Would you be willing to give up 4" of headroom for more range?

Would you be willing to give up 4" of headroom to get 500+ miles range?


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    95

Fleetwood75

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Having lived with two Tesla for over 5 years that have 300+ miles of EPA range, and often better efficiency than that in the real world, I'm more than satisfied with 320-340 miles of range and would not put up with an anchor of a battery to get additional range that would rarely even be of a benefit, and, when it was, it would mostly be a benefit of minor convenience.
I'd be very happy with a vehicle that could get me even 240 miles of range, but the caveat is that it has to get that 240 with a trailer behind it. And that's the problem here. I agree that 320-340 miles is perfectly adequate with no trailer, but that become what, 160 - 170 miles with the trailer? Not exactly great for taking the camper up to Yosemite, or out to Zion...
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Crissa

Crissa

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I don't think that it is necessary to give up head room, I would gladly give up 4" of ground clearance fromthe 17" max that leaves it at 13" which is still more than almost all stock trucks in its class.
rhat would *almost* double the range (accounting fir extra weight and inability to lower quite as far for highway driving) with no loss of cargo space or passenger comfort.
It wouldn't double, because of the weight but mostly the loss in aerodynamics.

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Gogster2k

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None of the battery seems to be under the bed, currently. You have the motor and hardware at and in front of the rear axle, then the tonneau storage.

But that is a valid direction to take it, although it would really reduce the maneuverability of the truck at that point. Big bed trucks have gotten so rare. How much does that overlap with the Semi used as a platform, I wonder?

EVs are simpler, their capabilities are less fiddly, so it goes that their model line will be simpler.

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Don’t forget the rear wheel steering that pretty much resolves the maneuvering issue which can be programmed to compensate for the longer bed length.
 

Gogster2k

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I chose no as I need all the headroom there is and wished the bed had more room too. Hopefully someone makes a shell that gives that vertical bed space back. The range isn’t what I was hoping for but that was because the battery energy density efficiency increase hasn’t happened yet. I do understand why they chose to make the additional range extender an option, but that takes away the bed space I need. Hopefully battery tech will get better soon and resolve these range issues!
 

Carmino

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4" of headroom is an absolute ton of headroom. 31% of people voting in support of this are wild.
 


bobang

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In my opinion the range extender is a great idea ...who really wants to carry all that extra weight if they don't have to? Only problem the range extender is poorly designed. It shot have been modular. It should have been designed so a couple people could easily plug it into the vault then keep adding modules of maybe 50 pounds each until you get the range needed that day. In the meantime when not needed in the truck these modules would serve as a power wall with that home system. Wow dual usage doesn't get better than that!! If one can put a man on Mars then this should be an easy task for these engineers even with the necessary cooling ports. I would 100 percent buy these after the initial purchase at similar cost per kwh as the existing range extender. Hopefully Tesla engineers have looked into that and are redesigning their future power walls for this type of accomodation.
 

RVAC

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Rear headroom is already borderline, taking 4" away would have made it unusable, that's a non starter. Adding 4" to vehicle height would have meant a significant increase in frontal area and would have likely required an increase in width as well, so as to balance it out.

The better option would not have been to double stack but rather go with a taller 46xxx cell. This would have allowed them to retain the same structural properties, no increase in manufacturing complexity of the pack (i.e. part count) and resulted in only a small increase in frontal area (1"-1.5"), if not none by increasing tailgate height.

That is what BMW is doing with 46120 cells for their large vehicles, they're effectively copying Tesla's strategy while giving themselves a capacity advantage. Hope Tesla has left themselves this option open as I feel like the "we know better than the customer" attitude when it comes to range will come back and bite them in the ass.
 

Abl3rider

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They could have double stacked the battery AND kept headroom AND kept ground clearance if they just made the vehicle taller. It's about 7" shorter than an F150 at mid height. Make it same height, problem solved.

Personally, I'm glad they didn't do this. That 7"+ of lower driving position will make it vastly better as a driver's car. It's one of my favorite CT features. I'm OK with sacrificing some bed space for a Range extender as I'll rarely use the full bed but will enjoy the lowered height every day.

I'm not sure overall that my use case is the best for Tesla. There is clearly a sacrifice here to provide the "performance of s sports car" in a truck. But I'm happy about it.
 

JBee

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Once again: if you take off 4" in the rear seat to roof height, you are taking off 8" from the total height of a person.

That means the current 6'4 is then a 5'8 max person rear seat.

Nobody would by this vehicle.
 

Huntsman

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No, I would not give up headroom for range.​
I like the idea of adding length for additional range if those two could come together and fit​
I am very disappointed at the range for the beast and the $16k we are expected to pay and still not get to 500 mile range. I know statistically the average person drives X miles a day. For those of us who are not average, we really focused on the 500. I ordered dual but over the years have come to recognize the way to beat range anxiety is to get more range. I had convinced myself I would get the tri or quad motor for the 500 or MORE range.​
Considering all the worthy things noted in this string, simply adding more batteries to increase the range is a unicorn that doesn’t exist. More batteries affects max payload, tire design, performance, recharge times, and more. So yes I’d like more range but NO I’m not willing to sacrifice headroom.​
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