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Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

reuters.com

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Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#141

Post by jnsaff2 »

everdrive wrote: post #112

This really shouldn’t be read as a defense of EV companies, but I think there is just a learning curve for EVs which people really haven’t grappled with yet. Here is a minor list of things which will reduce range pretty significantly: - Driving over 50 MPH - Using the AC - Using the heat - Driving in extreme cold or extreme heat - Driving in an area with a lot of hills. (From what I can tell regenerative braking make…

I have a mental model which goes something like this:

When 80% of your energy goes to waste than all the incidentals like AC and especially heating just does not surface as a contributing factor.

When however 80-90% of energy goes to driving, then speed and all the accessories start having a real impact.

It also shows how energy dense gasoline/diesel are that a 50kg tank will outperform 400kg batteries even with the 4-5x efficiency difference.

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#142

Post by ke88y »

tekla wrote: post #75
ke88y wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That only makes sense if there's strong correlation between the first 50% of a charge and the second 50% of a charge, but NOT an equally strong correlation between the previous charge cycle and the current charge cycle. That can be the case (eg on road trips) but usually isn't. Why not just always give the more precise estimates?

How does the car know what conditions its going to be driving in? I don't believe Elon has installed a time machine yet into a Tesla.

I'll literally repeat myself, since I think the point was abundantly clear:

>> That only makes sense if there's strong correlation between the first 50% of a charge and the second 50% of a charge, but NOT an equally strong correlation between the previous charge cycle and the current charge cycle.

But "That", I mean using optimistic estimates at the beginning of a charge cycle but a model based on historical driving about half way through a charge cycle.

There's no reason, prime facie, that future discharge rate should be better-correlated intra-charge than inter-charge, especially for recent charges, and especially if you have lots of historical charge/discharge cycle data for both the machine, the geographic area, and the individual driver.

The question is not "why not be perfect". The question is "why not do inter-charge forecasting the same way you do intra-charge forecasting".

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#143

Post by [deleted] »

cevn wrote: post #134
syntaxing wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not defending Tesla but battery range is really hard without context. Kinetic energy is velocity^2, which means moving twice the speed takes 4X the energy. They probably can get the right estimate for a destination because it knows the speed limit for the route and using that as your velocity can give you a better answer.

They could, but they don’t. Edit: someone else pointed out if you actually navigate then it will show remaining % more accurately. Still seems like false advertising..

[deleted]

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#144

Post by dkarl »

ke88y wrote: post #32
TheAlchemist wrote: post #5

That's a pretty damning article and it looks like there are more and more of those coming. Tesla still somehow benefits from its innovators / clean company reputation, but at this pace it won't be long before agencies start to act on what's become much more than just 'optimistic marketing'.

I think that reputation already died in the last 2-3 years. It's now pretty common in my circle to hear people say they'll pay a premium to not own a Tesla. Primarily because of lots of bad experiences with build quality/repairs, but also because there are now lots of high quality alternatives. Namely Rivian and Lucid, but also the legacy automakers (two friends bought mach-es recently and there's a smattering of F-1…

Musk is pretty much the whole reason. People have a much easier time remembering sleazy business practices when there's a celebrity CEO whose personality matches the crime.

If you think about the CEOs of major corporations, the only ones who are personally memorable for the public are founders. How many exceptions can you think of, memorable personalities that were hired as CEOs or rose to become CEO of established companies? Lee Iacocca is one, barely. Carly Fiorina manages to be forgettable even though she ran for president. I'm sure there are more exceptions, but not enough to invalidate the rule.

So why can flamboyant or quirky people like Musk or Zuckerberg not get hired as CEOs of huge corporations? At least part of the reason is that being bland and forgettable is part of the job requirements. It makes it that much harder for the public to remember the sleazy things they learn about a company. A crime committed by a faceless company is like a natural disaster. A crime committed by Tesla is easier to see as human evil, because we can see how Musk revels in his unaccountability. There's a story: evil person did evil thing. And an obvious corollary: evil person must be prevented from doing more evil! If Tesla had replaced Musk with a faceless professional CEO, there would be no story, just "bad thing happened for inscrutable reasons."

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#145

Post by edude03 »

I have an S so I'm biased but this feels like a hit piece.

Range is of course always going to be an estimate. Marketing is always going to be a battle of who has the bigger number. Having people schedule an appointment to fix their "broken" cars that can only go 470 instead of 500km is of course going to be a waste of time and money.

I'm part of a facebook group for tesla owners and literally every day this week there has been a post that goes something like "I left my house with 500km, drove 1km and now it says 497km. Should I schedule an appointment?" With the common advice being to switch to % instead of distance and remember that it's an estimate.

While I think Tesla (and most manufacturers) could do a better job at education, and of course having empathy for people who have spent a lot of money on something and worried it's defective, I don't think anything in this article is as damning as it sounds.

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#146

Post by rad_gruchalski »

vagab0nd wrote: post #51

Not just battery and range. I've had problems with the passenger side airbag not enabling, and turn signal not working. Both scary issues. Made appointments with the support. Both were cancelled outright by them (!). They tried to convince me that there was no problem, and it was all due to the way I use the car. They seemed to try everything to get out of appointments. My wife had to use the back seat for a month wh…

A new "you're holding it wrong" level.

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#147

Post by cmrdporcupine »

wredue wrote: post #87
ke88y wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that reputation already died in the last 2-3 years. It's now pretty common in my circle to hear people say they'll pay a premium to not own a Tesla. Primarily because of lots of bad experiences with build quality/repairs, but also because there are now lots of high quality alternatives. Namely Rivian and Lucid, but also the legacy automakers (two friends bought mach-es recently and there's a smattering of F-1…

Our caravan has been a pile of shit, which I’m sure anyone who’s ever had a caravan can attest to. Anyway. We are looking for reliability and imagine my surprise when Kia, of all brands, came out king of generally affordable reliability. Plus their EV reviews reasonably well. A lot has changed in 10 years for vehicles I guess…

Kia is always a mixed bag. On the most important fundamentals they produce a good value vehicle. But they are able to reduce prices by cheaping out a bit on drivetrain components. E.g. axles and CV boots that wear quicker, just slightly cheaper parts. If you watch the Munro Live videos when they tear down an analyze the engineering, they often concur with this.

And it's all fine if you drive your vehicle for <150,000km (100,000miles) and then sell or move on, but my experience with them is that after that they start to have mechanical parts issues. Which makes sense because they've effectively optimized for the most common consumer vehicle ownership pattern. But.

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#148

Post by stetrain »

cevn wrote: post #140
stetrain wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you talking about the battery meter? That is just EPA range * battery percentage. The precise estimate is in the navigation system, when you navigate to a destination and it says you will arrive with X% left. This takes into account speed, traffic, elevation, temperature, wind, etc. and is usually pretty accurate for me.

Ah I see. I will check on that but you would think that as soon as you get on the highway that estimator would change. It is also the first place someone would look for range, not inside navigation so I would call that false advertising…

I leave the battery meter set to percentage, the “miles” option is really just percentage dumbly mapped to miles.

The golden number in a Tesla Is absolutely the navigation route estimate. While navigating you can open the Energy app as well to see more detail, how you are doing compared to the estimate, and specific factors affecting consumption.

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#149

Post by nicpottier »

londons_explore wrote: post #16
jvanderbot wrote: post #8

I have a model Y. I hate almost everything about it. But most germane, The "Battery meter" at the top of the display is total bunk. That's got to be "rosy" numbers. It'll display a the battery in miles, but it's at least 25% inflated. However if you punch in a destination, you'll get exact numbers, and those are insanely reliable. It claims (and I don't believe any claims coming from tesla) that it'll factor wind, el…

Battery meter at the top is EPA range - ie. the official range measurement method, in basically ideal conditions. The routefinder 'learns' from your previous driving habits. Driving style easily has a 50% impact on range between "drives 50 mph slipstreaming behind a truck" and "drives 90 mph and brakes aggressively at every corner".

I think it's basically some PM taking a stand at Tesla with the fact that there's just no good estimate possible without knowing the route, so they will always show EPA estimate.

Any sane a Tesla driver changes that to show percent battery instead of range.

As others have said the trip planner is excellent, within a percent or two even in winter conditions driving over passes etc..

Note that range changes a lot more due to elevation, speed, cold etc, compared to gas cars because electrics are so much more efficient.

Re: Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

#150

Post by tekla »

cevn wrote: post #134
syntaxing wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not defending Tesla but battery range is really hard without context. Kinetic energy is velocity^2, which means moving twice the speed takes 4X the energy. They probably can get the right estimate for a destination because it knows the speed limit for the route and using that as your velocity can give you a better answer.

They could, but they don’t. Edit: someone else pointed out if you actually navigate then it will show remaining % more accurately. Still seems like false advertising..

How is it false advertising.
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