Is Range king?

[MUSK007]

As some of you know I strongly believe that Range is king. My opinion is you should buy as much range as you can afford.

Since none of us owns a CT At this time, and we are not really sure of the range we will actually get, especially when towing... I thought I would conduct a little experiment today with my 2017 MS P100D.

i drove up to the lake house today and at the bottom of the hill I noted that I had 17 miles to destination and I need to climb to 5200 feet. My range meter said I had 172 miles of range. Great. My MS was empty except for a duffel bag and my golf clubs. The temps were around 80 degrees and my speed up the mountain was 35-50 miles per hour. How did we Do?

When I arrived I only had 122 miles of range left. So I used approx 2.94 miles of range for every mile traveled up the mountain. Like towing, traveling up the grade uses a lot of battery energy. So basically 3 miles of range for every mile traveled.

OK, is Range king as I have suggested? Let’s take a look at some numbers. My P100D was supposed to get 320 miles of range At 100% SOC. But of course it’s doesn’t get that. Not even close. Now in 3 years I have lost 5% to battery degeneration. at 90% SOC is shows only 274 miles of range. Very disappointing.

If you have a Tri-Motor CT listed 500 miles, you only get a listed 475 with 5% degeneration. At 90% SOC you would end up with only 428 miles of range. Now at 3 miles of range loss for every mile driven with towing that would only get you 143 miles from your destination. Meaning you only really have 71-72 miles of travel each way. 72. Miles.

I suspect towing will greatly reduce the actual miles you can drive a CT. So if the 500 mile Tri-Motor can only drive 143 miles towing one way, what would a dual motor be able to handle?

Interesting to note. When I go down the mountain I pick up between 12-16 miles of range depending on the SOC before I leave. I never charge to 100% when heading down the mountain. You need to leave room for the battery’s to charge as you go down.

Any thoughts?

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[Newton]

Great real world example. thanks.

I can only afford the single motor. but im also only towing at most 40 miles each way. with not many hills.

Did you use the gps mapping to your destination if so...Im really suprised the mileage display didnt say how much it would use going up the mountain, they must have that data.

I expect range to be 50% when towing (anything decently heavy).
but Uphill heavy stuff seems like CT isnt the choice for that.

edit, also thought... your 2017 is probably using slightly less efficient tech than the newer cars, i wonder if the model y would do better

also calculated that average mountain climb angle to be 3.3degrees hopefully thats correct

 

[Blue Steel]

For your CT example, why would anyone who was planning a big trip with a trailer not start with 100% SOC?

 

[MUSK007]

They would start at 100%. I do. Even then it would still only allow for a short trip each way.

 

[TruckElectric]

As some of you know I strongly believe that Range is king. My opinion is you should buy as much range as you can afford.

Since none of us owns a CT At this time, and we are not really sure of the range we will actually get, especially when towing... I thought I would conduct a little experiment today with my 2017 MS P100D.

i drove up to the lake house today and at the bottom of the hill I noted that I had 17 miles to destination and I need to climb to 5200 feet. My range meter said I had 172 miles of range. Great. My MS was empty except for a duffel bag and my golf clubs. The temps were around 80 degrees and my speed up the mountain was 35-50 miles per hour. How did we Do?

When I arrived I only had 122 miles of range left. So I used approx 2.94 miles of range for every mile traveled up the mountain. Like towing, traveling up the grade uses a lot of battery energy. So basically 3 miles of range for every mile traveled.

OK, is Range king as I have suggested? Let’s take a look at some numbers. My P100D was supposed to get 320 miles of range At 100% SOC. But of course it’s doesn’t get that. Not even close. Now in 3 years I have lost 5% to battery degeneration. at 90% SOC is shows only 274 miles of range. Very disappointing.

If you have a Tri-Motor CT listed 500 miles, you only get a listed 475 with 5% degeneration. At 90% SOC you would end up with only 428 miles of range. Now at 3 miles of range loss for every mile driven with towing that would only get you 143 miles from your destination. Meaning you only really have 71-72 miles of travel each way. 72. Miles.

I suspect towing will greatly reduce the actual miles you can drive a CT. So if the 500 mile Tri-Motor can only drive 143 miles towing one way, what would a dual motor be able to handle?

Interesting to note. When I go down the mountain I pick up between 12-16 miles of range depending on the SOC before I leave. I never charge to 100% when heading down the mountain. You need to leave room for the battery’s to charge as you go down.

Any thoughts?

I agree 100%! A close analogy for me is when you get a computer get as much RAM and computing power as possible.

 

[Jhodgesatmb]

As some of you know I strongly believe that Range is king. My opinion is you should buy as much range as you can afford.

Since none of us owns a CT At this time, and we are not really sure of the range we will actually get, especially when towing... I thought I would conduct a little experiment today with my 2017 MS P100D.

i drove up to the lake house today and at the bottom of the hill I noted that I had 17 miles to destination and I need to climb to 5200 feet. My range meter said I had 172 miles of range. Great. My MS was empty except for a duffel bag and my golf clubs. The temps were around 80 degrees and my speed up the mountain was 35-50 miles per hour. How did we Do?

When I arrived I only had 122 miles of range left. So I used approx 2.94 miles of range for every mile traveled up the mountain. Like towing, traveling up the grade uses a lot of battery energy. So basically 3 miles of range for every mile traveled.

OK, is Range king as I have suggested? Let’s take a look at some numbers. My P100D was supposed to get 320 miles of range At 100% SOC. But of course it’s doesn’t get that. Not even close. Now in 3 years I have lost 5% to battery degeneration. at 90% SOC is shows only 274 miles of range. Very disappointing.

If you have a Tri-Motor CT listed 500 miles, you only get a listed 475 with 5% degeneration. At 90% SOC you would end up with only 428 miles of range. Now at 3 miles of range loss for every mile driven with towing that would only get you 143 miles from your destination. Meaning you only really have 71-72 miles of travel each way. 72. Miles.

I suspect towing will greatly reduce the actual miles you can drive a CT. So if the 500 mile Tri-Motor can only drive 143 miles towing one way, what would a dual motor be able to handle?

Interesting to note. When I go down the mountain I pick up between 12-16 miles of range depending on the SOC before I leave. I never charge to 100% when heading down the mountain. You need to leave room for the battery’s to charge as you go down.

Any thoughts?

Range is king until one’s threshold is hit, and that is a personal threshold. For me it is 400 actual miles. I’ve been waiting, impatiently, for years, for an electric SUV that could get that kind of mileage, without towing. At 500 miles the CT was the first to advertise 400+ and I signed up. Of course, there are many other CT features I like but that got me over the hump.

 

[MUSK007]

Amen to that brother.

I wanted 500 miles so I don’t have to supercharge for my trips up the mountain. I’m done with Towing and now I just haul stuff. With range loss to batteries and driving Loss 275-300 just isn’t enough but 475-500 is. I hope and pray with new battery technology that it ends up being more. I will pay for that too

 

[ajdelange]

My first advice to anyone wishing to understand the effects of various driving conditions on range is forget trying to keep track of how many miles you have in your battery. Keep track of how many kWh you have in your battery and learn how many Wh your vehicle uses per mile under various driving conditions. Start by setting your battery indicator to percent instead of miles. Divide your EPA rated range by 100. This makes it trivial to estimate the approximate range you have left by a simple glance at the battery meter. Example, a Raven X has 351 mile EPA range. It goes, under EPA like conditions, 3.51 miles per percent.

Next steps involve refinement of your knowledge of consumption. Start looking at the odometers. They will tell you how many Wh/mi you used on a given trip. Subscribe to TeslaFi which reports to you lots of data on each drive including how many kWh energy you used and what percent of the battery that is. Learn from this what your battery capacity is. Then you can make range remaining estimates with the following sort of thinking: My car is rated 351 mi, the battery gauge shows 43% remaining. I'm traveling on the freeway at around 70 mpH. How far can I go? Well I know from looking at my odometers on previous trips that I actually burn about 290 Wh/mi at this speed and I've learned from TeslaFi data that my battery discharge capacity is about 92 kWh so 43% of that is about 36.0 + 2.7 = about 39 kWh and I'm going to be using about .3 kWh/mi so I can go 39/.3 = 130 mi. Note the use of rounding and approximations to make the mental math easily doable while driving. Stir in head winds or tail winds as appropriate. From experience you should also know that rain adds about 40 Wh/mi to the demand.

It should be clear from the above how to modify the calculation to answer the question "How much will be left in the battery after 80 miles?" which is clearly often a valuable piece of information.

Now the big surprise to me is that you would ask such a question after driving a Tesla for 3 years. You should know all about TeslaFi and the energy utilization displays in the car and should have figured out how to use them. Thus my advice is that if you have not aquainted yourself with these tools do so now.

 

[BillyGee]

I've been following my own work mileage and worked out that I average about 83 miles a day in my service truck. That said I'm still getting a dual motor for the overhead since I a reasonable amount of off roading due to my line of work.

I wish I could justify the trip motor.

 

[Jhodgesatmb]

Amen to that brother.

I wanted 500 miles so I don’t have to supercharge for my trips up the mountain. I’m done with Towing and now I just haul stuff. With range loss to batteries and driving Loss 275-300 just isn’t enough but 475-500 is. I hope and pray with new battery technology that it ends up being more. I will pay for that too

Me too.

 

[Fabville]

We had a 2018 Model X 75D, it had an EPA rating of 235 miles of range. If we had gone up to the 100D, back in 2018 it would have cost an extra $16K (with some additional premium features that are now standard) and bumped up to 295 miles, I didn't see the ROI for an extra 60 miles of range at that price point. With the 2020's (100kWh battery) essentially at the same price as our old 75D was (no tax credit now though), it's impressive to make that jump from 235 to 351.

I have a 6x12 enclosed cargo trailer and it acts as a parachute when I tow it with our Model X with how it affects our range. We also have a utility trailer that's lighter by less than 100 pounds, but doesn't affect the range anywhere near as much as the cargo trailer. Wind drag is a huge variable. I had to tow it once with our 75D in near freezing temperatures on a round trip that was only 120 miles and had to supercharge twice to feel confident we'd get back home.

I used to start out with a charge to 100% for longer trips with our old 2018, but found if I don't need the extra range to the first supercharger I can typically save time. I think once you hit around 50-60% on a supercharger is when you see the kW's really start to drop. Certainly want to make sure you have substantial padding for the estimated battery capacity at a supercharger destination when towing. I usually don't go above 70-80% at superchargers anymore unless I feel I need the extra range to get to the next stop. Generally it's faster to stop at a second supercharger (if needed) than to try and go up to 90-100% at one. Also helps reduce battery degradation by not going up to 100% very often.

 

[Blue Steel]

We had a 2018 Model X 75D, it had an EPA rating of 235 miles of range. If we had gone up to the 100D, back in 2018 it would have cost an extra $16K (with some additional premium features that are now standard) and bumped up to 295 miles, I didn't see the ROI for an extra 60 miles of range at that price point. With the 2020's (100kWh battery) essentially at the same price as our old 75D was (no tax credit now though), it's impressive to make that jump from 235 to 351.

I have a 6x12 enclosed cargo trailer and it acts as a parachute when I tow it with our Model X with how it affects our range. We also have a utility trailer that's lighter by less than 100 pounds, but doesn't affect the range anywhere near as much as the cargo trailer. Wind drag is a huge variable. I had to tow it once with our 75D in near freezing temperatures on a round trip that was only 120 miles and had to supercharge twice to feel confident we'd get back home.

I used to start out with a charge to 100% for longer trips with our old 2018, but found if I don't need the extra range to the first supercharger I can typically save time. I think once you hit around 50-60% on a supercharger is when you see the kW's really start to drop. Certainly want to make sure you have substantial padding for the estimated battery capacity at a supercharger destination when towing. I usually don't go above 70-80% at superchargers anymore unless I feel I need the extra range to get to the next stop. Generally it's faster to stop at a second supercharger (if needed) than to try and go up to 90-100% at one. Also helps reduce battery degradation by not going up to 100% very often.

Knowing what you know now, do you wish you had spent the extra $16k?

 

[Ehninger1212]

I think charging infrastructure is king. Speed and ease of access is more important to me.

 

[Fabville]

Knowing what you know now, do you wish you had spent the extra $16k?

It worked out a bit different for us, we went through a lemon law on the 2018 and we ended up with a 2020 Long Range in December, which thanks to a software update is now a Long Range Plus. I don't think the extra 60 miles of range, cold weather package, premium sound, and biohazard that we were lacking would have swayed my decision to spend $16K more, but if it was a difference of going from 235 miles to 351 for the extra $16K, I would have definitely put a lot more thought into it - especially based on what I know now. It just adds convenience having that extra range and better positions you for battery degradation with reducing potential inconvenience of having to charge for trips that may not have previously required charging as you lose range. Just looking at that EPA rating can be deceiving, especially when you factor in other variables such as cold weather driving, towing, and eventual battery degradation. I'm sure there's a percentage range beyond your most common driving need/condition that should be considered.

With the month of August with heavy smoke from wild fires two years in a row blanketing Western Washington, I ended up having the biohazard HEPA filter installed after Tesla started offering it after the initial purchase for $500. Of course the year I had it installed we didn't see the massive smoke that year.

Occasionally I have to make a 157 mile round trip commute for work (used to be once a week, has been 2-3 times a week lately though). During the colder days with the 75D I would have to charge to 100% the night before and there were a few days I had to stop off and supercharge for a bit before heading home, despite leaving with 100%. Wouldn't have been an issue if our building had L2 charging, but unfortunately it hasn't happened yet (although multiple EV owners have talked to managers about it and it seems to be in consideration).

Whether the extra range is worth what can be a substantial amount, definitely comes down to understanding your driving habits (in my opinion). Typical miles traveled, whether you will tow very often, if where you live has colder winters, etc. Getting home with around 5% remaining on the 75D multiple times certainly wasn't ideal and can degrade the battery from my understanding if done on a regular basis. I'm not sure what would have been better for the battery with that commute, charging to 100% or only going to 80% but having to supercharge for a bit each commute.

My 18-year old daughter just bought her first car after saving up a down payment for a year, she ended up with the base Model 3 Standard Range Plus, the 250 miles of range should be more than enough for her needs - going to school and work. Our other vehicle is a 2012 Nissan LEAF, so we use our Model X for long trips. Based on our experience with less range than expected on some trips with the 75D between superchargers, fairly long charging times, the 351 mile range certain adds some convenience for us.

I initially preordered a single motor CT. I believe they had a typo on the night of the unveil, my brother-in-law said the same thing, where he too thought it said AWD for the single motor so that's what I chose. The next day, after seeing it show RWD for the single motor, I changed my order to a dual motor. Over the next week or so I kept looking at the dollar per mile of range and the impressive stat of 500+ miles per charge, and switched my order to the tri-motor. This was when we still at our 75D which cost $97K and only had 235 miles of range.

Hope this helps! This was my experience going from a 75D to Long Range Plus Model X and changing my pre-order not once, but twice. Originally I was expecting to have the Model X paid off by the time the tri-motor CT came out, but since they flipped it's expected production with the single-motor, I'll have to see how comfortable I am with my finances, whether I keep the X. Based on some quality control issues with the Model Y, I may talk to them about holding onto my reservation for a while longer (I'm in the first 40K) to let them work out the kinks of production a bit. My daughter didn't get her license until June because of the pandemic, they let her keep her deposit on the Model 3 until she got her license.

 

[ajdelange]

I think charging infrastructure is king. Speed and ease of access is more important to me.

I did see one article that said that charging infrastructure had supplanted range anxiety as the number one concern. The two are, of course, closely related.