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 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]
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