Set Charging Limit - set to a value less than 50%?

[RobertSeattle]

Is there a technical reason why we can't set the charging limit to a value less than 50%? There are times when drivers may want to limit charging to a lower value.

Example: Getting back from a long drive at night. I need a little bit of charge by morning, but not allot. I want to do my actual charging during the day when my solar panels are being productive.

 

[liuping]

It's a fairly uncommon case to want to change less than 50%. For those rare cases, you can stop the charge manually with the app.

 

[RobertSeattle]

It's a fairly uncommon case to want to change less than 50%. For those rare cases, you can stop the charge manually with the app.

Of course, but I would have to wake and do that. I'm just curious if there is a reason why Tesla set 50% as the lower limit.

 

[liuping]

Of course, but I would have to wake and do that. I'm just curious if there is a reason why Tesla set 50% as the lower limit.

Ah, in California, with net metering, it's much cheaper to charge at night during super off peak rates, and save the solar for for the peak rate credits.

 

[jelloslug]

You could look into putting a timer circuit on your charging equipment.

 

[David_Cary]

No technical reason - they were just trying to KISS. There seems to be no battery advantage to going below 50% but of course there could be other reasons.

You could come home with 10% and want to get to 30% right away for battery longevity reasons and then wait until low rates to go to 50%. But - not an option.

I wouldn't hold my breath either.

Now - I would think an app could do it. It would be great to have an app that would allow all sorts of edge charging scenarios - is any developer listening. Would be particularly nice if we could change amperage too. This becomes important when net metering goes away.

 

[skrenes]

I believe the reason Tesla doesn't allow less than 50% is because they want to encourage people to keep the battery at its ideal state for storage/longevity (which happens to be around 40-50%).

Would be particularly nice if we could change amperage too. This becomes important when net metering goes away.

The unofficial Tesla API is described here. As you can see, there is no known way to change the amperage. Perhaps if enough people asked Tesla, we could get that added as a feature. I can imagine a number of good reasons to have it such as matching solar ouput, down regulating for appliances (dryer, stove, etc) for homes that only have 100A service, etc.

 

[m2gmoi]

I can see a strong reason to set the low charging limit to say... 20%, because one might want to cycle the battery through 20-100% once in awhile. Instead of having to start the charging process at 50%

 

[kayak1]

Is there a technical reason why we can't set the charging limit to a value less than 50%? There are times when drivers may want to limit charging to a lower value.

Example: Getting back from a long drive at night. I need a little bit of charge by morning, but not allot. I want to do my actual charging during the day when my solar panels are being productive.

I have an SC that we stop at on the way home which would benefit from a lower max, I would like the charger to stop at 35%, which will get me home ~5%. I rather charge with my banked solar credits.
We walk the dog while charging. I usually end up unplugging in the 40s as the car charges very quickly when the pack is at a low SOC.