EVs (Teslas) DOA in cold weather

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/dead-teslas-oak-brook

We are thinking of getting an EV but this gives me pause given today's temp. I think I'm leaning towards a hybrid.

DC area doesn't get as cold as Chicago, but has anyone with an EV had issues charging their cars today?

It says right in the article that drivers need to hit the precondition button before charging. Did they do that?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Which EVs have thermal management of the battery? I'm thinking of the Bolt. The manual recommends plugging in below 32F and over 32C when it's parked, to keep the battery conditioned and promote longevity.

My 2017 Volt does. I live in Florida and it cools itself down while charging in my garage. Scared the daylights out of me the first time it did that, as I hadn't gotten to that page in the owners manual yet lol.

My garage has never gotten anywhere near 32F so I have no idea what happens then.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/dead-teslas-oak-brook

We are thinking of getting an EV but this gives me pause given today's temp. I think I'm leaning towards a hybrid.

DC area doesn't get as cold as Chicago, but has anyone with an EV had issues charging their cars today?

I live in Utah at 8000 feet and it’s cold. More cold days than Chicago and definitely way more snow. No problem charging our Tesla here in the past 4 years. Precondition (heat) battery before charging. We have driven it to snowbird, Alta, Jackson hole, sun valley, etc when the temps were frigid. No issues. The Chicago story sounds frustrating for sure, but I’m not sure why the cars died, unless they showed up to the charger with 0% battery and had no power to precondition. If you navigate to a charger, your car knows that it will charge soon and will automatically start conditioning the battery for fast charge. Just like you don’t wait until the gas tank is empty before heading to the gas station, you shouldn’t wait until the battery is dead before heading to a charger. People have teslas in Finland and park them outside in arctic conditions without an issue, as long as they don’t let the charge drop too low.

Does that mean you always have to be aware of the weather forecast to make sure your battery is preconditioned?

No, when I navigate to a charger, the car automatically pre conditions. Even when it’s not cold, the battery will precondition to increase charging efficiency. And this is only when I’m on a road trip and use superchargers. Otherwise, I charge at home and at free chargers, no preconditioning necessary.

Today, I skied the morning after dropping kids off at school and left the car outside in the snow. Before my last run, I used the app to heat the interior and defrost. It had snowed about 4 inches and I arrived to a warm toasty car with a clear windshield and rear window while everyone else had to brush all the snow off. So nice.

My every day gas car has an app that allows me to start the car and warm it up too. Amazing!

Amazing! But spewing carbon monoxide while you heat your car is not so amazing.

Do you know where the power is coming from to charge 'dem batteries?

A lot of EV owners are complete morons. Wait till they find out what their batteries are made from, and the deadly process it takes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/dead-teslas-oak-brook

We are thinking of getting an EV but this gives me pause given today's temp. I think I'm leaning towards a hybrid.

DC area doesn't get as cold as Chicago, but has anyone with an EV had issues charging their cars today?

I live in Utah at 8000 feet and it’s cold. More cold days than Chicago and definitely way more snow. No problem charging our Tesla here in the past 4 years. Precondition (heat) battery before charging. We have driven it to snowbird, Alta, Jackson hole, sun valley, etc when the temps were frigid. No issues. The Chicago story sounds frustrating for sure, but I’m not sure why the cars died, unless they showed up to the charger with 0% battery and had no power to precondition. If you navigate to a charger, your car knows that it will charge soon and will automatically start conditioning the battery for fast charge. Just like you don’t wait until the gas tank is empty before heading to the gas station, you shouldn’t wait until the battery is dead before heading to a charger. People have teslas in Finland and park them outside in arctic conditions without an issue, as long as they don’t let the charge drop too low.

Does that mean you always have to be aware of the weather forecast to make sure your battery is preconditioned?

No, when I navigate to a charger, the car automatically pre conditions. Even when it’s not cold, the battery will precondition to increase charging efficiency. And this is only when I’m on a road trip and use superchargers. Otherwise, I charge at home and at free chargers, no preconditioning necessary.

Today, I skied the morning after dropping kids off at school and left the car outside in the snow. Before my last run, I used the app to heat the interior and defrost. It had snowed about 4 inches and I arrived to a warm toasty car with a clear windshield and rear window while everyone else had to brush all the snow off. So nice.

My every day gas car has an app that allows me to start the car and warm it up too. Amazing!

Amazing! But spewing carbon monoxide while you heat your car is not so amazing.

Do you know where the power is coming from to charge 'dem batteries?

A lot of EV owners are complete morons. Wait till they find out what their batteries are made from, and the deadly process it takes.

A lot of people who rent EVs are complete morons and didn't do any research about hitting the precondition button on their Tesla. Our Nissan Leaf has never had any issues starting, nor did our Chevy Bolt when we had it.

PP here secretly dreams of being a Saudi Prince. That explains a lot of his opinions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/dead-teslas-oak-brook

We are thinking of getting an EV but this gives me pause given today's temp. I think I'm leaning towards a hybrid.

DC area doesn't get as cold as Chicago, but has anyone with an EV had issues charging their cars today?

I live in Utah at 8000 feet and it’s cold. More cold days than Chicago and definitely way more snow. No problem charging our Tesla here in the past 4 years. Precondition (heat) battery before charging. We have driven it to snowbird, Alta, Jackson hole, sun valley, etc when the temps were frigid. No issues. The Chicago story sounds frustrating for sure, but I’m not sure why the cars died, unless they showed up to the charger with 0% battery and had no power to precondition. If you navigate to a charger, your car knows that it will charge soon and will automatically start conditioning the battery for fast charge. Just like you don’t wait until the gas tank is empty before heading to the gas station, you shouldn’t wait until the battery is dead before heading to a charger. People have teslas in Finland and park them outside in arctic conditions without an issue, as long as they don’t let the charge drop too low.

Does that mean you always have to be aware of the weather forecast to make sure your battery is preconditioned?

No, when I navigate to a charger, the car automatically pre conditions. Even when it’s not cold, the battery will precondition to increase charging efficiency. And this is only when I’m on a road trip and use superchargers. Otherwise, I charge at home and at free chargers, no preconditioning necessary.

Today, I skied the morning after dropping kids off at school and left the car outside in the snow. Before my last run, I used the app to heat the interior and defrost. It had snowed about 4 inches and I arrived to a warm toasty car with a clear windshield and rear window while everyone else had to brush all the snow off. So nice.

My every day gas car has an app that allows me to start the car and warm it up too. Amazing!

Good for you! I can heat my EV in the garage with door closed without the risk of inhaling toxic fumes from the exhaust pipe. Bonus for me, it's about 3 steps from my back door to my warm garage.

Do Teslas have the same problem as the Bolts where they said to charge the car outside for safety reasons?

GM, to their credit, fixed that issue, which was a problem with LG batteries and affected only a small number of cars. Battery tech is improving all the time. I don't think GM has handled its electric rollout very well--I will never buy GM again--but they did correct the battery issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:My door handle froze on my gas guzzler too. that happens to all cars.

But EVs require the batery to be alive to open the door. ICE cars don't.

My battery died on my gas guzzler car that has electric locks and no key, and I couldn't open the door. I needed to charge the battery to open the car.

Check the owners manual. The key should be inside of your remote

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/dead-teslas-oak-brook

We are thinking of getting an EV but this gives me pause given today's temp. I think I'm leaning towards a hybrid.

DC area doesn't get as cold as Chicago, but has anyone with an EV had issues charging their cars today?

I live in Utah at 8000 feet and it’s cold. More cold days than Chicago and definitely way more snow. No problem charging our Tesla here in the past 4 years. Precondition (heat) battery before charging. We have driven it to snowbird, Alta, Jackson hole, sun valley, etc when the temps were frigid. No issues. The Chicago story sounds frustrating for sure, but I’m not sure why the cars died, unless they showed up to the charger with 0% battery and had no power to precondition. If you navigate to a charger, your car knows that it will charge soon and will automatically start conditioning the battery for fast charge. Just like you don’t wait until the gas tank is empty before heading to the gas station, you shouldn’t wait until the battery is dead before heading to a charger. People have teslas in Finland and park them outside in arctic conditions without an issue, as long as they don’t let the charge drop too low.

Does that mean you always have to be aware of the weather forecast to make sure your battery is preconditioned?

No, when I navigate to a charger, the car automatically pre conditions. Even when it’s not cold, the battery will precondition to increase charging efficiency. And this is only when I’m on a road trip and use superchargers. Otherwise, I charge at home and at free chargers, no preconditioning necessary.

Today, I skied the morning after dropping kids off at school and left the car outside in the snow. Before my last run, I used the app to heat the interior and defrost. It had snowed about 4 inches and I arrived to a warm toasty car with a clear windshield and rear window while everyone else had to brush all the snow off. So nice.

My every day gas car has an app that allows me to start the car and warm it up too. Amazing!

Amazing! But spewing carbon monoxide while you heat your car is not so amazing.

Do you know where the power is coming from to charge 'dem batteries?

A lot of EV owners are complete morons. Wait till they find out what their batteries are made from, and the deadly process it takes.

I don't think it's that they don't know. It's more like, trying to decide which is a lesser impact overall. The answer to that is not entirely clear at this time.

I have a PHEV. I understand that the battery is an environmental issue in itself. I also understand that the ice produces emissions that are bad for the environment, and takes gas which is a pretty deadly process to get (to market) in itself. I am hoping that by using mostly battery power, that I'm at least reducing my carbon footprint. I do use gas also, so it's not like I am not contributing on that front to pollution. Just trying to do the best I can do in these days when it's not entirely clear what the solution will be.

[Anonymous]

We don’t have any problems with our Tesla. The battery does drain more quickly in cold weather. The only time I remember it being an actual problem is when we left it at the airport over a particularly cold winter break — we lost maybe 30 miles of charge over the week so had to stop at a dharger on the way home because we had left without a ton of charge on the battery. That was dumb of us but it was fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/dead-teslas-oak-brook

We are thinking of getting an EV but this gives me pause given today's temp. I think I'm leaning towards a hybrid.

DC area doesn't get as cold as Chicago, but has anyone with an EV had issues charging their cars today?

I live in Utah at 8000 feet and it’s cold. More cold days than Chicago and definitely way more snow. No problem charging our Tesla here in the past 4 years. Precondition (heat) battery before charging. We have driven it to snowbird, Alta, Jackson hole, sun valley, etc when the temps were frigid. No issues. The Chicago story sounds frustrating for sure, but I’m not sure why the cars died, unless they showed up to the charger with 0% battery and had no power to precondition. If you navigate to a charger, your car knows that it will charge soon and will automatically start conditioning the battery for fast charge. Just like you don’t wait until the gas tank is empty before heading to the gas station, you shouldn’t wait until the battery is dead before heading to a charger. People have teslas in Finland and park them outside in arctic conditions without an issue, as long as they don’t let the charge drop too low.

Does that mean you always have to be aware of the weather forecast to make sure your battery is preconditioned?

No, when I navigate to a charger, the car automatically pre conditions. Even when it’s not cold, the battery will precondition to increase charging efficiency. And this is only when I’m on a road trip and use superchargers. Otherwise, I charge at home and at free chargers, no preconditioning necessary.

Today, I skied the morning after dropping kids off at school and left the car outside in the snow. Before my last run, I used the app to heat the interior and defrost. It had snowed about 4 inches and I arrived to a warm toasty car with a clear windshield and rear window while everyone else had to brush all the snow off. So nice.

My every day gas car has an app that allows me to start the car and warm it up too. Amazing!

Amazing! But spewing carbon monoxide while you heat your car is not so amazing.

Do you know where the power is coming from to charge 'dem batteries?

A lot of EV owners are complete morons. Wait till they find out what their batteries are made from, and the deadly process it takes.

Yes because petroleum production and refining is known for being one of the cleanest safest industries in the world— even more so because petroleum is a renewable resource.

The pot calling the kettle a moron 🙄

[Anonymous]

The smartest people get hybrids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The smartest people get hybrids.

Guess the smartest people are the worst drivers then

[Anonymous]

Hi OP, as an owner of 2 ev’s in a snowy mountain town, I can assure you that the drivers in the article are same people who would have run out of gas on the side of the highway in a normal car. Yes, ev’s require more thought about energy logistics than a conventional car with a 40 gallon tank. But rolling up to a charger in subzero weather with 60 miles left is like crawling to a gas station on fumes. I read another article about a guy who parked his ev in an unheated Minnesota parking garage with 30 miles left and he returned a couple of weeks later and was surprised the car wouldn’t start.

So if you have common sense and have never run out of gas, you will be fine. When I had an ICE car, I filled up when I went below half a tank. And now that I’m in an ev, I keep the car charged to at least 60% and never let it drop below 25%. I’ve had no problems in the past 5 years where it snows October - April.

[Anonymous]

Chicago has millions of people living in apartments. I'm safely assuming the issue is there are far too few Tesla Superchargers to serve such a large population. So Tesla's get blamed with this bad press, when the blame ought to go on the people who bought a car without a way to charge it conveniently.

My husband drives a Tesla and loves it. But he charges it home every night. I bet he's used a public charger less than five times.