- How much range does an 11-year-old Tesla Model S still have?
- With the original battery still alive and kicking, this EV has driven over 100,000 miles.
- The real-world range today is quite surprising
Going down the used route when considering buying your first electric vehicle can usually land you a great deal. Depreciation tends to hit EVs harder than their combustion-powered counterparts, especially if it’s a luxury car we’re talking about.
However, getting a used EV immediately raises a very important question: how much range does it still have? It’s a well-known fact that batteries degrade over time, so knowing how many miles a full charge can bring is very useful information.
Take the 2014 Tesla Model S featured in the video below. It was bought earlier this year by The Fast Lane EV for just $13,000. It’s a one-owner car with a clean title, so the price seems like a pretty good deal. That said, it’s an 11-year-old car with over 100,000 miles on the clock, and it still has the original battery.
Without a warranty, some might see it as a risky purchase. If the battery is old and tired, a new pack from Tesla is roughly $20,000. But the car’s new owners are not too worried about that despite using it as a daily driver.
When new, the 2014 Tesla Model S 85 had an EPA-estimated range of 265 miles. What has 11 years and 100,000 done to the battery pack since then? Not much, as it turns out. The team set out on a loop around Denver, Colorado, with a 99% state of charge and an estimated range of 274 miles showing on the gauge cluster.
The 111-mile loop was driven twice with the cruise control set to 75 miles per hour for the majority of the route. A small portion was around town, at lower speeds. At the end of the test, the results were as follows: 233.6 miles driven using 63.3 kilowatt-hours of energy and an average energy efficiency of 3.69 miles/kWh (271 Wh/mile).
That’s less than the original 265-mile range rating of the car, but only about 12% less. But bear in mind that the car was still showing 10 miles of range remaining. It’s also worth noting that the combined EPA cycle used for the range rating accounts for both highway and city driving conditions.
In other words, by driving at slightly slower speeds, this old Model S could have gone a little further. Still, it’s pretty impressive considering the age and mileage, but not all used cars are equal. Depending on how such cars are maintained and charged can lead to different outcomes over time, just as you’d expect with a combustion-powered vehicle.
