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That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

wheels.blogs.nytimes.com

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Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#91

Post by codex »

luigi wrote: post #7

Overall I think Broder acquits himself well, and his explanation about circling the Milford parking lot makes sense. Also, the Tesla engineer he was on the phone with at the time should have been able to tell Musk that happened (or Tesla should have just asked Broder to comment before posting the rebuttal). His action here is still hard to understand: > The Tesla personnel whom I consulted over the phone – Ms. Ra and…

He called early that morning complaining about the drop in mileage overnight. He was told the mileage drop was a glitch and to recondition the battery. When he called again, he was told to recondition the battery again--this time though a quick charge at Norwich. How many times should he call Tesla about the same problem, when he was told twice that the mileage was erroneously low? He had already attempted to recondition the battery--twice, which should be sufficient. In his mind, he now he has even more juice in his tank. He has even more of a buffer than he did pre-charge. So he gets on with the review. Of course, he does call again when it is clear that the conditioning + driving has not restored the needed juice--but by that time it is too late.

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#92

Post by slantyyz »

stcredzero wrote: post #64
zeteo wrote: post #16

The logged data does support the broad lines of Broder's story (large drop in battery charge overnight, slow driving, turning down heating) and the 10-15% imprecision (driving at 52 mph instead of 45, heating goes down at 200 miles instead of 182, charge time of 47 minutes instead of 58) is well to be expected from what is a journalistic review and not a scientific experiment. So this all comes down to what customer…

> and the 10-15% imprecision is well to be expected from what is a journalistic review and not a scientific experiment Sorry, but your standards are a bit low. A lot of things like a 10-15% imprecision, all biased in the direction of making the car perform less -- that's exactly what I'd do if I were trying to fix the drive's outcome. If Consumer Reports had multiple things 10-15% off, all pointedly to support a give…

It's important to note that unlike the NYT, Consumer Reports wouldn't review a car they didn't pay for. They will, however, preview/first-look cars they didn't buy.

AFAIK, car reporters for the big media conglomerates usually get expenses paid review junkets from the automakers. Those reporters tend to never post negative reviews for fear that they wouldn't get invited again. I think the same applies to movie and video game reviewers from major publications.

CR does have its hands on a Tesla, and they jumped through some hoops to ensure that Tesla didn't know who bought it or cherry pick a review unit for them.

http://news.consumerreports.org/cars/2013/01/our-own-tesla-m...

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#93

Post by vellum »

tomkarlo wrote: post #12

> "I was given battery-conservation advice at that time (turn off the cruise control; alternately slow down and speed up to take advantage of regenerative braking) that was later contradicted by other Tesla personnel." This is one of the more bizarre statements in this whole discussion. Why would anyone with the slightest understanding of electric cars or physics believe that to be true - and I mean the reporter, as…

To paraphrase Arthur C. Clarke: For many people, past a certain level of understanding, technology = magic.

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#94

Post by ChuckMcM »

jacquesm wrote: post #3

Two bits are completely non-sensical to me, is there any battery technician or otherwise knowledgeable person that can indicate in what conditions this makes any sense? > Beginning early in the morning of my second day with the car, after the projected range had dropped precipitously while parked overnight, I spoke numerous times with Christina Ra, Tesla’s spokeswoman at the time, and Ted Merendino, a Tesla product p…

If I were to speculate, and I am, I would guess that the variable here is the temperature of the battery packs. Batteries are chemical power sources, and the chemical reaction which frees up electrons has temperatures where it works, and temperatures where it doesn't. (Hence "cold weather amps" as a selling point on car batteries).

Anyway, I'd speculate that the Tesla person was thinking that if the battery got up to temperature it would go back to what it thought was the current capacity (as measured by open circuit voltage level).

I suspect something drained power from the car over night. In my case I've experienced power drain (non Tesla) from leaving an MP3 player plugged into the 'aux' jack of the center console. But we may never know for sure without better instrumentation.

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#95

Post by femto »

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #71
luigi wrote: post #7

Overall I think Broder acquits himself well, and his explanation about circling the Milford parking lot makes sense. Also, the Tesla engineer he was on the phone with at the time should have been able to tell Musk that happened (or Tesla should have just asked Broder to comment before posting the rebuttal). His action here is still hard to understand: > The Tesla personnel whom I consulted over the phone – Ms. Ra and…

That stuck out for me and I think he is being dishonest with his delicate wording. They didn't clear him to go, as he suggests. They told him that it would be ready in an hour. He also explains that he drove past a station "because no one made him aware of it". That smells like wordplay too. He was probably aware of it, and any reasonable owner of the car would probably be aware of it, or be well equipped to look it…

Maybe Tesla need to add an unobtrusive permanent display somewhere on the touch screen, showing the distance and direction to the nearest charging station? Touching the display would bring up detailed driving directions and start GPS navigation to the nearest station.

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#96

Post by AlexeiSadeski »

Elon's own arguments are absolutely killing the credibility of electric cars:

-Turn the heat down for more range? Who the heck wants to drive around cold in an extremely expensive car?

-Drive slowly? Again, what?

Elon is simply agreeing with the reviewer's most damning findings: The consumer must make considerable sacrifices - in addition to spending more money - in order to properly use their Tesla car.

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#98

Post by [deleted] »

zeteo wrote: post #16

The logged data does support the broad lines of Broder's story (large drop in battery charge overnight, slow driving, turning down heating) and the 10-15% imprecision (driving at 52 mph instead of 45, heating goes down at 200 miles instead of 182, charge time of 47 minutes instead of 58) is well to be expected from what is a journalistic review and not a scientific experiment. So this all comes down to what customer…

[deleted]

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#99

Post by smsm42 »

stcredzero wrote: post #47

> I do recall setting the cruise control to about 54 m.p.h., as I wrote. The log shows the car traveling about 60 m.p.h. for a nearly 100-mile stretch on the New Jersey Turnpike. I cannot account for the discrepancy, nor for a later stretch in Connecticut where I recall driving about 45 m.p.h., but it may be the result of the car being delivered with 19-inch wheels and all-season tires, not the specified 21-inch whee…

I think here the case is simple. Broder did not record his speed accurately, he just drove "around 45 mph", which very well might be actually 55 mph, on a good road with a good car 10 mph difference in speed doesn't feel at all. However, he can't just say "I didn't really collect the data accurately" since it'd hurt his credibility, so he mentions completely unrelated discrepancy in hope that most of the readers would say "ok, it's plausible, maybe he's right, maybe he's not, we're not engineers, we don't know whose fault it is". Thus both Tesla's point would be neutralized and Broder's credibility won't be hurt.

Re: That Tesla Data: What It Says and What It Doesn’t

#100

Post by VeejayRampay »

nikcub wrote: post #42

The biggest mistake Elon made in his response was to dump all that data and to attempt to tear apart each part of the review. This means that the rebuttals now involve taking pieces of that and disproving them in the aim of disproving Tesla's entire argument. Tesla should have posted nothing more than a single line statement saying that Broder left the last charging station for a 65 mile trip with 32 miles on his ran…

Exactly. The bottom line is that if there's no good reason to leave a gas station with 32 more miles to go in the tank if you intend to go another 65 miles. The fact that the car is electric or a Model S is irrelevant.

It's just a dumb choice and if you make such a mistake, I am of the opinion that it disqualifies from saying anything about said car. Especially if you usually specialize in mostly hagiographic articles about oil companies in the NYT.

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