Does dashboard efficiency only measure motor usage?

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BuckMkII

Well-known member
Joined
May 6, 2017
Messages
258
Location
Seattle
In September, I replaced my tires, and both the dashboard and LeafSpy seemed to agree that my miles/kWh dropped by 10% or a little more. Driving conditions for the first few weeks were still almost entirely dry road, daylight and no climate control.

Then, over the last month, daytime high temps have dropped at least 20° F, roads are wet most of the time, over half of driving is with headlights on and climate control has to run continuously to safely see out of the windows. My LeafSpy mileage and observed range has CRATERED by at least 20% more, yet the dashboard average trip mileage has barely budged. It may have dropped 2 tenths (4%). Does the car's mileage calculation ignore power going to heat and lights?

I mostly ignore the GOM, but I think at least it has responded somewhat more realistically to the changed conditions.
 
One nice thing about the cruddy weather is that the "wipers trigger 14 V on DC-DC system" situation seems to be keeping my 12 V battery happy. It took a fair bit of charging (several hours before current went way down) every couple of weeks when the weather was nice, but last weekend I put the charger on it and the current dropped to almost zero in a minute. So, the rain is good for something!
 
Yes turning on the wipers does seem to be a good trick to get the 12v battery charged. I've seen many cases, without the wipers on my 12v battery read 12v, turn on the wipers and the charge voltage instantly jumps to 14.4v :)
 
BuckMkII said:
... yet the dashboard average trip mileage has barely budged. It may have dropped 2 tenths (4%). Does the car's mileage calculation ignore power going to heat and lights?
.
No, its included in the calculations, but if you have not reset it since September you have got a lot of miles on the dashboard average so it will take a long time for that average to drop. The GOM responds to most recent usage, so it will reflect such changes very quickly
 
jpadc said:
No, its included in the calculations, but if you have not reset it since September you have got a lot of miles on the dashboard average so it will take a long time for that average to drop.
Good guess, but I reset the dashboard via the little 4-button cluster only 8-10 days ago. It's showing an average of 4.4 miles/kWh, which is equal to the *highest* five to seven mile trip I've seen in LeafSpy in the last couple of weeks, except one evening when it was dry and I went 6 miles with a couple hundred feet net downhill at almost 6 mi/kWh; most trips have been 2.5 to 3.3. I forget if I also reset the center screen value from the touchscreen at that time. It may have been a week or so longer since I punched that one.
 
BuckMkII said:
Good guess, but I reset the dashboard via the little 4-button cluster only 8-10 days ago. It's showing an average of 4.4 miles/kWh, which is equal to the *highest* five to seven mile trip I've seen in LeafSpy in the last couple of weeks
Well, I've never known LEAFSpy calculations on short trips to be very accurate (in part because it does not always report the same distance traveled as the odometer) and I tend to ignore it. I reset my dash display every time I charge the car and if I set LEAFSpy's M/kw to what the dash reports, LeafSpy estimates my miles to low battery and very low battery quite accurately, and that is my focus. Sorry, I got no other possibilities for you...
 
My 2011 with its resistance heater definitely took the auxiliary power into account for the miles/kWh calculation and display, but the displayed value was significantly higher than the value calculated from actual miles driven and actual charging power from the wall. The 2015 takes auxiliary power into account and its miles/kWh display is much closer to the value calculated from miles driven and charging power. I don't have an explanation for the discrepancies you are seeing.
 
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