mkhuffman
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- First Name
- Mike
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- Nov 19, 2020
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- 2021 MME GT, Jeep GC-L, VW Jetta
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I found this article that tested the impact of tire pressure on BEV range.
https://www.sae.org/news/2020/10/tire-pressure-impact-on-ev-driving-range
I am trying to determine if I want to change out the tires with 245/50 R19 tires to give the car a more aggressive look, and to improve handling. But I do not want to significantly impact highway range. It seems to me that adding width may be similar to low tie pressure, and maybe increasing tire pressure before a highway trip could offset the impact of getting wider tires.
According to the article, proper (and high) air pressure in the tires can improve range:
"Over the vehicle’s life, a variable tire RRC could account for up to 4% battery-charge difference. Reducing IPLR and “in-use” RRC creates the potential for Tier-1 suppliers and OEMs to consider a lighter and/or less-expensive battery. And ExxonMobil Chemical road testing has demonstrated that EV range can be improved from 3-7% with optimized tire IPLR. "
It seems a 5% hit to range is possible due to the wider and stickier tires. However, I bet if you crank up the air pressure in the tires, that can be mitigated significantly. My guess is with 32 psi, you probably will see close to a 5% range hit with the wider tires. I guess that raising the pressure to 40 will reduce that impact, so a good guestimate is 2-3%. I will go with 3% for a worst case analysis. 210 miles of highway range (on a full charge) will become 204 miles. So I guess you will loose 6 miles of range with 245 tires. If that is true, it is worth it to me to replace the tires. I hope someone will test this. Or maybe I will...
On a side note, it is interesting how significantly tire pressure impacts range. I bet a lot of EV owners do not monitor tire pressure and are getting less range just because their tire pressure is low.
https://www.sae.org/news/2020/10/tire-pressure-impact-on-ev-driving-range
I am trying to determine if I want to change out the tires with 245/50 R19 tires to give the car a more aggressive look, and to improve handling. But I do not want to significantly impact highway range. It seems to me that adding width may be similar to low tie pressure, and maybe increasing tire pressure before a highway trip could offset the impact of getting wider tires.
According to the article, proper (and high) air pressure in the tires can improve range:
"Over the vehicle’s life, a variable tire RRC could account for up to 4% battery-charge difference. Reducing IPLR and “in-use” RRC creates the potential for Tier-1 suppliers and OEMs to consider a lighter and/or less-expensive battery. And ExxonMobil Chemical road testing has demonstrated that EV range can be improved from 3-7% with optimized tire IPLR. "
It seems a 5% hit to range is possible due to the wider and stickier tires. However, I bet if you crank up the air pressure in the tires, that can be mitigated significantly. My guess is with 32 psi, you probably will see close to a 5% range hit with the wider tires. I guess that raising the pressure to 40 will reduce that impact, so a good guestimate is 2-3%. I will go with 3% for a worst case analysis. 210 miles of highway range (on a full charge) will become 204 miles. So I guess you will loose 6 miles of range with 245 tires. If that is true, it is worth it to me to replace the tires. I hope someone will test this. Or maybe I will...
On a side note, it is interesting how significantly tire pressure impacts range. I bet a lot of EV owners do not monitor tire pressure and are getting less range just because their tire pressure is low.
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