I have a model Y. I hate almost everything about it. But most germane, The "Battery meter" at the top of the display is total bunk. That's got to be "rosy" numbers. It'll display a the battery in miles, but it's at least 25% inflated.
However if you punch in a destination, you'll get exact numbers, and those are insanely reliable. It claims (and I don't believe any claims coming from tesla) that it'll factor wind, elevation, temperature, etc. But regardless of what it factors in, it's on the money.
I actually got stranded once for some hours because of the mileage indicator!
Was driving back from a campsite that I turned out to not have charging compatibility with, but thought I had plenty of margin to get to the nearest charger. As I drove through the mountains however, I began noticing that a.) my battery was depleting much faster than expected and b.) I wasn’t seeing any houses and very few motorists. I watched with increasing dread as the trip miles began converging with the battery miles, as my friends in the car got more and more quiet. We reached the inflection point, and the best I could do was hope we’d encounter somewhere with a plug that might be able to get us the rest of the way. Eventually though the milage indicator reached zero, and I pulled off the road to what I thought was a campsite but turned out to be a sort of rest stop with no power plugs in sight. To make matters worse I was in a mountain valley and had no phone signal, and hiking wasn’t an option as it was pretty hot and we had no water. We were there for hours until I was able to flag down a nice older couple and get a ride to a place with cell signal, where I was able to get a tow truck capable of transporting my car (turns out you need one that has a full bed because of the regenerative breaking, and tesla’s service doesn’t have infinite coverage) to the charger I was trying to get to.
Ironically that last part was probably the most frustrating. The charging spot was full save one spot in the back, which my tow truck guy Mel couldn’t get back to. No sweat I thought, I’ll just try asking someone to swap, but people in their cars pretended to ignore me, and one couple leaving theirs just walked away, as I asked if they could move so we could unload my dead car. Had a sudden wave of empathy for the people I usually walk away from who ask me for spare change lol. Eventually someone left and I was able to charge and resume the 6 hour road trip home. Biggest lesson learned was that slow is fast, keep it at 60 if you want the milage meter to not die as quick.
It's a very humbling experience to be ignored by so many folks, glad you reflected on that. The story about the couple just flat out walking away strikes me as obtusely anti-social, but sadly not unexpected in our day and age.
Tbh though, going up a mountain is insanely more energy consuming than regular driving, so the range indicator can't possibly take this into consideration ahead of time unless you chart a specific trip. In the other direction, I've had the experience of the battery charge level continuously increasing while going down a long mountain road - infinite range!
> able to get a tow truck capable of transporting my car (turns out you need one that has a full bed because of the regenerative breaking
Sounds incredibly short-sighted that the regenerative braking can't be temporarily disabled by the driver... two people can push a "regular" car to a nearby gas station in a pinch. Even one person can push a smaller car around a parking lot if necessary.
That said, they often send out full/flat bed tow trucks these days for almost any reason.
On a highway my hood latch broke (old car) and it flew up at 50 mph and crushed my windshield. I had no service (but knew the other carrier would have full bars) and spent over an hour waving at every car trying to get someone to stop to let me call my parents (I was 18 and not exactly intimidating). It was a crazy experience as I'd obviously had an accident. Nobody would help. Finally I just stood in the road like a crazy person and a nice family stopped and one of their kids was on the carrier I needed. It was far enough from a nearby town to be at least a few hours walk and not before nightfall.
FWIW, I was stranded due to a bug in the fuel level indicator and mileage remaining estimate on my 2017 Subaru Outback. Subaru knows about the issue but you have to bring it to their attention if you want a fix. Not giving Tesla a pass here, just mentioning that it's not unique to them.
Slightly off topic, but how come you were going on a multi-hour drive anywhere with no water, let alone into a remote mountainous area on a hot day?
I'm uncomfortably aware how quickly vehicles take me to inconvenient, if not dangerous, distances. 10 miles away is a short distance to drive but three hours to walk. Even fifteen minutes on a bike is a tedious walking distance back if it breaks down. For how easy it is to put or keep some bottled water in a car, why not do that all the time?
Did you have your destination entered into the navigation? I find the estimates to be fairly accurate when you tell it exactly where you are going, at least within 5% or so. I always enter my full trip into the planner before I start, and it hasn’t failed me so far.
There's an app called PlugShare where people have flagged locations with regular 120V and 240V plugs as well as off the beaten path chargers. There's even some people with home chargers that have left a way to contact them in an emergency and they'll let you charge if you ask nicely. Haven't used any of the latter but they exist.
>> (turns out you need one that has a full bed because of the regenerative breaking, and tesla’s service doesn’t have infinite coverage)
Is there a service for "On demand battery charging". A mini truck carrying a generator that can be called to the location. Could charge premium from the EVs that are too tired to move.
> people in their cars pretended to ignore me, and one couple leaving theirs just walked away, as I asked if they could move so we could unload my dead car
I wonder if they would have started responding if you motioned the tow truck driver to unload your car directly behind them, in a position that would obviously seriously inconvenience the other driver(s) or prevent them from leaving entirely...of course, also mentioning that was your plan to them loudly so you're sure they can hear.
Another option - although that depends on availability - would be roadside assistance, that can ironically bring a diesel generator to your car to give it some charge.
This really is an extreme and specific example, but risks like this are why most people want lots (lots) of range and why gas/diesel cars won't die out any time soon.
The sheer ease of mind that comes with having densely packed energy that can be replenished at a moment's notice practically anywhere should not be disregarded easily. Maybe battery tech can get there some day, but it's certainly not today.
Battery meter at the top is EPA range - ie. the official range measurement method, in basically ideal conditions.
The routefinder 'learns' from your previous driving habits. Driving style easily has a 50% impact on range between "drives 50 mph slipstreaming behind a truck" and "drives 90 mph and brakes aggressively at every corner".
No reason it has to show the EPA range. My family’s Subaru has “learned” that it lives in the mountains and the range estimates reflect that. And I’m pretty sure it’s a simply looking at what kind of gas mileage it got recently. When we have kayaks on top of the car, it readjusts the mileage estimates down pretty quickly.
All these comments about ICE vehicles being the same ignore that when ICE vehicles have estimates to empty, they take basic steps to try to get the estimate correct.
"Battery meter at the top is EPA range - ie. the official range measurement method, in basically ideal conditions."
I guess I'm flabbergasted by this, as that's not how my Chevy Volt (and I presume many other BEVs) work. The range value ('guessimeter' people call it) on my Volt takes something like a rolling average of your last few drives and that's what it shows you. So if it's winter, it shows you less range because your last few drives had less efficiency. It's not always accurate (if there's, say, major temp fluctuations), but it's way more useful than what you're describing.
To me, what you're describing is borderline dishonest marketing, and technically unnecessary.
What I'd like to see is two numbers: estimated range as I've described, and beside it a kWh # (which I can guesstimate from the battery % gauge visual, but not precise).
EDIT: Not sure why car manufacturers in general hide the kWh remaining-capacity of the battery so much. They seem to think consumers are too stupid to understand such technical terms? But they're clearly aware of it every time they use a public charger, and it's the closest equivalent to litres/gallons in an ICE.
There's no reason why Tesla can't calculate the accurate range in both places, is there? My 2022 Toyota RAV4 Hybrid has a "distance to empty" number that "learns" based on your driving habits and typical mileage. It's not perfect, for example going on a road trip can throw it off (the hybrid gets significantly lower highway MPG than around town), but most of the time it's very accurate.
It really does not learn. I have driven the same route to and from Richmond, VA as a range test over and over again since 2018.
My range is approx. 180 miles, in favorable conditions (summer, AC off). If it was actually accurate, as soon as you hit 70-80mph you would see your range half. Clearly that doesn't happen, so the estimator is off by ~40% for highway conditions, i.e. complete bullshit.
EPA range is a mix of city and highway range. City range is > highway range, thus EPA range will over estimate highway range and underestimate city range.
>The routefinder 'learns' from your previous driving habits.
I'd like to see evidence of this, but I'm skeptical. Sounds like something Tesla fans claim is happening, like when you report an error at an intersection it gets fixed manually. And, even if true, I'm not sure how useful it'd be.
I have a model 3. I recently took a trip of 196 miles but lost almost 270 miles in battery. I wasn’t driving like a maniac, I was on 65 mph cruise control the entire time with no traffic.
I think it's basically some PM taking a stand at Tesla with the fact that there's just no good estimate possible without knowing the route, so they will always show EPA estimate.
Any sane a Tesla driver changes that to show percent battery instead of range.
As others have said the trip planner is excellent, within a percent or two even in winter conditions driving over passes etc..
Note that range changes a lot more due to elevation, speed, cold etc, compared to gas cars because electrics are so much more efficient.
When you say “learns” is it actually factoring in the route or is it just using the historical average miles per… what, kWh, and multiplying it across the distance
I make EVs at a different company, and I'm not a fan of Tesla's range indicator. It's misleading because miles don't map directly onto battery charge. The range that that indicates is miles on flat level ground with no wind at 55mph which you will never experience in real life. At 80mph you're going to get 2/3 of that range every time. At 35mph you can get significantly higher range, but no one is ever going to drive 300+ miles at 35mph. If you just tap on the range icon it will change to percent, which is less misleading. ICE vehicles have all the same problems, but most ICE vehicles always just show gas level, rather than range.
My PHEV VW car shows range which is estimated based on the petrol level and the battery charge. I learned this the hard way because I noticed my petrol tank was very very close to empty driving on the motorway. I simply engaged fully electric mode, which turns off the petrol engine, and that way made it to the fueling station.
It sort of learns based on the immediately previous drive what the driving style is, and therefore what the range is.
Not defending Tesla but battery range is really hard without context. Kinetic energy is velocity^2, which means moving twice the speed takes 4X the energy. They probably can get the right estimate for a destination because it knows the speed limit for the route and using that as your velocity can give you a better answer.
"...moving twice the speed takes 4X the energy..."
That's not quite right. The power required to maintain a constant velocity v against a constant drag force of F is P = Fv. With air drag on a car moving at highway speeds, the drag force F actually depends on v: it's proportional to the square of v, i.e. F ~ v^2. All together then:
P ~ v^3
So doubling the speed will increase the required power by a factor of eight.
>They probably can get the right estimate for a destination because it knows the speed limit
Even this is a massive over-simplification. Driving the same speed with a 20 mph headwind is going to take lot more energy than with a 20 mph tailwind for example. There's lots of other variables and they may be certainly tracking some (like A/C current draw) but I doubt they track others (like rolling friction or road conditions).
Edit: I found this article [1] and it claims they track an impressive amount of weather and traffic data for the calculation. I'd be curious if this is based on car sensors (probably not?) or local weather stations.
It’s more relevant how much you need to accelerate, not just your velocity. A satellite in orbit uses very little energy even though it’s going very fast.
KE is not 4x the energy continuously used though that's 4x the energy spent getting to that speed. Air resistance does also square with velocity and that is an amount that's constantly required to be spent to maintain that speed.
Bummer to hear you all don’t like it. I drove a RWD Long Range Model 3 for 4.5 years. Absolutely loved everything about it. But the range was no where near 310 miles like stated. But I couldn’t have really cared less once I knew that fact. The few times a year I needed more than 200 miles, I used superchargers on my route just like I would if I had 250-300 and had to wait an extra 2 minutes at the charger. I averaged ~300-325 wh/m going 80-90mph on the highway (wind speed/direction obviously makes a big difference). 75kwh battery. 230 mile range. Every other day was charge to 80%, incredibly convenient to never think about it or gas and have more torque, speed than any other car you’re around. And low to no maintenance.
I now own a Long Range Model X. It is MUCH closer to the EPA mileage. I average ~330wh/m but I have a 100kwh battery, so much closer to a legitimate 300 mile range. Once again, doesn’t really make a different unless you happen to have an exact 275 mile trip. Either way, you’ll be stopping at a halfway supercharger to stay in optimal charge range (15-85%).
For what it's worth, I have a Nissan standard petrol car and it's pretty much the same. Every time I fill it up, it says I have 400 miles of range, then by the time I've driven about 300 miles, I've only got a few miles of range left.
Interestingly the accuracy seems to get a lot better by the time I'm down to half a tank. I don't know if it's a sensor issue, or maybe my driving habits just change a lot when I have a full tank versus when I'm running low.
The type of driving and time I'm driving can also make a huge difference to my trip MPG - some trips I average about 10MPG, others closer to 40MPG. Generally speaking, low speed but clear rural roads get the best, followed by motorway, followed by pootering around the city. The absolute worst mileage is during the winter, when I might only be driving lots of short trips around town on a very cold engine, with the headlights on, in the rain. In that case, I might only get around 200 miles out of a tank.
Anyway, my point is that knowing the specifics of this trip's fuel consumption is a much easier problem than knowing how many miles it'll be until you next need to refuel.
Yes, my Mazda does the same. It will happily report a 450 mile (725 km) range on my 13.2 gallon / 50 L tank, when I have never gotten more than 380 miles. Sometimes much less. To be fair, if you cruised slightly above the speed limit on the highway in fair conditions and drove it to truly empty, I think you would actually get that. But the gauge reads empty when there is easily 1.5 gal / 5.7 L in the tank, so in practice there is no way you're going to get the stated range.
However, the key difference is that my gas car can be filled up anywhere, and worst case I'd need to get a gas can. Running out of charge is a flatbed tow, that's a huge hassle. The range being accurate is a big deal on an electric!
We rented one on a trip recently, super annoying to realize the dozen or so chargers in this beach town were actually incompatible or just too slow for real life.
On the way back to the drop off autopilot tried to slam us into the Bentley next us! It had been traveling the same direction as us for like 20 minutes and when we passed through an intersection it just jerked hard left and I had to correct it manually. Possible injuries notwithstanding I’m sure that would have surpassed my insurance coverage, which I’ve intentionally gone way above minimums on.
> It had been traveling the same direction as us for like 20 minutes and when we passed through an intersection it just jerked hard left and I had to correct it manually.
Even if this and many other stories are just anecdotes, I could never imagine myself even testing this "auto-but-not-really-pilot" feature outside of a testing environment.
How do you folks dare to even try to use it? The risk is so big and the reward so tiny...
> We rented one on a trip recently, super annoying to realize the dozen or so chargers in this beach town were actually incompatible or just too slow for real life.
Where were you that has a dozen chargers but no superchargers?
I have a 2022 Nissan Leaf with 220 miles EPA range. I've found that this number is reasonably close to correct if one is driving under 60mph on country roads under moderate climate conditions. We live in Ohio and so I have actually done long drives like that to go to remote places to go camping. (There are, surprisingly, both L2 and fast chargers around in rural Ohio but you definitely need an app and need to check ahead of time.)
Speed matters because air resistance increases exponentially with speed, not linearly. Driving 60+, lots of stop and go, or using HVAC a lot will bring it down the range to as low as 180, but that seems like the worst range I've seen. That was driving ~75mph with HVAC on.
The rated range combines city and highway driving, and EVs get better city mileage due to the lower average speeds. So it would be expected that actual highway range (70+ mph) would be less than the rated combined range.
I had a Tesla Model 3 which was very optimistic with the range. My BMW iX3 however is quite conservative and I can usually drive longer than the display states.
We don’t have the iX3 in the US (yet?). I was looking at the x5 plug in hybrid with ~40 miles electric range and the normal b58 straight 6 motor. My wife has the X7, we have 3 kids and hobbies so I’m not sure if even an i5 would work. The new X5 headlights are not my favorite.
My EV6 reports a range that it also a loose estimate, but it seems based on recent driving behavior (ie, I was driving free and loose recently, so I may end up getting way more miles than it says, and vice versa)
I know someone who bought an early Leaf to get to work and back. The stated range was 107 miles and their commute was 35 miles each way. The problem was that there was >2000 feet of elevation change.
I don't quite get this. It was a round-trip thing right, like the overall net elevation change at the end of the day was 0, right? All that energy was stored as potential energy, they'd get it back rolling down the mountain. To my understanding a round-trip it shouldn't have made that much of an impact.
It's very easy to see how favorably or unfavorably Tesla's claimed range compares to competitors based on independent tests of multiple EVs in the same conditions:
> Spoiler alert: Tesla models fare about as well, if not better, than their EV cousins, hitting around 80% of the stated range in the wild.
This is not true according to the very article we're discussing here, which across many analysis learned that three Tesla vehicles were the least-accurate (most-optimistic or most-deceptive, depending on your point of view).
While there are things to hate on with Tesla cars, range is not one of them. I have a Model Y and for the most part I like it. I plug it in when it needs charging. What's so hard about that? I've been on several 6000+ mile journeys across the country and never had a problem, even out west where charging is more sparse.
The thing I hate most about my car is that I spent $10K on "Full Self Driving" and rarely use it. It totally sucks and is definitely the worst $10K I've ever spent on anything. That money could have gone to a nice vacation somewhere and I would be happy about that. But no, every time I try out the FSD, I come away disappointed.
Waited for 2 years for the new long range Tesla Model X and sold it within 3 months for exactly this reason. The range was a total fabrication - actual range for city driving was closer to 180 miles, not the claimed 300+. Complete sham.
Not owning a car only using rentals, I still think Tesla has the best and most intuitive UI. I can find everything easily, whereas in a SUVs from Skoda/VW/Audi/BMW/Renault/... it's hard to find things - at least for me.
What I do hate about the Model Ys we rented is the noise! Wind/wheel noise is as loud at 100km/h as a BMW at 150km/h - I guess they do this to safe weight and increase range, but it makes the trips very unpleasant.
Also how it randomly breaks in self driving (at least on a German Autobahn).
It's what drives me nuts about "300 miles is more than enough".
Consider:
- batteries lose, best case, about 10-20% of max range over a typical car ownership period
- not charging to the max is very often important to not getting bad degradation, so take another 10% off
- winter can take 10-20% range off
- driving at typical speed as opposed to the alleged ratings is probably another 10-20% reduced range
- headwinds, air conditioning/heating, and other factors can remove another 10-20%.
So suddenly, some 300 mile rated range is actually 150 miles of real world range. So here in the midwest, with underinvested charging infrastructure and biiiiiiggggg states and rural density, a 400 mile range really is pretty much required for any functional long distance driving.
This is not a hard concept, and it’s rather surprising that this of all things is what you have issue with.
The battery icon is Miles of rated range, where “rated” means flat windless road at 60MPH and 70 degrees. Call it “standard” range if you will. The car has no idea where you’re going so it uses the standard calculation.
When you set a destination it can now (and does) factor in elevation change, speed on given roads, wind speed, wind direction, temperature along the route, etc etc etc and is more accurate.
So your least favorite feature is one you openly admit to not using properly? If you want laser precise range estimation set a destination ffs. Or, if you’re like most drivers you start every day with 200-300mi of range and unless you’re going out of state you don’t even think about range.
I also prefer the battery meter to show percentage simply to reduce range anxiety. Even if the mileage estimate was accurate, I’d rather not constantly be calculating how many miles I think I might need to drive before the next charge.
There is a reason why the mileage estimate on EVS are called GOMS (guess o meters). They are like laptops, totally unreliable. They should really just stick to percentages. I don't think anyone really relies on the mileage left in gas cars, that mentality should be carried over to EVs. The number is really the fault of the EPA which uses a synthetic tests and allows manufacturers to just run with that.
This is my experience too. If you plan your trip, it’s really good about predicting the % battery remaining. I never put it on miles display anymore; that’s evidently going to be inaccurate because it doesn’t take into account many other factors. But if I enter in a route, now it actually has something to go on and can do a good job.
I find the range numbers on my Model Y to be fairly accurate, when I choose and am able to drive at optimal speeds on level ground (which is the situation on some trips). 60-65 MPH is the commonly sighted range for the dual motor Model Y. The range does attempt to factor in heat pump usage, and I am unclear how accurate those adjustments are.
It's the same problem as displaying the battery percentage on your phone. you're more inclined to look at it, and will be more anxious when that number drops.
I wish Tesla would allow you to hide the battery percentage entirely (unless it drops below a threshold).
It is true that it's very accurate. I was on a trip that predicted 22% battery on arrival, and I had 21%. The last 5-10km were mostly descending down a valley, so lot of regeneration. Thus, when I arrived, 22%, as predicted.
I recommend tapping the battery meter to put it into percent instead of EPA miles (useless, misleading) and only estimate range using the trip planner, which is usually quite good.
Shenanigans like that is how you end up with regulations on what car can display in terms of range. This is similar to how we ended up with strict rules on MPG when purchasing.
This has been my experience as well. When there's a disparity, the Energy app gives additional details why the estimate was wrong (driving speed, climate control, etc).
Rented a MY a couple months ago and was surprised how much I, and more surprisingly, my wife, hated it. Now, I despise Elon and the risky safety decisions of Tesla engineers, so I'm biased, but I wanted to give them a shot.
Range was horrible. We drove about 100 miles and spent a couple hours over several sessions at superchargers. The handling and turning radius sucked. The controls were frighteningly distracting and confusing. Sound in the cabin seemed very weird, probably due to the glass roof and noise cancelling system. Finally, for a dual motor, I expected a lot more acceleration. I drove a Chevy Bolt for a year and was surprised how heavy and sluggish the MY felt.
> We drove about 100 miles and spent a couple hours over several sessions at superchargers
Honestly I don't believe this. Requiring two hours sessions in 100 miles is an absolutely extraordinary claim, requiring something to be extremely wrong with the car in some way that didnt brick it entirely.
As a Tesla owner, I think the source of the confusion is the EPA range displayed in the HUD on the Tesla. We toggled ours to show the battery percentage, which is much more useful to us.
We've never owned a gas vehicle that met it's EPA range and the Tesla is no different. No one takes EPA MPG * GALLONS of gas and expects it to be a real life estimate of range.
Wind resistance increases EXPONENTIALLY with speed. Drive a little over the speeds the EPA used to determine range, and the observed range will drop significantly as a percentage when compared to the EPA range for any vehicle.
If you do have a Tesla, you'll quickly find out that the trip computer is very accurate. The worst I've seen is a cold January day in Wisconsin (-10F) while on a road trip with a head wind. In that scenario, the trip computer was off by 7% mostly due to the head wind. In the summer, it is spot on usually within 1 - 2%.
FWIW Our Audis (Q5, A6 allroad) have significantly better MPGs than the advertised ones
The Q5 advertises 28mlg on the highway but i consistently hit 30+ here
And the wagon hits 35mpg on the highway very often even though it only advertises 26. It actually turns off 2 of the 6 cylinders when it senses that it can.
Both cars I've owned have had better efficiency and thus range than advertised (a Honda and a Subaru). I'm often shocked at how I can get 38-40mpg + on a car that is supposed to be getting 29mpg.
Same here. I've come to the conclusion that most drivers (or most drivers that complain about EPA mileage ratings anyway) have insane driving habits. Every car I have ever owned (And I've run the gamut from sedans to light pickups of both American an Japanese make) has met or exceeded the EPA rated mileage.
The only oddity that I have observed is in my current car, a Lexus hybrid crossover just barely meets its city rating in town while easily beating the city rating (which is higher since it's a hybrid) on the highway. Not that I'm complaining, but it's not what I expected from my first hybrid vehicle.
> We've never owned a gas vehicle that met it's EPA range and the Tesla is no different. No one takes EPA MPG * GALLONS of gas and expects it to be a real life estimate of range.
Because gas stations are still far more common than fast chargers. We'll get there with EV charging, but right now range does matter, especially if you routinely see half of what was advertised.
I had a similar thought before we purchased our Tesla. Our actual experience has been much better than expected. Here's why:
1) Everyday Driving / Commuting: Much like an ICE vehicle where one thinks about 1/2 tank, 1/4 tank, etc... we think about percentages. For us, a round-trip to the in-laws is 50% in the summer and 60% in the winter, for example. Commuting round trip is ~15% in the winter, and ~12% in the summer. This combined with the fact that the car starts every morning charged to 80% means that we really don't ever worry about super charging in our day-to-day life.
2) Road Trips: The navigation software on the tesla automatically add charging stops where needed, and critically, it is very accurate when predicting range as a percentage when it knows your destination. We typically charge until it say we'll reach our destination/charging stops with 10%. That reserve has always been more than enough even on 1000 - 2000 mile road trips.
My general advice to anyone with a Tesla who has range anxiety:
1) Put the round trip into the trip computer. (e.g. Home => Place I Want To Go To => Home)
2) Always make sure you'll get to your next charging stop with 10 - 15% left according to the trip computer.
3) Relax and enjoy the auto-pilot :)
Right now it varies a lot where in the world you are. I don’t have exact numbers but I have a feeling there’s more fast charging locations around me than gas stations. (There may be more gas pumps but it doesn’t matter because most EV owners here don’t use fast charging as their main method of charging)
I guess this is only true in like 2-3 countries in the world right now. But it’s changing very rapidly.
> We've never owned a gas vehicle that met it's EPA range and the Tesla is no different. No one takes EPA MPG * GALLONS of gas and expects it to be a real life estimate of range.
Why is this exactly? It's been true - MPG is lower than estimated - of every vehicle I've owned too except for my most recent, a '23 MX-5 (i.e. a sports car, which I tend to drive at higher RPMs and in lower gears.) I'm getting spot-on or a little above the EPA estimated on the car I'd least expect it.
Consider yourself lucky. Off the top of my head both Ford and Subaru were subject to lawsuits about vehicles not meeting EPA range expectations. When I had an outback I was very lucky to get 17MPG and the EPA range on the window sticker was 27 which felt really deceptive.
My 2021 Honda CR-V doesn’t get close to EPA MPG but the range calculator is still accurate to within maybe 15%. I’ve tested it a few times driving from Oakland to LA which is right around the full range of the car and it gets pretty close- even with a whole mountain range to drive over north of LA. It doesn’t appear to use EPA MPG for its estimates and it makes for a better experience.
I think this is a problem because a lot of what people use to shop an EV is the headline range number, which you are declaring is not accurate. This is false advertising.
My EPA highway mile rating is lower than I see in actual driving in my ICE. City is about accurate unless I’ve been in a lot of traffic’s with its look back range for live mpg estimates. Lots of owners of other EV brands and the article itself said they’re much better than Tesla’s estimate as well. It’s difficult to see how the issue is anything but specific to Tesla and its method of presenting info to consumers. They were even force to lower their previously stated range, per the linked article.
Neither v^2 nor v^3 is exponential. They are polynomial functions. Exponential would be if wind resistance or power or fuel consumption were c^x for some constant c.
It seems to have become fashionable to say "exponentially" or even "EXPONENTIALLY" when you mean it's a rapidly increasing function, but to the technically-minded, whom I would hope to find on HN, there is still a clear-cut difference between exponential and polynomial.
I drove a Tesla for over a month and it was a relief to go back to my Honda Civic. The range (both miles and %) was wildly inaccurate. If I had to drive anywhere that wasn’t a few miles within the city, I was under constant anxiety. No thank you.
It’s a wonder to me that anyone would ever trust anything Elon Musk ever says about anything. He’s a proven liar and creates an openly hostile, negative culture wherever he goes. I feel sorry for people who are caught up in his lies, either customers or employees or people who work closely with him and have to suffer his tantrums. There was a point I admired him, but that is long past.
I can’t credit myself with the observation, it was someone else on HN, but it ran something like this:
For years Tesla made cars that were disproportionately appealing to people with concerns about the environment, a population that skews liberal/progressive. Those on the other side of the political world view might like the cars too- especially technophiles— but there certainly a large contingent that are skeptical to anything with a primary appeal of being “environmentally friendly”. Then comes the current culture-war driven political ecosystem, and all musk has to do is tweet some controversial things that might resonate with some contingents on the political right and all of a sudden those individuals may feel more comfortable buying cars from a guy who speaks their language.
I certainly don’t know if that was Musk’s deliberate strategy though, but it wouldn’t shock me if his actions in that way are partly “him” and partly him leaning into a role of social prominence that resonates with a consumer population previously less likely to buy his cars.
It would be interesting if I could fine surveys of automobile brand customer bases broken down by political affiliation, and if it’s shifted Tesla’s at all in recent years.
The article says that Tesla knowingly overestimated their numbers. Tesla even switches the range algorithm to be more accurate when mileage gets to 50%.
I think the difference is that a gas-powered car will keep driving when the gas indicator hits zero. You can still get a couple dozen miles at that points, and those are so important. Tesla is really doing you a disservice by not considering that.
I've had problems with the passenger side airbag not enabling, and turn signal not working. Both scary issues. Made appointments with the support. Both were cancelled outright by them (!). They tried to convince me that there was no problem, and it was all due to the way I use the car. They seemed to try everything to get out of appointments. My wife had to use the back seat for a month while I argued with them.
Eventually both problems were resolved by software updates, proving that the problems were indeed on their side.
Is the back seat safer than the front seat, even if the front seat airbag doesn't deploy? I know recent tests show the back seat is a good bit less safe, and I think it's primarily due to most manufacturers not using the same seat belt technology as they do in the front, but maybe some of that is the lack of a front airbag.
I thought it was just me! Trying to control turn signals is beyond infuriating in a Model Y. You would think that this should be part of the functionality that is largely free of bugs..
A lot of comments are discussing the difficulty in estimating range accurately or how all EPA estimates are inflated. But the article claims Tesla knowingly uses an algorithm with inflated numbers and swaps the rost estimate out for a more accurate estimate at 50% charge. That's different than a good faith attempt at estimating range and a dark pattern.
I was trying to interpret what that means. I'm guessing they aren't factoring current conditions above 50% and instead rely on average conditions. I'd be surprised if this is actually worse than what the EPA views as average given the truth-in-advertising requirements they put on Tesla.
This isn't entirely unreasonable. Most people whose battery is at 80% aren't going to be depleting it in the next few hours, so say factoring the present cold morning might produce overly pessimistic guesses.
They are being aggressive for sure, but this article strikes me as pretty biased against Tesla. The article concedes that most of these customers have no range problems -- they are probably driving in cold at 80 MPH blasting their heat to 70 degrees wondering why their range is so poor -- even though it is entirely expected behavior.
> This isn't entirely unreasonable… factoring the present cold morning might produce overly pessimistic guesses
It’s always unreasonable in something like this to present knowingly inaccurate data when accurate data is available. As others have pointed out, Teslas do seem perfectly capable of doing this based on their performance when estimating a particular route. It’s also something other brands do better, so even if there was an argument to be made that Tesla didn’t have the data, it would still be the case that they should have it.
It is also not pessimistic to give an estimate in the conditions you outline: It’s accurate. Whether you’re going to be driving that long is irrelevant because Tesla should not be defaulting to some probabilistic behavior guess prior to even starting the car or entering a route. It should default to “hey, I see you’re driving your car. If you keep driving this is your range”. It shouldn’t default to “I don’t know how long you’ll be driving so I’ll just give a range estimate that assumed you’ll drive for a short time now and then more later and maybe later the conditions will provide better range, so let’s use that number”
I’m not sure why Tesla would be defended in this point by anyone when other EV’s do this more accurately and consistently. If it was a general problem and no one could do it any better then by all means it would be unreasonable to complain about Tesla, it would simply be a limit of the technology. But it’s not.
That's a pretty damning article and it looks like there are more and more of those coming.
Tesla still somehow benefits from its innovators / clean company reputation, but at this pace it won't be long before agencies start to act on what's become much more than just 'optimistic marketing'.
I think that reputation already died in the last 2-3 years.
It's now pretty common in my circle to hear people say they'll pay a premium to not own a Tesla. Primarily because of lots of bad experiences with build quality/repairs, but also because there are now lots of high quality alternatives. Namely Rivian and Lucid, but also the legacy automakers (two friends bought mach-es recently and there's a smattering of F-150 lightnings.)
The fact that Musk has adopted the public persona of a crazy uncle who doesn't get Thanksgiving invites -- and is heavily associated with the Tesla brand -- doesn't help either.
Musk is pretty much the whole reason. People have a much easier time remembering sleazy business practices when there's a celebrity CEO whose personality matches the crime.
If you think about the CEOs of major corporations, the only ones who are personally memorable for the public are founders. How many exceptions can you think of, memorable personalities that were hired as CEOs or rose to become CEO of established companies? Lee Iacocca is one, barely. Carly Fiorina manages to be forgettable even though she ran for president. I'm sure there are more exceptions, but not enough to invalidate the rule.
So why can flamboyant or quirky people like Musk or Zuckerberg not get hired as CEOs of huge corporations? At least part of the reason is that being bland and forgettable is part of the job requirements. It makes it that much harder for the public to remember the sleazy things they learn about a company. A crime committed by a faceless company is like a natural disaster. A crime committed by Tesla is easier to see as human evil, because we can see how Musk revels in his unaccountability. There's a story: evil person did evil thing. And an obvious corollary: evil person must be prevented from doing more evil! If Tesla had replaced Musk with a faceless professional CEO, there would be no story, just "bad thing happened for inscrutable reasons."
Our caravan has been a pile of shit, which I’m sure anyone who’s ever had a caravan can attest to.
Anyway. We are looking for reliability and imagine my surprise when Kia, of all brands, came out king of generally affordable reliability. Plus their EV reviews reasonably well.
A lot has changed in 10 years for vehicles I guess…
I don't know much about Lucid, but Rivian in its current form is not sustainable. Their cars are incredibly overweight and overengineered, their COGS/BOM is out of control, and with the end of ZIRP I'm not sure they have the time and financing to fix these problems at the burn rate they are at. Don't get me started on their "environmentalist adventure vehicle" marketing that's putting 7000-pound cars on mountain trails.
I'm a lot more excited about Hyundai/Kia and Ford.
Do those people who say they will pay a premium to not own a Tesla already own a Tesla? Because all the people I know who own a Tesla say it's the best car they've every owned to the extent that they wouldn't consider any other car.
Are they also in the market for an electric car? I said I would pay a premium not to own a Tesla, largely because of Musk. And then it came time to buy an EV: and there just isn't a vehicle under $100,000 that performs better under 100mph. And range? The Kia EV6 GT, which costs $5k more than the Model 3 Performance (or $12,500 because it doesn't qualify for the tax credit), is slower 0-60, has only 200 mile range. The Model 3 could have 26% lower range than advertised and still have 10% more range. So .5 second faster 0-60, 10% longer range, for $12,500 less.
If their stock price is anything to go on, they channel perfect futuristic cars out of a time void and will bring about a utopian post-scarcity society.
I don't think you need more data. Tesla had a team of people "managing" this issue to relieve demand on their service centres. What more data do you think would be useful to clarify Tesla's actions?
> [one customer] ultimately concluded there is nothing wrong with his car. The problem, he said, was that Tesla is overstating its performance
As I read this, either his car was defective or he was lied to to convince him to make a $XX,000 purchase. It seems that Tesla should be facing some form of fraud-based lawsuit over the lies selling the car or treating it under warranty, right?
Most normal Tesla owners I'm familiar with just come to accept that the website range claim is complete horseshit. They go on with their lives and just don't worry about it. For around town, it'll get somewhat close to rated range anyway, and road trips aren't that common for most people. The supercharger network is pretty good, and if you have to stop every 200 miles instead of the rated 358, then so be it.
Personally I think the EPA should revamp the rating system. I want to see every manufacturer forced to admit what range to expect if we use 90% of the battery capacity, at 70 mph, in 32F ambient temperature with climate control set to 68F. The only time people really care deeply about range is on the interstate, so the range numbers really ought to reflect that.
No. Sorry. Making the claim that most tesla owners do X is in my opinion horseshit. Tesla should be ashamed of themselves and should be sued into oblivion for false advertising. This is not a +/- 5%. This is a massive lie and a coverup.
The EPA recommended system is pretty accurate and conservative, according to the article. Mercedes is supposed to use it and has more accurate estimates. Tesla is still using their own math from before the EPA had a plan.
Meanwhile, what difference does it make if most Tesla customers do X? Tesla now has enough customers that hurting 10% of them is a major impact.
EPA should also add multiple range estimates say at 70mph, 80mph. Lots of people drive 80mph+ on the highway.
And buyers should be made aware they will be using only 70% (10 to 80) of the battery between highway charger stops. Charging gets really slow after 80%.
Tesla advertises the EPA rated range. The car not actually achieving that range in real world conditions (which are more varied than the test conditions) is not necessarily defective or false advertising.
Now I do think that the EPA ratings are inadequate and inconsistent. Those could use some improvement to better reflect real world driving conditions.
I have an S so I'm biased but this feels like a hit piece.
Range is of course always going to be an estimate. Marketing is always going to be a battle of who has the bigger number. Having people schedule an appointment to fix their "broken" cars that can only go 470 instead of 500km is of course going to be a waste of time and money.
I'm part of a facebook group for tesla owners and literally every day this week there has been a post that goes something like "I left my house with 500km, drove 1km and now it says 497km. Should I schedule an appointment?" With the common advice being to switch to % instead of distance and remember that it's an estimate.
While I think Tesla (and most manufacturers) could do a better job at education, and of course having empathy for people who have spent a lot of money on something and worried it's defective, I don't think anything in this article is as damning as it sounds.
> He expected to get something close to the electric sport sedan’s advertised driving range: 353 miles on a fully charged battery.
> He soon realized he was sometimes getting less than half that much range
We’re not talking about a couple of miles here or there.
And if Tesla discovered that range issues (even if entirely based around customer perception) were a widespread enough issue to set up a team specifically to address it, that team said nothing publicly and instead cancelled service appointments without explanation… that’s absolutely newsworthy, whether you consider it a “hit piece” or not.
> Inside the Nevada team’s office, some employees celebrated canceling service appointments by putting their phones on mute and striking a metal xylophone, triggering applause from coworkers who sometimes stood on desks. The team often closed hundreds of cases a week and staffers were tracked on their average number of diverted appointments per day.
> > He soon realized he was sometimes getting less than half that much range
Either he has VERY BAD driving habits, or he's driving in some extreme scenarios.
I have a Model 3 Performance that's estimated to have a 299 mile range, IIRC. I've driven at 75 mph in 30F weather, and it reduced my range to about 230 miles. That's just shy of 25%, which while is certainly a significant reduction, is not the >50% the guy was dealing with.
Do people think they'll get the full EPA range at 70+ mph with the heat or A/C on? I always assumed EPA ranges were done on flat terrain at 60 mph with climate controls off and expected any deviation from that to reduce my range.
That all said, getting over 50% less than estimate range is pretty bad, and unless they're driving fast in super cold weather up hill, it really points to a potentially faulty battery that Tesla is trying to get out of replacing.
I'd have to see more to believe that people are seriously getting less than half the estimated range. Not one person "sometimes" having an issue. (Moot point anyway cause I'm probably never gonna buy a Tesla.)
I've owned EVs from different brands, including Tesla. In my experience so far, only Tesla uses the naive and wildly optimistic EPA number for the range display. My wife drives a Bolt and it uses your moving average to calculate the range estimate, and it's pretty much dead-on accurate.
Tesla -could- do it but chooses not to. Put it in trip mode and it's pretty close to dead-on. Look at the consumption page and it's pretty accurate there too. Tesla elects not to use this already available information, because it would consistently show people a lower number than what the web page did when they ordered the car.
You should have higher expectations of your vehicle.
My 2016 ICE car's "miles left" meter is accurate to +/- 2 miles from the moment I top up the tank (80% highway driving, 20% hilly city and rolling country roads).
IMO, accurately telling the vehicle operator how many miles of juice you have left is a KPI, as it informs when you'll need to plan for refueling.
Having driven an EV for a few weeks in identical conditions, this inaccuracy is probably the major contributor to "range anxiety". I have no idea whether I'll need to recharge in 60 miles or in 25 miles, and that's totally unacceptable in most parts of the US (where there aren't available chargers every 5 miles of your trip).
> My 2016 ICE car's "miles left" meter is accurate to +/- 2 miles from the moment I top up the tank (80% highway driving, 20% hilly city and rolling country roads).
No way. That’d be accurate to under 1% - well within the variation you’ll get just from different air densities (temperature, pressure, humidity). Forget about A/C on or off, tire pressure, etc.
The difficulty is because of the difference in operating regimes of the power trains.
An old ICE has to run within an RPM range, so the top end on MPG is set below infinite, and the bottom end is limited by the time to ramp the engine to its max consumption.
Electric vehicles have neither of these issues. On a downhill run that is long enough you could in theory fully recharge your battery, and you can always send full power (and resultant fuel consumption) to the engine.
On top of this EVs are operating at much higher efficiencies so the effective size of the tank is smaller.
This is not to say range estimation couldn’t be improved, only that it is a much more challenging model with EVs.
This isn't a hit piece. As someone that formerly owned a Tesla, all of this rings true and I was so glad to finally ditch the vehicle back to the second hand market.
You are extremely biased. I have both owned a Tesla and non Tesla EV. Non Tesla EVs are way more conservative in their range estimates and you can actually beat their estimates. People routinely beat BMWs advertised EPA range - something you will never hear for a Tesla
For sure, I was using an extreme example for my anecdote(s) but also how many people get 50% of their estimated range? This specific example might be someone with a bad battery that tesla is trying to sweep under the rug BUT the article positions this as it's basically everyone.
"This 1 guy gets 50% of the estimated range and the problem is so wide spread tesla started a team to address it!"
is really different from
"Many customers are surprised they get less range than it says on the site and for a very extreme example, one guy gets 50% less (under uncertain circumstances)"
“In March, Alexandre Ponsin set out on a family road trip from Colorado to California in his newly purchased Tesla, a used 2021 Model 3. He expected to get something close to the electric sport sedan’s advertised driving range: 353 miles on a fully charged battery.
He soon realized he was sometimes getting less than half that much range, particularly in cold weather – such severe underperformance that he was convinced the car had a serious defect.”
He simply does not understand how batteries and power delivery work. Driving through the Rocky mountains will reduce mpg significantly for an internal combustion engine as well. Colder temperatures require a heater and less efficient for batteries due to increased viscosity of electrolyte fluid. All a perfect storm for poor EV performance.
Sure, but the system continues to make extremely optimistic (and unrealistic) estimates about your range until you hit 50% battery, at which point it tries to be more realistic so that it doesn't strand you in the middle of nowhere.
It should be giving you the more realistic estimate as soon as possible, so that you can plan better, rather than misleading you for half your trip.
> Driving through the Rocky mountains will reduce mpg significantly for an internal combustion engine as well.
Do you mean it will reduce the mpg because of reduced air density, or because of temperature as well? I thought the efficiency of an ICE was dependent on the difference in temperature it creates between the combustion and the coldest part of the cycle. It seems efficiency would improve in cold temperatures because less energy would be wasted cooling the engine since the incoming air is doing that.
EV batteries are less efficient cold weather and hot weather too. Yes, ICE would be more efficient in cold due to cooler/more combustable air entering the combustion chamber as evidenced by the use of intercoolers in turbos to cool the hot compressed air from the turbo mechanism.
They come up w/ the range under absolute perfect driving conditions that don't actually exist. The driving conditions should reflect normal driving conditions.
The problem is what are normal driving conditions? Another poster mentioned having efficiency numbers by the grade of the road, which would provide more information to buyers.
Readit News
However if you punch in a destination, you'll get exact numbers, and those are insanely reliable. It claims (and I don't believe any claims coming from tesla) that it'll factor wind, elevation, temperature, etc. But regardless of what it factors in, it's on the money.
Was driving back from a campsite that I turned out to not have charging compatibility with, but thought I had plenty of margin to get to the nearest charger. As I drove through the mountains however, I began noticing that a.) my battery was depleting much faster than expected and b.) I wasn’t seeing any houses and very few motorists. I watched with increasing dread as the trip miles began converging with the battery miles, as my friends in the car got more and more quiet. We reached the inflection point, and the best I could do was hope we’d encounter somewhere with a plug that might be able to get us the rest of the way. Eventually though the milage indicator reached zero, and I pulled off the road to what I thought was a campsite but turned out to be a sort of rest stop with no power plugs in sight. To make matters worse I was in a mountain valley and had no phone signal, and hiking wasn’t an option as it was pretty hot and we had no water. We were there for hours until I was able to flag down a nice older couple and get a ride to a place with cell signal, where I was able to get a tow truck capable of transporting my car (turns out you need one that has a full bed because of the regenerative breaking, and tesla’s service doesn’t have infinite coverage) to the charger I was trying to get to.
Ironically that last part was probably the most frustrating. The charging spot was full save one spot in the back, which my tow truck guy Mel couldn’t get back to. No sweat I thought, I’ll just try asking someone to swap, but people in their cars pretended to ignore me, and one couple leaving theirs just walked away, as I asked if they could move so we could unload my dead car. Had a sudden wave of empathy for the people I usually walk away from who ask me for spare change lol. Eventually someone left and I was able to charge and resume the 6 hour road trip home. Biggest lesson learned was that slow is fast, keep it at 60 if you want the milage meter to not die as quick.
Just out of curiosity, where was this?
This also works in petrol cars: the air resistance efficiency falloff is dramatic at higher speeds.
Sounds incredibly short-sighted that the regenerative braking can't be temporarily disabled by the driver... two people can push a "regular" car to a nearby gas station in a pinch. Even one person can push a smaller car around a parking lot if necessary.
That said, they often send out full/flat bed tow trucks these days for almost any reason.
Edit: fixed "breaking" to "braking"
Another take-home lesson: if you're driving out of range of civilization, carry water along with your first aid supplies.
I'm uncomfortably aware how quickly vehicles take me to inconvenient, if not dangerous, distances. 10 miles away is a short distance to drive but three hours to walk. Even fifteen minutes on a bike is a tedious walking distance back if it breaks down. For how easy it is to put or keep some bottled water in a car, why not do that all the time?
Seems like so many Tesla owners drive like complete jerks.
Drive way too close to people (tailgating).
Drive way too fast all time, even in neighborhoods.
Drive way too aggressively.
Drive way too entitled.
I’ve seen some crazy stuff from people driving a Tesla. Driving on the shoulder when traffic backs up. Zipping around people to steal parking spots.
Tesla owners posting videos online of anyone that walks by their car.
We won’t park near a Tesla at all these days. I guess that campaign is working to their advantage.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35468855
Is there a service for "On demand battery charging". A mini truck carrying a generator that can be called to the location. Could charge premium from the EVs that are too tired to move.
[0] https://www.motorcycleclassics.com/classic-motorcycle-tourin...
I wonder if they would have started responding if you motioned the tow truck driver to unload your car directly behind them, in a position that would obviously seriously inconvenience the other driver(s) or prevent them from leaving entirely...of course, also mentioning that was your plan to them loudly so you're sure they can hear.
towing a car with regenerative braking seems like a great way to charge it! Elon needs to put somebody on this.
Maybe the non-bed truck could've simply charged your car by pulling it :D
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The sheer ease of mind that comes with having densely packed energy that can be replenished at a moment's notice practically anywhere should not be disregarded easily. Maybe battery tech can get there some day, but it's certainly not today.
and the most disappointing.
Dead Comment
The routefinder 'learns' from your previous driving habits. Driving style easily has a 50% impact on range between "drives 50 mph slipstreaming behind a truck" and "drives 90 mph and brakes aggressively at every corner".
All these comments about ICE vehicles being the same ignore that when ICE vehicles have estimates to empty, they take basic steps to try to get the estimate correct.
I guess I'm flabbergasted by this, as that's not how my Chevy Volt (and I presume many other BEVs) work. The range value ('guessimeter' people call it) on my Volt takes something like a rolling average of your last few drives and that's what it shows you. So if it's winter, it shows you less range because your last few drives had less efficiency. It's not always accurate (if there's, say, major temp fluctuations), but it's way more useful than what you're describing.
To me, what you're describing is borderline dishonest marketing, and technically unnecessary.
What I'd like to see is two numbers: estimated range as I've described, and beside it a kWh # (which I can guesstimate from the battery % gauge visual, but not precise).
EDIT: Not sure why car manufacturers in general hide the kWh remaining-capacity of the battery so much. They seem to think consumers are too stupid to understand such technical terms? But they're clearly aware of it every time they use a public charger, and it's the closest equivalent to litres/gallons in an ICE.
My range is approx. 180 miles, in favorable conditions (summer, AC off). If it was actually accurate, as soon as you hit 70-80mph you would see your range half. Clearly that doesn't happen, so the estimator is off by ~40% for highway conditions, i.e. complete bullshit.
I'd like to see evidence of this, but I'm skeptical. Sounds like something Tesla fans claim is happening, like when you report an error at an intersection it gets fixed manually. And, even if true, I'm not sure how useful it'd be.
Any sane a Tesla driver changes that to show percent battery instead of range.
As others have said the trip planner is excellent, within a percent or two even in winter conditions driving over passes etc..
Note that range changes a lot more due to elevation, speed, cold etc, compared to gas cars because electrics are so much more efficient.
It sort of learns based on the immediately previous drive what the driving style is, and therefore what the range is.
but I have driven 35mph on slow city streets to make it to the next charging station when the one I was at was full with a line. (years ago)
Tip: tap the range estimate to switch it to percent. The EPA estimate is meaningless. Yes, that should be improved.
That's not quite right. The power required to maintain a constant velocity v against a constant drag force of F is P = Fv. With air drag on a car moving at highway speeds, the drag force F actually depends on v: it's proportional to the square of v, i.e. F ~ v^2. All together then:
P ~ v^3
So doubling the speed will increase the required power by a factor of eight.
Even this is a massive over-simplification. Driving the same speed with a 20 mph headwind is going to take lot more energy than with a 20 mph tailwind for example. There's lots of other variables and they may be certainly tracking some (like A/C current draw) but I doubt they track others (like rolling friction or road conditions).
Edit: I found this article [1] and it claims they track an impressive amount of weather and traffic data for the calculation. I'd be curious if this is based on car sensors (probably not?) or local weather stations.
[1] https://electrek.co/2022/03/16/tesla-accounts-wind-air-densi...
Edit: someone else pointed out if you actually navigate then it will show remaining % more accurately. Still seems like false advertising..
I now own a Long Range Model X. It is MUCH closer to the EPA mileage. I average ~330wh/m but I have a 100kwh battery, so much closer to a legitimate 300 mile range. Once again, doesn’t really make a different unless you happen to have an exact 275 mile trip. Either way, you’ll be stopping at a halfway supercharger to stay in optimal charge range (15-85%).
Interestingly the accuracy seems to get a lot better by the time I'm down to half a tank. I don't know if it's a sensor issue, or maybe my driving habits just change a lot when I have a full tank versus when I'm running low.
The type of driving and time I'm driving can also make a huge difference to my trip MPG - some trips I average about 10MPG, others closer to 40MPG. Generally speaking, low speed but clear rural roads get the best, followed by motorway, followed by pootering around the city. The absolute worst mileage is during the winter, when I might only be driving lots of short trips around town on a very cold engine, with the headlights on, in the rain. In that case, I might only get around 200 miles out of a tank.
Anyway, my point is that knowing the specifics of this trip's fuel consumption is a much easier problem than knowing how many miles it'll be until you next need to refuel.
However, the key difference is that my gas car can be filled up anywhere, and worst case I'd need to get a gas can. Running out of charge is a flatbed tow, that's a huge hassle. The range being accurate is a big deal on an electric!
On the way back to the drop off autopilot tried to slam us into the Bentley next us! It had been traveling the same direction as us for like 20 minutes and when we passed through an intersection it just jerked hard left and I had to correct it manually. Possible injuries notwithstanding I’m sure that would have surpassed my insurance coverage, which I’ve intentionally gone way above minimums on.
Even if this and many other stories are just anecdotes, I could never imagine myself even testing this "auto-but-not-really-pilot" feature outside of a testing environment.
How do you folks dare to even try to use it? The risk is so big and the reward so tiny...
Where were you that has a dozen chargers but no superchargers?
In a recent review, a Tesla did a slightly better job than most of the cars tested, as far as portion of stated range achieved.
https://youtu.be/fvwOa7TCd1E&t=36m15s
Most people speed on the freeway. Extra speed reduces range significantly.
I have a 2022 Nissan Leaf with 220 miles EPA range. I've found that this number is reasonably close to correct if one is driving under 60mph on country roads under moderate climate conditions. We live in Ohio and so I have actually done long drives like that to go to remote places to go camping. (There are, surprisingly, both L2 and fast chargers around in rural Ohio but you definitely need an app and need to check ahead of time.)
Speed matters because air resistance increases exponentially with speed, not linearly. Driving 60+, lots of stop and go, or using HVAC a lot will bring it down the range to as low as 180, but that seems like the worst range I've seen. That was driving ~75mph with HVAC on.
The estimates are based on driving on a flat road at the speed limit.
Even my Lexus SUV can get 24mpg driving on 35-45mph roads vs 16-19 in the city or going to the mountains where elevation increases.
People's understanding of range is just not quite there yet whether it's for an ICE vehicle or an EV.
Do you like the BMW electric system?
I know how far % will go. Very simple.
The miles is a PR stunt.
By convention, you are required to phrase this as "I love my Tesla, but..."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LWL90paufE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynCaTDR4rDQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFB6hsYXDiA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fvwOa7TCd1E
Spoiler alert: Tesla models fare about as well, if not better, than their EV cousins, hitting around 80% of the stated range in the wild.
This is not true according to the very article we're discussing here, which across many analysis learned that three Tesla vehicles were the least-accurate (most-optimistic or most-deceptive, depending on your point of view).
The thing I hate most about my car is that I spent $10K on "Full Self Driving" and rarely use it. It totally sucks and is definitely the worst $10K I've ever spent on anything. That money could have gone to a nice vacation somewhere and I would be happy about that. But no, every time I try out the FSD, I come away disappointed.
Not owning a car only using rentals, I still think Tesla has the best and most intuitive UI. I can find everything easily, whereas in a SUVs from Skoda/VW/Audi/BMW/Renault/... it's hard to find things - at least for me.
What I do hate about the Model Ys we rented is the noise! Wind/wheel noise is as loud at 100km/h as a BMW at 150km/h - I guess they do this to safe weight and increase range, but it makes the trips very unpleasant.
Also how it randomly breaks in self driving (at least on a German Autobahn).
I think the best UI was before all the computer displays in cars. Everything operable without visual contact.
Or, you know, margins.
Consider:
- batteries lose, best case, about 10-20% of max range over a typical car ownership period
- not charging to the max is very often important to not getting bad degradation, so take another 10% off
- winter can take 10-20% range off
- driving at typical speed as opposed to the alleged ratings is probably another 10-20% reduced range
- headwinds, air conditioning/heating, and other factors can remove another 10-20%.
So suddenly, some 300 mile rated range is actually 150 miles of real world range. So here in the midwest, with underinvested charging infrastructure and biiiiiiggggg states and rural density, a 400 mile range really is pretty much required for any functional long distance driving.
The battery icon is Miles of rated range, where “rated” means flat windless road at 60MPH and 70 degrees. Call it “standard” range if you will. The car has no idea where you’re going so it uses the standard calculation.
When you set a destination it can now (and does) factor in elevation change, speed on given roads, wind speed, wind direction, temperature along the route, etc etc etc and is more accurate.
So your least favorite feature is one you openly admit to not using properly? If you want laser precise range estimation set a destination ffs. Or, if you’re like most drivers you start every day with 200-300mi of range and unless you’re going out of state you don’t even think about range.
ICE cars all show a percentage, and maybe additionally a mileage on newer cars. The fact that they threw that away is a little silly.
You state this as a fact, but it's completely incorrect. It has been an option since at least 2018 to change the indicator to percentage.
I wish Tesla would allow you to hide the battery percentage entirely (unless it drops below a threshold).
Judging by this the EPA numbers it gives are accurate on average.
Can you tell more about this? I'm curious.
I do long road trips all the time with it. Best car I’ve owned ever by a mile.
Otherwise it looks to me that your rant is just for karma collecting.
Worth noting this is also common in ICE cars. Mine has it.
Coasting on a flat surface at 35mph with a positive tailwind?
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Sunk cost and all that
Range was horrible. We drove about 100 miles and spent a couple hours over several sessions at superchargers. The handling and turning radius sucked. The controls were frighteningly distracting and confusing. Sound in the cabin seemed very weird, probably due to the glass roof and noise cancelling system. Finally, for a dual motor, I expected a lot more acceleration. I drove a Chevy Bolt for a year and was surprised how heavy and sluggish the MY felt.
Honestly I don't believe this. Requiring two hours sessions in 100 miles is an absolutely extraordinary claim, requiring something to be extremely wrong with the car in some way that didnt brick it entirely.
We've never owned a gas vehicle that met it's EPA range and the Tesla is no different. No one takes EPA MPG * GALLONS of gas and expects it to be a real life estimate of range.
Wind resistance increases EXPONENTIALLY with speed. Drive a little over the speeds the EPA used to determine range, and the observed range will drop significantly as a percentage when compared to the EPA range for any vehicle.
If you do have a Tesla, you'll quickly find out that the trip computer is very accurate. The worst I've seen is a cold January day in Wisconsin (-10F) while on a road trip with a head wind. In that scenario, the trip computer was off by 7% mostly due to the head wind. In the summer, it is spot on usually within 1 - 2%.
The Q5 advertises 28mlg on the highway but i consistently hit 30+ here
And the wagon hits 35mpg on the highway very often even though it only advertises 26. It actually turns off 2 of the 6 cylinders when it senses that it can.
The only oddity that I have observed is in my current car, a Lexus hybrid crossover just barely meets its city rating in town while easily beating the city rating (which is higher since it's a hybrid) on the highway. Not that I'm complaining, but it's not what I expected from my first hybrid vehicle.
Because gas stations are still far more common than fast chargers. We'll get there with EV charging, but right now range does matter, especially if you routinely see half of what was advertised.
1) Everyday Driving / Commuting: Much like an ICE vehicle where one thinks about 1/2 tank, 1/4 tank, etc... we think about percentages. For us, a round-trip to the in-laws is 50% in the summer and 60% in the winter, for example. Commuting round trip is ~15% in the winter, and ~12% in the summer. This combined with the fact that the car starts every morning charged to 80% means that we really don't ever worry about super charging in our day-to-day life.
2) Road Trips: The navigation software on the tesla automatically add charging stops where needed, and critically, it is very accurate when predicting range as a percentage when it knows your destination. We typically charge until it say we'll reach our destination/charging stops with 10%. That reserve has always been more than enough even on 1000 - 2000 mile road trips.
My general advice to anyone with a Tesla who has range anxiety: 1) Put the round trip into the trip computer. (e.g. Home => Place I Want To Go To => Home) 2) Always make sure you'll get to your next charging stop with 10 - 15% left according to the trip computer. 3) Relax and enjoy the auto-pilot :)
Right now it varies a lot where in the world you are. I don’t have exact numbers but I have a feeling there’s more fast charging locations around me than gas stations. (There may be more gas pumps but it doesn’t matter because most EV owners here don’t use fast charging as their main method of charging)
I guess this is only true in like 2-3 countries in the world right now. But it’s changing very rapidly.
Why is this exactly? It's been true - MPG is lower than estimated - of every vehicle I've owned too except for my most recent, a '23 MX-5 (i.e. a sports car, which I tend to drive at higher RPMs and in lower gears.) I'm getting spot-on or a little above the EPA estimated on the car I'd least expect it.
(edited to clarify "it's been true")
https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/browseList.jsp
I have a 10 year old Mazda 3 and the MPG estimate is on target: 32 combined 28 city 39 highway estimate and I get 36 mpg. User average is 35.2.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drag_(physics)
And the power required to move against the air is the cube, not the square!
It seems to have become fashionable to say "exponentially" or even "EXPONENTIALLY" when you mean it's a rapidly increasing function, but to the technically-minded, whom I would hope to find on HN, there is still a clear-cut difference between exponential and polynomial.
It’s a wonder to me that anyone would ever trust anything Elon Musk ever says about anything. He’s a proven liar and creates an openly hostile, negative culture wherever he goes. I feel sorry for people who are caught up in his lies, either customers or employees or people who work closely with him and have to suffer his tantrums. There was a point I admired him, but that is long past.
For years Tesla made cars that were disproportionately appealing to people with concerns about the environment, a population that skews liberal/progressive. Those on the other side of the political world view might like the cars too- especially technophiles— but there certainly a large contingent that are skeptical to anything with a primary appeal of being “environmentally friendly”. Then comes the current culture-war driven political ecosystem, and all musk has to do is tweet some controversial things that might resonate with some contingents on the political right and all of a sudden those individuals may feel more comfortable buying cars from a guy who speaks their language.
I certainly don’t know if that was Musk’s deliberate strategy though, but it wouldn’t shock me if his actions in that way are partly “him” and partly him leaning into a role of social prominence that resonates with a consumer population previously less likely to buy his cars.
It would be interesting if I could fine surveys of automobile brand customer bases broken down by political affiliation, and if it’s shifted Tesla’s at all in recent years.
Car and Driver's EPA range versus real world highway tests:
https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a43657072/evs-fall-short-e...
EVs are quite different to ICE when it comes to EPA range ratings.
It’s a bad idea in a gas car too, my friends that have run out of gas did so because of driving on E.
Though at least with gas it’s easier to bring it to the car.
I've had problems with the passenger side airbag not enabling, and turn signal not working. Both scary issues. Made appointments with the support. Both were cancelled outright by them (!). They tried to convince me that there was no problem, and it was all due to the way I use the car. They seemed to try everything to get out of appointments. My wife had to use the back seat for a month while I argued with them.
Eventually both problems were resolved by software updates, proving that the problems were indeed on their side.
Is the back seat safer than the front seat, even if the front seat airbag doesn't deploy? I know recent tests show the back seat is a good bit less safe, and I think it's primarily due to most manufacturers not using the same seat belt technology as they do in the front, but maybe some of that is the lack of a front airbag.
https://www.iihs.org/ratings/vehicle/tesla/model-y-4-door-su...
Seriously, sorry you've had such a bad experience with Tesla service.
She must have enjoyed having a chauffeur for a month...
This isn't entirely unreasonable. Most people whose battery is at 80% aren't going to be depleting it in the next few hours, so say factoring the present cold morning might produce overly pessimistic guesses.
They are being aggressive for sure, but this article strikes me as pretty biased against Tesla. The article concedes that most of these customers have no range problems -- they are probably driving in cold at 80 MPH blasting their heat to 70 degrees wondering why their range is so poor -- even though it is entirely expected behavior.
It’s always unreasonable in something like this to present knowingly inaccurate data when accurate data is available. As others have pointed out, Teslas do seem perfectly capable of doing this based on their performance when estimating a particular route. It’s also something other brands do better, so even if there was an argument to be made that Tesla didn’t have the data, it would still be the case that they should have it.
It is also not pessimistic to give an estimate in the conditions you outline: It’s accurate. Whether you’re going to be driving that long is irrelevant because Tesla should not be defaulting to some probabilistic behavior guess prior to even starting the car or entering a route. It should default to “hey, I see you’re driving your car. If you keep driving this is your range”. It shouldn’t default to “I don’t know how long you’ll be driving so I’ll just give a range estimate that assumed you’ll drive for a short time now and then more later and maybe later the conditions will provide better range, so let’s use that number”
I’m not sure why Tesla would be defended in this point by anyone when other EV’s do this more accurately and consistently. If it was a general problem and no one could do it any better then by all means it would be unreasonable to complain about Tesla, it would simply be a limit of the technology. But it’s not.
Tesla still somehow benefits from its innovators / clean company reputation, but at this pace it won't be long before agencies start to act on what's become much more than just 'optimistic marketing'.
It's now pretty common in my circle to hear people say they'll pay a premium to not own a Tesla. Primarily because of lots of bad experiences with build quality/repairs, but also because there are now lots of high quality alternatives. Namely Rivian and Lucid, but also the legacy automakers (two friends bought mach-es recently and there's a smattering of F-150 lightnings.)
The fact that Musk has adopted the public persona of a crazy uncle who doesn't get Thanksgiving invites -- and is heavily associated with the Tesla brand -- doesn't help either.
If you think about the CEOs of major corporations, the only ones who are personally memorable for the public are founders. How many exceptions can you think of, memorable personalities that were hired as CEOs or rose to become CEO of established companies? Lee Iacocca is one, barely. Carly Fiorina manages to be forgettable even though she ran for president. I'm sure there are more exceptions, but not enough to invalidate the rule.
So why can flamboyant or quirky people like Musk or Zuckerberg not get hired as CEOs of huge corporations? At least part of the reason is that being bland and forgettable is part of the job requirements. It makes it that much harder for the public to remember the sleazy things they learn about a company. A crime committed by a faceless company is like a natural disaster. A crime committed by Tesla is easier to see as human evil, because we can see how Musk revels in his unaccountability. There's a story: evil person did evil thing. And an obvious corollary: evil person must be prevented from doing more evil! If Tesla had replaced Musk with a faceless professional CEO, there would be no story, just "bad thing happened for inscrutable reasons."
Anyway. We are looking for reliability and imagine my surprise when Kia, of all brands, came out king of generally affordable reliability. Plus their EV reviews reasonably well.
A lot has changed in 10 years for vehicles I guess…
I'm a lot more excited about Hyundai/Kia and Ford.
Are they also in the market for an electric car? I said I would pay a premium not to own a Tesla, largely because of Musk. And then it came time to buy an EV: and there just isn't a vehicle under $100,000 that performs better under 100mph. And range? The Kia EV6 GT, which costs $5k more than the Model 3 Performance (or $12,500 because it doesn't qualify for the tax credit), is slower 0-60, has only 200 mile range. The Model 3 could have 26% lower range than advertised and still have 10% more range. So .5 second faster 0-60, 10% longer range, for $12,500 less.
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Uber is still a publicly traded company, despite explicitly starting up by just ignoring and bypassing existing regulation.
The US is so anti-consumer it will never relevantly punish a business making money.
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For example, if you get 10 tesla cars of the same model, do the ranges differ?
If you get 1 car and 10 different drivers, do some drivers get the advertised range while others don't?
If you disassemble the battery packs, do you find some bad/degraded cells in cars with reduced range, or is this a design fault?
Do drivers that have trouble have inefficient mods, like roof racks, big wheels, etc?
> [one customer] ultimately concluded there is nothing wrong with his car. The problem, he said, was that Tesla is overstating its performance
As I read this, either his car was defective or he was lied to to convince him to make a $XX,000 purchase. It seems that Tesla should be facing some form of fraud-based lawsuit over the lies selling the car or treating it under warranty, right?
Personally I think the EPA should revamp the rating system. I want to see every manufacturer forced to admit what range to expect if we use 90% of the battery capacity, at 70 mph, in 32F ambient temperature with climate control set to 68F. The only time people really care deeply about range is on the interstate, so the range numbers really ought to reflect that.
Meanwhile, what difference does it make if most Tesla customers do X? Tesla now has enough customers that hurting 10% of them is a major impact.
And buyers should be made aware they will be using only 70% (10 to 80) of the battery between highway charger stops. Charging gets really slow after 80%.
Now I do think that the EPA ratings are inadequate and inconsistent. Those could use some improvement to better reflect real world driving conditions.
Or, more likely, when looking at that big a settlement, we can find a lawyer who works on contingency.
Range is of course always going to be an estimate. Marketing is always going to be a battle of who has the bigger number. Having people schedule an appointment to fix their "broken" cars that can only go 470 instead of 500km is of course going to be a waste of time and money.
I'm part of a facebook group for tesla owners and literally every day this week there has been a post that goes something like "I left my house with 500km, drove 1km and now it says 497km. Should I schedule an appointment?" With the common advice being to switch to % instead of distance and remember that it's an estimate.
While I think Tesla (and most manufacturers) could do a better job at education, and of course having empathy for people who have spent a lot of money on something and worried it's defective, I don't think anything in this article is as damning as it sounds.
> He expected to get something close to the electric sport sedan’s advertised driving range: 353 miles on a fully charged battery.
> He soon realized he was sometimes getting less than half that much range
We’re not talking about a couple of miles here or there.
And if Tesla discovered that range issues (even if entirely based around customer perception) were a widespread enough issue to set up a team specifically to address it, that team said nothing publicly and instead cancelled service appointments without explanation… that’s absolutely newsworthy, whether you consider it a “hit piece” or not.
> Inside the Nevada team’s office, some employees celebrated canceling service appointments by putting their phones on mute and striking a metal xylophone, triggering applause from coworkers who sometimes stood on desks. The team often closed hundreds of cases a week and staffers were tracked on their average number of diverted appointments per day.
I mean... c'mon.
If the predicted range ALWAYS decreases by 3km after driving 1km, then the prediction is bs.
Either he has VERY BAD driving habits, or he's driving in some extreme scenarios.
I have a Model 3 Performance that's estimated to have a 299 mile range, IIRC. I've driven at 75 mph in 30F weather, and it reduced my range to about 230 miles. That's just shy of 25%, which while is certainly a significant reduction, is not the >50% the guy was dealing with.
Do people think they'll get the full EPA range at 70+ mph with the heat or A/C on? I always assumed EPA ranges were done on flat terrain at 60 mph with climate controls off and expected any deviation from that to reduce my range.
That all said, getting over 50% less than estimate range is pretty bad, and unless they're driving fast in super cold weather up hill, it really points to a potentially faulty battery that Tesla is trying to get out of replacing.
Tesla -could- do it but chooses not to. Put it in trip mode and it's pretty close to dead-on. Look at the consumption page and it's pretty accurate there too. Tesla elects not to use this already available information, because it would consistently show people a lower number than what the web page did when they ordered the car.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U3P32TyLMMM&t=644s
My 2016 ICE car's "miles left" meter is accurate to +/- 2 miles from the moment I top up the tank (80% highway driving, 20% hilly city and rolling country roads).
IMO, accurately telling the vehicle operator how many miles of juice you have left is a KPI, as it informs when you'll need to plan for refueling.
Having driven an EV for a few weeks in identical conditions, this inaccuracy is probably the major contributor to "range anxiety". I have no idea whether I'll need to recharge in 60 miles or in 25 miles, and that's totally unacceptable in most parts of the US (where there aren't available chargers every 5 miles of your trip).
No way. That’d be accurate to under 1% - well within the variation you’ll get just from different air densities (temperature, pressure, humidity). Forget about A/C on or off, tire pressure, etc.
It’s gotta be tricking you somehow.
An old ICE has to run within an RPM range, so the top end on MPG is set below infinite, and the bottom end is limited by the time to ramp the engine to its max consumption.
Electric vehicles have neither of these issues. On a downhill run that is long enough you could in theory fully recharge your battery, and you can always send full power (and resultant fuel consumption) to the engine.
On top of this EVs are operating at much higher efficiencies so the effective size of the tank is smaller.
This is not to say range estimation couldn’t be improved, only that it is a much more challenging model with EVs.
Btw, this "range anxiety" term, is it designed to make people seem crazy for wanting a long-range car?
"This 1 guy gets 50% of the estimated range and the problem is so wide spread tesla started a team to address it!"
is really different from
"Many customers are surprised they get less range than it says on the site and for a very extreme example, one guy gets 50% less (under uncertain circumstances)"
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He soon realized he was sometimes getting less than half that much range, particularly in cold weather – such severe underperformance that he was convinced the car had a serious defect.”
He simply does not understand how batteries and power delivery work. Driving through the Rocky mountains will reduce mpg significantly for an internal combustion engine as well. Colder temperatures require a heater and less efficient for batteries due to increased viscosity of electrolyte fluid. All a perfect storm for poor EV performance.
It should be giving you the more realistic estimate as soon as possible, so that you can plan better, rather than misleading you for half your trip.
Much like MPG is denoted as city vs highway.
Do you mean it will reduce the mpg because of reduced air density, or because of temperature as well? I thought the efficiency of an ICE was dependent on the difference in temperature it creates between the combustion and the coldest part of the cycle. It seems efficiency would improve in cold temperatures because less energy would be wasted cooling the engine since the incoming air is doing that.