[NomoTesla]

On a 1,500 road trip I discovered, toward the end of the trip, that the car will throttle the DC charge rate after DC charging too many times. The last two times we charged a message appeared on the screen saying that in order to protect the battery, DC charge rate will be throttled for up to 2 days.

I'm surprised nobody other than Bjorn Nyland has covered this, or maybe they have and I just missed the boat. This issue appears to be known in the i4 forums and has been discussed there. I am somewhat disappointed this is the case, as Mercedes, Audi, Tesla, and others have no such issue with repeated DC charging.

Here is Bjorn's video for reference:

Sorry if I'm late-comer to this issue.

[Road Trip]

Not mentioned by Kyle @ State of Charge and he took many trips in an IX including one over 3,000 miles. In fact he really raved about it — and we know Kyle likes to take his charging state down to 5% left or less.

[Road Trip]

What were your exact consequences please for in one sentence you use the phrase “throttle up?

[NomoTesla]

Originally Posted by Road Trip

What were your exact consequences please for in one sentence you use the phrase “throttle up?

You mean where I said "DC charge rate will be throttled for up to 2 days"? That means it will charge at a slower rate for up to 2 days. It was a screen that popped up saying it would throttle the charge in order to protect the battery.

I am also surprised that Kyle never mentioned this, but in Bjorn's video he says this may have been introduced via a software update. Bjorn states that charging the car on AC overnight might resolve the issue and reset the "throttle timer", but in my case the care specifically said this would be the case "for up to 2 days".

During our trip we ran the battery down to about 8% and charged it as high as 90%. When we started our trip we left with 100% SOC.

Really shocked about this.

[NomoTesla]

Throttling was rather severe, as it started at 150 kW and then the screen popped up and charge rate dropped to 70 kW range and dropped further, to 42 kW at about 75% and kept dropping. This was not a charger issue because the car specifically said "Battery Protection - In order to protect the battery, DC charge rate will be reduced for up to 2 days" or something along those lines. I didn't take a photo of it.

Bjorn mentions that this is mentioned in the i4 manual. If you visit the i4 forum you will se it discussed there. This is an issue for the iX as well based on my recent experience.

[Pictor]

It's referenced in the manual but I thought one of the recent updates removed that limitation. Maybe I'm incorrect in that thinking.

I have not run into the throttling on the iX simply because the car will outlast me on road trips given its range especially on the first leg.

How much distance were you covering and how many charges did you get before it throttled the charging stop?

[NomoTesla]

Originally Posted by Pictor

It's referenced in the manual but I thought one of the recent updates removed that limitation. Maybe I'm incorrect in that thinking.

I have not run into the throttling on the iX simply because the car will outlast me on road trips given its range especially on the first leg.

How much distance were you covering and how many charges did you get before it throttled the charging stop?

The total trip was 1,500 miles. We departed with 100% SOC (charged at home on AC) and DC charged about 4 times on the first 750 mile leg using 350 kW chargers and got maximum charge rate of almost 200 kW. We overnighted with a friend and charged the next day another 4-5 times for the next 750 mile leg.

Temps were in the 50s and raining. The maximum speed we hit along the way was 80 MPH, which isn't much given that some of the freeways we used had a maximum speed limit of 75 MPH.

We are on the latest software update for 8.0 software that was pushed out a few weeks ago. This is our first road trip so just surprised about this. We don't normally drive 1,500 miles so it likely won't be an issue, but makes me scratch my head.

Last data point: We charged according to the recommendations from ABRP for shortest trip time. In Bjorn's video he is not sure whether the limitation is based on number of DC charges, or the total kWh charged using DC.

[Road Trip]

Thank you very much for details on the specifics of it happening. Highly doubt I will ever be doing 750 mile days. We will do 500 milers so anyone experience throttling at that mileage level.

[ricerboi]

I got this a couple times especially when doing more than 5 DCFC/day (mostly on winter road trips LA-SLC). It’s annoying as hell since it makes an already excruciatingly long drive even worse. Sadly, more ammo for the anti-EV types. I haven’t had the “throttled for 2 days” issue. Usually resets the next day to full speed.

[ggalanis]

Originally Posted by NomoTesla

On a 1,500 road trip I discovered, toward the end of the trip, that the car will throttle the DC charge rate after DC charging too many times. The last two times we charged a message appeared on the screen saying that in order to protect the battery, DC charge rate will be throttled for up to 2 days.

I'm surprised nobody other than Bjorn Nyland has covered this, or maybe they have and I just missed the boat. This issue appears to be known in the i4 forums and has been discussed there. I am somewhat disappointed this is the case, as Mercedes, Audi, Tesla, and others have no such issue with repeated DC charging.

Here is Bjorn's video for reference:


Sorry if I'm late-comer to this issue.

Thanks for the info. I remember seeing the i4 videos about this and always found it weird that the iX didn't seem to have the same thing... But looks like it does after all and may have indeed been added after the fact via a software update.

It is a disappointing item for those that want/need to do such long road trips. Although other brands may allow you to continue to fast charge in the same circumstances, it for sure affects the long term degredation of the battery pack to do so do to the heat this generates. There is no magic being done by any of the other companies. In order to fast charge at full speed, the battery needs to be pretty warm and doing so generates even more heat on the pack which is not good for the long term. The difference is where each company draws the line and I am not exactly surprised that BMW would be on the conservative end of that spectrum.

I wonder how much room for improvement there is for the cooling systems and whether these batteries would benefit by having the dcfc stations being designed to offer better cooling solutions to help maintain the batteries at the "right" temperature to avoid some of this issue. Like having an extra coolant line fed to the car via the dispenser that runs in parallel to the car's own that would be connected to a huge radiator at the station that could dissipate much more of the added heat than what a car can offer on its own.

[Windshieldfarmer]

Interesting. I wonder why BMW does this…Tesla certainly does not. Seems like this could be a significant problem for someone relying on level 3 charging.

[exxxviii]

Originally Posted by Windshieldfarmer

Interesting. I wonder why BMW does this…Tesla certainly does not. Seems like this could be a significant problem for someone relying on level 3 charging.

A decade of catch-up.

My Soap box: “level 3” charging is not a thing. DC fast charging is level 1 and 2, like AC, but DC. Level 2 DC charging is the stuff above 80 kW, so pretty much everything…

[sor]

Originally Posted by Windshieldfarmer

Interesting. I wonder why BMW does this…Tesla certainly does not. Seems like this could be a significant problem for someone relying on level 3 charging.

Only if you’re doing crazy miles constantly. Someone doing fast charging for regular city driving is probably only charging once or twice a week.

I know Bjorn covered an i4 charging throttling issue and then went back at BMw’s request and found the issue was resolved. This was a year or more ago now. Maybe this is newer than that series of events though.

I agree if they’re doing it it’s because they’re concerned about longevity (maybe even because they’re on the hook for warranty), and I don’t suspect other manufacturers have magic that makes the situation better for their cars.

[sor]

Originally Posted by exxxviii

A decade of catch-up.

Eh I don’t think Tesla has some decade ahead magic tech, at least not in production. There are plenty of people who have had to have their battery swapped because of degradation. Their cars also don’t go as far on a charge as they advertise, I think they’re just very aggressive as far as marketing and pushing the car capabilities to the edge.

[ggalanis]

Originally Posted by sor

Eh I don’t think Tesla has some decade ahead magic tech, at least not in production. There are plenty of people who have had to have their battery swapped because of degradation. Their cars also don’t go as far on a charge as they advertise, I think they’re just very aggressive as far as marketing and pushing the car capabilities to the edge.

The magic is they let you degrade the battery. That is not zee German way.

[exxxviii]

Originally Posted by sor

Eh I don’t think Tesla has some decade ahead magic tech, at least not in production. There are plenty of people who have had to have their battery swapped because of degradation. Their cars also don’t go as far on a charge as they advertise, I think they’re just very aggressive as far as marketing and pushing the car capabilities to the edge.

You're living in alternate reality. There is a company. One company. Who has been selling BEVs for over a decade and collecting battery data, everything data, that nobody else on this planet has. So, the stuff that went sour a decade ago, they figured out and adjusted in the BMS software and battery design. Your silly anecdotes are the lessons another company has learned from that nobody else has.

Originally Posted by ggalanis

The magic is they let you degrade the battery.

Nope. Real science looks like the early soldiers learned from early advances. You might want do read beyond the Deutch walls that surround your passive-aggressive self.

[sor]

Originally Posted by exxxviii

Nope. Real science looks like the early soldiers learned from early advances. You might want do read beyond the Deutch walls that surround your passive-aggressive self.

I think you’ve had too much of the kool-aid I suspect next we will hear how great FSD is. I don’t doubt they have more data, we can agree there.

For most of that decade, they used 18650 cells, the exact same off the shelf cells that I have in my hobby projects. Audi launched out of the gate with a superior cooling system and charging curve, was not hard to catch up with this design.

Then came the newer larger cells that were supposed to be so much greater, but then they weren’t and everyone was scratching their heads. There are lots of people and data showing overall battery degradation at high miles is good, but also plenty of people having battery swaps due to early degradation. It’s just a game of numbers - some tiny fraction of people are going to do 1500+ mile trips, Tesla just thinks it’s worth letting those possibly degrade to avoid any negative press.

If there’s one thing Tesla has always been great at it’s that startup mentality and marketing - fake it til you make it. This is why FSD is always just a year away, and why they are the worst of all EV makers in meeting their claimed range numbers in real world. They’re aggressive, and that’s fine, but isn’t without consequences.

[ggalanis]

Originally Posted by exxxviii

You're living in alternate reality. There is a company. One company. Who has been selling BEVs for over a decade and collecting battery data, everything data, that nobody else on this planet has. So, the stuff that went sour a decade ago, they figured out and adjusted in the BMS software and battery design. Your silly anecdotes are the lessons another company has learned from that nobody else has.Nope. Real science looks like the early soldiers learned from early advances. You might want do read beyond the Deutch walls that surround your passive-aggressive self.

I live in reality and not some fantasy land with elon musk posters plastered all over the walls.

Remember the case of the guy using a standard range model 3 as an Uber/Lyft that was brought up in another thread? He fast charged all the time, multiple times a day... His battery pack failed and needed to be replaced at just over the mileage warranty after just 2.5 years. That's cause it caused excessive degradation. Battery packs are supposed to last way beyond the mileage warranty limits but with a steady decrease in capacity over time, but allowing users to just abuse the batteries causes them to go bad very quickly. This is but one example of this, but when faced with things like this, you chose to believe that they have some secret sauce that allows their batteries to not degrade like every other battery ever made by humanity.

Truth be told they do have a secret sauce... It's how gullible some of their customers seem to be.

[sor]

To be fair, I acknowledge my own bias. To me, Tesla has shown that they embellish (to put it kindly). Once I see that, I just can’t trust anything they do.

Most real world tests show them underperforming compared to their claimed ranges. Yes, these are EPA standards and ultimately the fault is there, but compare that with a company who is more conservative and possibly exceeds expectations in the real world. How does that make a potential customer feel about the company’s other claims?

The whole FSD thing is just a mess. My friend spent thousands of dollars for a feature he didn’t get, with claims he could use his car as an autonomous taxi. Feature got pushed and pushed, and eventually he got allowed into a beta with occasional patches. He still doesn’t trust it beyond the normal level 2 autopilot, almost five years after purchase.

I personally bought two gen 3 HPWC with promises of WiFi and power sharing. Waited and waited for a firmware to actually deliver load sharing and connectivity, in the meantime they had broad overheating issues that required a new hardware revision. It took over a year to get sorted in all, and eventually I just gave one away.

I got a quote from Tesla solar, their automated engineering algorithm put solar panels on my northern shaded roof and they said “that’s the plan, take it or leave it”.

The end result is I’m pretty sore and distrusting in what Tesla claims. They’re a huge company now with massive resources, and they definitely have a larger EV sample set than any EV maker. I’m sure they do some things well, but I just don’t believe they are decades ahead on tech, or especially that the things they were doing 5+ years ago were better than what anyone else is doing now. And mostly I just don’t trust them so it really doesn’t matter if they are genuinely good at some things.

[ricerboi]

Guys relax. I’m probably in the top 1% of highest mileage iX’s (45k miles/16.5 months) with a mix of city/highway, monthly road trips and winter long road trips to cold places.

The throttling issue has happened TWICE. I’m aware of it but really not concerned about it. Let’s not get our feathers ruffled over what may or may not happen to most people 6-8 years down the road. Most aren’t going to notice 10-15% degradation over 8-10 years.

Remember, most people “abusing” the DCFC like me are only doing it for 2 years while it’s “free” through EA. After that, most of us will suck it up and install home AC/L2 charging. With that in mind, the “abuse” will subside after 2 years.

[NomoTesla]

Thanks, everyone!

To be fair, driving 1,500 miles in two days is not a normal use case for any EV except, maybe, for Bjorn Nyland and Kyle Connor (Out of Spec). Driving these distances is just not practical in an EV as it will add at least 30% to the travel time. We did it because we have friends to visit along the way, some items to deliver to family, and we thought of having a little bit of an adventure.

Under normal circumstances we do not exceed the daily range of our car. I posted this because it's good information to have, and that I was surprised because I was not aware of this happening. The warning message says DC charging will be limited "up to 2 days", which is a maximum. Bjorn was able to get 150 kW after 24 hours.

I'm not particularly bothered by it since this is not a normal trip distance for us. I prefer that BMW does this rather than allow my battery to degrade. Tesla famously (and permanently) throttled back the DC charging rate on all 85 kWh packs due to age and use to the point where they get an average session charge of 70 kW or less. That was one of the reasons why I sold my 2013 Model S. Taking it on even the shortest road trip was a headache because I would never get above 100 kW for more than a few minutes, and that's if the battery was close to 0. Within the first 10% it would throttle back to about 80 kWh and drop from there. My Model S battery degraded about 15% after 9 years. Hopefully the iX will degrade less.

This is all a learning experience!

[exxxviii]

Originally Posted by sor

I think you’ve had too much of the kool-aid ... To be fair, I acknowledge my own bias. To me, Tesla has shown that they embellish (to put it kindly). Once I see that, I just can’t trust anything they do.

Originally Posted by ggalanis

I live in reality and not some fantasy land with elon musk posters plastered all over the walls.

No Kool-Aid here, just a little more pragmatic or realistic view of things...

Tesla recently published that they only see 12% battery degradation after 200K miles. That's their data advantage they claim - they have first hand info about charging patterns over long term that nobody else has.

I am neither anti- nor pro-Tesla. But I am extremely thankful for the company because they advanced and improved a lot of things about automobiles and the industry that badly needed fixing. And Tesla accomplished it in a massive headwind against state and federal governments. A lot of the things not going well in today's legacy BEVs are mistakes Tesla made and corrected a while ago. Like this example of DC throttling - it could be something that a more experienced BEV automaker already saw and solved. Or not.

I cannot remember if either of you have had a Tesla or are just regurgitating comments and statements that fit your expectation biases.

I totally agree that Tesla embellishes a lot. And I completely agree that they seem to lead with a fake-it-until-they-make-it philosophy. But they are also targeted a lot. Think of every news story that features a burning Tesla, when ICEVs burn far more frequently. Think of every Tesla crash story featured in that blames Autopilot or FSD, when in fact the features were not even engaged. (I'm not ignoring the crashes where one of those features was engaged and there was a crash.) So, you have to sift through Tesla noise a little differently than other things.

I did not want a Tesla when I was initially shopping for a BEV last year. Even though I had several friends with one or more of them, and they had nothing negative to say, I just did not like the cars. My one friend's only real criticism was that the interior of his Model S (first gen) was not made from materials as nice as his Porsches and BMWs. And, his mom hates the yoke in the new S. But for the most part, they were all highly positive experiences.

I mostly disliked Tesla's driverless-first philosophy that led them to eliminate the dash and HUD. The exterior styling is bland to me and the cars lack a lot of features I want. I bought a Model Y on a whim, with almost no research, as a holdover car until I could eventually get a longer-term car. My initial choice was an Ioniq 5 Limited, but dealers wanted to tack on $12K to MSRP, so that shoved me to a Tesla. I knew I would give up HUD, surround view, CarPlay, SiriusXM, blind spot, rear cross traffic, ventilated seats, really annoying heated seat control for rear passengers, stupid door handles, and probably a few more things I grew to tolerate.

If you haven't had a Tesla, you would not know that their get-in-and-drive user experience is far better than any other car on the road, because they rethought the entire driver experience. You touch no superfluous buttons or actions, and the car anticipates and automates nearly everything. Much of the interface is simply more intuitive and natural than any other Legacy automaker. I really like that about the Model Y. I will miss the monthly updates with actual features that benefited me. My ownership experience has been flawless and consistent with everyone else I know who had a Tesla. Not to say that everyone has a great experience, but most of the negatives I've seen were on non-Tesla forums. The Tesla forums are mostly full of posts seeking understanding or upgrading, and less about chronic issues.

Here's the short list of stuff I will not miss:

• I will not miss the harsh ride - the MY is tuned like a chubby sports car.
• I will not miss the bland styling - I have mistaken my car for a Model 3 or Model X multiple times and walked to the wrong car in the lot.
• I will not miss the forced, always-on OPD.
• I will not miss the big center screen.
• I will not miss the road noise.
• I will not miss the awkward exterior door handles.
• I will not miss the attention it gets. (Even though there are tons of them, people still react with "you have a Tesla!?" like it is an exotic.)
• I will not miss the Autopilot. Autopilot is generally great at staying in the lane and stuff, but it holds way to aggressively if you want to do an evasive maneuver. And it has no automatic lane change unless you spring for the $6K EAP.
• I will not miss the Media UI. Even thought I think Tesla's media system is superior to the BMW, I just like a more traditional legacy media system UX. I just have to figure out how the freakin' iX works.

I am so thrilled my BMW iX finally arrived. I had the Model Y months longer than I ever thought I would. I will probably never buy another Tesla, but it is not because of any negative feelings I have toward then. I just like other stuff more.

Edit: I forgot to add that I totally agree with you about FSD. That was never on my radar, so I don't care. My one fried with it only used it once - it creeped him out. I am shocked that so many people paid $12K or $15K for the feature that is far from arrival. And, I don't think I would ever want a car that was principally designed to drive for me.