Hey Tesla community, I have a quick question about pre-conditioning the battery on my Model Y. Do I need to do it every single time I drive the car, or just in the mornings? And what about on the weekends when I may go out at random times? I want to make sure I'm taking the best care of my battery and getting the most out of it. Any advice or guidance would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!
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Tesla Battery Preconditioning: When, How, and Why You Should Do It
- Thread starter kelkel
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Scheduled Departure Preconditioning is a convenience if you leave each weekday/everyday at the same time. Otherwise turning on the Climate Control from the Tesla app shortly before you head out means never having to get into a cold vehicle in winter. This usually takes under 10 minutes but in very cold weather the time need to bring the passenger cabin to your desired temperature could take longer. (If you park outside, in winter, there is a separate button you can activate within the Tesla app under Climate Control to defrost the vehicle.)
If it is cold enough you will see a blue snowflake symbol that indicates the battery is cold. A cold battery will not provide maximum performance when accelerating and regenerative braking will be limited (so limited that you may experience a total absence of regenerative braking.)
Tesla added a setting under Pedals & Steering that will apply the friction brakes anytime regenerative braking is reduced or unavailable (battery too cold, battery too full.) If you enable this setting the Tesla Model Y will slow as expected even when the battery is cold.
If the battery is cold enough you will see three vertical orange heat grid lines. This symbol (looks like three strips of sizzl'n bacon) indicates that the battery is automatically being warmed.
Preconditioning the battery prior to Supercharging (raises the battery to a much higher temperature) happens automatically provided you enter the Supercharger location as the next waypoint or destination in the Tesla Navigation system. This ensures the quickest and most efficient charging session when Supercharging.
If it is cold enough you will see a blue snowflake symbol that indicates the battery is cold. A cold battery will not provide maximum performance when accelerating and regenerative braking will be limited (so limited that you may experience a total absence of regenerative braking.)
Tesla added a setting under Pedals & Steering that will apply the friction brakes anytime regenerative braking is reduced or unavailable (battery too cold, battery too full.) If you enable this setting the Tesla Model Y will slow as expected even when the battery is cold.
If the battery is cold enough you will see three vertical orange heat grid lines. This symbol (looks like three strips of sizzl'n bacon) indicates that the battery is automatically being warmed.
Preconditioning the battery prior to Supercharging (raises the battery to a much higher temperature) happens automatically provided you enter the Supercharger location as the next waypoint or destination in the Tesla Navigation system. This ensures the quickest and most efficient charging session when Supercharging.
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Thanks for all your information. That’s very helpful for newbies like me. Another question come up, in winter when do you use defrost and climate? Also do you need to precondition your battery when summer. Thank you!
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E90alex
Active Member
Don’t worry about the battery. Like I said the manual and scheduled preconditioning is mainly for cabin comfort and does not do much to the battery in any significant manner.
Precondition if you want the cabin to be a more comfortable temperature when you get in.
You use defrost in the winter when you want to defrost snow and ice build up. There is no need to overthink any of this.
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The Defrost Vehicle button is there for those times when your Tesla vehicle has been parked outdoors and you return to find the vehicle covered in ice and/or snow. You should clear deep snow from the vehicle with a snow brush. The Defrost Vehicle button combines several climate control settings into one command. Turning on Defrost Vehicle using the Tesla App Climate Control function turns the cabin heating, turns on the front defroster to Max Defrost and also turns on the rear window defroster. The charge port will also be heated. The B pillar cameras, front cameras will also be heated. If you have set the steering wheel heater to come on during preconditioning then the steering wheel will be heated. If the front seat heaters are set to Auto then these seat heaters will automatically warm the front seats.
You never need to precondition the battery (fall, winter, spring or summer.) The Tesla Model Y's battery management system will automatically warm or cool the battery as required. You can control preconditioning for Supercharging (a special form of battery preconditioning) by using the Tesla Navigation system when navigating to a Supercharger location. The Tesla Model Y may start to precondition the battery for optimal Supercharging when your Model Y is still a good 30 minutes/30 miles away from the Supercharger location (when on a road trip.)
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You never need to at all. These are just for your own convenience or comfort if you feel like it, but this isn't something you need to do to protect or care for or baby your battery. If it's cold, it will take care of itself anyway, by just limiting its own input and output until it warms up some. So you can't hurt it by preconditioning or not preconditioning it.
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I need to learn more about how to use a super charger. I used one for the first time the other day, sent the info to the car. But, I got there in like 5 minutes. The max charge was like 81kw, even though said a 250kw charger. I got some message about
pre conditioning I did not understand.
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That will happen when you start out driving and are close to the Supercharger location. (5 minutes is not enough time.) I have observed that the Tesla Model may perform some battery warming while Supercharging to improve the efficiency and speed of the Supercharging session.
On a road trip Superchargers may be spaced 100 miles or more apart. This affords plenty of time for the Tesla Model Y to fully precondition the battery for next Supercharger charging session. When you enter your destination in the Navigation System (else enter the Supercharger location as the destination) the Tesla Model will preconditon the battery for Supercharging.
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It's not necessary to learn more, but there are details that will explain what's happening so it won't feel like unmet expectations.
The 250 kW number is like "up to" wording. That's the maximum capability the station can put out, but there are factors with the car of how much of that it can use at the time. The most ideal conditions to get that fastest charging rate generally needs these things:
Large size battery
Mostly empty battery
Very warm battery
So you probably had the opposite of at least one of those conditions, which would explain the 81 kW.
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Thanks, still was really happy with 81kw charging compared to my home 11kw. Going to try the CSS adapter and see what happens
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You want the Tesla Model Y's battery state of charge to ideally be at or less than 30% when you begin a Supercharger charging session. This is essential to be able to charge anywhere close to the maximum charging rate for the Supercharger station.
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That's not going to make it faster. It's just like your car being bilingual so it can talk to two different kinds of stations. It will still have the same limitations.
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Silicon Desert
Well-Known Member
yup, that is me as well. I might have done it 4 or 5 times in the last 6 years. While I applaud folks that like to get the most out of their car batteries, in reality it is a waste of effort in many cases. OP, just drive the car and enjoy it.
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Silicon Desert
Well-Known Member
Yes, Rocky, you reminded me of a conversation I had with AT&T last week on the phone when checking for the price and internet bandwidth speed they provide for this area. I had to tell him 4 times to stop telling the speed it "goes up to", I want to know the minimum speed you are going to guarantee. He couldn't answer the question. You and many others here know that 250 number is rarely achieved and if it is, then it isn't for very long.
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