Elon Musk Pledges To End "Range Anxiety" For Tesla Model S

An anonymous reader writes: Elon Musk has used his Twitter account to announce a press conference on Thursday which he claims will end "range anxiety" for Tesla's Model S sedan. Whatever change they're making will be implemented through an over-the-air software update to the cars, affecting the entire fleet. Range anxiety is the term for a fear that your vehicle won't have enough fuel/charge to reach its destination. It's a common reason for people to avoid buying electric cars, given the much smaller infrastructure build-out compared to gas stations. If Tesla is improving the Model S's range through a software update, then it likely involves optimizations to the battery and to the ways in which power is used. Tesla has also talked about developing a feature called "torque sleep," which puts one of the drive units to sleep while not needed. They say it can wake up and begin delivering torque again "so fast that the driver can't perceive it."

Comments

Or, it could be unrelated to actually extending

[Rei]

.. range. For example, more charging stations and/or a better locator (perhaps with a partnership with a nationwide chain of stores or two), better range calculation, a service to have charging trucks come out to you to you should you run out of charge (maybe even heading to the point where you would run out of charge before it even happens so that there's no wait), or all sorts of other possibilities. There's no guarantee that it actually means more range.

Of course, it could mean that.

Re:Or, it could be unrelated to actually extending

[itsdapead]

Of course, it could mean that.

No - your suggestions are all better. Unless they're going to download new laws of physics to the cars, the sort of incremental range improvement that a software update might bring is hardly going to end "range anxiety". Range anxiety isn't so much about the absolute range - its about the scarcity of recharging stations c.f. petrol, the time taken to recharge, the uncertainty of the quoted range and the need to be towed to a recharge station if you do run out.

Re:Or, it could be unrelated to actually extending

[jellomizer]

I think the tipping point for electric vehicle range would be 1000 miles on one charge. Yes that is 2 to 4 times as much as most cars, however, the charging time for an electric car is much longer than gasoline, So in order for you to have a car good for all purposes ( Not an electric car for your commute, and a gas car for long trips ) 1000 range, means you can drive for 16 hours then take 8 hours (when you are sleeping ) to charge up.

I think this 1000 mile per charge should be a goal for Electric auto makers. That or they need to need to match the charge time to a refueling time, and have at least 250 miles per charge.

Predictive behavior and minor User Input

[cloud.pt]

In order to stop drivers from micromanaging their ranges, is just to let a user know how likely is he to run out of juice, right off the bat when he starts his journey. A simple voice request from the car speech synthesizer, asking for a city, a street, or something not very specific which can be used for broad calculations, and then let the user know: "You might have not enough battery to go/come back home"/"You can make a round trip 8 times to that destination"/"You might run out of juice but there's a supercharger nearby, would you like me to reserve a spot for you at hh:mm AM/PM?"

Re:No, it couldn't. Read the post.

[PhilHibbs]

That says nothing about extending range. It talks about ending range anxiety. Which could be, for isntance, adjusting the sat nav so it calculates how much further you can drive before you go out of range of the nearest charging station.

Re:Impossible

[Ol Olsoc]

Please tell me, where can I charge my Tesla S in 10 minutes or less along the corridor from Atlanta to New York, because I am certainly not going to make it from Atlanta to New York without charging.

This is not range anxiety, this is practical realism.

No, it's making up special cases to prove your point.

There are places out west that a proper petro fueled vehicle owner will suffer the same anxiety.

Hell, once on a Sunday trip in Pennsylvania on my motorcycle the one gas station along my remote route where I planned to refuel my motorcycle had closed. Want to talk about range anxiety?

Three points 1. Range anxiety is most definitely not confined to the Spawn of Satan Tesla. I have relatives who start sweating at 3/4 a tank of proper gasoline fuel.

2. Making up special cases is silly, like looking down on people who drive car, because you want to haul stuff, therefore why would anyone want to get a car rather than a pickup truck? All vehicles have their purposes, and maybe not everyone needs to go from Atlanta to New York with only 10 minutes to spare. You need to take a gas guzzler across the western desert some time.

3. Don't want a Tesla? No problem - don't buy one. Just because you have to have a vehicle that has to meet certain specifications doesn't mean that everyone has to. Your major issue is infrastructure, which is easily addressed over time. As the infrastructure improves, we'll see the recharge issue start to go away. Don't forget that at one time, horses had a better refueling infrastructure than petrofueled vehicles. Of course, at that point you would probably be decrying those gasoline powered vehhicles you defend so much today.