Essay by Eric Worrall
h/t MGUY; “We got a bunch of dead robots out here”: Drivers are complaining Tesla is not responding to complaints, despite being stuck for days in the Chicago Supercharger “Tesla Graveyard”.
The problem appears to be the Teslas are not charging, even when they are connected to a working charger.
Fox claims an automobile expert advised drivers to hit the “battery precondition” button on the vehicle before attempting to charge in extreme cold, but surely even if the driver forgets, the battery manager would sense the cold, and optimise the battery temperature without human intervention when plugged in?
Here is WGN’s take on the Chicago Tesla disaster;
There could be more pain to come for the Chicago Tesla drivers. Prolonged exposure to severe frost conditions can permanently wreck the battery, and some of those bricked Tesla drivers have been stuck in the cold for days.
Will Tesla customer service start responding to distressed Chicago drivers? I hope so – but in 2021, a Finnish Tesla owner became so fed up with Tesla customer service, after his battery was permanently wrecked by severe cold, he strapped 30Kg of Dynamite to the Tesla, and filmed a rather spectacular negative product review.
Note we at WUWT do not recommend blowing up your Tesla, regardless of the quality of Tesla customer service you receive. Explosives should only be handled by trained professionals, and Teslas contain large quantities of toxic chemicals. The Finnish Tesla owner in the video above responsibly removed the most toxic component, the battery, before detonating his Tesla.
Anybody who buys an EV but does not have their own home charging station is extremely foolish.
That’s because there’s no money in public EV chargers unless they’re subsidised-
Why NOBODY will build EV charging stations | MGUY Australia (youtube.com)
While Tesla recognised that early on and invested privately in order to move their cars they won’t be able to continue to do that for other freeloading EV manufacturers unless the taxpayer coughs up. Pay for your own servos EV bludgers.
If more people had EVs, there would be bans on charging them during peak hours. Or hours when the wind isn’t blowing. Or at night. Or finally… charging them at all without permission from Xi himself.
And your SMART METER will make sure you do as you are told!
The ideal situation is we all have home chargers. Each night we plug in our EV’s. We put in the number of miles we want added to our car, and when we want to use our car again, and the smart grid talks to our smart chargers and the EV’s are charged efficiently using grid power when it is most abundant and cheapest. Then, if there is danger of a brownout, the grid can refuse to charge the cars and the grid can draw power from the car batteries to support the grid. Our iPhone app will let us monitor and modify this process. For example, if we have to have a certain number of miles added by 9:00am tomorrow, we can mark our charging as urgent, and we will pay whatever the costs happen to be. Hopefully, this will never happen.
I would never let the grid use my expense EV battery – if I had one – because I need to get to work in the morning, don’t trust the AI to make sure of that, and who’s paying for the wear and tear on the battery??? Most battery backup solutions cost more than the wind turbine it supports, and that’s only for 4 hour backup – so the current going rate for electricity is not going to be enough compensation for using my battery. I’ll buy energy from the grid at something cheap like 10¢/kWh, but I won’t part with it for less than $1 – maybe more.
I don’t have a garage or driveway, the only way I could charge an EV would be to open a window and run a cable across the pavement to the car. Which would leave me vulnerable with the open window and liable for putting a trip hazard on a public thoroughfare. Not going to happen.
I forgot to add to my utopian scheme: The central grid could check your social credit score and decide how much electricity it will allocate for your use. Each person will have a rationed amount of electricity in any case. Or, the grid can check on your income for last year, and adjust how much you pay for electricity. And, it can check on your vaccination status, although that will be part of your social credit score, too.
Think I am kidding? I had to pay to park in NJ this month at a state park. The machine asks for your license plate number, and then runs it looking for outstanding citations before it gives you your ticket.
The more you think about it, the more attractive this approach is.
Replace GRID with Brandon (he wants to be this powerful) or Big Brother, and I think we all see the SARC intended by our friend Joel.
Each battery has a limited number of charge/discharge cycles. If you allow the grid to use up a lot of those cycles, your EV will brick that much sooner.
There are several problems with your charging scenario.
The first and most obvious is that everybody considers there needs to be urgent.
The second is what happens when the AI decides that the hospital down the street, or some other business, is higher in the priority list compared to you, so that no matter how much you are willing to pay, no electricity for you.
The third is what happens when the AI decides that your social score is too low and you are no longer entitled to electricity.
Finally, why should we settle for a world in which electricity is so limited that we have to pay extra just so we can drive to work?
an awful lot of the young drivers buying EVs are rental dwellers who have no garage and certainly no access to home charging. Some multi-unit apt buildings have one or two chargers, but think of the folks who rent from the typical urban rowhouse duplexes in Chicago, they have no alternative but to park on the street
More ‘rocks in their head’
lol “Recommends charging before reaching 30%”
You’re not supposed to charge over 80%, so that means 50%. And it lasts 50% as long in the cold weather, so you’re down to 25% battery life in the winter.
The standard range is Tesla-rated (i.e. exaggerated) to be ~300 miles, which means real-world range in ideal conditions is 80% of that = 240 miles.
If your car is 3-4 years old, it’s probably down to 85% battery life, so 204 miles.
25% usable portion in January weather = about FIFTY MILES OF RANGE!!
A lot of people couldn’t even make it to work and back on that, lol!!!
And to add, when it gets to about 0F (-18C) my ICE car (a highly fuel-efficient Honda Fit with a tiny 40L gas tank) still gets 85% of its ideal range. On a full tank I can go 300 mils in all-urban driving at those temps. If I always keep 5% gas in the tank, that still gives me 280 miles of range that I can refill in seconds. So more than 5 times better than the tesla.
Tesla – 1/5th the car for 3 times the price (i.e. 15 times worse).
The loss of range is due to it taking more energy to warm up the engine.
Once the engine is up to temperature, having the air be colder means your engine actually gets more efficient.
I thought the range calculation took into account the 20-80% allowed battery charge range, no?
Any Teslaratti out there want to chime in?
Less than that if you have the heating on in the car.
Or heating on for the battery.
“If your car is 3-4 years old, it’s probably down to 85% battery life”
BS
“You’re not supposed to charge over 80%”
BS
Slow charging to 100% makes a lot of sense in the cold months to help offset loss of range Not mandatory to recharge at 20%, Use 10% in cold weather to extend range. Same for long trips, if you dare to take a long trip with an EV.
80% / 20% is a rule of thumb. not a law
There’s no evidence that 90% / 10% would make an observable difference
The EV charge acceptance rate is the maximum kW an EV is able to consume or accept from a charging station. Many EV manufacturers will throttle or cap the rate of power their EVs can consume . The acceptance rate for an EV can decrease as it gets closer to 100% charged. For example an EV could be charging at a 100 kWh Level 3 fast charger and receive 100 kWh from 10-80% but slow down to 65kWh from 80-100%. This information will be noted in the manufacturer’s specifications of the vehicle.
Richard “BS” Greene wrote:
“BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS BS…”
LOL He does that a lot. Of course, all the BS can be avoided by driving an ICE vehicle.
So every book on building battery chargers is wrong? Because you want it to be?
It could very well be this problem will be the death of EVs in most of the US where it gets cold. They are a joke.
I bet a lot of people are having second thoughts about buying an EV, after seeing incidents like this.
EV’s are not ready for prime time in areas subject to severe cold.
This could be the moment to short Tesla stock.
I always knew EV performance drops with lower temperature; this is true of all electro-chemical batteries and has been well known for many decades. I did not know they reach a “tipping point” and shut down completely.
You’d think Elon would have tested this.
Perhaps past a certain point the battery heater can’t keep up with the cold, and the batteries never reach optimum temperature. Assuming batteries subject to such extreme cold can ever accept a charge again.
You can see why you’d pre-condition the car at home in cold weather if you require maximum charge/range as discussed here-
Tesla Battery Preconditioning: When, How, and Why You Should Do It | Tesla Motors Club
Let me think.
See a gas station. Decide to stop for gas. Fill the tank. Drive away with maximum range restored.
OR have a bunch a variables that do not allow the above.
I think (know) I will be staying with an ICE vehicle, although I MAY look at a hybrid this next go round for THE wife’s replacement car. It will be a 4 WD SUV.
Cold can effectively halve the Tesla range bearing in mind you need occupant heating and preconditioning the battery for the next supercharger-
Tesla Model 3 SUB-ZERO Range Test: We All Know That EV Range Is Bad In The Cold…But THIS Bad! – YouTube
Now they run that down to 2% SOC because they’re on a known test loop and can cut that fine with a normal 300mile range down to 158miles. But in a real world trip you can’t cut it that fine and risk running out and freezing and not preconditioning while travelling means longer charging-
Supercharging A Tesla In Winter: Preconditioned Vs. Cold Battery Test (insideevs.com)
PROVIDING you actually make it to a vacant working charger and that was the issue for many as they either didn’t make it or ran them flat waiting their turn with the heater on.
More Worrall anti-EV propaganda BS with no data
“Prolonged exposure to severe frost conditions can permanently wreck the battery,” EW
Total BS.
The range may be severely reduced and charging time may be much longer at 0 degree F. but this weather will not destroy the eV battery
Just a few days ago Worrall published an article based on a twitter post about some Canadian guy who made a very long trip in an EV at -40C. which happened to be the same as -40F. The worst case use of an EV I ever heard of.
There was no indication that man failed to complete his very cold long trip. Which contradicts the implication here that Chicago weather, far warmer than -40 degrees F., will damage EV batteries
There are MANY reasons to criticize EVs. Lying about them or publishing data free negative disinformation are not the journalism anyone should respect.
Mr.: Greene: Thanks for stopping by, so we can congratulate you on getting your wish- you are officially the new griff! Commenters above call you out before you even post your predictable denial. This began when Istvan used the word “significantly” and you kvetched. In the comment string you reference, your other Mr. Greene posted a comment saying cold “significantly” reduces performance of LIon battery, the same remark Istvan made. You said there’s no field data, looks like Chicago is the lab where your comments go to die (frozen). You claimed Istvan had no “science” to support his claims of reduced range and greatly increased charge time (forever is a long time), here you admit it but race ahead to “battery not destroyed.” Your “data” is based on about the EV driver in Canada, but you assume he completed his trip. Do you know? No, you don’t.
You have reduced yourself to the site’s punching bag, thanks for coming in for your well-deserved beating.
The usual conservative no science no engineering comment that makes no attempt to refute anything I have written
Just childish insults as if throwing down the most insults wins the debate
Look in the mirror. Mr. Courtley
and you will see a fool.
Istvan has no data on battery deterioration from fast charging. He exaggerated.
The Canadian EV on a long trip was recharging at -45 degrees C. and there was no indication the driver thought trip could not be completed. If he was able to charge at -45 degrees C,. then it is logical to assume he COULD complete the trip.
Of course logic is not your strong point
You specialize in insults.
So long as you refute yourself, I don’t need to dabble in science or engineering. Don’t need to look at a mirror, either. Just read your comments and note the gaps- you don’t know if the Canadian completed the trip, you assume it. Thanks for admitting it.
My specialty is deconstructing your comments. I’d like to retire.
Fascinating how you have to throw “conservative” in there, as if that made a difference.
And here come the childish insults, all the while whining about childish insults.
Despite the real world data being presented by many here, RG will continue to rely on his unnamed and probably imaginary Ford engineer.
I really don’t understand the chorus of abuse which greets Mr Greene’s posts on EVs. He is about as far from endorsing EVs as you can get. The only points he is differing from the general view here of them are:
He doubts the deleterious effects of fast charging are significant. I have to agree on admittedly cursory research, with the proviso that this seems to be a problem largely overcome by modern car systems, and it does require prudent battery care. If you are fast charging an older car, or in a very cold or very hot environment, or from an 80% charge level, it seems you will damage the battery. But a modern car in a temperate climate, carefully used, the evidence seems to be not, or not much.
In the present thread he’s doubting the received view here of the damaging effects of below zero F weather. But with the qualification that he is talking fully charged batteries. So his view is that a modern fully charged car will lose small amounts of charge daily, but still be driveable and still chargeable – that battery will not be wrecked by low temps. I don’t know about this, but suspect he may be right.
It is still a very silly thing to do to drive an EV on deserted roads in the depths of a Mid-Western or Canadian winter. The loss of range, the lack of any ability to warm by running the engine occasionally, all that makes it silly, and you really have to doubt that they are fit for purpose in such environments. But he would agree with all these points.
Why is this so objectionable?
I think, actually, that he’s a bit too hard on EVs. They do have a niche, and its bigger than golf carts. A retired couple with home charging facilities doing only low mileage for recreation or shopping, living in a temperate climate, they may make sense. Its not a big niche, its not going to be viable for a manufacturer, but they do fit such a case reasonably well.
Mostly because he is so impressed with … himself.
This and his rank hypocrisy about people being mean to his giant ego.
Don’t know about that. But on the substantial point, there are reports of people hooking up their Teslas for hours and not getting any charge. However, we do not know what sort of level the batteries were in at that point. From the reports I have read, they seem to have abandoned them, so presumably they were not driveable?
You’re supposed to preheat and then charge, and it does seem that rapid charging from very low levels when very cold may do damage.
michel: The reports you read re: abandoned at the charge point, AND in line at the charge point, is what Mr. Greene has essentially said “can’t happen”. He may respond that he didn’t say that, but you can look it up.
michel: If you have followed this, you will see that I tried to tell folks here that Greene mostly agrees with us, but he posted that he was here to gaslight us and become the new griff. Why? Because Rud Istvan said that fast charging diminishes the battery, and Greene wanted to argue about the word “significant.” He demanded field data on fast charging, showing his ignorance. Then, in another string, he said fast charging significantly diminishes the battery. Now it’s “going to frozen 0% doesn’t wreck the battery.” What does your cursory research show about that?
As you note, he posts comments critical of EVs, too. But in the past few strings, he contradicts himself quite often. He wants to be insulted, he says that’s why he’s here, so I give him what he wants. And he can’t take it! Anyway, defend him if you like, I tried, but be ready for him to tag you just like anyone who tries to disagree with him. It gets worse when you try to agree! h/t Wm. Buckley
I particularly like the way he insults anyone who disagrees with his unsourced claims, all the while complaining about being insulted.
It didn’t ‘damage’ the EV batteries although how running them to zero charge in those conditions affects their longevity is anyone’s guess. The issue was the halving of range catching many EV owners napping and running into the obvious problem of not enough working chargers.
That will always be an insurmountable problem because there’s no realistic economic case for them-
Electricity grids WON’T COPE with mass EV charging | MGUY Australia – YouTube
even in Oz with minimal snow and ice conditions
EV fast charger companies are collapsing! | Auto Expert John Cadogan (youtube.com)
As for running them on solar and wind that’s fairy tales for children stuff.
The only case for EVs is you don’t mind paying a lot of money for fast acceleration.
There are no other advantages.
You’re right there even when their refuelling stations are subsidised-
Auto website CarExpert’s Sydney-Melbourne road trip reveals the shocking truth about whether EVs are cheaper to run than petrol cars | Daily Mail Online
and they’re often being given a free ride with road user charges which can’t continue-
Changes to road user charges will see EV owners paying more, climate expert says | RNZ News
Teslas in particular do suit revheads but there’s no excuse for taxpayer subsidies for them or well to do virtue signallers.
Just think of the energy savings!
What are “severe frost conditions“?
I know what “low temperature conditions” are, but what is a “severe frost condition“?
Whatever severe frost conditions are, I’m sure they are bad, caused by climate change, and worse than previously thoiught.
“Fox claims an automobile expert advised drivers to hit the “battery precondition” button on the vehicle before attempting to charge in extreme cold”
It’s funny that this expert knows about this button but none of the Tesla owners appeared to know about it. The vehicle didn’t display a message, there is no signage at the charging station and the Tesla customer service line didn’t tell them about the button. It sounds like either this “expert” isn’t an expert or Tesla is not wanting to publicize the fact that charging in cold weather is a problem.
Is Chicago the only location experiencing this problem? On another site, a user commented about a friend in Wisconsin experiencing the same type of problem. Given the media’s interest in suppressing this type of story, maybe it is happening but going unreported. The problems in Chicago are being pretty widely reported, but no reports that I have found for other locations experiencing the same cold weather conditions.
Yeah.
Anybody in Minnesota to report? North Dakota? Montana? Wyoming?
Gums asks..
It all depends on how LEFT the local news stations are. In Minihaha, they are WAY left, so no news is good news with regards to EVs. After searching “EV charging issues Minneapolis” on DDG I got ONE current article regarding the COLD in the first 20 listings. After that I started to get references to the Chicago issues, NOT Minihaha.
https://www.cbsnews.com/minnesota/news/drivers-say-electric-vehicle-batteries-perform-worse-amid-cold-weather/
Mr. Moore: It could be that there are alot more Teslas in Chi than Des Moines or Waukeshau, and more owners (Ubers in particular) who can’t charge at home.
From the New York Times:
“When it’s cold like this, cars aren’t functioning well, chargers aren’t functioning well, and people don’t function so well either,” said Javed Spencer, an Uber driver who said he had done little else in the last three days besides charge his rented Chevy Bolt and worry about being stranded with a dead battery — again.
Mr. Spencer, 27, said he set out on Sunday for a charging station with 30 miles left on his battery. Within minutes, the battery was dead. He had to have the car towed to the station.
“When I finally plugged it in, it wasn’t getting any charge,” he said. Recharging the battery, which usually takes Mr. Spencer an hour, took five hours….
…..A few charging posts down, Joshalin Rivera was also experiencing a bit of buyer’s remorse. She sat with the heat blasting inside her 2023 Tesla Model 3 as she juiced up the battery.
“If you’re waiting in that line and you only have 50 miles, you’re not going to make it,” Ms. Rivera said, gesturing to the line of vehicles stretched out onto Elston Avenue. She said that she had seen a Tesla run out of battery shortly after a driver attempted to cut the line.
In normal conditions, Ms. Rivera’s car can drive up to 273 miles on a single, 30-minute charge. This week, Ms. Rivera said she has awakened to find about a third of her car battery drained from the overnight cold. As temperatures plummeted, she spent hours every morning waiting in line and recharging the battery.
“It’s kind of like, I don’t really want a Tesla,” she said.
Didn’t RG assure us that batteries only lose 1 to 2% from the cold overnight. Max.
I’ve noticed that even with a dead battery, I don’t have any problem adding fuel to the tank, even in bitterly cold weather.
And as long as the battery isn’t damaged, a few minutes of boosting will usually get me going fine.
The comparison with an EV is the whole point. Or rather that it just doesn’t compare.