If you could request three factory add-ons, what would they be?

[TruckDaddy]

1. Drone that deploys from a trap door in the bed with charging pad for reconnaissance/police location/traffic routing.

2. Below dash compartment for 16" barrel, collapsible stock, AR-15.

3. Full-size fire extinguisher for putting out Lamborghini fires and other ICE fires after drag races with the 4 motor.

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[Ogre]

What you will find in practice is that efficiency is not ruled by whether regen is on the go pedal or the stop pedal but how the driver uses it. I coast all the time in my Model 3 simply by applying the throttle to the appropriate position.

The problem is on Teslas it’s a pain in the ass to simply coast. Hyper miling requires coasting as far as I know.

Not just for efficiency, but just in general there are situations where I’d prefer to just coast versus regen.

You are right though, on average over tens of thousands of drivers, having it on is massively more efficient. Having the options for those who would prefer it or can actually use it to squeeze a few more miles out of a car would likely cause more confusion and result in overall worse economy even if in a few cases it improved it.

 

[Crissa]

Ehh, being able to put regen on the brake pedal can make for a much smoother ride, too. Not just more efficient.

-Crissa

 

[Bill906]

On a Tesla, when you do not have one pedal driving mode on, does it engage regen when pressing the brake pedal? Do we know if the brake pedal is mechanically connected to the brake system, or is it brake by wire. Or is it both, where the first inch or two of brake pedal movement are brake by wire (including regen) and after that, the pedal mechanically activates the brakes.

 

[Crissa]

I don't know that Tesla has any of the brake blended with regen, unlike others.

On my Zero, a set amount of regen kicks in when the brake light is activated. But on some others, they take a portion of the brake pedal and blend it with a variable amount of regen.

-Crissa

 

[Ogre]

On a Tesla, when you do not have one pedal driving mode on, does it engage regen when pressing the brake pedal? Do we know if the brake pedal is mechanically connected to the brake system, or is it brake by wire. Or is it both, where the first inch or two of brake pedal movement are brake by wire (including regen) and after that, the pedal mechanically activates the brakes.

I don’t believe you can turn 1 pedal driving off on a Model Y or Model 3.

If you can, I’d love to know how because I sure haven’t figured it out.

 

[Crissa]

I don’t believe you can turn 1 pedal driving off on a Model Y or Model 3.

If you can, I’d love to know how because I sure haven’t figured it out.

Yeah, Google says they rolled it into hold/creep but it used to be a separate setting.

-Crissa

 

[HaulingAss]

Ehh, being able to put regen on the brake pedal can make for a much smoother ride, too. Not just more efficient.

-Crissa

I let my 88 year old neighbor drive my Tesla Model 3 Performance and it was the jerkiest, least smooth ride I've ever had. He simply didn't know what he was doing. I have enough experience driving with one pedal that it is MUCH smoother for me than any two or three pedal car I've ever driven.

The reason for this is simple: One pedal is set up to be not only 100% smoothly progressive, but to also transition seamlessly from braking to acceleration. So, there are no variations in acceleration when, for example, the ICE drivers' foot is lifted from the brake to the accelerator.

In 2018 or so, a survey of EV drivers found that a solid majority of them preferred one-pedal driving compared to blending regen on the brake pedal. I don't think that's changed in the last 5 years.

 

[HaulingAss]

It's unrelated to Tesla: Zero Motorcycles allow you to change these settings, and since the motorcycle already has limited range, guys have tested the heck out of it.

It's like the old saw about cruise control being more energy efficient to hold a steady speed: A human will wobble a little, so you can't hold exactly the right spot over time so you end up shifting your grip (or step). Modern cruise control can do it much faster, in smaller increments.

Regen just increases those differences, so one-pedal driving over the long run is slightly less efficient than only activating regen when you intend to slow down more than a coast.

-Crissa

When I was an ICE car driver, I was either hypermiling or driving in fun "sport" mode. I enjoyed both a lot. Cruising on the highway I was generally hypermiling and I tracked my results very carefully on multiple cars. I found I could *always* get better MPG by driving manually than I could with cruise control (as long as I was disciplined enough to maintain the same average speed and not let my speed creep higher when driving without cruise control assistance). The reason for this is a skilled driver can intuitively hold a steadier speed by anticipating dips and hills in advance and gently easing on or slightly off the throttle before the hill impacts speed. Future versions of cruise control may be able to do this using AI vision mapping of the road surface, but current versions are incapable of doing it so a good human driver still has the advantage.

As usual, there are no absolutes when it comes to ALL drivers because we all have different habits. I am more efficient with one pedal driving because I can drive smoother and more seamlessly as I make the transition from accelerating to coasting to braking and back again. And I can respond more instantly to changing traffic conditions in front of me when I don't have to switch pedals to make the transition. Efficiency increases when the momentum of the vehicle can be maintained and one pedal driving assists with that by allowing me to respond instantly, even when going from braking to coasting to light acceleration.

Others will have different results, particularly if they still have the bad ICE habit of letting off the accelerator completely when they no longer need acceleration.

This is true whether on a long highway only trip or driving in urban/suburban traffic.

 

[Zabhawkin]

Personally I think it is best to have it blended on the accelerator pedal. My reasoning is that if it is blended on the break pedal it may not always be available at the same level due to either high state of charge or cold temperatures limiting regen.

You would either have inconsistent braking, or a computer in-between controlling how much pressure to apply to the brakes in which a failure could cause the brakes to not operate correctly. The way it is now the driver directly operates the brakes.

 

[Crissa]

It is true, when my Zero locks out regen, the brake pedal gets jerky as it allows a little, then cuts out, then a little more. But that's a function of its design being clunky. It only does all or nothing.

The Taycan uses resistive (and possibly capacitive) regen so that the amount of regen available is always the same, no matter if heavy/frequent braking, temperature, or charge level. It's just a matter of design.

And it's been a long time since a human without cruise control could exceed a human with cruise control. You just have to know when it's more efficient and when you're more efficient.

-Crissa

 

[HaulingAss]

It is true, when my Zero locks out regen, the brake pedal gets jerky as it allows a little, then cuts out, then a little more. But that's a function of its design being clunky. It only does all or nothing.

The Taycan uses resistive (and possibly capacitive) regen so that the amount of regen available is always the same, no matter if heavy/frequent braking, temperature, or charge level. It's just a matter of design.

And it's been a long time since a human without cruise control could exceed a human with cruise control. You just have to know when it's more efficient and when you're more efficient.

-Crissa

No, it's common knowledge that a good hyper miler can outperform even the newest cruise controls. They cannot see ahead like a human and, until that changes, it will be possible for a human to outperform it.

 

[Bill906]

Personally I think it is best to have it blended on the accelerator pedal. My reasoning is that if it is blended on the break pedal it may not always be available at the same level due to either high state of charge or cold temperatures limiting regen.

You would either have inconsistent braking, or a computer in-between controlling how much pressure to apply to the brakes in which a failure could cause the brakes to not operate correctly. The way it is now the driver directly operates the brakes.

I owned a 2009 Ford Escape Hybrid. It did brake blending and did it very well. It wasn’t absolutely perfect, but very close. I learned (from researching on the web) that the brake pedal would produce hydraulic pressure to the brake control unit but, unless something went wrong, that pressure was only used to tell the unit that braking was requested and how much. In the event of something gone wrong a value would open allowing brake pedal pressure to be directly applied to the brakes. But normal operation the brake control unit would decide how much regen braking and how much mechanical braking to apply and it would supply the requested pressure to the brake pads. Essentially brake by wire. The only time I found this system to be less than perfect was when the brakes got wet (specifially coming out of a car wash). The unexpected change in friction on the brake pads seemed to confuse the brake control unit. This typically caused a jerky braking experience for the first 2-3 times I used the brakes after they got wet. Other than that, the blended braking was as seamless as mechanical only braking.

 

[Ogre]

With my Outback I would usually do a mix of cruise control and manual driving depending one where it was. For long hills I would slow down a lot because that’s where the biggest impact on fuel burn is. For shorter hills I would just coast up and slow down a little to the summit for the same effect. Fundamentally cruise control doesn’t have the tools a driver has. Cruise control has it’s hands tied at a specific speed and burns however much gas/ range it takes to maintain that speed. Just varying your speed on hills can make a massive difference in fuel burn.

 

[Crissa]

No, it's common knowledge that a good hyper miler can outperform even the newest cruise controls. They cannot see ahead like a human and, until that changes, it will be possible for a human to outperform it.

No. You mishear.

A Human with cruise control always beats a Human without.

A Human with cruise control bests cruise control on its own - because it can't yet see down the road and plot the right acceleration and deceleration curve to take into account terrain and traffic.

It's another tool, and in this case, a tool that extends the driver's ability without loss. The hypermiler on their own is just a Human, and can't hold throttle perfectly or measure pace perfectly.

-Crissa

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