Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Tesla created secret team to suppress thousands of driving range complaints

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

391–400 of 769 posts

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

#391

Post by [deleted] »

stetrain wrote: post #376
steveBK123 wrote: post #323

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably showing range in 3 different places that don't really agree is bad right? We are HN tech crowd here so its all fun & games hobbyist stuff. But normies do not want to get into these types of inane subtleties. Arguably the front & center, always-there range display should be the most accurate, not the least accurate.

Most accurate by what standard? Range depends on a bunch of factors. The range you got going to the store yesterday is not the range you will get driving to your friend’s house tomorrow. The car doesn’t know where you are going, whether it is city or highway driving, whether or not there is an elevation change, unless you tell it by navigating somewhere. It could take a guess, but that guess still has plenty of chanc…

[deleted]

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

#392

Post by nunez »

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…

It's the same problem as displaying the battery percentage on your phone. you're more inclined to look at it, and will be more anxious when that number drops.

I wish Tesla would allow you to hide the battery percentage entirely (unless it drops below a threshold).

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

#393

Post by crypot »

tekla wrote: post #150
cevn wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

It is false advertising.

FTA: Musk and two local executives did so in a June 19 statement, acknowledging “false/exaggerated advertising.”

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

#394

Post by gonehome »

ravenstine wrote: post #357
vel0city wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People who are worried about range on EVs are not worried about a usecase that looks like this, obviously. But this use case covers the majority of drivers in the US. The vast majority of people I've personally talked to concerned about range could absolutely charge at home and rarely drove more than even 100 miles.

If that's true, then it may be a matter of lingering perception. As an ICE car owner who lives in LA, I see plenty of charging stations, but not necessarily when I go on drives of hundreds of miles outside the city. Of course, I may be biased given that I don't need to pay active attention to vehicle chargers. But, for me, it would be a deal breaker if I couldn't be confident that my car could still be fuelled up in…

They're there if you need them - not always extremely visible though if you're not driving to one (can see the map here: https://www.tesla.com/supercharger).

If you got a Tesla you'd get a better sense for how many superchargers there are.

What you're saying is relevant though and why until recently I didn't really consider non-Tesla EVs an option to recommend if it was your only car (though now that Tesla has pivoted to opening up the superchargers to other car companies this is less of an issue).

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

#395

Post by CorrectHorseBat »

vel0city wrote: post #375
CorrectHorseBat wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without any resistance or breaking you are correct, but in real life you do have to break. Non constant speed also makes it worse because resistance is not linear.

Resistance is the same as on flat ground. It shouldn't be making an impact in the whole going up and down the mountain. The amount of resistance you get going 10mi at 60mph is the same going up as going down as going flat. So we're still at you spent some extra energy going up, and now you have that extra energy going down. I do get if you're needing to ride the brakes a lot you'll get a pretty big impact on range, b…

>Resistance is the same as on flat ground

At the same speed, but if you don't break you likely won't have a constant speed. There's also motor efficiency, but that has less of an impact on electric vehicles because they are efficient over a high range.

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

#396

Post by appleflaxen »

blake929 wrote: post #313

A lot of comments are discussing the difficulty in estimating range accurately or how all EPA estimates are inflated. But the article claims Tesla knowingly uses an algorithm with inflated numbers and swaps the rost estimate out for a more accurate estimate at 50% charge. That's different than a good faith attempt at estimating range and a dark pattern.

When you market cars need on known false numbers, it sounds a lot like criminal fraud

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

#397

Post by sib »

martin8412 wrote: post #294
b0sk wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Braking doesn't increase range. Rather the natural foot off pedal regen braking increases range. If you physically slam on brakes, I'm sure that doesn't help range.

That's a Tesla problem. They couldn't figure out blended braking. If I press the brake hard in my car, the regen goes to max possible.

I'm sure that if you "slam on the brakes" (per GP), your car will take region to the max and the apply the real friction brakes, causing lots of kinetic energy to be converted to heat and "wasting" energy...

(Also, Tesla cars do have blended braking between region & friction...)

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

#398

Post by dinom »

sib wrote: post #381
dinom wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> able to get a tow truck capable of transporting my car (turns out you need one that has a full bed because of the regenerative breaking Sounds incredibly short-sighted that the regenerative braking can't be temporarily disabled by the driver... two people can push a "regular" car to a nearby gas station in a pinch. Even one person can push a smaller car around a parking lot if necessary. That said, they often send…

If you put the car in car wash mode, you would be able to push the car: Controls > Service > Car Wash Mode And then "Enable Free Roll"

thank you

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

#399

Post by giobox »

purpleidea wrote: post #261
dinom wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> able to get a tow truck capable of transporting my car (turns out you need one that has a full bed because of the regenerative breaking Sounds incredibly short-sighted that the regenerative braking can't be temporarily disabled by the driver... two people can push a "regular" car to a nearby gas station in a pinch. Even one person can push a smaller car around a parking lot if necessary. That said, they often send…

Tesla cars are way heavier. Nobody is pushing one with their friend. Unless it's downhill.

You can push a tesla in most typical push situations. Sure its heavy, but its in the ballpark of pushing any large sedan or SUV, not just electric ones. You can enable free-rolling wheels in the car and push away, especially if you have luxury of two people pushing.

The weight of a Tesla is not some unprecedented figure for a passenger car - a model 3 is no heavier than many BMW 5 series configurations etc.

The far bigger problem for pushing EVs in my experience is blown pyro-fuses that lock the axle after crashes preventing the wheels from turning - a common issue after an EV shunt. This is why you will often see EVs "dragged" out of shunts by the recovery vehicle until they can get the locked wheels onto dollies. This is only an issue if the EV being pushed has been in an impact generally, but the bar for a pyrofuse blow seems to be low too - it will trip even if airbags haven't deployed. The wheels on many EV motor axles wont turn again until the pyrofuse is replaced.

I think the earlier example that required a full recovery truck - that sounds exactly like a blown pyrofuse, which is by far the most common reason an EV ends up requiring a full lift/dollies rather than a simple tow on its own axles.

This is also why you generally always smell burning in the cabin after a tesla shunt too - nothing to do with a battery fire, its the smell of the pyrofuse burning out under the rear passenger seat.

> https://www.wired.com/story/evs-fire-pyroswitches-cut-risk-s...

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

#400

Post by ethanbond »

vel0city wrote: post #299
ethanbond wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who are worried about range on EVs are not worried about a usecase that looks like this, obviously. Home/work plug-in is amazing , and an underrated QOL improvement over ICE, but it’s just not relevant to most of the concern around EV range. Range concern comes from either not having a charger available as a matter of daily business (street parking) or from frequently going on very long drives.

> People who are worried about range on EVs are not worried about a usecase that looks like this, obviously. But this use case covers the majority of drivers in the US. The vast majority of people I've personally talked to concerned about range could absolutely charge at home and rarely drove more than even 100 miles.

Right but most people buy cars for the totality of the driving they have to do, not just the majority. I bought a car specifically because I was tired of the awful rental experience, so "just rent when you need to go on a longer drive" is not a viable solution.
Post reply on HN