Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

Undocumented supercharging feature?

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
Well, I posted on page one, and got to test this out from my trip to Seattle this past weekend. I got to see an confirm some specifics. I had charged at home before my trip, and then set the charge limit at 60%, to make sure that the first charging stop would have to make that decision about going past the limit. I had no cell signal at the location (Baker City, OR), so I couldn't watch it in realtime, but I saw what it had done when I got back to the car.
(1) Yes, it blew right through my charging limit, without any notification.
(2) There was disagreement on page 1 about what it would then do. It does not continue all the way up to 100%. It was stopped when I got back to the car at 190-some miles, which is less than my 80%. So it was going by its "ready to go" mark, apparently, but its opinion of "ready to go" was only showing a 7% buffer at arrival! That sucks, so I moved the limit up and restarted charging to get more margin before leaving.

So it seems to be kind of the worst of both worlds. It doesn't respect your charge limit, and it still doesn't charge high enough.

(3) And someone mentioned about how it may be using the charge limit level to decide on its recommendations. Like if you have it set at 90 or 100%, it would try to go for really long charges to skip over Superchargers, but with a lower limit set, it might be trying for short charges and more stops. Not totally conclusive, but doesn't seem like the case. I was at Baker City, Oregon with a 60% limit, and it still decided to try to overcharge to go skip over Pendleton to get to Kennewick, Washington.
 
Well, I posted on page one, and got to test this out from my trip to Seattle this past weekend. I got to see an confirm some specifics. I had charged at home before my trip, and then set the charge limit at 60%, to make sure that the first charging stop would have to make that decision about going past the limit. I had no cell signal at the location (Baker City, OR), so I couldn't watch it in realtime, but I saw what it had done when I got back to the car.
(1) Yes, it blew right through my charging limit, without any notification.
(2) There was disagreement on page 1 about what it would then do. It does not continue all the way up to 100%. It was stopped when I got back to the car at 190-some miles, which is less than my 80%. So it was going by its "ready to go" mark, apparently, but its opinion of "ready to go" was only showing a 7% buffer at arrival! That sucks, so I moved the limit up and restarted charging to get more margin before leaving.

So it seems to be kind of the worst of both worlds. It doesn't respect your charge limit, and it still doesn't charge high enough.

(3) And someone mentioned about how it may be using the charge limit level to decide on its recommendations. Like if you have it set at 90 or 100%, it would try to go for really long charges to skip over Superchargers, but with a lower limit set, it might be trying for short charges and more stops. Not totally conclusive, but doesn't seem like the case. I was at Baker City, Oregon with a 60% limit, and it still decided to try to overcharge to go skip over Pendleton to get to Kennewick, Washington.

Yep, same results I got this past weekend while confirming. I think I'll just set the charge limit to 100% for trips and set it down to 90% for the last charge of the day and then back to 75% when I get back home.
 
  • Like
Reactions: .jg. and Rocky_H
Yep, same results I got this past weekend while confirming. I think I'll just set the charge limit to 100% for trips and set it down to 90% for the last charge of the day and then back to 75% when I get back home.
Exactly. Trip Planner seems like more cons than pros. I'd rather just leave my limit at 100% when traveling, so it's being productive with the time and not sitting idle if I'm still heading back to the car, and I'll just set each next sequential Supercharger as my destination, so you still get the appropriate ready to go notices.
 
  • Like
Reactions: .jg.
On road trips you should always have it set to 100%. If you take a longer break, the car might as well pick up more energy. There is zero advantage to stop it earlier. It won't save you time driving to the next station, but it will save you time charging at the next station when you continue your trip. I'd say, great feature!

(The only time you don't want to charge to 100% is when your next leg is a lot of strong downhill right in the beginning. )
 
  • Like
Reactions: .jg. and TexasEV