in the car while we washed, so the AC was on and they were playing music. An hour later, we lost another 6 miles.

Anyone else having issues?

 

[ceric930]

My car was delivered with updated BMS bootloader and last week got 28.2 update. I lost 8-10 miles each night until I log out and deleted Tazlab app from my phone. Now I lose only 1-2 miles each night parking in garage.

 

[devilmountain]

We upgraded to 28.5 about a week ago. Ever since then the drain has been massive.
At first we thought it was the cabin overheat protection. My husband parks outside at work and it's been high 80s maybe low 90s. He lost about 30 miles a day.

However, today he charged it up at home in the garage and unplugged at 6pm. We took it out in the driveway for a wash an hour later at 7pm and we had lost 6 miles! The kids sat in the car while we washed, so the AC was on and they were playing music. An hour later, we lost another 6 miles.

Anyone else having issues?

I upgraded to 26.3 about two weeks ago. I My was losing mileage fast the day after the upgrade. I rebooted my car which solved the issue. I am now back to around 1 mile per day.