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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

#201

Post by corresation »

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…

All the hard data from the Tesla logs except for the 'shutdown' is contradicted by words apparently spoken (and probably unverifiable except for 'he said/she said' style debate) rather than actually refuting the data.

Is it? The Tesla temperature chart makes a big thing about temperatures at a very specific point, ignoring that not much further in the journey the temperature dropped to the minimum for 50 miles. The infamous "32 mile" charge also shows that when the car was parked for the night it has 90 miles of range, disappearing overnight. Or complaining that he didn't know about a charge station that the car itself didn't know about.

Further, "hard data" is a bit of a stretch. No one but Tesla has the raw data, and they've carefully presented selective bits of it for maximum impact, which is naturally given that they're incredibly biased. Such as the "drove around a parking lot trying to kill the car" bit, when it was actually just five minutes looking for a unlit, unmarked charge station. It's also humorous that they take their telemetric speeds as gospel, when vehicle speedometers are notoriously unreliable.

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

#202

Post by james_ash »

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…

The line "I did not ignore their advice" seems particularly ambiguous. An example of not telling the whole truth.

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

#203

Post by andrewfelix »

andrewfelix wrote: post #192
tunesmith wrote: post #162

I put a graph together showing all the points/counterpoints and here's what I'm left with. - not charging past 90% at the 1st station is defensible. Especially if Tesla warns it will shorten the battery's life. - It'd be better if Tesla's software took temperature into account when estimating mileage range. - Broder is being ridiculous about the cruise control and his speed estimates, and the temperature. He has part…

"reads like Broder was trying to stack the deck" I disagree. I think Broder is doing what a lot of journalists do and has accentuated the overall negative experience to create a better narrative. In spite of the poor communication and slight exaggeration, I don't feel like there was malice or a great deal of intent on Broder's behalf. He generally had a poor experience. The errors in his story do not negate that, and…

If you're going to downvote this, at least have the courtesy to respond.

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

#204

Post by PebblesRox »

recoiledsnake wrote: post #132
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…

The major WTF moment for me was this: > 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) Someone failed at basic thermodynamics. Converting electricity to mechanical and back to electricity causes a terrible loss in power.

Point 4 of this article suggests that accelerating in short bursts with long coasts in between works best for gas-powered cars. I can see how turning off cruise control could be more efficient in this case too, although I agree braking would be silly. http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2011/07/26/hypermiling-expert...

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

#206

Post by tubbo »

andrewfelix wrote: post #192
tunesmith wrote: post #162

I put a graph together showing all the points/counterpoints and here's what I'm left with. - not charging past 90% at the 1st station is defensible. Especially if Tesla warns it will shorten the battery's life. - It'd be better if Tesla's software took temperature into account when estimating mileage range. - Broder is being ridiculous about the cruise control and his speed estimates, and the temperature. He has part…

"reads like Broder was trying to stack the deck" I disagree. I think Broder is doing what a lot of journalists do and has accentuated the overall negative experience to create a better narrative. In spite of the poor communication and slight exaggeration, I don't feel like there was malice or a great deal of intent on Broder's behalf. He generally had a poor experience. The errors in his story do not negate that, and…

This guy (Broder) was clearly too stupid to use the car. Jesus Christ, I mean...I can't even get to Newark from Connecticut on a full tank of gas! What the fuck was he thinking?

I'm sorry but the stakes are too high here to assume anything otherwise. Someone is obviously being paid to make the review as shitty as possible, even though the Tesla Model S has clearly over-achieved its goals.

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

#207

Post by DeepDuh »

zevyoura wrote: post #193
DeepDuh wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While the whole discussion makes me skeptical of both Broder and Tesla's customer service, I'd like to add here that Tesla most probably would need permission to do that. Even releasing GPS data is already a questionable move - IANAL, but I believe in Europe this would be pretty much unthinkable, except if he gave explicit permission on paper first (general agreement terms probably wouldn't be enough, because of the…

This would be a more significant concern if he was driving his own car, but since it's a Tesla owned review model, I'm sure they have legal rights to it. In addition, given their past troubles with Top Gear I wouldn't be surprised if Tesla wrote it into a review agreement.

> .., but since it's a Tesla owned review model, I'm sure they have legal rights to it.

I doubt that. Say, you lend a car to your friend and let the navigation system log his/her route. The route includes compromising information about work related issues. Even the logging itself is questionable, but then releasing that information to the public - boy, I'd sure check my lawyers first.

As I understand, the 'European sensor' for privacy tingles at quite different levels than the US American one.

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

#208

Post by justin_vanw »

I realize that the NYTimes likes to pretend they are 'the newspaper of record' and therefore 'tell us how it is', but when they themselves are accused of lying, to come out with an article claiming to tell us what is really going on? Ha! Haha!

Yes, nytimes, please tell us, what does the Tesla data says, and what it doesn't. We shouldn't look at your original article ourselves, and then look at Tesla's reply. We should instead read the objective analysis of the situation. An objective analysis from the very party accused of lying. Oh god, the irony, it burns, the goggles do nothing.

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

#209

Post by SCAQTony »

gamblor956 wrote: post #55
nirvana wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The answer is very simple: Brody is lying about what Tesla told him, just like he's told many other lies in his article and in the rebuttal. Putting it into a "he said / she said" is a smokescreen. The car might be a lemon but the idea that Tesla told him to run the heater to charge the battery is beyond credulity. This is not exactly the first time the NYT has told lies for ideological reasons. The paper does it reg…

Elon Musk has a billion dollars riding on calling the NY Times a liar and discrediting them. Here's the thing though: the problem with the Tesla battery is the same problem that every other EV to date has had in sub-zero weather: they lose their charge and the charging meter gets decalibrated. Tesla's bane is not a biased NY Times reporter. Their fundamental mistake was giving an EV to the NY Times to test drive in t…

I agree, The NYT has global influence and like you say TESLA is in a sink or swim situation.

But I have to ask this: doesn't is take some 30-years to get a technology completely figured out and completely usable with no hassles or bugs and could Tesla be entering the second decade of that process? You mentioned the cold weather and that is definitely a valid consideration that has to addressed.

To use the web as an analogy, it took 12-years to create, 4-years to grow and produce a web-browser. 3-more years to commercialize and another 10-years to become part of everything we do.

With that in mind, perhaps TESLA is reluctant to admit that they are just in the "browser creation" stage and they still have work to do?

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

#210

Post by vacri »

taproot wrote: post #196
vacri wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The more people that track your movements, the more potential for security breaches or malicious use.

I trust Tesla a lot more than I trust Google, Facebook, ISP's, or the banks, and they know everything there is to know about me. I do understand what you are saying (perhaps more than most people), I guess we just differ in opinion about how much it matters.

I've been arguing about this article on another forum, and have been looking closely at how Musk is interpreting his own data - and he's being loose and fancy-free with it (both sides have engaged in embellishment, it seems). As a result, I don't think he's a shining bastion of honesty - I wouldn't trust Tesla any more than any other entity.
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