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What is best for the battery?

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From what I understand:

  • Maintaining a 70-90% battery charge state is best for the battery health long term
  • Battery heat is bad (eg, >100 degrees outside)
  • Supercharging is bad for the battery (lots of stress on the battery + heat)

My questions are:
  • Assuming I can charge every day
    • Is charging at a lower amperage better for the battery health (thinking: less heat, lower stress)
      • eg, should I recharge at 8 or 10 amps instead of 30+ because I am at the office for >8 hours -- so don't need to 'rush' the charge at full L2 speed.
  • I use 80 miles of range per day
    • Should I charge every day to get it back into the 70-90% charge range or wait until I am in the 30-50% range and then charge (eg, every ~3-4 days vs daily)
 
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There are published curves which reflect the optimal charging rates and capacities of Tesla's batteries. In general, its best to keep the battery under 80% and above 20% SOC, although recently Elon has stated that there is not much of a difference in the long term between 80 and 90 percent. I would also suspect that there is not a significant difference between 8-10 AMP rate of charge and 30 AMP rate of charge at an L1 charger like there would be at 120-250kWh super charging session which is several orders of magnitude faster than your proposed charging rate.

If you are finding that you're often in excess SOC in reserve and you don't need it for emergencies, it may make sense to drop back your frequency and SOC. I've been keeping my car between 65-80% whereas I used to keep it at 90% after I read Elon's tweet simply because it is not a requirement that I have. The data I have seen on this seems to indicate that this is better for the battery, although it was based on older battery technology.

Interestingly, there is some data which appears to suggest that Super Charging at rapid charging rates is not only NOT bad for your battery, but may be suitable for it because it reduces the amount of time the battery is subjected to heat. Similarly, there is also data which indicates it is good to exercise the battery periodically to full capacity and down again.

The challenge I have with these statistics is that they're subject to change as the battery chemistry and design changes. In 2014, Elon Musk tweeted that its best to keep the battery between 30-80% SOC. Here is some data which suggests keeping the battery charged to 70% is optimal: https://electrek.co/2018/04/14/tesla-battery-degradation-data/.

Newer battery technology seems to be more forgiving, and one battery expert I know personally who is involved in Tesla Battery mentioned to me that it really doesn't harm the battery to take it up to 90%. Nevertheless, my rule of thumb is, if I don't need to do it, I won't.
 
People overthink this way too much. Just leave it plugged in whenever you can. Set your upper charger limit to what you need, somewhere between 50-90%. Charge to 100% if immediately going on a trip. When supercharging, plan to arrive at between 10-20% battery at the next supercharger, charge to 70% or so and move into the next charger if you can, when you get to your destination plug into something.
 
I tend to go with the manual on things such as these. While I don't often read them, and some things don't even come with printed ones these days. In this case the care of the end product by the consumer can dictate its longevity or usefulness. I think it is warranted to read in these such cases. Plus I haven't read much if any recent information from Tesla saying different publicly regarding charging.

Tesla is also the one providing the warranty. I wouldn't want to say to Tesla, I do X because I decided on the 1 of 8500 different battery charging techniques on the internet.

Which is why I just leave it plugged in. Charge to 90% and walk away. Still holding in at 319-321 on a full charge. Should have 40k in miles by Memorial Day.
 
Why are there so many restrictions on Tesla battery? I have not heard of a single thing on Fiat, VW, Bolt, BMW etc on so many restrictions.

There are not. This is a forum of mostly techie people - many engineers and scientists - and the rest overly OCD people who just want to treat the battery “optimally” even if the benefits are irrelevant or theoretical.

It’s no different than car enthusiasts discussing how much it matters if you overfill your engine oil by a quarter liter.
 
It makes little difference charging every day vs charging every other day if you don't drive much in a day. I would probably charge every day just in case you have something coming up and need more driving.

Charging at 10 vs 20 vs 32 vs 48 Amp makes no difference. If the wiring in your house is poor, maybe that's a reason to charge at a lower power level, but for the battery it makes absolutely no difference.

Supercharging is a little more stressful for the battery, but it would only become an issue if you did that every day. But then if you drive so much that you need to supercharge every day, the amount of battery usage just as a result of driving the car so much is wearing the battery (and everything else on the car) out more.

As other have mentioned, the extreme ends (0% and 100%) are more stressful for the battery so try not to use the extreme ends on a daily basis. If you need it, use it, though. Overall, don't worry about the battery too much. The BMS (battery management system) is doing an excellent job keeping the battery healthy without any input from the user.
 
Stop worrying about the battery!!!

What's the worse thing that you can do? Supercharge it multiple times a day?
If you believe that, then how come the cars with the most miles have over 400,000 miles on them?

Tesla designed the battery not to worry about. How many restrictions do you see in the manual? None!

Drive the car, enjoy the car, charge the battery to best fit your lifestyle.

My recommendation, just charge to 100% every few months to allow the battery cells to balance. And no need to ever run the battery low, but no reason that you shouldn't if you need the range.
 
Why are there so many restrictions on Tesla battery? I have not heard of a single thing on Fiat, VW, Bolt, BMW etc on so many restrictions.

Not restrictions per-say; more like best battery management practices. All batteries will degrade over time, be it cell phones or EVs. I would want to minimize (within reason) the degradation. The Nissan Leaf has particularity poor battery degradation.
 
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Not restrictions per-say; more like best battery management practices. All batteries will degrade over time, be it cell phones or EVs. I would want to minimize (within reason) the degradation. The Nissan Leaf has particularity poor battery degradation.
They're not even best practices. They're obsessive practices that will have no practical difference over the usual lifespan of owning a Tesla. If a possible difference of a couple of miles of range after many years will really matter to you, then you bought too small of a battery.

Best practice is to plug in every day when you get home and only charge to 100% for trips. Other than that, chill out, let the battery management system manage the battery, and enjoy the car.
 
Elon tweet. Interesting both OP tweet drive the same every day.o_O

20190417_081944.jpg
 
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People overthink this way too much.

Stop worrying about the battery!!!

People are spending way too much time trying to find the absolute optimal solution to maximize battery longevity. The difference between the perfect solution for each person specific case and one that is pretty good is probably negligible in terms of battery life. While at the same would require so much extra effort to implement as to make it completely unreasonable.
 
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