Featured Model 3 has 310 mile range

My starting point was Custer, SD, I viewed the eclipse from Glenrock, Wyoming, and I ended up in Westminster, Colorado. I stayed at a hotel in Custer that had a Tesla destination charger (and an L2 where I charged my Prime, also across the street from a Conoco where I fueled my Prime), so assume you can start from full at 6:30am on eclipse day. The first supercharger I could have stopped at to charge would have been in Cheyenne, WY at around midnight, 17 and a half hours and 345 miles later.

This was the fifth trip I've taken since I got my Prime in April that exceeded the range of the top-of-the-line Model 3. Four of those five could have been done in a Model 3, just barely, but with substantial (1-3 hours) of delay. I'm now planning a trip over Thanksgiving you couldn't do in a Model 3 at all, and that's with zero range buffer remaining (I always keep 100 miles of range buffer minimum, and 150 in the winter) as it has one leg that goes nearly 500 miles between supercharger stations.

 

I agree with Bob - it's super helpful to here people posting how something will never ever work for them, again & again & again .... no matter how repetitive - no matter how pedantic ... it's down right exciting to continue hearing, over & over, ad nauseam, ad infinitum - no matter how many readers might believe such statements continue to be repetitive .

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If people keep saying wrong stuff, I'm going to keep contradicting them. That's how I got back into this thread, remember?

Model 3 has 310 mile range | Page 23 | PriusChat

 

But what @markabele said wasn't wrong.
The Tesle ranges are based on the combined fuel efficiency rating. Moving slower, like the traffic heading out of Florida, and the car will go farther. Then the situation there was such that if you needed to stop for fuel, a Supercharger could take less time than a gas station, and wouldn't be suffering from being out of electrons.

 

So, you're saying it's better, in an emergency, to be in a car with a 300 mile range that might extend to 400 miles because of the slow speed and can re-charge in an hour at one of about 10 places than be in a car with a 600 mile range that might extend to 800 miles because of the slow speed and can re-charge in 5 minutes at one of about 1000 places?

If I had been stuck in Miami with my Prime, I could likely have driven to Atlanta without stopping and without tapping into my 150 mile reserve range. I can't see even one reason why going twice as far without stopping, and being able to re-fuel 10 times faster in 100 times as many places isn't a far superior solution.

 

Barring a loss of power, the Tesla will start the trip with a full charge.

The Prius/Prime likely won't. Not every one will plan far enough ahead. Some will, some won't. Either way, with the number of people asked to evacuate, there was going to be a wait at the gas station to get that fill up for the trip.

 

Not true at all. I posted about Irma more than a week before landfall. I would have filled up then. You know how much gas my Prime uses in a normal week in the city? Zero. And remember even a half tank is more than a full charge in a Model 3.

 

I just wonder if he is as much of a joy in person as he is online.

 

Where in my post did I say you?

 

300+ miles is not enough! 500+ miles at slow speed is not enough !
if only more members here would get on board, how, "it will never work for MEEEE" ..... we might stem the tide of these poor ignorant souls in line with 400,00 others - ignorantly willing to buy a car that will not work for 'MEEEE' .
C'mon now!

 

He rather line the pockets of big oil and make Colorado air just a little less clean.

 

Right, that's why I live in a built-green house, drive a plug-in hybrid and have spent almost my entire career doing wind energy research.

 

How about you tell us why then you like to come on a Tesla specific thread and spread anti Tesla (and EV) propaganda. Maybe we could understand you better if you said your points more clearly and less hostile. You will have a much better chance of changing minds if you change your tone.

 

I don't. As a scientist, I don't easily put up with people telling either half-truths or out-right lies. There's a lot of that from Tesla owners about the current slate of low-range Ev's because they like their cars so much and have very little grasp of the real-world use of the vast majority of US drivers. I admit, I was the same way at one time. I started in all-electric power in 1986 for model airplanes, and wanted to work on Ev power systems in 1993 when I got my first Power EE degree. But a 1,000+ hour study of the NHTS data combined with a ton of custom-built models really woke me up to the reality of the transportation needs of the people in the country. Elon has done a great job of his usual thing - over promising and under delivering (usually he delivers late products, not poor products). A lot of people think these low-range cars are the answer to most or all transportation needs, and they are sadly mistaken.

The math is even quite a bit counter-intuitive. For example, a 500 mile range renders the entire supercharger network almost totally obsolete, and the next-gen (350+kW?) system even more obsolete. But if you're stuck with 200-300 miles of range, the supercharger network does need 350kW (500kW would be better), and it needs to be about 10 times as large as it is now (I usually say every town larger than 10,000 people). It's a pretty massive risk to build that out knowing it might be obsolete in 10 years if we get better batteries (currently an unknown, but I'm hopeful).

The other big misunderstanding is the inefficiency of our bi-modal transportation usage. Most people can get by with a 30-40 mile range and destination L1 charging, for 95+% of their trips. It's the other 5% that are mostly over 300 miles that are the killers. Carrying around a thousand pounds of battery 100% of the time for 5% of the trips is a major energy hog (acceleration losses and rolling friction) as well as a major expense ($190/kWh?), and it will always be so until batteries are way more energy dense - like 900Wh/kg, which is about what the hybrid power-train is in my Prius.

This is why hybrids make the most sense currently - the bi-modal distribution of trip length means that you need a high-energy, high-energy-density source for the long trips but can get by with a low-energy, low-energy-density source for the 95% of trips you take around town.

 

I'm covinced!
one down - 399,000 to go.

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And others don't put up with individual cases being conflated into what works for all. Vehicle use patterns cover a spectrum. Yes, a BEV won't work for some, but it will work for others.

 

Yes...a 200-300 mile BEV can be the only car for around 5% of the population, with current charging infrastructure. It can be an in-city only car (a "second car", if you'd prefer) for >95% of the urban population, but then so can an 80 mile range Ev.