Tesla Range - Surely there’s something wrong?!?

[Kenners]

Lots of people talk about the benefits of preheating or preconditioning before you set off as a way of boosting efficiency. Maybe I am being stupid, but can someone please explain to me how using electricity from the mains to heat the car/battery help with efficiency? You are still using energy to do this, even if it’s not coming off your state of charge (you are charging the car to provide the electricity to heat your car before you drive it) I guess it might be more efficient to pre-heat the battery at home, rather than allowing it to get up to temperature while driving? But it really just spoofs the cars actual efficiency and seems to be more of an exercise in delusion.

At the moment I can’t help but think this is the equivalent of starting a little fire under the engine of your ICE car before setting out, to get the engine to its optimal operating temperature. And then completely ignoring the energy used!

 

[26ct2143]

The others know a whole lot more on this than I do, but in short (for brevity).
In winter (so like 0c) the computer effectively reduces the battery capacity until it's warm (to protect it from low discharge in cold weather or something).
It also reduces regen, so less of the car's kinetic energy during braking goes back to the battery.
Because the battery is big and full of coolant it can take many hours to get up to optimal temperature. (ICE car might be hot in 10 minutes)
So you may well reach your destination before the full battery capacity is available, then you switch off the car.
You have to remember EVs don't really generate a great deal of heat, as that would be wasteful. In winter this can work against it compared to an ICE car.
All the above effects the range, and some of the range loss can be mitigated, if the battery is warm and the interior is warm before setting off.

 

[darkNstormy]

To get 360 miles range I reckon, it would have to be summer with optimal temperatures, AC off, 50mph continuously on the motorway with no accelerating or decelerating.

I was doing a regular trip from Teesside to Cheshire over the summer. There were a few times I did this at 60mph following lorries if I could, with aircon on at 20C, just to see how it worked out. 140 miles used 36% of the SoC (90% to 54%) and that's going over the Pennines (although I accept that means quite a bit of downhill too). If I drove 'normally' it would be about 30% SoC at the destination. As I only had granny charging available at the destination, my driving style and detours to superchargers would be dictated by how much driving was required after my arrival!

The other advantage of hypermiling in a Tesla is it's very easy to follow a lorry and you don't generally get any phantom braking (although to be honest I've been lucky enough to not experience this much at all) on autopilot in such circumstances! Probably not as good an idea when the road is wet either.

Would like to see the figures with a longer journey although I think I'd get bored. One of the other reasons for people buying a Tesla is the insane acceleration, is it not?

 

[26ct2143]

I was doing a regular trip from Teesside to Cheshire over the summer. There were a few times I did this at 60mph following lorries if I could, with aircon on at 20C, just to see how it worked out. 140 miles used 36% of the SoC (90% to 54%) and that's going over the Pennines (although I accept that means quite a bit of downhill too). If I drove 'normally' it would be about 30% SoC at the destination. As I only had granny charging available at the destination, my driving style and detours to superchargers would be dictated by how much driving was required after my arrival!

The other advantage of hypermiling in a Tesla is it's very easy to follow a lorry and you don't generally get any phantom braking (although to be honest I've been lucky enough to not experience this much at all) on autopilot in such circumstances! Probably not as good an idea when the road is wet either.

Would like to see the figures with a longer journey although I think I'd get bored. One of the other reasons for people buying a Tesla is the insane acceleration, is it not?

Yes following a lorry on autoroute in france at 55mph for hours on end in the heat with no AC switched on is almost like boredom torture.
Although running out of electrons and stuck on the side of the autoroute in france would be worse.

So when you see EVs hypermileing behind lorries, they are probably out of juice and limping it to the next (hopefully working) supercharger.

 

[MrBadger]

I'm also seeing similar range on my M3LR 2021, currently my commute of 20 miles each way uses around 20% of the battery for the round trip so extrapolates as around 200 mile range.

Thats like (conversely) comparing a sub 10 second 100m sprint and wondering why no one does a marathon in an hour 10.

That said, in warmer conditions, you should exceed the EPA efficiency with a bit of reasonable care, but still unlikely to get that range if you split it up into multiple trips as the car still uses power just doing nothing and first few miles of a journey use disproportionately more energy.

 

[MrBadger]

they are probably out of juice and limping it to the next (hopefully working) supercharger.

Busy maybe, but navigating to a supercharger then finding them not working is thankfully a concern you soon forget about.

 

[Juve]

Electric car isn’t for me? Apologies but I’m not questioning whether the car works for me or my lifestyle. That’s not an issue.

Why worry? I am definitely not worried about the car providing me with the range I need daily. Come on though, they’re advertising the vehicle with 360 miles of range which, after some research, sounded like circa 280-300 summer and 230-250 winter range. Currently, which may change once I adjust to the car better, it is no where near that.

One of the top reasons people buy a Tesla is for the battery range. Would you be happy buying a 50k car (price doesn’t really matter here though) quoting 360 miles of range but instead gave 50 miles just because your daily commute is 10 miles and you can charge at home? (Exaggerating the circumstances of course).

It’s funny but I don’t think anyone commenting has said maybe the battery could be the problem. I don’t know if that is an issue anyone else has had but logically could occur? Too early to tell yet.

 

[Medved_77]

Will wait patiently until next winter (hopefully) before I can join this debate.

Given the travel restrictions that have been in place since I purchased in March '20 I honestly think a Renault Twizzy would have sufficed.

 

[browellm]

Come on though, they’re advertising the vehicle with 360 miles of range which, after some research, sounded like circa 280-300 summer and 230-250 winter range.

As has been patiently pointed out already, this is like every car, ICE or EV, ever.

 

[Juve]

As has been patiently pointed out already, this is like every car, ICE or EV, ever.

and as I have been patiently explaining, the mentioned ranges would have been fine. However when I’m getting, not fully tested yet of course, less than 150 miles in winter I think it’s worth a query.

The ranges mentioned above are what I expected to get, in line with every other type of vehicle adjusting to weather conditions. I’m not getting anywhere near that.

 

[Juve]

I think ICE cars are generally much less effected by cold weather.
In a tesla if going long distance charge to 100% (to finish just be leaving) and preheat the battery (especially in winter)
Range will be less in winter on any EV, if you don't like it EVs aren't for you.
But remember even in winter, the fueling costs of an EV is almost always way cheaper than an ICE car.
Especially if charging at home on low rate power.
To get 360 miles range I reckon, it would have to be summer with optimal temperatures, AC off, 50mph continuously on the motorway with no accelerating or decelerating.
I did something like this in our '168 mile' leaf in france when I had a v v long drive and problems with broken superchargers (almost got stranded with flat battery).
I managed just over 175 miles on a charge (i thought it was going to stop me).

NewI think your right, ICE cars are definitely less affected by cold weather conditions and as we learn more about EV cars and how they behave this will become apparent.

“Range will be less in winter for any EV”. This is a given and I was fully aware before purchasing. The problem isn’t the range is less. The problem is how much less?? Again from my previous post, would you be happy if your LR gave you 50 miles out of a full charge just because you only did 10 miles a day and it didn’t affect you? (Exaggerated)

 

[browellm]

and as I have been patiently explaining, the mentioned ranges would have been fine. However when I’m getting, not fully tested yet of course, less than 150 miles in winter I think it’s worth a query.

Well newsflash, but the NEDC, WLTP and EPA range tests aren't done on a series of 10 miles journeys with a stone-cold battery.

 

[Juve]

Well newsflash, but the NEDC, WLTP and EPA range tests aren't done on a series of 10 miles journeys with a stone-cold battery.

So in your expert opinion, what range is acceptable when using the car as a car, varied journey lengths, on and off a few times a day, which is typical for lots of users? 200, 150, 100, 50, or is it irrelevant because you can charge the car at home?

 

[26ct2143]

I do understand your point, the only way to know for sure if there is an issue with your battery, is to charge to 100% and pre heat battery and cabin. Then drive till 1%, at a steady speed. (preferably with no heating on)

But figures are often misleading, the Mitsubishi outlander PHEV supposedly does 156.9mpg, maybe on a set of rollers in a lab. Nobody could ever hope to get that in 1 million years in the real world.

 

[Kenners]

As it stands we don’t even seem to get the town/motorway range breakdown do we, I have only ever seen the headline WLTP/EPA test number.

 

[Juve]

I do understand your point, the only way to know for sure if there is an issue with your battery, is to charge to 100% and pre heat battery and cabin. Then drive till 1%, at a steady speed. (preferably with no heating on)

But figures are often misleading, the Mitsubishi outlander PHEV supposedly does 156.9mpg, maybe on a set of rollers in a lab. Nobody could ever hope to get that in 1 million years in the real world.

I’m hopefully not questioning the battery at this point and when the weather gets better and mixing some longer journeys into it, I would expect better range more in line with comments I have seen throughout the forums from other users. Everyone drives differently so there will of course be some variation but if I still get less than 150 miles on warmer days and slightly longer commutes added in, then I think there is an issue. Time will tell.

 

[browellm]

So in your expert opinion, what range is acceptable when using the car as a car, varied journey lengths, on and off a few times a day, which is typical for lots of users? 200, 150, 100, 50, or is it irrelevant because you can charge the car at home?

To a point it's irrelevant, because as long as the car has "enough" range for it do the job I want then I'm not concerned by range anxiety. The car's efficiency doesn't concern me either because it is orders of magnitude more efficient and cheaper to run than an ICE vehicle.

If you want to see better efficiency in the vehicle for the types of journeys you described, then look into preconditioning the battery.

This article is quite good at describing how the ranges are calculated. You'll soon see why there can be so much variance with range. This goes for ANY car not just EVs. Electric car range tests are a nightmare for consumers - Gearbrain

FWIW, the exact same outcomes would occur in my 330d using the cycles you described, with two differences:
1) the 330d has a much larger 'tank'. I don't drive that to 0% either but as a percentage I have more available miles before refuelling than a M3.
2) Although it has a range figure in the OBC, I never use it because it's misleading. I'm guided by the fuel gauge. Which is why everyone here will you suggest you switch off the range view immediately and move to the % based view.

 

[Glan gluaisne]

So in your expert opinion, what range is acceptable when using the car as a car, varied journey lengths, on and off a few times a day, which is typical for lots of users? 200, 150, 100, 50, or is it irrelevant because you can charge the car at home?

All cars, whatever fuel they use, vary massively in efficiency depending on a whole stack of factors, from temperature through driving style, to terrain and average journey length.

In cold weather, all cars, irrespective of the fuel they use, will be between 10% and 20% less efficient than they will be in warmer weather. EVs will suffer more in cold weather, and short journeys, because they use usable battery energy to heat the car and battery pack, rather than engine waste heat.

Most EVs have the equivalent of a pretty small fuel tank when compared to an ICE car. For example, a petrol engined car with a 50 litre fuel tank has a usable energy storage capacity of about 438 kWh. A Tesla Model 3 LR has a usable energy storage capacity of a bit over 70 kWh, perhaps around 74 kWh (the actual figure isn't clear from Tesla, AFAIK). Even though electric propulsion is around 3 to 4 times more efficient than a petrol engine, there is still a big disparity between the amount of usable energy available between the two.

Losing 20% of range in winter for an ICE car may not be that noticeable, even though most cars do lose this sort of range in cold weather. Losing 20% of range in winter for an EV, with its shorter maximum range, is far more noticeable. I gave evidence of this earlier, showing that my old Prius lost around 150 miles of range every winter, compared to the official range figure. This wasn't really an issue, as it just meant the range drop was from the official figure of ~650 miles to a real figure of ~500 miles. For me at that time it meant stopping to fill with fuel a day earlier in winter than I needed to in summer.

The key thing with any EV is that the "fuel" is very cheap when compared to petrol or diesel. I charge at night, using an off-peak tariff, that costs 9p/kWh. The effective cost of petrol (allowing for the efficiency difference) is around 40 to 50p/kWh. This means that using, say, an extra 20% or 30% of electricity to precondition the car, in order to reduce range loss in cold weather, doesn't really make much of a difference - the fuel cost will still be a fraction of the cost of using petrol or diesel.

 

[LukeUK]

In my experience, your extrapolation of what is actually a non-linear relationship, is creating a problem that doesn't exist, at least not to the extent you think it does, in most circumstances.

If you have a home charger, or access to nearby charging, it doesn't really matter if your short range efficiency is low, because it's a short journey and you can get home and charge up overnight. i.e. you don't need to worry about multiple journeys in between trips to the pump, as you would with an ICE.

A long journey is not the same as multiple short journeys. You only need to get the battery warm once, you only need to heat the cabin once (ok, there are losses, but it's not a big deal).

My own personal experience (2020 M3 LR) is that range 'loss' with the car sat on the drive, and me doing local journeys, is pretty poor. TeslaFi regularly reports efficiencies worse than 400 Wh/mile. I like to pre-heat the car if it's freezing outside and a lot of journeys are <10 miles, so if I don't preheat, the battery doesn't get warm and I don't get full regen. I happily use a few kWh pre-heating on battery. It doesn't matter. I use Octopus Go and I am currently charging around once a week. There's no point pre-heating on mains from a cost or range perspective, so I use pre-heat using the battery.

I often commute for work. For the last 6-8 months or so, around lock-downs, etc. I have been commuting 220 miles early on a Monday morning. In the summer, I could do this with 80% charge and still arrive with 25% ish. In the winter, especially when it dipped below zero, I charged to 100% and would still arrive with 20%. Yes, the efficiency has dropped, but I still made the same journey, the same driving style and it didn't affect my plans.

When it was -6°C when I left, I did splash and dash at the services using an ecotricity 11 kW AC charger (so limited charge, the CCS charger is broken, what a surprise), for the time it took me to go for a pee and buy breakfast - 30 mins or so. I still arrived at my destination at the same time, and I probably needn't have bothered with the charge.

Last summer, I did a 300 mile round trip in a day, no charging, country roads, 50 mph or so. I arrived home with 3 miles range showing. Probably a bit silly of me but it proves a point (did to me, anyway) - the range is attainable, in moderately ideal circumstances.

My advice is to actually do some longer journeys before you conclude that it's all doom and gloom. if you are in a position to schedule your charge to finish just before you depart, all the better.

 

[init6]

Changed to percentage and will now monitor drain over night.
.

and as I have been patiently explaining, the mentioned ranges would have been fine. However when I’m getting, not fully tested yet of course, less than 150 miles in winter I think it’s worth a query.
.

A lot of people here are saying that it's normal to lose power when its cold and I don't dispute that. What we don't know at this point is wether the loss Juve is seeing is normal or not. So all the talk of EV vs ICE is a bit premature until we see what sort of loss Juve is getting.

There are plenty of posts - mostly on the 2020.48.30 thread - about people seeing much increased loss after that update, myself included. I think Kenners saw the same in this thread. So let's see what the drain really is and then start looking for the causes. Until then we're just guessing and IMHO muddying the waters.