Towing with an EV: The Shocking Range Loss in Arctic Temperatures | Tesla Model Y
Good morning everyone it’s a very frosty morning it’s- 12° here in Stockholm nice weather sun is shining no wind no snow perfect conditions for trying a range test with a trailer so if you ever wondered how much rain you will lose with your electric car when throwing a
Trailer this is the video for you I will try to do this as scientific as possible so I will do it in three different runs the first run will be without any trailer at all just the Tesla M performance in this case from Giga Balin the second run will be with a empty
Trailer attached the total weight of this trailer is 390 kg empty and the Third Run will be with the same trailer attached but fully loaded so total weight including the load 750 kilogram so that’s the three runs after the three runs are completed I will dissect all the numbers for you
Show you the exact differences between the three different runs both in consumption and range that way you will know how your car gets affected by towing a trailer let’s start with the first cycle with the Tesla Model y only so I’ve just put 25 km behind on the
First range test and this is the test without any trailer as you see there is no trailer behind in the car and as you see it’s sunny and nice weather outside despite the blizzarding cold so average consumption until now 24 KW hours per 100 km
Flat uh I mean that’s high but uh it’s cold outside so that’s the reason it will probably go down a lot more but let’s see about that I have never tested this uh car in this cold before I mean arrange tests and consumption tests so it will be really
Interesting to see how much the model Y is affected by the cold weather today interesting to see just some brief information about the test cycle it’s a 80 km long test cycle it consists of speeds between 50 all the way up to 11 km/ hour but this time I’m lowering the
Speed a little bit cuz the speed limits are normally between 50 all the way up to 110 km per hour but since it’s not allowed to drive faster than 80 km/ hour with a trailer I’m actually lowering the maximum speed from 110 km per hour down
To 80 km/ hour just to stay at the allowed speed limits cuz I don’t want to get tickets or or lose my driver’s license because of this test and uh I always put AC into 20 degrees Cel and enable Eco modes if available but Tesla doesn’t have that so I’m
Driving it as usual and sticking to the speed limits all the time otherwise it will be impossible to compare the results so I’ve just put 55 km behind soon finalizing the first stretch of consumption test without trailer current average consumption is just over 22 kws per 100 km so it has
Been dropping a bit but the weather actually got even colder than expected during a certain stretch it actually hit all the way down to -8° C that’s really cold considering I live in Stockholm that’s not the normal weather conditions you get here but uh it is what it is is and I
Guess it will be exactly the same conditions when I pass the same spot with the trailer let’s take a short break and talk about my newly released members function here on YouTube as a member you get early access to content you get access to all my test data that
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Finalize the first stretch without any trailer average consumption 20.6 Kow hours per 100 km that equals to a full range of 364 km that’s not that bad I mean given the average temperature of -5° C really cold weather it can can be considered as
Good and um I mean I needed to keep a lower speed so it’s hard to compare to uh other test I have done with the same car but in higher speeds I have actually managed to score a lot lower consumption with the exact same car and the exact same
Tires uh if I remember it correctly I was able to drive it and consume 50 .5 kws per 100 km in better conditions it was a couple of degrees Plus in that case and higher average speed because I didn’t need to consider the maximum speed for trailer towing in Sweden
That’s 80 km per hour given that a lot lower average speed than I normally do the the consumption can be seen as fairly high but uh Teslas are normally very efficient so I guess it will be hard to beat this score with any other electric vehicles currently available so let’s connect the
Trailer and do the second test and this is the test with a unloaded trailer and after that I will do a fully loaded test with the trailer I think that’s enough let’s connect it All done let’s move first checkin with empty trailer 28 km past average consumption 37.1 Kow hours per 100 kilm that’s a lot High almost 15 Kow hours per 100 kilm more than the same point without a trailer and this time it’s empty so as you see here the trailer is on and it’s
Rolling one thing that seems to have changed with the new software is the illustration when towing now it seems like a car is slipstreaming me sing and staying very close behind like half a meters in between the cars strangely it doesn’t illustrate a trailer it knows that I’m pulling a
Trailer but still illustrates a normal car haven’t seen that before I think that’s introduced in the new software seems like a bug so soon hitting 50 km of traveled distance average consumption still really high 30 5.8 almost 36 Kow hours per 100 km that’s a lot state of charge
27% I started off around 77 or 78 and this is the second run of 80 km stretch so I have been driving almost 140 km since the last charge I think I will be forced to do a quick stop for charging before running the last run with a loaded trailer but
Average consumption almost 36 kows per 100 km let’s see how this ends up it will be really exciting to compare all the results later on especially the results when comparing a loaded trailer and a unloaded trailer so the same temperature drop actually occurred on the exact same spot as earlier so now currently
-7° that’s cold so I would say that the average temperature during the whole trip is around 15° C negative minus cold ice cold just charged up getting ready for the final round with a fully loaded trailer this is the last bits and pieces after that I will be fully ready to go
It’s getting dark so I’m trying to hurry up a little bit before it gets too dark the video quality gets a bit too bad in dark weather that’s why I’m trying to hurry up a little bit so do you think there will be any difference between a
Fully loaded trailer or a empty trailer let me know in the comments below and with how much do you think the difference will be let us have a discussion before you watch the end of this video let’s go so just past the 30 km line of the last round with a fully
Loaded trailer this time average consumption until now 34.6 kows per 100 km so almost 35 kows per 100 km so almost the same as with a unloaded trailer at this point now it’s getting colder again this is the cold section so uh – 16° uh so this is the part where the car
Actually will start heating the battery pack again seems to be engag around – 16 -7° of course depending on the battery temperature and the the consumption will probably increase a little bit from here and on this is interesting uh it seems like the consumption with a load
Compared to a unloaded trailer is around the same but we are not finished yet so uh we will see later on in this test let’s continue soon hitting 70 kilomet on the last run fully loaded I must say that the current consumption is really really exciting uh
I did not really expect this really interesting results I’m really not done yet but I can already now see what’s happening I need to do some calculations I need to do that when I come home cuz it’s getting too dark and I will record the rest of the
Video tomorrow and until then I have got a lot of time to calculate dissect the numbers and present them for you in a good and understandable way I’m also going to do some calculations according to the kinetic loss of energy uh to be able to see if that result goes hand in hand
With my results so stay tuned a couple of months ago I did a range test with five different EVS where one of those were carrying a battery pack of 40 kg of extra load a lot of viewers stated that this was really unfair and that the car with that extra
Battery pack was losing a lot of range and I did not agree and I also backed this up with a couple of different calculations to show that the amount of energy or range lost by those 40 kg was negligible this result in this video this trailer test actually shows that I was right
Let’s have a look at the results and compare the three different runs and as you see here in the graphics the consumption for the car only was a lot lower than when towing a trailer whether it was loaded or unloaded that result gave a total range of
364 km that’s far from the stated WP range of 514 km but still good consider it the cold weather minus 15 de as an average temperature and towing the empty trailer resulted in a increased consumption of 72% compared to not towing anything at all that’s a really big difference and
That actually gave us a total range of 212 km that’s a significant drop compared to the 364 km with no trailer at all and the difference between the loaded and unloaded trailer is almost none resulting in a total range of 210 km so after adding all this weight
To the trailer it resulted in a Range loss of 2 km that’s really astonishing so why is the difference so small I mean most of the energy is consumed during acceleration and since the tests in this case are more or less constant speeds with smaller differences a couple of stops but still mostly
Highway driving the energy consumed is to keep the constant speed and that’s more or less affected by physics around the car and the trailer and those are the same so in this case acceleration and deceleration is not as important so acceleration also results in decent acceleration and deceleration for
Electric cars results in regeneration or reoperation of energy so more load results in potentially higher energy that you can recuperate when decelerating so the extra amount of energy used when accelerating with more weight also leads to higher energy recoloration and the last and most important factor here is actually
Friction one friction is air resistance since the volume of the car and the trailer as such are exactly the same for the two L runs the external friction is the same the only part that may change is the friction on the trailer and in this case the
Bearings and the actual tires on the trailer since the trailer is the igned for carrying such a weight at 750 kg the tire pressure the tires as such and the bearings are designed for handling that kind of friction and weight and therefore leading to a very small difference in actual friction and also
Energy consumption for towing the empty trailer compared to a fully loaded trailer trailer so what’s your view on the result do you agree do you think it’s plausible let me know in the comments below or maybe you are very surprised let us talk about it and dissect the numbers even more so that’s
It for today I hoped you enjoyed this video and that it did shed some light over consumption and range when towing with a fully electric car subscribe like and engage and as I always always say stay electric thank you for watching speak to you soon
How far can I tow in -15°C with an Electric SUV? Does the load make any differnce?
Let’s try with a Tesla Model Y Performance.
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