santana338
Member
I've never seen that before. Is that a new feature? Is there a way to make that come back up if you miss it the first time do you know?
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Traffic: 120 miles in 5 hours. Passed a dozen+ out-of-gas ICE vehicles.
- Thread starter wk057
- Start date
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- Driving Dynamics Model S
I've never seen that before. Is that a new feature? Is there a way to make that come back up if you miss it the first time do you know?
While it is an important tool, I would say don't trust the nav system, because sometimes it will take you way out your way, when the normal route would still be faster. It's a crap shoot. Instead, take the nav routing as an ominous sign, and go online to try to figure out what is going on.
For instance, I was driving from San Diego to Orange County early one Saturday morning. Normally this would be a simple trip up the 5. But the Tesla nav was telling me to take some ridiculous route that would add an hour to my 90-minute trip. It turned out the CHP was doing traffic breaks next to the San Onofre power plant, while work was done on the overhead power lines. They were doing this while the traffic was light and only accumulating small groups of cars, before releasing them. It was annoying, but the normal route was only 10 minutes slower because of this.
I wish the 'auto-rerouting' feature was an option (ie, ask & confirm if you'd like to re-route). On my trip to Pittsburgh this weekend the NAV tried to send me on a 30+ mile detour to save 10 minutes of sitting in traffic. Sure, we would have gotten to our destination 10 minutes sooner, but with -5% battery remaining. Had to ignore the NAV and sit through the traffic.
LargeHamCollider
Battery cells != scalable
I don't think think your numbers are right, the only engine for which I have data off the top of my head is a 165hp !erc. Diesel (designed in the last 10 years) and it burns just over 3 liters per hour at idle.
Fun story. Poor ICEers.
But the story also taught me something I did not know. I did not know that when I bring up the car's Nav system and tell it where I'm headed it somehow knows about traffic problems and tries to route me around them.
Wondering if I misunderstood I opened the copy of the Model S manual I downloaded and, sure enough, right there on page 91 it explained the feature.
So now next time I hear about a traffic stoppage I'm going to tell the Nav system that I want to go in that area and see what it shows me.
I don't think I'll ever discover everything the wizards at Tesla have incorporated in Model S.
Anyone here happen to know just how the Nav system knows where the problems are?
Truth is, I don't have direct experience with american cars.
I do however have direct experience with VW cars that when idling display hourly consumption that is in the order of ~0.3l/h. Yes, diesel engines.
It may be that gas cars are that much worse at idle and american gas cars even worse.
Is is also truth that american cars do not have a good image in european minds. Gas guzlers in direct sense.
While consumption while idling is low it could be that some of those stranded drivers had started out thinking they had "just enough" to get to where they were going (I've been guilty of that in my ICEs) not knowing there was going to be a long delay en route.
I think it was a combination of heat (mid 80s), bumper to bumper traffic, stop and go creeping at ~1 MPH (meaning all of these ICE vehicles were idling in "D" holding back their automatic trans most of the time), and the length of the delay (~3+ hours). Keeping an ICE in "D" even at a stop consumes a bit more fuel than in park idling.
Fuel consumption at idle differs dramatically between vehicles depending on:
- engine size - a V8 engine (as used more often in the US than in Europe) will burn more when idling
- A/C on or off - modern engines increase idle speed to run A/C compressor, significantly increasing idling fuel consumption
- gas vs diesel - a gasoline engine uses much more fuel than a diesel during idle
So getting stuck in hours-long traffic jams can indeed be a problem for ICE vehicles, even if driver is not especially careless.
Here in Alabama winter a year ago, we had a sudden ice storm that paralyzed the roads for hours; after sitting in traffic for hours in my LEAF, I noticed that I arrived at home with the same battery percentage remaining as a normal trip! The electric vehicle really shines in the case of bumper-to-bumper traffic.
Living in the greater NYC area where 60 minute waits for tunnels and bridges is a regular occurrence, Turnpikes turn to parking lots at 1am for no reason, and just getting through my local NJ town can take 20 minutes in the morning, this story is comforting to me...as I anxiously await the delivery of my car....
Canuck
Well-Known Member
Yes, great story. With regard to cold, driving over mountain passes a lot in the winter, where it's easy to get snowed in or avalanches can block the road, I always carry candles and lighters in the car:
"Candles – If you have never tried burning a candle in a small area, you should try it. It is quite amazing how much warmth can come from one small candle when it’s contained in a small area, such as a car. Along with the candles, make sure that you have something to light them with. If you are not a smoker, some matches in a waterproof container and/or a lighter needs to be with the candles."
Crack the window, of course.
yea, my wife waits for the light to go on and continues to drive around like that doing chores before finding a gas station...drives me nuts.
