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Proposed Reporting Checklist

inchman254

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I find many of the stories of range, low or high, frustrating to read. They often contain just one, or a few, of the many variables that affect range. I've only had my Lightning for 2 months and I've seen a very wide range of mileage and there seems to be a wide range here on the forum, as well.

The most common listed are speed, outside temperature (if it's cold), cabin temperature and preconditioning. But often one or more of these is left out and almost universally, Wind and elevation change are not referenced.

So, if I may be so bold as a relatively new member, I would propose a checklist for people to use when reporting mileage or range. It would help both the poster and reader to understand what is going on.

First the checklist, then you can read the explanations if you want, or TLDR it. There is a rough calculation included that lets you figure out relative mileage due to wind. No temperature corrections.

If you want to use it, just cut and paste the checklist , then fill in the relevant info. There no rule that you have to fill everything in and you can add any description of your trip that you want.

Comments are welcome and I'll add relevant items or pull this down if people think it's too anal. Would also appreciate it if someone could tell me if I screwed up the math at the end.

Change the font to Courier New after pasting if it looks weird.

Year/Model/SR/ER
Trip Speed
Mileage (m/kwh) achieved
Distance traveled
Cruise Control (on/off)
Wind (speed,head/tailwind)
Outside Temperature (f)
A/C/Heat on?(heat pump?)
Cabin Temp setting (f)
Seat/Steering wheel heat?
Preconditioning
This Trip info (C/D/A/ExT)
Interstate/county road/?
Traffic conditions
Net Elevation Change (+/-)
Terrain (hilly/flat)
Tires (snow?, inflation)
Percent Start
Percent End
Range Start
Range End
Vehicle mileage
Other



Wind speed and relative direction is rarely listed, but we all know wind has a great effect. Nobody would be surprised with a difference in mileage comparing between 60 and 80 mph, but seem to disregard the entire point of why that difference exists when it's external (wind).

The math at the very bottom of this message shows that, if the zero wind mileage at 60 mph is 2.2 m/kwh, the mileage will be 3.4 m/kwh with a 20 mph tailwind and 1.5 m/kwh with a 20 kt headwind (no corrections except for wind). I was not expecting this outcome in the math, to be honest. I thought the headwind would hurt a lot more than the tailwind would help.

To calculate the mileage values for any windspeed (car speed plus headwind) when your zero wind consumption at 60 is 2.2.
1/((speed**2/1600)*0.12+0.17).
**2 means squared
You can put this into any calculator by starting with speed squared, don't worry about the brackets then do a 1/x at the end.

For example, 90 mph windspeed results in mileage of 1.29 m/kwh and 50 mph results in 2.79.

It ain't perfect, I'm sure, but it gives some relative numbers and only takes into account wind.

Traffic. (a bit of speculation here) If you're on the interstate all by yourself, you're moving all the air by yourself. If you're surrounded by cars moving the same speed, you're all creating a bubble of moving air and sharing the load. Stop and go traffic won't fully regen what you're using to accelerate.

Net elevation change. Moving 6300 lbs uphill 1000 ft burns 2.4 kwh in the perfect world of physics. Probably closer to 3 kwh. So you lose ~8 miles of range by going up that hill. On a 150 mile trip it's only 0.1 m/kwh overall. On a 50 mile trip, you lose 0.4 m/kwh. You won't get all of that back when you go back downhill.

Hilly or not. Some people think that the regeneration from ups and downs improves mileage vs a flat road. Hills are better in an EV with regen relative to an ICE vehicle, but I understand there's only about an 80% energy regeneration coming down relative to energy used going up. Regeneration can only be so efficient. Plus it's not like you'll get back the losses due to wind drag, road friction, A/C or battery temperature losses, either. So, if you go up and down a bunch of hills, even if they're only a couple of hundred feet each, you will almost surely see a reduction in mileage.

Cruise control on or off. Some people are pretty wild with the accelerator pedal. We've all been behind drivers that go between 50 and 70 for no apparent reason, and I'm sure they don't know it. One thing that I have noticed is that the lack of engine noise and frequency in my Lightning removes my subconscious awareness of my speed and it wanders a bit more than it used to. Speed variations will have some effect on mileage, even with regen.

Tires (Snows, inflation, age)
'Nuff said.

Other.
Anything you want to add.

(skip this part if you're not into math)
On a 72f day, going 60, no A/C, no wind, you're probably getting about 2.2 m/kwh. Let's invert this for ease of math. 1/2.2 = 0.45 kwh/m. We know that about 10% is used for non-driving stuff. So net 0.4 kwh per per mile. We'll add the 0.05 back in later.
Audi says that, for any vehicle, aerodynamic drag exceeds inertial and rolling resistance loads ("other") starting at ~40 mph . Probably at a bit slower equalization speed for a brick. But let's go with Audi. The rolling resistance values are probably higher on the F150 than an A6.
(all speeds from here on in are wind speeds)
So, first we have to figure out what the wind drag at 40 is. We'll say that "other" are 1 total and the wind drag is 1 at 40 mph. At 60, the wind drag will be 2.25. Total drag, 3.25. 2.25/3.25 = 0.7. So aerodynamic drag makes up 70% of the 0.4 kwh/m, or 0.28 kw/m. That means that 0.12 kw/m goes into "other" which will be constant for all three wind scenarios.
That means that, since "other" is 0.12, the aerodynamic load at net 40 is also 0.12. 0.12 +0.12+0.05 = .29 kwh/m = 3.44 m/kwh
We already know we're at 2.2 m/kwh at 60, but we can prove it... (2.25*0.12)+0.12+0.05 = 0.44 kwh/m = 2.27 m/kwh (rounding error)
And with a 20 mph headwind (net 80), we'll be 4 times more drag than at 40. (4*0.12)+0.12+0.05 = 0.65 kwh/m = 1.5 m/kwh.
Bottom line, the difference in mileage between a 20 mph tailwind and a 20 mph headwind at 60 mph is more than double.

You lose 0.77 m/kwh with a headwind but you gain 1.2 m/kwh with the same tailwind. Surprizing.
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CD4TNF

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What is an easy way to collect
1) elevation change? The only tool I know is the PlugShare TripPlanner website function. That produces a graph once the charging locations are plugged in. It's manual and labor intensive and produces a clear picture of elevation gain. Any suggestions?


2) wind conditions. I'm not aware of any tools or resources than can be used for the duration of the trip or look back historically.


Thanks for thinking of standardizing the information for trip reports to make reports more comparable. I'd be curious if the more gifted sheets experts could do some sheets magic with this information.
 
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inchman254

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What is an easy way to collect
1) elevation change? The only tool I know is the PlugShare TripPlanner website function. That produces a graph once the charging locations are plugged in. It's manual and labor intensive and produces a clear picture of elevation gain. Any suggestions?


2) wind conditions. I'm not aware of any tools or resources than can be used for the duration of the trip or look back historically.


Thanks for thinking of standardizing the information for trip reports to make reports more comparable. I'd be curious if the more gifted sheets experts could do some sheets magic with this information.
1. Elevation.

There's a couple ways. There is an elevation right on the on-board navigation map in the bottom right hand corner.

Next, you could ask siri or google assistant for either the elevation of each city or the difference in elevation between two cities. Google assistant seems to be able to give the change between cities, but not addresses. A google search (not with voice assistant) will also provide lots of listings for almost any city or town.

You could also use Google Earth Pro. It's an installable program for PC, mac and phone. On the android phone version, pressing and holding a point brings up the elevation.

Or go to whatismyelevation.com.

There are a bunch of apps that can provide current elevation through gps.

2. Wind.

The easiest thing to do is guess. Just stand outside your truck. Light breeze- 10, medium wind- 20, strong wind-30, knock-you-over-wind- 45.

Even if you knew the value exactly, roads twist and wind varies, so it's just to get an idea of what was happening.

Have a look at a flag....
If the flag flaps lightly, the wind speed is between 12 to 18 mph.
If the flag is waving over the entire length, the wind speed is 19 to 24 mph.
If the flag is stretched and flapping fast, the wind speed is 25 to 31 mph.
If the flag is stretched and flapping hard, the wind speed is 32 to 37 mph.

If it's at an angle but mostly on the nose, take 3/4, if it's mostly to the side but still a bit of a headwind, take 1/2.

The easiest website is probably wunderground.com. Select a station near you, then click history, select a date and all of the info is there.

There are lots of sites, though, just search for historical weather.

There are also other clues to guessing according to this:
https://www.weather.gov/media/pqr/wind/wind.pdf
 
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inchman254

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Let's see how this works....

Year/Model/SR/ER 2024 Lariat ER
Trip Speed 30-55
Mileage (m/kwh) achieved 2.2
Distance traveled 20mi
Cruise Control (on/off) off
Wind (speed,head/tailwind) 10 mph round trip
Outside Temperature (f) 32
A/C/Heat on? Yes
Cabin Temp setting (f) 70
Seat/Steering wheel heat? Yes/Yes
Preconditioning no
This Trip info (C/D/A/ExT) 17/71/7/9
Interstate/county/local road/? local and county
Traffic conditions light
Net Elevation Change (+/-) 0
Terrain (hilly/flat) flat
Tires (snows?, inflation) snows 40
Percent Start 80
Percent End 73
Range Start 200
Range End 175
Vehicle mileage 3000
Other

Not bad.
 

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XENOILPHOBE

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WTF, Why can't Ford do that? It wouldn't be hard for Ford to write code to record those stats for the driver... or better yet have Tesla or Apple do it for them, so it works..
 

SpaceEVDriver

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I only report long road trips like my recent 3,300 mile trip. A few of those parameters were constant throughout, but not even the tire pressure was the same (I aired up before heading home because of low temperatures). I'm not going to bother with all of that for every leg of a trip. I rarely even can be bothered to run CarScanner for a full trip--I'm lucky if I remember to run it for a single leg.

Ford doesn't provide a pitot tube (I would be surprised if any wheeled vehicle manufacturer does), and none of my road trips have constant wind speeds or directions for the length of the trip, so wind speed simply isn't going to be recorded or reported by me unless it was particularly memorable.

Build me a sensor array that knows when to start recording and when to stop recording and I'll be happy to report those data, but it's just not something I always have the energy to bother recording myself. I might record some of it sometimes. But I've done enough recording and analyzing data to say I'm happy with the truck and will continue driving it until something better is offered, and while I might sometimes record data, it's a low priority.
 

XENOILPHOBE

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