[Rumor]Tesla is reducing speed of Supercharging as your Tesla gets older

[ODE90D]

As your Tesla gets older the maximum kW you experience while charging at the SuC will drop and charging take longer. Unofficially several Tesla employees have explained this as a limitation that has been implemented to protect the battery, but the details of the "algorithm" seem to be unknown and officially Tesla has never explained themselves in this matter.

Personally I find it unacceptable Tesla makes such changes to my car post purchase. What is next - reduced acceleration when they get concerned about the wear and tear from too many quick starts?

It seems that something happens once you pass approx. 30-40.000 miles. The charging curve changes and especially those with the new battery chemistry introduced in the 90D back in 2015 seem to be hit hard by the preventive measures. Several 90' owners report a drop from a max of 115 kW to 96 kW once they passed approx 50.000 km.

I have prepared a Google Sheet in which I hope those of you with a high milage (+30.000 miles) will maintain your SuC charging statistics at least once - and especially those with 90Ds. Note there are 2 tabs, one for metric (km) and another for imperial (miles) - just make your pick. Make sure the battery is warm and not sharing a pair of stalls.

Tesla Supercharging Speeds

Please do no highjack this thread with all the usual comments about battery temperature, sharing stalls etc. I know how all these things influence charge speed and can assure you it has been taken into account.

 

[Aieukl378]

I always believe unofficial news from new members. Have you heard about the child sex trafficking ring working out of the pizza place near the Fremont plant...just awful!

 

[bonnie]

This makes no sense. Zero. Sorry, just doesn't. Rate of charge is not the issue with maintaining battery life - but rather things like sitting at 100% for extended periods or zeroing out on a regular basis.

Did you talk to Tesla Engineering? Or someone at a local store?

 

[wycolo]

I'm guessing they are reducing the initial surge as you plug into SuC having arrived with, say, under 40 miles remaining. Fine by me since it won't add that much extra time to the charge cycle and will extend the life of a nicely broken in battery. But are they going by vin # or the (possibly replaced) battery serial #?
--

 

[ODE90D]

@bonnie: You can argue all you want, but the numbers don't lie - so please update the sheet if you are in the "target group"

I had my logs analyzed by Tesla Engineering and waited for two months before I got the message from them (I assume they were the ones analyzing the logs).

 

[TexasEV]

I call BS on this one.

 

[malcolm]

That's fine. As I get older I take longer to pee; drink coffee; walk.

Also, you're forgetting to rant about calendar life - as the pack ages the capacity reduces.

Maybe it balances out your proposed reducing supercharger rate.

You're also neglecting any developments in supercharger technology.

Also if you drive like a loon that will have an adverse effect on the battery. Driving like Miss Daisy won't.

TLDR; Entropy. It's everywhere. Get used to it.

 

[bonnie]

@bonnie: You can argue all you want, but the numbers don't lie - so please update the sheet if you are in the "target group"

I had my logs analyzed by Tesla Engineering and waited for two months before I got the message from them (I assume they were the ones analyzing the logs).

There is a difference between 'Tesla is limiting our charging' (what you implied) and a battery that is charging more slowly because of age / lowered capacity (which is what appears to have been told to you by someone who implied the info came from Tesla Engineering). An aging battery would make more sense. Rate of charge harming the battery still makes no sense.

 

[ODE90D]

There is a difference between 'Tesla is limiting our charging' (what you implied) and a battery that is charging more slowly because of age / lowered capacity (which is what appears to have been told to you by someone who implied the info came from Tesla Engineering). An aging battery would make more sense. Rate of charge harming the battery still makes no sense.

The message I got was that Tesla had reduced it intentionally to protect the battery.

 

[eye.surgeon]

OP lacks the forum credibility to make such a significant claim.

 

[wcfinvader]

I have standing in this area. With more than 90k miles on our pack we have noticed the exact opposite. Our charge rate got faster with age. Not because of the car though but because of revisions in the superchargers. When our car was new we got fast charging but our top speed ever achieved was achieved on our trip to Chicago back in mid January. 118-119kwh was the top speed ever achieved in our Classic 85. I claim myth busted with respect to Classic 85s anyhow. I would give you a update next time we supercharge but I'm unsure if we will have our originally battery pack back because of the failure we had. If you want info on that look at my other thread and don't hijack this one about it please.

 

[strider]

This is how the launch mode counters thread started. The early pages were the usual suspects piling on that the OP was full of crap, shorting Tesla, etc etc. Turns out they were right and caught Tesla in a major cock up. Let's collect some data and see if the OPs claims bear out. Maybe they misunderstood their SC or maybe Tesla is playing games. Wouldn't be the first time...

 

[abasile]

One of my complaints about the Nissan LEAF EV, shared by many long-time owners, is that as the battery pack degrades, the BMS (battery management system) limits regenerative braking to a greater extent. This is supposed to protect the battery pack from faster degradation due to increased internal resistance and consequent heating, I believe. In situations where our LEAF may have allowed 25-30 kW of regen in the past, it now allows only 10-15 kW. This is a real bummer when descending hills and mountains!

Given that Tesla battery packs incorporate thermal management and have proven to be far less susceptible to degradation than Nissan's packs, this should prove to be much less of a concern here. However, from older packs, I would expect there to be slightly less power available for peak acceleration, and potentially a slight hit to the maximum Supercharging speed. Probably not enough to significantly affect usability, though.

 

[ODE90D]

I cannot believe all these stupid comments from you guys. I am only repeating information I have from Tesla and yet some of you call me a liar?! What kind of a forum is this?

My point with the post is to collect some fact based information about charging patterns for different batteries of different age/mileage as there seems to be something strange going on. If you want to contribute It's great - if not don't.

 

[jelloslug]

As your Tesla gets older the maximum kW you experience while charging at the SuC will drop and charging take longer. Unofficially several Tesla employees have explained this as a limitation that has been implemented to protect the battery, but the details of the "algorithm" seem to be unknown and officially Tesla has never explained themselves in this matter.

Personally I find it unacceptable Tesla makes such changes to my car post purchase. What is next - reduced acceleration when they get concerned about the wear and tear from too many quick starts?

It seems that something happens once you pass approx. 30-40.000 miles. The charging curve changes and especially those with the new battery chemistry introduced in the 90D back in 2015 seem to be hit hard by the preventive measures. Several 90' owners report a drop from a max of 115 kW to 96 kW once they passed approx 50.000 km.

I have prepared a Google Sheet in which I hope those of you with a high milage (+30.000 miles) will maintain your SuC charging statistics at least once - and especially those with 90Ds. Note there are 2 tabs, one for metric (km) and another for imperial (miles) - just make your pick. Make sure the battery is warm and not sharing a pair of stalls.

Tesla Supercharging Speeds

Please do no highjack this thread with all the usual comments about battery temperature, sharing stalls etc. I know how all these things influence charge speed and can assure you it has been taken into account.

Looks like I will have to post this twice today:

 

[jelloslug]

I cannot believe all these stupid comments from you guys. I am only repeating information I have from Tesla and yet some of you call me a liar?! What kind of a forum is this?

My point with the post is to collect some fact based information about charging patterns for different batteries of different age/mileage as there seems to be something strange going on. If you want to contribute It's great - if not don't.

Too many trolls come in here and have some wild new "data" that people that have been tinkering with these cars for years have never seen all the time. If something like that was in the firmware of the car it would have been found long ago.

 

[wcfinvader]

I cannot believe all these stupid comments from you guys. I am only repeating information I have from Tesla and yet some of you call me a liar?! What kind of a forum is this?

My point with the post is to collect some fact based information about charging patterns for different batteries of different age/mileage as there seems to be something strange going on. If you want to contribute It's great - if not don't.

I posted relevant DATA so if you're saying that I'm calling you a liar then so be it. I've never seen any unusual slow down of supercharging.

 

[Electroman]

The message I got was that Tesla had reduced it intentionally to protect the battery.

.. and this is somehow bad ?

My Lexus does not have the same level of acceleration that it had now at 100K miles as much as it was when it was new.

 

[Jopo43]

I don't call bs I call gm ....or ford...or any other Dino car maker that really doesn't want to sell electric cars.... oh the bolt ...compliance car

 

[ODE90D]

I posted relevant DATA so if you're saying that I'm calling you a liar then so be it. I've never seen any unusual slow down of supercharging.

Thanks for your contribution

As I wrote in my initial post it seems to be the new battery chemistry introduced in the first 90Ds where the most significant changes in peak are registered.

It will be interesting to see if we can see some patterns when we have more data.