An interesting article on the economics of EVs: https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/25/cars/what-happened-with-electric-vehicle-sales-in-2023/index.html
But was that to 80 or 100%?
I thought it was ideal to not let them get below 20% & then only fill to 80% because that’s the fastest rate of charging; which is only putting in 180 miles of range in a 300 mile ‘tank’
We did what was needed. We’ve decided we are comfortable getting down to 8-10% (the lower the charge state, the faster it charges). We then fill to the amount needed for the next stop. We don’t ever charge to 100% because you lose out on regen braking at the high of a state of charge. For the return trip, we started at 90% and arrived at the charger at about 15%. We charged to 83% and got home with about 8%. You can see your final destination % go up as you charge (yes, it will show a -% until you get to the point it thinks you can make it home, and then will start going up).
I thought fastest charge rate was between 20 & 80% & that it slows down below/above that percentage; are you saying it only slows down above that percentage?
That only gives you 24 miles (assuming 300 full range); not a lot of excess if there’s an accident/detour, especially in winter’s cold; you’d be getting home on fumes electrons.
Just a reminder that range issues also affect ICE cars. I had to take my kid to the airport today, and the 80km round trip used up half a tank of gas. -20 weather and deep snow everywhere.
It is super fast when it is down below 10% and it definitely slows as it fills up. It goes from 10% up to 50% in a couple minutes. The analogy I’ve heard is it’s easy to find a parking spot at the mall when you get there before it opens, and then as it fills, you have to start circling to look for a good spot as the lot fills up.
As Aerosmith says, livin’ on the edge!
We know this stetch of road very, very well. I wouldn’t cut it that close for unknown paths. Of course, if you are on interstates, there are many chargers to choose from, but I already know of places on state highways that are in need of charging. It’s filling in though.
Using expensive Tesla Superchargers (expensive compared to home charging), the costs were less than half what it would cost for gas for our Subaru.
A slow down will not take extra battery, and will probably use less battery. A two hour trip at an average of 70mph will use more battery than the same trip at an average of 35mph, but taking 4 hours. For an EV, a slowdown and being stuck in traffic should reduce range anxiety, even when counting the extra time running AC or heat. Excluding extreme cases like the trapped on a freezing road for 40 hours.
Detours can of course be a different problem. Adding an extra few miles to the trip is no big deal, even if you’re only leaving yourself a 5% margin, but I always think about the detours here in the mountains where a rock slide could add 250 miles to a trip, which can be bad for gas cars, too.
I’m not sure if that’s true once you include the stop and go traffic that comes with an accident. When I’m stuck behind an accident, I don’t see a significant efficiency increase in my Prius once I’ve burnt off the battery cache. I would agree that if there is a general traffic jam that nonetheless never comes to a complete stop and rarely requires braking if you leave sufficient distance ahead of you, it would probably increase rather than decrease mileage.
One of the Technology Connections videos covered this. According to him, the biggest reduction in range comes from air resistance. According to him, driving slower will increase your range.
I’m not sure how how much (high voltage) energy EVs use at a stop, but I can’t imagine it’s much.
But for an EV, it’s all battery cache. Stopped, an EV is using very little battery, which is counterintuitive to many gas drivers. Additionally, regen will capture back a good portion of the energy used to accelerate. Of course, someone can drive like an idiot and go hard and then slam on the brakes each time skipping regen and using as much power as possible for every few feet traffic creeps forward.
Yes, sometimes the car will even warn of this with something like “decrease speed to under 70MPH to make next charging location.” Occasionally when planning routes I’ll get legs between chargers that have something like “maximum speed 55mph”. Usually I don’t use that route.
It depends. In cold weather, being stuck in a traffic jam means running the heater off the battery while not moving.
The Tesla model 3 heater is 4.8kW, I think. Running it full blast is a substantial battery drain. Roughly 20 miles of range lost per hour?
It is going to be pretty dire circumstances to require running the heater full blast continuously. That will have the interior over 90F in much less than an hour. The only times I can imagine running that hard for that long is if it is snowing very hard, and you’re trying to keep the windows clear. Typically, the heater will consume lots of power to get the car up to temperature, and then much less power to maintain that temperature. That is why pre-conditioning the car while it is still plugged in can be a big battery savings.
It’s easy to come up with scenarios where an EV or ICE car will fail (just scroll up this thread). For me, being stuck in a long, unexpected traffic jam in an EV is not dangerous, just annoying.
These people got 38 hours from 80% to 10% charge keeping a Model 3 at 18C with an average outdoor temperature of -5C. So not your -40C Canada extreme, but a reasonable real world test of getting trapped in a snow storm.
We’ve been driving in cold conditions, although not below 20F, and don’t have the heater running high at all. Just enough to keep the windows from fogging up. Having the heated seats and steering wheel go a long way to keeping us warm. You can see how much power the environmental controls use compared to the other factors, and it is always very low.
Well, you guys should try Edmonton. It’s -20 here right mow. -20 is common, -30 happens occasionally, and -40 usually at least a few times per year.
At -40, even in an ICE car it’s hard to keep warm and the windows clear with the heater on full blast.
Also, at those temps it doesn’t take long for the car and battery to cool down when shut off. So when you make a stop for more than a few minutes, you’ll use up some power to reheat the interior and battery.
I don’t recommend you get an EV.
Tell our Prime Minister. He’s mandating them. We are supposed to be 60% zero emissions by 2030, and 100% by 2035.
PHEVs may qualify, but they also have problems in extreme cold. Anyway, it will hever happen.
We went into town in -40 temps the day after we got the Cadillac–it did fine. It was garaged overnight and between very aggressive snows and the temps, the range definitely is decreased.
May qualify? Or absolutely do qualify?
You guys are really making me appreciate the Seattle weather.
Moderating:
This is a thread for taking about your EV plans, not for political tirades. Take it somewhere else.
In fact, i see this isn’t the first note you’ve gotten in this very thread:
So you are now banned from this thread.
Edited to add: after discussion with the moderation team, this has also been upgraded to a formal warning.