This seems a bit exaggerated. Staying regenerative-only does require sticking to about half or so of how fast I could stop, but so far that seems to work fine unless a light turns right in front of me or traffic acts up. Usually it says it gets high 90's or 100%, and it didn't go below 50% even when a stoplight did turn at exactly the wrong time. (2022 Ford Escape non-plug-in hybrid, recently bought used.)
It's NOT relevant to overall (tyre, brake system & engine braking & regen braking) braking system performance since that's a dynamic value variable over many factors constantly.
Bigger battery is more capacity sure. But their point was that even without a big battery they have enough capacity to get close to maximum effectiveness, contrary to ajross saying that a hybrid's capacity is "not really" effective and "at best" helps "some".
braking system = circa 1G of deceleration possible (depending on tyres, coeff of friction, temperature, ... etc etc)
So max effectiveness is unreachable for any regen system on a consumer car hybrid or ev, by a factor of around 6x i believe?
With recognition of the mistaken framing (near max effectiveness) we're back to the larger ev pack has a greater ability to sink current, a larger ability to slow the vehicle than does a smaller battery (obvious considerations about inverter capability, wire gauge etc etc aside)
Their definition of effectiveness is the percentage of braking force that turns back into electricity and goes into the battery. If your regen system can only do .15G, but 90% of your braking is under .15G, then you'll have about 94% effectiveness by that definition. 94% is not max but it's near max.
It's not about what happens during peak braking, it's about what happens over entire drives.
And when they say "half or so of how fast I could stop" they're underestimating, that's a comparison to a normal but aggressive stop, not pushing the pedal into the ground.
Every other EVs and HVs assign first half of brake pedal for regen and bottom half for mechanical brakes. Tesla uses bottom half of gas pedal for the same, which eliminates the need to accurately determine the appropriate pedal force that corresponds to intended braking force to be added up with regen to match intended deceleration. Mapping regen to gas is `set_motor_torque(1.25 * gas_pedal - 25);` and that's much simpler.
And it's not a problem when you get used to regenerative-only braking distances, which are surprisingly long at highway speeds.
It only becomes a problem when idiots thinking "the shorter the distance between first and last car, the smaller the traffic" start cutting you off when you leave enough distance for regenerative braking.
Your very old tires makes you a serious threat on the road while completely oblivious about this fact... not cool, please change them if you drive on public roads, if not for you just for the sake of others.
I just trashed some 15yo Firestones last month, after wearing them completely bald of course.
My manual car could do this 20 years ago. My fully ICE motorcycle can do it today.
I know engine braking is cool but it’s not some amazing new thing only EVs can do. Altho granted it only produces heat and noise in petrol vehicles. But it also makes your heart sing so that’s nice
2 kWh for the drivetrain
809 Wh regenerated
2 kWh for the drivetrain
547 Wh regenerated
I'm mostly happy about that but there is one thing that annoys me. 33% is close to how much a kilometer is shorter than a mile (38%).
Why the fuck would I care that these two numbers are that close? It is because of a mystery in the Hyundai app. When you look up the trip details for an EV trip it gives you mileage, duration, and energy use (drivetrain, climate, accessories) and regeneration.
The mileage is substantially less than what the car shows. For example for the aforementioned trip home that trip odometer shows 8.0 miles but the Hyundai app shows 5 miles. The car odometer has the correct distance.
There are two theories to explain this.
1. The app is showing how many miles worth of energy you used rather than your actual trip mileage. All the other data it shows (except for the duration) is energy related. For my 8.0 mile trip I got 3 miles worth of the energy the drivetrain used back via regeneration, so I only actually paid for 5 miles worth of electricity.
Based on the Wh given it should actually be 5.4 miles, but the app only displays integer mileage so 5 it is.
2. It's a botched unit conversion. E.g., the car uploads the data in miles but the expects the data to be in km, so it is doing a conversion. That would turn the 8.0 into 5.0, which would be 5 in the app and so matches what theory #1 predicts.
I've checked several of my trips and they have always happened to have the right amount of regeneration so that the two theories match due to the app only showing an integer mileage.
I did a test today to try to tell them apart. I changed the car's settings to km and took a trip. The idea was if the car had been uploading in miles that would hopefully change it to upload in km, matching the app's expectation, and so the miles shown in the app would match the actual miles of the trip if theory #2 was correct, and show the regeneration corrected miles if theory #1 was correct.
The result was that the app still showed miles consistent with theory #1. So mystery solved, right?
Maybe not. When the car was set to miles everything showed in miles. Speedometer, odometers, efficiency (mi/kWh), speed limits it read from traffic signs, and speed limits it gets from the map data when using navigation on highways.
I expected than when I switched it to km all of those would be in km, and I would not see miles anywhere. Also, I expected that when it saw a speed limit sign that said say 60 it would interpret that as 60 km/hr.
What actually happened is that miles mostly did go away, except on the speedometer it added a smaller mi/hr display under the km/hr display. For the traffic signs it still knew they were in mi/hr and it converted them, so when I got on the freeway as soon as I passed the sign that said 60 the speed limit sign shown on the instrument cluster said 97, and the red dot on the speedometer showing the current limit was placed in the right place.
That suggests that the car knows it is in a country that uses miles, and doesn't just go by whatever the units setting in the setup screen is set to. It could be that in miles countries the car also uploads in miles all the time, and so switching the units setting to km would not change the results if theory #2 was true.
Now my plan is to find a big parking lot that is mostly empty overnight, such at a Walmart or Home Depot or a mall, go there and turn the car off and then back on which starts a new trip, set regeneration to 0 which turns off automatic regeneration on the accelerator so the car only regenerates when you use the brake pedal, and then drive around the parking lot for about 10 miles without using the brakes, then coast to a stop and turn the car off the end the trip.
Then I'll turn it back on, drive home, and check the trip details in the app. If theory #1 is right then the miles in the app should match the odometer miles. If theory #2 is correct the app miles should still be 38% shorter than the odometer miles.
With an EV I don't touch breaks unless in situations I fail to/couldn't predict (maybe up to 10% of all speed reductions and even less stops).
Oh all the time. I used to drive like a typical youth. I've been in USA for 10 years now and still hate driving automatics because they shift into too high a gear and then you have to constantly use the brakes. It's annoying.
A lot of CVTs have virtual gears for that even, although others like the prius only have B mode.
Are you comparing to an automatic ICE or a manual?
In my experience of driving EVs their engine braking is sub-par to what I'm used to at least from my motorcycle. Bikes have silly high compression compared to their weight. You def have to be careful about chopping the throttle.
And I mean if drifters can use shift lock to literally skid their wheels, then clearly engine braking is effective.
Also I learned in driving school in Europe (and during the motorcycle course in USA) to downshift while braking so your engine helps the brakes and you’re always in the right gear. There shouldn’t be any sudden revs if you’re gentle with the clutch.
Then again as a young idiot I also learned how to heel-and-toe on public roads so I could rev match more effectively while braking into corners. Maybe I’m just a weird driver with unusual habits. It’s ok.
I also like the noise, but it is noise pollution that is very annoying to everyone else.
Hybrid makers just don't really care about that.
(They also don't do blending between friction brakes and regen, so the cars behaviour when letting of the accelerator is highly inconsistent depending on temperature and charge level).
One of the reasons I long for the lease on my Model Y to end so I can replace it with a less stupid vehicle.
Many thousands kilometers later I hate it almost as much as at the start, so lack of regen configuration will be a dealbreaker next time I pick a new car.
1. It is inconsistent, especially during winter and when fully charged.
2. Crossings with shrubbery/objects that hides approaching pedestrians/cars/bikes and it is rare that there is anyone actually crossing. I encounter these several times per day.
My preferred way of approaching #2 is to reduce speed well ahead, start gliding and put my foot on the break pedal to be ready for a complete halt in the rare case (once in a 500 maybe) that I need to give way to someone. In the Tesla I must reduce speed to almost standstill and creep slooooowly, since it would take half a second to move the right foot to the break.
I understand it sounds like an extreme corner case, but for me it is all the time every day. Central Scandinavia.
I want my right foot on the break pedal, ready to brake hard and fast in the rare case that something comes across the road.
I don't want to reduce speed any further than is necessary to have a safe breaking distance at fully ready state.
With any other car (that I have driven) than the Tesla, I can approach a situation like this at between 20kmh and 40kmh, depending on the specifics. In the Tesla I need to go at between 5 and 10kmh.
I generally turn off the auto regen braking because i find it uncomfortable.
Importantly, regenerative braking is a danger on icy roads. I disable it entirely in the winter in eastern Canada because it often causes the tires to lose grip.
They didn't care much for convential wisdom and car building competence in the early days of Tesla.
> was difficult to get used to
To ask the obvious, how used to something are you going to get on a test drive? It takes time.
The key takeaway is that there are differences to driving an EV to driving an ICE vehicle. Equally those differences are in fact easy to adjust to given a bit of practice.
Of course cars have always had different control options. Automatic and Manual gearboxes spring to mind. When I first learned some cars had a gear selector as an arm on the steering column, and so on.
EVs like a somewhat gentler foot, because the torque is instant, so a heavy foot is likely to be a more uncomfortable ride.
So yes, different cars, different styles. But of course we adjust very quickly, and its not really difficult to drive anything- it just takes a bit of practice.
All to say, check out a few to be sure, im still shocked how much i love driving this thing (and how criminally fast it is, totally absurd).
Secondly, I rented an EV for a week and by the end of it actually preferred the strong regen setting. It was convenient in stop-start traffic, and on a twisty road, you could use it to tighten the nose as you entered the corner.
Are you not? Do you drive by blipping the gas every few seconds?
I've had Uber drivers do this and it is annoying bordering on nauseating as a passenger. It is probably pretty bad for mileage and transmission wear as well (constantly taking up and releasing the backlash in the gears).
For example here is how it works in Hyundai EVs (and I'd guess Kia too). It is easy to set them so that they drive very similar to an ICE. I believe several others also work similarly. There are only a few that try to really push you to one pedal driving.
1. When use explicitly use the brake pedal that car uses regenerative braking unless you are trying to stop faster than regeneration can handle in which case it will also use the friction brakes.
There may be a setting somewhere in the settings menus where you can adjust how strong the braking is, but I don't remember because the way the car comes from the factory the brake peddle feels a lot like an ICE car's brake peddle.
2. There is a regeneration level setting that controls what happens when you ease up on the accelerator or remove your foot from it. This setting has 6 possible settings: Level 0, 1, 2, 3, i-Pedal, and Auto.
There are two paddles on the steering wheel that let you move through these settings quickly and easily, and you can do this while driving so you are free to pick whatever setting fits the conditions and your mood the best. Here's what they do.
• In level 0 there is no braking associated with the accelerator. Take your foot off and the car coasts is if it was in neutral.
• Level 1 provides a small amount of automatic braking when you let up on the accelerator. In ICE terms it is similar to the engine braking you would get on level ground going fast enough to be in 3rd gear in a 3 speed automatic. You slow down faster than coasting, but not so fast that if you were on the freeway and your felt the need to shake your right leg around a little it would slow enough to be a problem.
• Levels 2 and 3 step up the amount of automatic braking. 3 is enough that in city driving most of the time you can be quite leisurely when it comes to moving your foot from the accelerator to the brake at most stop signs, but it will not bring your car to a complete stop. It will get quite slow and then creep at that speed.
• i-Pedal is one pedal driving mode and corresponds to what that EV you test drove was doing. In this the braking is similar to level 3 as far as aggressiveness goes, but it will take you all the way to a stop most of the time. Once you get used to it you should be able to do most city driving and most highway driving without touching the brake pedal. About the only times you would need the brake pedal (outside of emergencies) is if a light changes on you when you are too close to the intersection.
• Auto mode automatically switches between 0, 1, 2, and 3 based on the distance to the vehicle in front (using the same system that adaptive cruise control uses) and the slope of the road. If you are on the freeway for example with a good distance between cars it will be in 0 or 1. In the city where you are close to the next car it might be in 2 or 3.
• If you press and hold the "increase regen level" paddle for at least 0.5 seconds it will switch from whatever your current setting is to i-Pedal and stay in i-Pedal as long as you continue to hold the paddle. Release the paddle and it switches back to whatever your previous setting was.
This system gives you plenty of flexibility and you should be able to easily find a setting you like. Some people really like one pedal driving and so they can just put it in i-Pedal and leave it there (with a slight annoyance...when you turn the car off in i-Pedal it comes back on in level 3, so you will have to hit the regen up paddle once).
Some people set it to one of the numbered levels and leave it there (again with slight annoyance at startup where it comes on at 1 so they need a paddle flick or two).
Some people use the paddles instead of the brake pedal, mixing levels to get the kind of deceleration curve they want.
I normally drive in level 0, with an occasional day or two in i-Pedal just for a change of pace, but if I'm coming up on a series of roundabouts I might switch it to i-Pedal. That's great for say a 35 mph road with 10-15 mph roundabouts every couple of blocks. (If it is just one roundabout I'd probably use the "hold regen up paddle for 0.5 seconds" option to just turn on i-Pedal for that intersection.