Range question - how does traffic effect range when travelling long distances?

[TimothyHW3]

It is close to 480W. (Between 360W and 600W)

At idle?! No, not even close.

Bjørn tested it but can't find the video, I have to pull the data myself one of these days.

In this video he has a BT controller and 3D game running + the steering wheel I think an he only pulls 250- 300Watts. And the game is so intensive that it even freezes the MCU, plus he has the ambient lights on for the camera which are around 20-30W alone.

On idle without ambient lights and headlights you are closer to 100W

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

At idle?! No, not even close.

Bjørn tested it but can't find the video, I have to pull the data myself one of these days.

In this video he has a controllers and a 3D game running + the steering wheel I think an he only puls 300Watts. And the game is so intensive that it even freezes the MCU.

On idle without ambient lights and headlights you are closer to 100W

I'll repeat this. I can only report what I observe in my car - and this is what I observe:

"My point is that if you turn off HVAC and it says 2A @ 240V, and you turn HVAC on and it says 9A @ 240V, the HVAC is using 7A@240V. There shouldn't be any debate about that, right?"

In the Nyland video (as far I could tell from a super quick look as I have no patience for the rambling) he doesn't have the car plugged in so it's not a relevant test - the charging circuitry is not powered up. You don't have to worry about that overhead in that case. He's measuring battery draw. You're measuring AC draw from the wall. The AC-DC converter is on. It has fixed overhead. And I think you'll find it minimizes at 2A@240V with the HVAC off (no fan). (Which is 360W-600W, 1.5-2.5A @ 240V) Briefly. Then the relay opens.

 

[jerry33]

You were limited to 3kW in this video due to the plug limits. And in general when operating in auto mode it would go between 1-2kW. This is about a factor of 2- 4 lower than typical Heat use. I think that's all @jerry33 was saying - heat really can hurt.

I live in a hot area of the country and my experience over six plus years (129K miles) is that A/C takes very little (unless you set it to LO or something silly like that) and heat uses a lot--even if you end the charge before you start to drive and preheat the cabin.

 

[TimothyHW3]

I'll repeat this. I can only report what I observe in my car - and this is what I observe:

"My point is that if you turn off HVAC and it says 2A @ 240V, and you turn HVAC on and it says 9A @ 240V, the HVAC is using 7A@240V.

In the Nyland video (as far I could tell from a super quick look as I have no patience for the rambling) he doesn't have the car plugged in so it's not a relevant test - 2A@240V .

It is very relevant, because this is the data that the BMS is reporting. And the BMS I am sure knows the spec for each part and how much power it draws...

Where do you see that 2A 240V? In the car or outside meter? Do you have a screenshot?

 

[TimothyHW3]

I live in a hot area of the country and my experience over six plus years (129K miles) is that A/C takes very little (unless you set it to LO or something silly like that) and heat uses a lot--even if you end the charge before you start to drive and preheat the cabin.

You have to understand one thing, this is a Model 3 forum and from what we have seen and measured the Model 3 has a very inefficient HVAC system. I can again forward you to Nyland who has measured this both in cold and warm weather. Something to the effect of factor 2-3 more inefficient than an S and X.

From what I have measured and 3 hot evenings(27°C or 78-80F) spend in the car, the car uses a lot of kW for A/C.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

And the BMS I am sure knows the spec for each part and how much power it draws...

Yeah but the battery does not power the AC-DC converter!

In the car or outside meter? Do you have a screenshot?

In the car. I had a picture but deleted it a while ago. Easy enough to reproduce.

 

[TimothyHW3]

Yeah but the battery does not power the AC-DC converter!



In the car. I had a picture but deleted it a while ago. Easy enough to reproduce.

Well yeah, I did, it is in my video this is why I asked. When I turned off HVAC A/C and used the air blower only it drops to 0A and 1V in my video.

Also, I don't quite understand where the 500W will come from. A 5k retina 27inch with i7 6 core will run at around 120-160W for both monitor and CPU and everything, so I really don't understand how a 17inch and a small MCU can pull more if everything else is idle.
Undocumented | TeslaTap

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Well yeah, I did, it is in my video this is why I asked. When I turned off HVAC A/C and used the air blower only it drops to 0A and 1V in my video.

You perhaps just weren't watching carefully. It only lasts for 20-30 seconds max before the EVSE decides to turn off so you have to be watching for it.

Here's a couple pictures the first at 3:48 shows just after I turned off HVAC. It's still ramping down (fan was spooling down). The next picture at 3:49 was taken 22 seconds later. HVAC has been off for a while at that point. It's definitely not doing anything. You can get this same behavior to happen too by simply reducing the charging level (though some EVSE will quickly turn off, so it depends), so this is not some residual from HVAC.

This is not that hard to conceive. We know the overhead during charging is 250W or so!

it is in my video this is why I asked.

I watched as much of your video as I could fast scrolling through it, and as far as I can tell you did not capture the relevant scenario where you had HVAC on then turned it off (that part of the video is cut I believe). I might have missed it, but I did try to find the relevant time period where you would see this. I saw HVAC off with the EVSE relay open (showing 1V). But that was it.

 

[TimothyHW3]

I will check with the car plugged in and see what the BMS reports and the car. I think 150-250Watts is going to be the most I see though.

I will also test with the screen in clean mode and see how much the screen pulls.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I don't quite understand where the 500W will come from.

Part of it is the AC-DC converter. There's the DC-DC as well. Remember the BMS does not power the AC-DC converter. I did not turn off my lights for the pictures above, BTW. So that is part of it. Maybe 50W. The Bjorn video is interesting because it provides an approximate level of power for the car's systems (from the battery, not the wall). But before he started playing the game at 1:56 it was already 230W + (this would be close to 270W from the wall).

So add the AC-DC converter overhead, and you can easily imagine getting to 360W - its only another 90W or so at most.

230W+ (from the battery) for the car's systems seems pretty high, TBH. But it is what it is. I could see the engineering requirement being less than 1% impact to range at highway speeds (which is what it ends up being - 80mph takes about 25kW). It definitely seems like there is plenty of room for optimization there - but it's just not worth it from a driving perspective - there is not much to gain. However, these numbers come into play when vampire drain is a concern - and then the level of consumption of these various accessories becomes unconscionable, as there is apparently no way to turn them off when topping up the 12V battery.