Tesla Model 3 deliveries

[nash031]

I was thinking about this in context of my daily commute. It's about 9 miles each way, so 18 total. I could theoretically charge once every two weeks, and if that's all I use it for, I could discharge down close to 0. Obviously there's risk of traffic and such, but that goes with gas as well. Seems like if you treated your battery charge like you treat a tank of gas, you'd be good. FWIW, it's not good for engines to run on gas tanks less than 1/4 tank due to increased capability to bring water into the engine. Could treat your battery like that and only charge based on (1) need for range, then (2) <25% charge.

 

[FIREmenow]

I was thinking about this in context of my daily commute. It's about 9 miles each way, so 18 total. I could theoretically charge once every two weeks, and if that's all I use it for, I could discharge down close to 0. Obviously there's risk of traffic and such, but that goes with gas as well. Seems like if you treated your battery charge like you treat a tank of gas, you'd be good. FWIW, it's not good for engines to run on gas tanks less than 1/4 tank due to increased capability to bring water into the engine. Could treat your battery like that and only charge based on (1) need for range, then (2) <25% charge.

You wouldn't save anything energy-wise by charging every two weeks vs. every day. Charge-out = charge-in + charger inefficiencies.

You would, however, prolong the life of your batteries by not discharging them down to 25% each time. By how much (given Tesla's charging algorithms), is another matter.

 

[ERD50]

Perhaps, but don't they do that already with Hybrids by keeping the charge level somewhere between 80% and 20% so as to ease the strain on the batteries and increase their life? I imagine all electric vehicles do the same thing. Or maybe not

How can they, at least on the bottom end? With a hybrid, they can go to gas mode. With an all-electric, unless you want it to die with 20% capacity left, it keeps going. Best they can do would be a warning indicator, which maybe they have.

On the charge side, Tesla owners or experts would know whether there is an option to keep it from fully charging, without manual intervention, or if that's even beneficial.

It's a matter of design. You can install a system with "X" nominal capacity, but for longer lifetime, you might set the "FULL/EMPTY" points on the EV at 20% and 90% of nominal, and never push beyond those points (or maybe allow an emergency override, with limits on how often it can be used).

So by the same token, buying a larger battery than you need should provide a longer lifetime for that battery, you won't be pushing it as hard as often. But so far, it seems Tesla has been pretty conservative with their battery degradation margins, and battery prices are still on a downward path, so I kinda doubt that concept will work out dollar-wise. The Nissan Leaf, IIRC, had some pretty serious battery degradation in hot climates though.

I'm not sure if the Tesla allows for a 'partial' full charge or not, maybe an owner will comment.

-ERD50