Substantial phantom drain between 60-70%

[afty]

This has been a long standing issue with my 2019 Model 3 LR. When I park the car with the battery between 60-70%, it loses substantial charge just sitting there. For example, today I parked in my 65 degree garage with the battery at 67%. An hour later it was at 63%. Sentry was off and no one touched the car during that time. The car’s energy app attributes this to “vehicle standby.”

This only happens between 60-70%. At other battery levels no charge would be lost.

My best guess is that this is not real battery drain but just inaccuracy in the battery gauge. Back of the envelope, the car would have to draw 3 kW to drain the battery 4% in an hour, which seems unlikely.

Has anyone else seen behavior like this?

 

[Benito1283]

I notice similar phantom drain. Like 2-3% lost overnight about 1/3 of the time (plugged in or not). 1/3 of the time the charge stays the same.

The other 1/3 of the time the percentage actually goes up 2-3% when I drive the next day. For this reason I agree it’s likely just the calibration/estimation jiggling around a bit, not actual battery drain.

 

[KenC]

What does the Energy screen under Park show? Is most of the change listed under Vehicle Standby?

Generally, if I see a drop, it's because my warm battery has cooled off. Conversely, if I take my cold battery and park it out in the sun for a few hours, it'll be higher.

 

[afty]

What does the Energy screen under Park show? Is most of the change listed under Vehicle Standby?

Generally, if I see a drop, it's because my warm battery has cooled off. Conversely, if I take my cold battery and park it out in the sun for a few hours, it'll be higher.

Yes, it’s attributed to vehicle standby. I could believe the temperature hypothesis if this happened at other battery levels. But I only see this when my battery is between 60 and 70%.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

My best guess is that this is not real battery drain but just inaccuracy in the battery gauge.

Yes, this is just a BMS adjustment documented elsewhere.

It actually happens at other levels as well but it is probably different for every pack.

Don’t worry about it and ignore it.

 

[KenC]

Yes, it’s attributed to vehicle standby. I could believe the temperature hypothesis if this happened at other battery levels. But I only see this when my battery is between 60 and 70%.

View attachment 926410

Sometimes it's just coincidental that you notice it. I can see a vehicle standby drop, as I described. Here I went to the gym to workout, for an hour. I came out, it was colder, -11F, and the SOC had dropped about 4 or 5%.

Then on another day, I drove from my cold carport, to the doctor's office, where it was warm and sunny. And, after 90mins, my car showed an increase of 3%. For me, these changes are ambient temp related BMS adjustments.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Sometimes it's just coincidental that you notice it. I can see a vehicle standby drop, as I described. Here I went to the gym to workout, for an hour. I came out, it was colder, -11F, and the SOC had dropped about 4 or 5%.
View attachment 926506

Then on another day, I drove from my cold carport, to the doctor's office, where it was warm and sunny. And, after 90mins, my car showed an increase of 3%. For me, these changes are ambient temp related BMS adjustments.
View attachment 926505

Yes. And similar jumps can occur in a matter of a 15-30 minutes (as long as you are watching closely!) with no change in temperature.

 

[alexgr]

My car's energy is also going slightly mad. Sometimes the car can get 10-15 miles lost (along with %) right after charging. Sometimes, it can gain a few % of charge. I have a 19 M3LR and with 310 mi nominal that went down to as low as 265 mi (almost 15% loss). Last week the maximum went back to 295 and then to 300 mi (!). Now it came down to 290-292. ... is my car dying?

Also, my June 22 MYLR (19") with 330 original miles is running at 316 mi now (-4%).

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

My car's energy is also going slightly mad. Sometimes the car can get 10-15 miles lost (along with %) right after charging. Sometimes, it can gain a few % of charge. I have a 19 M3LR and with 310 mi nominal that went down to as low as 265 mi (almost 15% loss). Last week the maximum went back to 295 and then to 300 mi (!). Now it came down to 290-292. ... is my car dying?

Also, my June 22 MYLR (19") with 330 original miles is running at 316 mi now (-4%).

Normal.

Mine took a dump to around 285 then jumped up to 300, now is setter back to 295. Wasn’t paying attention but most likely a software change there somewhere. I know a few other people who saw increases in the same timeframe. (This is quite separate from the topic of discussion here.)

I also see this large jumping up/down after completing a charge. I check most mornings, and there is usually a loss noted. But sometimes there isn’t. (And of course the only way to see a jump is being over the charge limit set since it doesn’t count negative numbers.)
Anyway, all this jumping around is normal and nothing to worry about. If your HV battery the bed, it’s just a coincidence most likely.

 

[Jazz_MIII]

This has been a long standing issue with my 2019 Model 3 LR. When I park the car with the battery between 60-70%, it loses substantial charge just sitting there. For example, today I parked in my 65 degree garage with the battery at 67%. An hour later it was at 63%. Sentry was off and no one touched the car during that time. The car’s energy app attributes this to “vehicle standby.”

This only happens between 60-70%. At other battery levels no charge would be lost.

My best guess is that this is not real battery drain but just inaccuracy in the battery gauge. Back of the envelope, the car would have to draw 3 kW to drain the battery 4% in an hour, which seems unlikely.

Has anyone else seen behavior like this?

I drive a 2019 LR RWD and am having an issue where I park my car underground after charging to 90% and I don’t drive for 5-6 days, yet was at 50% the next time I went to drive. Sentry mode was on, but no instances reported. I’m going to test turning off cabin overheat protection because it’s obviously not needed, but I don’t understand why it’s losing so much charge?!

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I drive a 2019 LR RWD and am having an issue where I park my car underground after charging to 90% and I don’t drive for 5-6 days, yet was at 50% the next time I went to drive. Sentry mode was on, but no instances reported. I’m going to test turning off cabin overheat protection because it’s obviously not needed, but I don’t understand why it’s losing so much charge?!

Sentry mode. Look at the Park tab. Should be instructive here (though it is a pile of as explained elsewhere and can be wrong about usage contributors), chances are it will get it right.

Expect 16 miles per day or so for that car. Very roughly. In your case that works out to 20-25% so not quite right but can look at the Park tab.

Detections in Sentry Mode of course make no difference to consumption - no idea how that idea got started.

 

[AAKEE]

I park my car underground after charging to 90% and I don’t drive for 5-6 days, yet was at 50% the next time I went to drive. Sentry mode was on, but no instances reported.

As @AlanSubie4Life says, Sentry use a lot of energy.
A small add on: Sentry keeps the car awake, which means all computers is on, USS and cameras is on.
At least in cold climate/weather, there is heat in the cameras keeping the glass from frosting from ice.

A simple rule of thumb is that the car draws circa 200W with sentry on. Thats about 5kWh each day or about 6-7 to 10% each day, depending on the batterry type and level of degradation.
A LR car ”should” use about 7% each day or so, 5-6 days would cost 35-45% SOC.

So we should expect 40% plus minus a little depending on how long it was.
90-50% fits perfectly in this.

 

[KenC]

In my experience, I could lose up to 1.3miles/hr if Sentry was on. So, after 5 to 6 days, that could easily be 120+hrs, or ~160miles of range loss. You only lost 40%, so within the margin of error.

If you don't turn on Sentry, my car at the airport parking lot in the cold, with a blue snowflake, after over 7 days, just a month ago. I lost 4.2%, BUT, some part of that was the blue snowflake. I think I lost only 1.8% for the mobile app, and the 2.6% was the blue snowflake.

 

[AAKEE]

Well, I very selldom guess when I make statements. If I do, I more or less always make a note about not being sure, or even guessing

I did get SMT before the first dayt of having a Tesla and take daily looks at i since. Since > 1 ½ years I have a tablet in front of the steering wheel showing all data I need. The standard setup includes the "battery power" that the car use. So this screen I see at every drive and it is powered as long as the car is not sleeping, which means that arriving to the car when it is in sentry mode without anything else will show the consumption that the car use for sentry mode.
We can se it ripple between 0.18kW and 0.22kW, showing 0.22 more often than 0.18. Sometime it reaches 0.26 kW but it would be fair to say that 0.2kW or 200W is the appriximated power.
(Teslalogger tell med that the average battery power for the last 30 minutes is 0.24 kW during which I did have sentry on for this)

For rule of thumb, 200W is a easy number to rember, as 5kWh per day is.
The real consumption is 240 W in average and 5.76 kWh per day, for my 2021 M3P.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

In my experience, I could lose up to 1.3miles/hr if Sentry was on.

Yeah maybe my 150W estimate is too low. Been a long time since I measured. Was just assuming standard idle mode drain but maybe that number is also off (also fairly easy to measure but I never have).

Anyway the Park tab should tell the tale.

We can se it ripple between 0.18kW and 0.22kW, showing 0.22 more often than 0.18. Sometime it reaches 0.26 kW but it would be fair to say that 0.2kW or 200W is the appriximated power.

I guess you could probably tell me what park mode consumption is and if it is any lower. I suppose it would depend on whether or not the 12V is being charged. I just have a very rough estimate of 150W but 200W seems completely possible.

 

[AAKEE]

Yeah maybe my 150W estimate is too low. Been a long time since I measured. Was just assuming standard idle mode drain but maybe that number is also off (also fairly easy to measure but I never have).

Anyway the Park tab should tell the tale.

Or just use the quality number from the post above I guess we wrote them at the same time.

240W /5.76kWh per day is certified and thorougly checked by @AAKEE.
You can send *any* issues you get from using that number directly to mee. I'll take full responsibillity

Edit: I added a teslalogger log from later in the same snetry session. Here the average is down to 0.22kW.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Or just use the quality number from the post above I guess we wrote them at the same time.

240W /5.76kWh per day is certified and thorougly checked by @AAKEE.
You can send *any* issues you get from using that number directly to mee. I'll take full responsibillity

Yep - added to my post. Makes sense. Any difference sentry vs idle? Wasn’t clear to me from that post - that seemed to be a Sentry Mode number (what is relevant here of course).

“Expect 16 miles per day or so for that car. Very roughly. In your case that works out to 20-25% so not quite right but can look at the Park tab.”

Also screwed up this math (not sure how) This is at a minimum 27.5% or so and probably more like 33%. Anyway it’s just Sentry mode and I should have left it at that!

 

[AAKEE]

Yep - added to my post. Makes sense. Any difference sentry vs idle? Wasn’t clear to me from that post - that seemed to be a Sentry Mode number (what is relevant here of course).

“Expect 16 miles per day or so for that car. Very roughly. In your case that works out to 20-25% so not quite right but can look at the Park tab.”

Also screwed up this math (not sure how) This is at a minimum 27.5% or so and probably more like 33%. Anyway it’s just Sentry mode and I should have left it at that!

Thats sentry alone, I'm sneeking around without unlocking or anything. The later picture from teslalogger, no one was in the garage, except my 3D printer printing. These values on the picture have been seen by me hundreds of time before, at *any* location when I approach the car.

For me this would be 7.5% or so each day. (5.76/(79*0,955)).

 

[Jazz_MIII]

As @AlanSubie4Life says, Sentry use a lot of energy.
A small add on: Sentry keeps the car awake, which means all computers is on, USS and cameras is on.
At least in cold climate/weather, there is heat in the cameras keeping the glass from frosting from ice.

A simple rule of thumb is that the car draws circa 200W with sentry on. Thats about 5kWh each day or about 6-7 to 10% each day, depending on the batterry type and level of degradation.
A LR car ”should” use about 7% each day or so, 5-6 days would cost 35-45% SOC.

So we should expect 40% plus minus a little depending on how long it was.
90-50% fits perfectly in this.

Thanks guys! So far from simply disabling Cabin Overheat Protection and leaving Sentry Mode active, I have already noticed a dramatic decrease in loss of energy. Parked at 75% last night and have only lost 1% so far today. I will consider this, so far, to be a win!

 

[Copes]

This has been a long standing issue with my 2019 Model 3 LR. When I park the car with the battery between 60-70%, it loses substantial charge just sitting there. For example, today I parked in my 65 degree garage with the battery at 67%. An hour later it was at 63%. Sentry was off and no one touched the car during that time. The car’s energy app attributes this to “vehicle standby.”

This only happens between 60-70%. At other battery levels no charge would be lost.

My best guess is that this is not real battery drain but just inaccuracy in the battery gauge. Back of the envelope, the car would have to draw 3 kW to drain the battery 4% in an hour, which seems unlikely.

Has anyone else seen behavior like this?

Yup. Just messaged Tesla for a look at it. I lose about 5% between 60-70%