Tesla Chronicle #4 - Charging Techniques

(Posted to Facebook 7/12/2021)

Go on the internet, and everyone has an opinion on this one, and they are all different for sure.

Camp #1 - Charging every evening - this is definitely the way to go for people with just the basic travel charger with a 110V outlet, or for people that have longer daily drives.

Camp #2 - Charge as needed - But note, the general belief is that keeping the the charge between 20-80% is the best for the long term battery life.

I am currently in Camp #2 for a number of reasons. My daily commute / usage is generally less than 30 miles...plus some of the daily battery drain (for security and temperature management)...which means my daily % usage is less than 15%...that would be one charge every 3rd day or so if I start day one at about 80%. We'll see if this changes in the winter (which I expect it will... EVs are just not as efficient in the winter for a number of reasons).

I don't have enough data on this last thought yet, but I am starting to see a trend in my data.... a few more than half of my home charges have required a battery conditioning period. I have no idea why some have required this and some haven't... air temperatures at the time of charging should have been roughly consistent (60-70 deg). Think of this as a charge overhead or tax, which makes smaller charges less efficient (the percentage of power going into the car vs. the power needed from the wall for the charge event). This has me concluding that larger, less frequent charges are actually going to be more cost efficient.