Supercharger Preconditioning

[khrest]

So, as a newish LR M3 owner, this feature seems broken to me. Driving home over 170 miles from the South Coast last night late, we needed a stop around halfway. The car routes us to the Heathrow T4 Supercharger site to arrive with 10% battery left. This seems fine. But then as we left Portsmouth the car starts pre-conditioning the battery, an hour (60 miles distance) before we will be needing to charge. According to the energy app this effectively halves the efficiency down to 2 m/kwh as we are using the same % warming the battery as we are for actual driving. This doesn't seem right to be wasting nearly 10% of my battery on preconditioning so far out, especially with temps around 12c which is hardly arctic conditions.

In the end, with no option to disable pre-conditioning I just removed the destination and reapplied it 10 miles out from Heathrow; we arrived with nearly 20% charge and still had only a 25 minute stop. Personally, I'd far rather wait an extra few minutes to charge more slowly if it means spending less on actual charging; should there be an option somewhere to turn off preconditioning on the understanding that charging speed will be slower? Or am I missing something obvious here?

[Zcd1]

I don’t think you’re “missing anything”, but I’ve found that it’s often largely a fool’s errand to try to out-think the car’s systems when it comes to charging.

One comment would be to ensure that the final destination is programmed into the car’s SATNAV - the car takes the overall trip speed into account when planning charging stops.

[timwatsham]

I share exactly the same thoughts - seems wrong to use energy up in order to charge a little faster, and then have to charge more when you get there. On a long trip with multiple charges (we did 900 miles in a day last summer with bikes on the towbar rack, which needed quite a few!) then perhaps it makes sense as it shortens each stop, but as a single stop on a long trip I think it is flawed.

I do the same thing - remove the charging stop from the trip on the satnav (you can do this when a destination is first input to the satnav), but then re-insert it 5 mins before arriving to allow some pre-conditioning. Seems to have worked well so far (although I don't often use the superchargers it has to be said!)

[somouk]

You're right, especially if you are heading to a V2 charger that is busy so will only get 65Kw anyway, the energy used to pre-condition is wasted.

I've stopped doing it now.

[Heres Johnny]

Yep, it seems to be over heating the batttery for the whole journey which cripples range.

I avoid setting a supercharger as a destination or waypoint, I just select it when I'm maybe 15 mins away, It's never been smart enough for me, not since I was in Rochdale and it tried to route me to Tankersley on a journey to Telford. I decided to charge at Park Royal hotel near Stretton as I was passing anyway

[jasebta]

+1 to now removing the destination until a few mins before charging. The car seems to be kicking in the preconditioning much earlier since the last major update.

I expect somebody at Tesla was tasked with increasing charging revenues…

[Zcd1]

If you don’t care about reaching your destination in the shortest amount of time, absolutely ignore the car’s preconditioning recommendations.

The car charges more quickly in the lower half of the battery SOC range AND with it at the appropriate temperature, so arriving with a lower SOC but properly warmed CAN actually make the trip quicker overall despite any efficiency hit.

I couldn’t care less about a few cents (or pence or pounds) extra cost on a road trip - I generally just want to get to the destination as quickly as I can in my EV.

Edited by Zcd1 on Thursday 13th April 03:33