Eberhard's Tesla wastes some electrons when it's parked
click above for a high res gallery of Martin Eberhard's Tesla Roadster
Martin Eberhard was along for the Tesla Motors ride for quite some time before unceremoniously leaving the company and starting his own blog. As one of the chief architects behind the current Tesla Roadster, he knows more than a thing or two about how it works, but even he is caught off-guard from time to time with how the vehicle works now that there is a shiny Roadster sitting in his garage. The latest interesting bit of information comes by way of Eberhard's blog and involves how much energy the car uses -- get this -- when parked. Astonishingly, the car's battery constantly has coolant run through it, just so long as it's at least half-charged. Because his car is nearly always fully charged, Eberhard's pump is always running. To track its power usage, a meter was installed and Martin was very surprised to find that 22-percent of his car's energy usage was being used while the car sat!
Besides using up precious energy, Eberhard also wonders how long his pump will last, considering that it's running almost constantly. A much bigger issue could be a reduction in the life of the battery, as Eberhard's calculations indicate that his battery's life could be reduced by up to two years or 20,000 miles, and that's a really big deal.
[Source: Tesla Founders]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
gorr 11:07AM (10/16/2008)
What will be the next fad when batteries will be proved wrong?
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DasBoese 11:38AM (10/16/2008)
What will be the next fad when cellphones will be proved wrong?
What will be the next fad when laptop computers will be proved wrong?
What will be the next fad when airplanes will be proved wrong?
What will be the next fad when horseless carriages will be proved wrong?
What will be the next fad when steam locomotives will be proved wrong?
Go learn how science works.
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MikeInNC 11:55AM (10/16/2008)
@gorr: Why would we continue to limit ourselves to the ICE? Just the mere idea seems utterly absurd.
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John Rowell 1:14PM (10/16/2008)
That doesn't sound quite right. The coolant pump should shut off once the batteries cool down, I would think. Maybe Eberhard's car has a defective thermostat.
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andrichrose 2:20PM (10/16/2008)
One would have thought this function would be powered by the service battery , rather than the traction battery,and anyway
as John points out why pump coolant if the battery is cool , all sounds a little strange to me .
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GaryinCT 4:09PM (10/16/2008)
Strange indeed. Could his being 'caught off-guard from time to time with how the vehicle works' be a reason for the unceremonious departure?
Jack H 5:19PM (10/16/2008)
Wow, sounds like they have some serious bugs in the power mgt software. How could something like that have ever gotten through testing? I know these guys have put a lot of effort into this car, and I have a hard time believing they're really stupid...so there must be some serious problem with the battery pack they are dealing with. That's the only thing that makes sense.
Wow.
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Andrew 9:58AM (10/17/2008)
I could be wrong but I do not think that charging and discharging will lower the battery life.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lithium-ion_battery#Advantages
"A unique drawback of the Li-ion battery is that its life span is dependent upon aging (shelf life). From time of manufacturing, regardless of whether it was charged or the number of charge/discharge cycles, the battery will decline slowly and predictably in capacity."
I am no battery expert so maybe someone else could confirm or correct me on this.
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RockStoneSteel 4:03PM (10/17/2008)
I really can't believe they didn't consider total power draws and battery cooling into the equation. There's more to this than is revealed in this blog. My guess is that the car should simply remain plugged in when home, with the charger more directly powering the cooling pump and perhaps bypassing the batteries.
There is no doubt the cooling pump should remain running when the vehicle is parked, at least for a while immediately after driving until batteries are cooled to an ideal level. Perhaps they should have a system like military aircraft, with both external power and external cooling (i.e. forced air) applied when parked.
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gorr 7:54PM (10/18/2008)
All that heat is waste energy and battery destroyer. Imagine you drive for 3 hours, then the batteries are hot, then you give a quick charge of 15 minutes and the batteries get fires, unless you give a slow charge of 30 hours. A yaris or lupo is better then that.
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RADScientist 11:56PM (11/05/2008)
Hybrid technology that incorporates batteries, an electric motor, a generator and a small, but traditional ICE (internal combustion engine) seems to be the wave of the near future. This gives us the ability to react spontaneously when issues come up when the battery isn't fully charged in the car. This is more realistic of American lifestyle.
Neil Young has partnered with H-Line Conversions out of Wichita, KS to convert older vintage cars into CNG hybrids. See www.voltsjournal.com.
-RADScientist
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