Zero means Zero - another battery depletion story

Let's get this part out of the way up front--I'm a dumbass. No need to point that out, the story will show how I convinced myself that what I was doing makes sense, and why it didn't, ultimately, make sense....

I drove from St. Louis yesterday morning and got home (~230 miles) with only about 5 miles range showing. I was already late for a sword fighting event a few miles away, but I plugged in while I was changing clothes and getting ready. I had 10 miles range showing when I left the house. My destination is an easy (rural roads) 3-4 miles away, and the battery still showed 7-8 miles when I got there, which should've been plenty to get me home. But, for some reason, I decided to leave the key fob in the cup holder in the car, something I normally never do. Apparently, that is enough to keep the car from sleeping and makes it think I'm about to get in and drive which increases the "vampire drain" on the battery. In this case it was enough to take it to zero.

I'd never experienced that (I never leave the fob in the car) so I assumed it was just a battery balancing issue or something and I convinced myself that there was actually enough energy in the pack that I could make the 3-4 mile trip home. I didn't believe that 7 miles of range would drain in the 5-6 hours the car was sitting unused. Ignoring multiple warnings and massively reduced power I chose not to ask to use a 120v outlet at the location i was doing my sword fighting (which I could have). Instead I chose to try to make the 3-4 mile drive home and ultimately pushed on until it completely petered out just 1.5 miles from home.

The car shut down as I was trying to go up a steep hill on a road with no shoulder. I was able to coast, backward, down the hill and steer onto a dead-end side road with even less traffic. It took an hour for the tow service to arrive (used AAA and saved my free courtesy tow from Tesla), we had issues getting the 12v to wake back up (I think he was shorting the positive clamp by having it resting on the support bar), but ultimately my wife brought my jump box and I was able to wake it up and get it out of parking brake mode and onto the truck. Once home it had enough juice in the 12v to allow me to plug in to my HPWC and all was well. I spoke to Tesla Service this morning and they recommended a full charge to balance the pack (which I will do tomorrow), but didn't see any other issues.

Thanks to the 2 hours it took to get the thing towed the last 1.5 miles to my home and on the charger will be plenty of consequence to prevent me from doing this again....

Please let this serve as a warning to others. Don't ignore the warnings.
Dumbass depletes his Tesla battery - YouTube

[video]https://youtu.be/KIIrG7o1qCE[/video]

I believe it is at ZERO that it changes to Charge Now

taurusking said:

Thanks for posting this efusco.

Last week I drove to Corsicana supercharger with only 10 miles left in the battery. Luckily the weather was good and I arrived on time. Would never take such risk on a winter weather.

However being stranded on the road has happened to me once while driving ICE car. Thought I will make it to the next gas station and then it stopped on the highway. Gas station was about 1 mile away when the car stopped.

Had to hitch hike...what an embarrassment.

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Without question this is 100% driver error.
That said, this wouldn't have been an issue if 1)There had been a supercharger on I-44 between St. Louis and Nixa as I would have travelled faster and gotten a quick top up charge enroute and 2)If there were some sort of fail-safe that didn't allow such massive battery drain just b/c the fob is left inside the car, esp. when the pack is at a very low level already. Maybe a text to the app, something.

But I had options, I had warnings, I was cavalier and paid the price. Same sort of logic errors can easily lead to a similar issue in an ICE vehicle.

Thanks all for the support. I did post so that others don't make the same mistake and make similar assumptions.
On a side note, apparently I need to post all my dumb moves on there (and there are many), I've gotten more positive reputation today than in any given week! I appreciate the support.

MrBravo said:

Thanks for sharing the story!

My car should be delivered next week, so I don't know, but isn't leaving key fob in the cup holder dangerous? Can't someone just drive away?

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Well, it's not dangerous unless it drains your battery or someone drives your car away! But I was parked in a private driveway, in a rural area, and the car was in my line of sight almost the entire time. I had no concerns of it being stolen. But yes, that is precisely why I don't usually leave the key in the car. In this case I didn't want the fob lost or damaged by an errant blow from a sword or pike and didn't want it lost in my gear bag. Seemed to make sense and the idea that it would lead to premature draining of my battery never occurred to me.