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Tesla Batteries Retain Over 90 Percent Charging Power After 160,000 Miles, Survey Finds (engadget.com)

According to a survey of over 350 Tesla owners, Tesla batteries retain over 90 percent of their charging power after 160,000 miles. The EVs dropped only 5 percent of their capacity after 50,000 miles, but lose it at a much slower rate after that. Most Tesla vehicles will have over 90 percent of their charging power after around 185,000 miles, and 80 percent capacity after 500,000. Engadget reports: Tesla has no battery degradation warranty on its Model S and X luxury EVs, but guarantees that the Model 3 will retain 70 percent battery capacity after 120,000 miles (long-range battery) and 100,000 miles (shorter-range battery). That's a bit more generous than the one Nissan offers on the Leaf (66 percent over 100,000 miles) for instance. According to the survey data, Tesla will easily be able to meet this mark.

11 of 188 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Too expensive by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This 'survery' was basically a collection of message board posts. 350 respondents, but the article doesn't say how respondents reported results with so many miles. I looked at the first few pages of respondents and none reported having driven near 100K miles yet. So I assume the actual sample of high mileage owners was quite small. Too bad the author neglected that obviously important info.

  2. Musk's dilemma.... by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Interesting
    He never wanted to go public, he hates all the strictures that come with SEC regulation of being a publicly traded company. He would love to take it private. But too many people believe in him and it is nearly impossible to find private investors at this valuation. So in some sense if the shorts crash the stock price and take it low, he will be able to put together financing to take it private.

    Of course, that will void all the billion dollar options and package he has now, but he does not care much about money personally. So that is not a problem. But he has so much ego and would not like the shorts to win either. That is his dilemma.

    He needlessly limited his options, by responding to Economist and Bloomberg, saying categorically he is not going to seek financing etc. He should have thrown in some weasel words in there.

    But, in the end, Space X is very good shape, it is likely to land some really big defence contracts and communication satellite launches. So like he used Tesla to rescue Solar City, he will use SpaceX to rescue Tesla. By the time Tesla rescue package bill comes due, Tesla is likely to be in a much better shape and will weather the storm.

    If it is not SpaceX, he can tap the Japanese bond market through the battery making partner Panasonic. Or he can sell out to the devil and bring China in and they would gladly retire the Solar City rescue package debt for a decent chunk of Tesla and access to its AI experts. So my personal hunch is the shorts are going to escape with just some minor losses, suing for a draw.

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    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
  3. Tesla is Done by apoc.famine · · Score: 5, Funny

    Teslas don't work in the winter, they are too expensive and nobody buys them, there is no way to charge them on any sort of reasonable road trip, they won't work for me because I commute 500 miles every day, and they're just propped up by the government anyway. Add to this that they can't manufacture them in volume, they will run out of batteries, they'll run out of the raw materials for the batteries, and nobody wants them anyway, and look at all the recalls!

    My ICE doesn't drop down to 90% capacity after 160,000 miles. This is just proof that Tesla will never be successful, and there's no reason for us to keep talking about them.

    Tesla. Is. Dead.

    (Did I hit all of the hater points, or did I miss one or two?)

    --
    Velociraptor = Distiraptor / Timeraptor
    1. Re:Tesla is Done by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Funny
      You missed many more: Tesla factory must be terrible if the CEO had to pull all nighters to fix the issues. The Solar City bonds will kill them. And the fit and finish is so poor, you can actually fit a Prius in the gap between the frunk lid and the fender.

      And we all will sorely miss matching our wits against the dealership salesdroid. I love doing research on Truecar, Vehix.com Edmunds and Costo.....

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      sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
    2. Re:Tesla is Done by pezpunk · · Score: 5, Interesting

      i did pick up that post was sarcastic. but still i feel like mentioning that my Tesla has worked just fine through two winters, including days well below freezing.

      I also wanna mention just this spring, my family took the Tesla on a 550-mile road trip to Charleston, and it was a phenomenal trip. counter-intuitively, it was easier and more pleasant than it would have been in an ICE vehicle. Only had to stop every 4-5 hours or so, and since superchargers tend to be located in the parking lots of nice places to eat most of the time, it lined up perfectly with our meal schedules. the car was ready to go long before we were.

      My wife thought we would have to take the minivan, because we don't pack light at all. But we were able to fit everything the four of us needed for a week in an unstocked beach house (including clothes / towels / food / toys / house supplies / beach chairs / pool noodles / etc) easily with plenty of room to spare. for a "sport sedan" the Model S has an unreal amount of cargo room.

      also it's neat to drive 1200 miles on a vacation and spend $0.00 on fuel.

      --
      i could live a little longer in this prison
  4. Re:Too expensive by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 5, Informative

    This 'survery' was basically a collection of message board posts. 350 respondents, but the article doesn't say how respondents reported results with so many miles. I looked at the first few pages of respondents and none reported having driven near 100K miles yet. So I assume the actual sample of high mileage owners was quite small. Too bad the author neglected that obviously important info.

    OK, here is the actual data if anyone is interested;

    https://docs.google.com/spread...

  5. Re:So Warranties and Guarantees dont describe qual by viperidaenz · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Laptop batteries are kept fully charged, right next to the hottest components in the system.

    It's like they are designed to degrade the life of the high margin consumable part of the product you can usually only buy from the manufacturer due to its proprietary design..

  6. Re:Tesla Batteries by Rei · · Score: 5, Informative

    Indeed. A few other things:

      * For a vehicle with a range of, say, 250 miles, where the driver drives, say, 25 miles per day, is only using 1/10th of a cycle per day.
      * Few owners charge to 100% daily. Most set a limit in the 60-90% range, with 70% and 80% being common. So not only are they doing shallow cycles, but they're doing shallow cycles in a near-optimal-for-longevity portion of the pack.
      * Unlike laptop batteries, which are often just cells in series and thus limited by the weakest cell, Tesla packs have many dozen cells in parallel forming bricks, which are then linked in series (these in turn are linked in parallel). A failure in an individual cell has an insignificant impact on the whole.

    In short, you have shallow cycles, in a gentle portion of the charge curve, with a chemistry specifically designed for long life, a failure-resistant architecture, and climate controlled to optimal operating conditions. You get what you design for. A cell phone and a laptop, by contrast, design for low unit cost and high energy density. Tesla packs are only 150-180Wh/kg, whereas you might get over 240Wh/kg in a cell phone battery. But cell phones and laptops are only designing for a couple year lifespan, with deeper cycles every day, no redundancy, no climate control, etc

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    No matter how kind you are, German children are kinder.
  7. Re:Too expensive by dgatwood · · Score: 5, Informative

    Those use pretty much the same kind of batteries, donâ(TM)t they? You might not get 500k miles out of them on a bike, but in terms of capacity after x charge/discharge cycles they might well be similar.

    I doubt you would even get close, realistically, for two reasons:

    • Tesla vehicles use a heat pump to keep the battery within a narrow operating temperature range to minimize battery degradation during both regenerative braking and normal charging.
    • Tesla vehicles contain additional pack balancing circuitry to ensure that each cell gets charged as much as possible even if it is surrounded by weaker cells, and to ensure that cells can discharge as much as possible before the pack fails.

    A bicycle is not likely to do either of those things. It probably isn't even physically possible to usefully put a heat pump into something the size of a bicycle—a motorcycle, maybe, but not a bicycle.

    --

    Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.

  8. Re:How are their batteries so much better than lap by Rei · · Score: 5, Informative

    1) Laptop batteries are designed for energy density, not longevity. There are tradeoffs in chemistry selection.
    2) They're not climate controlled. Just the opposite, they're right next to a source of heat.
    3) They go through deeper cycles, over a wider portion of the SoC range.
    4) They have no redundancy / cell bypass
    5) They're designed for a product with a pre-determined expected lifespan of only a few years, so they have no incentive to do better.

    You can design to any spec, if you're willing to accept the tradeoffs.

    --
    No matter how kind you are, German children are kinder.
  9. Re:Gas Tank by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 5, Funny

    My Subaru gas tank developed a rust through hole on the side wall of the gas tank at around 109K miles. It lost more than 80% of capacity.

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    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact