[FAQ] - Question: I'm a new EV/Macan owner - I'm stressed about the battery…

[daveo4EV]

Question: what can I do to maximize my battery's life even though I likely won't keep the car long enough for it to matter?

TLDR; short answer - there is nothing _YOU_ can do to the battery…there is thousands of lines of software running in your vehicle to manage the battery - if anything happens to your battery is was very very unlikely to be anything _YOU_ did to it…

this question keeps coming up - and it's been answered before…I'm pleased with how this post has aged - so I thought I'd share it here - post #4 from this thread in the Taycan forum…shared here for your insomnia fix or enjoyment - your choice!!

https://www.taycanforum.com/forum/t...-have-less-charging-cycles.16183/#post-249092

Porsche and it's battery management software is in control - you are not - even though you are plugging the car in - Porsche's in vehicle on board Battery-Management-System/Software (BMS) is doing all the heavy lifting - there is nothing _YOU_ can do to the battery - what ever is going to happen is going to happen - it's not anything you did!!!

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[daveo4EV]

https://www.caranddriver.com/features/a31875141/electric-car-battery-life/
https://unitil.com/blog/electric-ca..., a recent study,even longer with proper care.
https://www.irishevs.com/no-you-wont-need-to-replace-your-ev-battery
https://vitalsigns.edf.org/story/el...re-really-good-and-theyre-getting-even-better

 

[daveo4EV]

https://news.stanford.edu/stories/2...teries-may-last-up-to-40-longer-than-expected

 

[daveo4EV]

used Tesla - 180k+ miles - still has 90% battery capacity left after over 1000 charging cycles…

https://www.yahoo.com/autos/car-expert-dismantles-popular-ev-111546008.html

as long as you don't have a warranty issue the battery is not the problem.

 

[srekrek]

I've driven a Etron55 from 2019 before my Macan 2025. Battery capacity about 90% after 200k+ km

 

[daveo4EV]

more data - https://www.taycanforum.com/forum/t...less-charging-cycles.16183/page-2#post-420320

 

[jwatte]

The one thing you can do is to set the "max charge" to 80%, which will do the most to preserve the battery for longevity. At the expense of having to plan ahead if you're going to want to drive 280 miles instead of 220 (or whatever your conversion/speed factor is.)
This does make the battery last longer, but from what I know about the chemistry, it's 10-20% of longevity (20% range loss happens at 12 years instead of at 10 years?)
I haven't seen qualified aging curves for the cells used in these vehicles, so the specifics aren't 100% clear, but it's not a huge difference, no matter what specific cell it is.

What I do: Plug it in every evening, get a 80% full car every morning, and never worry or wait for charging (or having to do detours to a gas station) because I don't drive more than 200 miles per day.

 

[daveo4EV]

https://www.taycanforum.com/forum/t...about-ev-battery-replacements-articles.31643/

 

[USMA81]

Interesting tidbit from the Stanford study: short, sharp instances of acceleration are actually good for the batteries. Your license to drive it like you stole it: “Honest, dear, I’m just protecting the battery.”

 

[daveo4EV]

more data that sweating the battery isn't really worth your time…

https://www.greencars.com/greencars...wpkzZIxodQuRzC7WQ1ail3hPpp7a0e54aAjcEEALw_wcB

https://www.recurrentauto.com/research/how-long-do-ev-batteries-last

 

[daveo4EV]

small battery behavior (phones, tablets, notebooks) model to big battery behavior (the individual cells in big batteries are the entire battery for small devices) - but their behavior individually can inform us about their behavior at scale in EV batteries…

I found this post very enlightening - and some broad trends (but not exact data) can be learned about what does or does not affect modern batteries cells - be them small or large…

take it all with a grain of salt, but some of this stuff is universially true…because chemistry doesn't know it's a small device or a big car…it's just chemistry!

https://randsinrepose.com/guides/apple-charging-guide.html

 

[MacanEVOwner]

used Tesla - 180k+ miles - still has 90% battery capacity left after over 1000 charging cycles…

https://www.yahoo.com/autos/car-expert-dismantles-popular-ev-111546008.html

as long as you don't have a warranty issue the battery is not the problem.

Many studies have shown that the average degradation of today’s EV’s batteries, with newer/better battery management systems, ranges from 1.2% to 2.5% SoC degradation per year. Most of that variability is dependent on whether you used fast chargers (more stressful than home chargers). Automobile manufacturers know this and is why they warranty their batteries for up 8-10 years, with a SoC not falling below 70% in that time period. Worst case scenario from the statistical data, EV’s….after 10 years of use….the SOC is still expected to be above 75%. That said, even at 70%, for most of us that charge at home….having the range reduced by 30% does not render the car useless For work or daily errands.

Coincidently on my own EV battery (non-Tesla), I recently went in for my last check-up under warranty (delivery April 2022 with just over 100k miles), and one of the things they measured was the car’s SoC. It measured 92% from new …that represents an average 2% drop/year.

But don’t take my word for it that most newer, high mileage EV’s retain 90% of the original SoC, over 4 years of use.….here is an an analysis of over 1,000 high mileage vehicles at 150k miles:

https://insideevs.com/news/785794/ev-range-loss-high-mileage-data/

Per the bar graph in this article, please note that starting at around 2021 (with better battery management/better battery cooling/etc) , the EV batteries for these >150k miles vehicles were showing 90% of the original range.

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