this post was submitted on 20 Jan 2024
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Sigh. Not this again. Look, I personally really don't like the Cybertruck. I think it's ugly and pointless. But as someone who likes EVs in general I have to call out the usual "the range is so bad lol" BS.
The range you get when not fully charging the battery is meaningless. It's like partially fueling an ICE and complaining it doesn't deliver the maximum range. Good for a clickbait headline though.
Driving aggressively, at high speed, in relatively cold weather is the perfect trifecta to make any EV underdeliver in range. Those are real downsides of EVs (and weather and speed are factors with ICE cars, just more so for EVs) but it's nothing new or specific to this vehicle. And it is not the scenario the EPA uses to come up with range numbers. Perhaps they should, but they don't.
80% is a full standard charge. You only actually full charge immediately before a road trip, because it wears the battery faster to charge to 100%, and wears even more of you hold the charge before using it.
Do for someone charging their car over night for normal operations, 80% is a functionally full charge.
Yes and no. When you first hit the road, yes, you'll charge to 100%. However, along the way you'll charge up at a DC fast charge station. Those have what's called a charge curve, where it doesn't charge as fast as the battery charges. Think of it like filling a bike tire with a hand pump - the first few pumps are easy and the gauge jumps fast, but the last few are a lot harder and the needle barely moves. Much like air trying to resist higher pressure, more electrons repel each other as you charge the battery.
Ok, so charging. Charging from 10% to 80% takes roughly as long as charging from 80% to 100%. Rather than going to 100% at each charge, it's often beneficial to get just enough to get to the next charger with a little buffer room. Often you'll come out ahead if you just go to 80%ish (of course, if it's a long stretch to the next charger or you can skip a charge with more you may have reason to go beyond 80%)
Bigger range has its obvious advantages, but a bigger battery means you can take advantage of the charge curve a little more.
I take it you don't own an EV?
Range is always relevant. For me, my max normal range (without the very time sensitive full charge) is a day to day factor.
And I’m an outlier in the other direction: charge to 80% and usually go a week before plugging in
For what it's worth, general consensus is that staying plugged in, even with just a normal outlet, is best practice. That has the battery conditioning run more aggressively, which is better for battery longevity. This isn't like the NiCd batteries with a big memory effect if you recharge too early.
[citation needed]?
I have read that but wonder how much of that is so that you don’t have range anxiety. My driving is usually predictable so not a big deal
Again, it's for battery conditioning to run more aggressively. Absolutely nothing to do with range anxiety. That's the part that heats and cools your battery to keep it in good shape in the long run. You have nothing to gain by leaving it unplugged (of course, that's not to say you should panic if you can't plug in)
While that is true, it's not fair to say "see they lied! In completely different circumstances you only get a fraction of the range!" Even for ICE vehicles they use ideal conditions to measure their MPG/range even though most people aren't driving in ideal conditions.
Have you not noticed the same exact comments being made about ICE vehicles, particularly when their mileage estimates are highly advertised?
You all seem to act like this is particularly unfair to Tesla, when it's literally the same exact discussion we've had for decades.
Well, no. I don’t ever recall a comparable stream of articles and discussion pointing out that, say, the new Jaguar XF has really poor fuel economy in suboptimal conditions. I agree it’s the same thing, so why is this news?
Maybe because the real world conditions is being reported by owners at roughly 50% of Teslas advertised range. When for ICE, real vs advertised is typically around 80%.
Also, there has been reasonable skepticism on the range of heavier EVs, like trucks. And Tesla being the self made premium brand, and the Tesla truck being such a weird style, is in a spotlight of its own making.
Sure if that were really the case in general it would be notable. However I'm not sure it's true. Independent tests with data done by journalists, or various countries, do not reproduce this 50% number. At worst the range was 10-20% off which is comparable to ICEs. At least for Tesla's previous vehicles. We'll see if the Cybertruck is different.
Good point with your second paragraph though, yeah it does draw a lot of negative attention. It's just the unsourced / poor methodology EV range testing which frequently shows which up annoys me...
It's a truck that's meant to tow and haul loads. Using it for that purpose is a much larger drain on the battery than aggressive driving, and significantly reduces its useful range. If it's getting these numbers just being driven, you can expect a sub-100 mile range per charge when towing. Imagine having to stop to recharge for 30+ minutes for every hour and half of towing you do. Woof.
A pickup truck towing and hauling loads? What a bizarre idea. I'm pretty sure it's only meant to go to the office, and maybe to the maul on weekends, once in a while.
If they marketed it as such, but they heavily marketed it as capable as, if not better, at doing truck things than other trucks. And to be fair, most of us knew it was bullshit, but it's impressive how absolutely wrong they were. I mean, Elon said it'd tow a Porsche 911 faster in the quarter than the 911 could run the 1/4 mile itself, and they released a video to prove it...except keen eyed folks quickly noticed that the "finish line" they show is actually the 1/8th mile marker on that drag strip, and the 911 is clearly about to pass the CT at that point. Engineering Explained on YT made a great video detailing how it couldn't beat even the slowest modern 911.
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Now that is a good point. It's been repeatedly shown how towing drains EV batteries. Then again I'm not sure most buyers of EV trucks plan actually use it as a useful truck... Another reason why I don't like this whole segment.
I use my F-150 fairly often to haul and tow. If I didn't need to tow ~5000lbs I'd have just kept my old 97 Tacoma. I was all in on getting a Lightning a few months ago, especially with $15,000 in rebates and tax credits. Then I did the math and realized going from my brother's shop to my place while towing 5000lbs means I'd have to stop and charge for 30 minutes SIX times on that trip. And sadly, it seems that's as good as it gets for EV trucks right now. I'm 100% onboard with an EV truck, especially a Lightning with the ability to use it as a generator for your home in an outage, but towing/hauling range has to improve astronomically before they're practical.
I feel like the towing issues won’t be easily resolved without aerodynamic towing covers. That’s really what’s hurting the range when towing in an EV. Small differences in efficiency make a much bigger impact with EVs. Like let’s say an EV needs 100 watts to maintain speed. Adding 100 watts of aerodynamic drag doubles the energy drain. But since ICEs are less efficient overall, they would say require 500 watts to maintain speed. The extra 100 watts from towing makes less of a difference.
I predict there will be aerodynamic fairings for towing in the future as more EVs hit the road.
Supposedly the Silverado EV does have astronomically better towing range, but GM seems to be slow-rolling that one.
The great news is we have Zac (JerryRigEverything) to test exactly that:
https://youtu.be/yk_u9fbkoKM
Towing at around its maximum rating in the cold, the range was indeed below 100 miles.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://piped.video/yk_u9fbkoKM
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
According to my Tesla driving neighbor most people do not charge their Tesla to 100% in order to extend the battery lifespan. I don’t understand it but apparently Tesla recommends it.
Yeah Lithium batteries stay healthy for much longer if you keep them roughly between 20%-80% charge. Many laptops and phones now use similar management strategies to avoid wearing out the battery.
That's common for lots of batteries. My laptop has a setting to not charge between 50-70% because it lives on a dock and doesn't need max life in travel. Batteries are stored between 40 and 80% usually. So it makes sense that a car with the same battery chemistry recommends the same thing. It's only different in regards to a car being important in an emergency, but realistically, an emergency is unlikely to be both sudden and require long distance driving. So 100 miles of range is probably as good as 400 in common usage.
Your phone does the same thing just without communicating it. Samsung phones let you change the percentage of the battery is "100%" charged.
As mentioned, lithium batteries are happiest charged around 20-80%. No shame in going higher if you need it, but typical day to day I drive less than 50 miles in a day. If I'm using 20% of my battery capacity, I don't care if that means I go from 100% down to 80% or 80% down to 60%. I'll plug it in at the end of the day and charge back up to whatever I want by the next morning.
Put another way, how many times have you woken up thinking you need to stop at a gas station because you only have 3/4 of a tank?
I mean, fairly often. But I imagine for neurotypical people it might be way less.😂
70 is aggressive? In California ppl will be passing you on both sides at that speed.
The word aggressive is from the article, so I don't know. Anyways driving 70mph consistently is going to deliver you less than the advertised range with EVs, which I believe is a blend of driving types not just constant highway speed. Consider while ICE cars have awful efficiency in city driving (stop/start) so highway driving is preferred, with EVs it's actually the other way around thanks to fewer mechanical losses and battery regen braking.
Aggressive doesn’t mean fast. It means more abrupt changes, more acceleration/deceleration
For example, with the frigid weather I notice I use a lot of brake when regen isn’t effective
I read aggressive as in accelerating aggressively. Possibly to get around people?
It's below the recommended average on German roads (stands at 130kph / ~81mph).
Didn't they just get obligated to report a lower range for many models because they were reporting unrealistic figures?
My understanding of this article is that Tesla's range estimates were based on assuming they were being driven in it's range-maximizing, low-performance "chill mode", while the new EPA rules require reporting the range in the car's default mode.
Elon “last second autopilot disengage” Musk gonna make chill mode the default then throw up a “would you like to use normal mode for better performance?” screen that autoaccepts in three seconds
They probably did. However it doesn't make these articles less annoying. Someone posting on a forum isn't a newsworthy testing result. Did everyone suddenly forget "Your Mileage May Vary" was always true even for ICE cars?
Tesla apologist
Or a shill!
Anyone who supports a corporation is just a big dumb dummy.