294 miles of range confirmed. Didn't check it earlier as we were heading out of town that night for the eclipse in my folks' Model Y and it's not good to leave the battery sitting at 100%. The new V3 Superchargers that went online 5 months ago in Luling, TX made a big difference for the trip - plug in, walk in to use restrooms & get drinks, walk back to car, unplug, resume trip. In past trips to Bandera the older V2 Superchargers in Flatonia would require additional time, so we'd use the stop as a meal break even though the food options weren't the best.

My most recent update included a change to the Estimated Battery Range: My car just finished charging and is at 80% with 235 miles of range, which extrapolates to 294 miles at 100%. That's 5.2% down from the original 310 miles of range. Cumulative milage is 50,151.

FSD Beta is now FSD (Supervised). Got v12 earlier this week and it's a major improvement over v11. Issues I'd been having like the blinker turning on too early when leaving my neighborhood, and waiting too long to change lanes for an upcoming turn, have finally been resolved.

Hmm, looks like both rates went down by 1.6¢ per kWh

Hard to believe it's been 5 years since installing solar panels. My net-metering plan was on a 5 year contract, so it was time to renew or pick a new electric provider. I checked around and the rates have gone up quite a bit. Decided to go with Tesla Electric, which is a TOU (time of use) plan: $0.124* / kWh during peek usage, which is 4pm - 7pm. $0.077* / kWh all other times * add another $0.055 for grid and delivery fees for $0.179 and $0.132 respectively. These prices are what appear in the app: The rates were lower than other options, but instead of net-metering any excess solar production is bought at the 90% of market price, which varies every 15 minutes based on demand. This also shows up in the app: This time of year demand isn't very high, as temperature's nice outside so AC usage is low, so the market price is low. It even goes negative on occasion, though it looks like I'm not charged for them to take it: I did see some instances of higher rates, such as getting paid almost $0.30 per kWh for a brief period on the 18th. If the selling price goes above $0.30 then energy stored in the Powerwall will be sent to the grid. I have that set to only use the upper 70% of my Powerwall for that. Bill for first 11 days, note that it lists $0.124 and $0.077 for Tesla's rates, with the grid charges broken out further down: Not great compared to my net-metering plan due to how low market prices currently are for my excess solar. I'll be evaluating how this turns out over the summer when increased electric usage raises market prices. If it works out well I'll keep this plan, if not it's a month-to-month plan so I can easily switch to another without any penalty.

Ran across the 8Bitdo SF30 Pro controllers I'd picked up back in 2018 for a Raspberry Pi Retro gaming project. Haven't fired up that Pi in a long time, so decided to charge the controllers up and try them out with the car now that it has support for bluetooth game controllers. They're nice and compact compared to the Logitech F310 USB controllers I've been using in my car, which would be great for storage: First one paired with the car just fine; however the car wouldn't let me pair the second one as I already had 2 devices connected, the other being my phone. Was surprised at this as I thought bluetooth had a 7 device limit. Controller worked well in Beach Buggy Racing 2; though the button labels are swapped, X <--> Y and A <--> B, vs the Logictech controllers. The on-screen instructions use the Logitech layout, so if they refer to a specific button you have to remember to use the other one - such as button B if instructions say A.

Since I work from home the day I usually drive the most is the first workday of each month as that's when I drive into Houston for our monthly meeting. This graph shows solar production for the day and where it went: Blue = used directly by house Red = charging car Green = charging Powerwall Grey = sent to grid As specified on Tesla's page: Which explains why the car stopped charging around 5pm even though it had not reached at 80%. The car resumed charging the next morning when there was once again 1.2kW of stable excess solar.

The text above the slider changes while you're adjust it:

My Tesla's on the FSD Beta software branch, which often lags behind on updates like the Charge on Solar feature. It finally showed up with last night's update, so I'm giving it a try. The Sun slider (on the left) is set to 40%, if the charge is less than that the car will charge up to that slider using the grid. The max slider on the right is set to 80%. Car's receiving 11A Charging the car takes priority over charging the Powerwall. Some clouds reduced solar output, so car's now receiving 6A A Charge Tip appears if you set the max above 80%. The recommendation used to be a range of 50% to 90%, and I had been leaving mine at 50% since I work at home.

It is mostly a matter of math calculations. We know how the batteries degrade quite well now. So if the price you are getting paid extends the degradation it becomes interesting. Plus you have some autarky if you can use the battery for your needs.

Bluetooth game controller support coming to the 3 & Y with the next software update! 😁

For me in Texas it does seem like it would make more sense to send excess to the grid during the day when it's needed to cover peak demand from AC usage, and schedule the car to charge at night when we have excess wind power. I do have net metering though so the power company pays me for my excess solar. For every 1 kWh I send to the grid they pay me the same amount I pay them to draw 1 kWh from the grid, so it doesn't matter financially when I charge the car. For somebody without net metering it would make sense to use excess solar to charge their car rather than give it to the grid for free. Of course they would need to be at home when this occurs for it to be useful. I have read that some people have net metering plans that are also TOU (Time Of Use). The utility pays more for each kWh during the day when demand is high than the customer pays for each kWh in the middle of the night when demand is low. For those people it would not make sense financially to charge via excess solar. No, Tesla doesn't support V2G. I wish they would as it could be helpful after a hurricane. Tesla CTO JB Straubel On Why EVs Selling Electricity To The Grid Is Not As Swell As It Sounds (Sadly the video they got the quote from is no longer available.) This was back in 2016 though, when batteries were much smaller and more expensive.

Sounds cool. Can you use your Tesla as battery too?

Tesla's added a new feature that lets you predominantly charge your car using excess solar: It requires your car, Powerwall, and phone app to have a minimum software version level. My App is up to date, but both my Model 3 and Powerwall are not so I can't try it out yet. For some reason Model S and X cars prior to 2021 do not support this feature.

The estimate was off - they forgot to enter the parts, the $107.50 was just the labor. Total came to $302.52. Pickup was super easy - you now pay for service via the Tesla App, which also tells you which parking spot your car was left in. So once I got there I just got into my car and drove off.

Besides the above, I've also replaced the tires twice: April 2019 $1330 June 2021 $780

2nd time made no difference, still 288 mile range. I covered the service I've had done in the first year in the first post of this topic. This is the service I've had done since: June 28, 2019 cost $0 replaced passenger side headlight replaced camera assembly due to chrome coming off NOTE: this was already covered in 1st post March 25, 2020 cost $0 FSD (full self driving) Computer retrofit. Tesla upgraded the car's computer to a faster one required for FSD software. Replace charge port pin deadfronts June 29, 2020 cost $143 clean AC evaporator replace cabin filters This was due to AC getting musty smelling. I've done this myself 1 time since then, in October 2021, as well as 1 time for my folks which was much easier as Tesla had redesigned the access door to the filters. Will be doing this again soon as I'm starting to get faint whiffs of the musty smell. Filters and cleaner are $45. November 10, 2021 cost $0 Replace 12V battery Repair glove box - was no longer opening smoothly/slowly, just abruptly dropping down and spilling its contents on the passenger Yes, there's still a 12V lead acid battery in there that has to be periodically replaced just like with a gas car. Tesla has since switched to a 12V lithium battery, which should last longer. If you're interested, this article goes into detail on why Tesla still uses a 12V battery. February 28, 2022 cost $0 Reseal front upper control arm ball joints replaced driver side headlight - developed same issue that the passenger side was replaced for (see pictures in first post) Yesterday, June 4th, the control arms started making noise so I guess the reseal just delayed an issue. I'm scheduled for service on the 15th, which will include fixing some recall issues. One thing I was surprised about is the service is scheduled at the Richmond Service Center: Which I was unaware of. It's so new it's not even on Tesla's Find Us page - I put an X where it's at:

Seems to be typical, with more degradation in the earlier years before slowing down, as I lost 21 miles of range as of June 2022 and only 1 additional mile since then.

Sounds like a typical, average loss of capacity, no?

Time flies, just a few more weeks and it'll be 5 years of owning an EV! My final car payment is on the 15th. Decided to recalibrate the battery so let the car down below 10%, sit for an hour while keeping it awake, then charged to 100%. I now have 288 miles of range, down 7.1% from the original 310. Cumulative mileage is 46,419. Instructions suggest doing this twice in a row, so I'm going to skip charging until I get it below 10% then do another 100% charge.

I'd forgotten about it too, it popped up on my YouTube suggestions last night. Was surprised it hadn't been waterproofed, I'd find it annoying to have to run out and cover my car every time it rained. Of course we get 90+ rainy days per year in Houston, have no idea how common it is where she lives. The charging bot was neat, but wouldn't work for me - when parked there isn't enough room between the car and the garage wall for it to maneuver. Maybe something that was mounted on the wall. Charging mat could be interesting, depends upon how much loss there is.

Wow, I completely forgot about this project, thanks for linking to the video! Nice to see she's still driving Truckla around, and that she had some additional work done on it (and sounds like they're going to do a bit more). The charging bot was interesting, although I'm not sure I'd trust it to not scratch the hell out of my car. Tesla is going to have to come up with some sort of automated solution someday, maybe a giant charging mat you park over as was kind of shown in a render / photo at a presentations they did recently. ..Al

Tesla has setup a page where you can vote for five future Supercharger locations, from a large list of locations in the US and internationally: https://www.tesla.com/supercharger-voting I haven't looked at this too closely yet, but I will. One I will definitely vote for is Terlingua, Texas, which is near Big Bend. It's somewhat difficult to get to Big Bend now and actually stay out there, as charging is very limited in that area. ..Al

November 21, 2022 - Reuters article about the latest Tesla recall makes sure to emphasize that it's the 19th this year: Other reports on this made sure to include "19th this year" in the headline. Result is all over social media people are claiming 19 recalls in 1 year is horrible. November 24, 2022 - Reuters article, by the exact same reporter, about the latest Ford recall makes no mention on how many recall's for the year. It was Ford's 64th recall...