Broder actually had an ok story to begin with, with a number of facts that are review-worthy. The cold weather energy loss is certainly one of them. Also, the Supercharger stations are not close enough together, admitted by Musk. Their customer support gave them incorrect instructions to use cruise control to preserve energy, which raises questions about how knowledgable their staff really is if it could leave you stranded. And electric cars use electric heaters, and you might be forced to pick some combo of heat and miles on freezing days. Most importantly, you still need to constantly be thinking about range.
But Broder pushed it. Trying to get the battery to die in his first Milford stop is an obvious one. But when he failed to do that, he got a second chance by leaving Norwich without possibly being able to make it back to Milford. Both Broder and Musk agree that the car showed 32 miles of range, and that the car had made it 51 miles. But he would have known, before he left Norwich, that the distance to Milford was 61 miles. How Broder reasonably expect he would get there?
As a result, he gets his dramatic photo of the Motor Trend Car of the Year, helpless on a flatbed truck.
If I was a car reviewer and rocked up at a charging station with 0 miles range showing, I'd want to know what happens if you push it for a little bit more. It would definitely be an exaggeration for the story but we're talking about half a mile out of 200. He might have even been completely honest deliberately going the extra half mile if there had been some catastrophic result - a review isn't just a real drive, it has to be part simulation.
As for driving that final stretch with 30 miles range showing - his story is that Tesla told him it would be fine because it would be regained through the battery conditioning. Tesla says that they told him not to stop charging. Well there is a lot of wiggle room for both those statements to be true.
> I'd want to know what happens if you push it for a little bit more.
Well, that should be obvious: the car stops. But even if that's what he wanted to do, he should have acknowledged it. At the end of the day, there's lots of reasons to not buy a Tesla or an EV in general. But this is a question of integrity, and when it starts to sound like the reviewer didn't provide a fair review, it brings a lot of collateral damage to the entire organization.
> Well there is a lot of wiggle room for both those statements to be true.
Agree. I went back and read that portion again. It's possible that he was falsely told that the range would be greater than indicated. Or he was told that a few minutes of charging would help the range, and simply assumed that what he did was enough, while ignoring the actual displayed range.
Clarification on this point is important because that's the headline and lead photo of this article -- that he was completely stranded.
Yeah but does it stop on zero? Does it brick the car?
As it turns out Tesla knows what they are doing, and there is a reserve, probably that's pretty disappointing as a car journalist. But hey, when did we think car journalists were on the side of car manufacturers?
But, then Broder should have mentioned it in his article, like: "I drove around for a few minutes on empty while right in front of the charging station to see what would happen. But Tesla's battery outlasted my patience and I decided just to charge instead."
What reason besides stupidity would explain a reviewer intentionally bricking the car? It would be like putting vodka in the gas tank "to find out what happens".
@tatsuke95 normal use being continue to drive in circles after the car flashes "0 miles" and "recharge immediately" in your face for minutes? Besides, it turns off before the battery is depleted for that exact reason, it won't be bricked unless you try really hard.
"Normal use" being "I forgot to get gas last night, I wonder if I have enough to make it to work and stop on the way home". Less likely for a car that gets plugged in every night and has enough range for 3-4 days, but more severe since you'd be at least 30 minutes late instead of 5 minutes.
This is mind-boggling, it's like every comment starts a new, out-of-context discussion. The context here is someone purposedfully continuing to drive the car after it's empty and the "car bricking under normal use" comment. In your example it wouldn't be bricked.
Both Broder and Musk agree that the car showed 32 miles of range, and that the car had made it 51 miles. But he would have known, before he left Norwich, that the distance to Milford was 61 miles. How Broder reasonably expect he would get there?
Broder claims: "Tesla’s experts said that pumping in a little energy would help restore the power lost overnight as a result of the cold weather, and after an hour they cleared me to resume the trip to Milford."
In other words, it sounds like he thought that the 65 miles of range he lost overnight would be restored by charging it a little bit more at Norwich. He says he just couldn't make it to the next charging station by the time he realized this clearly wasn't going to work.
I imagine Tesla weren't terribly keen to press the point when he left Norwich because a journalist having to stand around for several hours in the freezing cold whilst the Tesla Model S charged wouldn't look that much better in print than the same journalist running out of power and having to be towed.
It would have taken him, oooh, about 8 hours to do a full charge at Norwich. What actually seems more likely - Elon Musk's insinuations that the only reason he didn't charge up fully there was because he was deliberately trying to run the car flat, or the journalist not wanting to hang around for an entire day in a small town in freezing weather?
He did not have to sit around 8 hours for the full charge, just enough to have the estimated range match how far he needed to drive. Then if it did not make that range, he could truthfully say that the car missed fell short of its estimate. As it is, he left on a 61 mile trip with the car telling him he only had 32 miles left.
And then Elon Musk would have again blamed him for not charging up fully there. He's already insinuating that the only reason not to do a full charge was because he wanted to run out: "On the third leg, where he claimed the car ran out of energy, he stopped charging at 28%. Despite narrowly making each leg, he charged less and less each time. Why would anyone do that?"
(Also, looking closely at the graphs I think I underestimated the charge times. It'd be more like 10 hours, which would basically wind up adding another day to the trip - after which Elon would presumably have written a blog post complaining that he could have just charged enough to get to the Supercharger and done the journey much faster, and use that as evidence he was maliciously trying to discredit Tesla. It's lose-lose for the unlucky journalist.)
The charging stations take one hour to fully charge the 85 Kwh Model S that was test-driven. A 30-minute charge would give the vehicle enough juice for 150 miles of travel.
But Broder pushed it. Trying to get the battery to die in his first Milford stop is an obvious one. But when he failed to do that, he got a second chance by leaving Norwich without possibly being able to make it back to Milford. Both Broder and Musk agree that the car showed 32 miles of range, and that the car had made it 51 miles. But he would have known, before he left Norwich, that the distance to Milford was 61 miles. How Broder reasonably expect he would get there?
As a result, he gets his dramatic photo of the Motor Trend Car of the Year, helpless on a flatbed truck.