At what percentage should I charge?
06-17-22, 05:27 PM
#1
3rd Gear
Thread Starter
At what percentage should I charge?
Hello
First of all, thanks in general for this forum - I just got an NX450H+ and absolutely found answers to questions here, even before I bought the car. My car is about 5 days old now....
I have attempted to google this answer and didn't find it - nor did I see it in my manual (although I think I fell asleep 3/4 of the way through reading it... it is long).
I often will just drive maybe 10 miles a day, utilizing a smallish percentage of my battery. The first few nights I was plugging it in every time, and then I realized that's probably not my best move for battery longevity. At least it's not for things like cell phone batteries. (More in the past than now, but still not great.)
Should I plug in every night, even if I'm only 10% depleted (90% full)? Or should I wait to get .... less than 50%? 40? 20? before charging. Obviously if I know I've got a longer drive the next day, I'd want to plug in so I'm full before I go.
If anyone has any references for this, please let me know. Thanks
First of all, thanks in general for this forum - I just got an NX450H+ and absolutely found answers to questions here, even before I bought the car. My car is about 5 days old now....
I have attempted to google this answer and didn't find it - nor did I see it in my manual (although I think I fell asleep 3/4 of the way through reading it... it is long).
I often will just drive maybe 10 miles a day, utilizing a smallish percentage of my battery. The first few nights I was plugging it in every time, and then I realized that's probably not my best move for battery longevity. At least it's not for things like cell phone batteries. (More in the past than now, but still not great.)
Should I plug in every night, even if I'm only 10% depleted (90% full)? Or should I wait to get .... less than 50%? 40? 20? before charging. Obviously if I know I've got a longer drive the next day, I'd want to plug in so I'm full before I go.
If anyone has any references for this, please let me know. Thanks
06-19-22, 07:54 AM
#2
Here’s what I do
Not sure if this is what is ‘best’ but I plug in overnight when I’m down to 30-40% or even lower depending on where I’ve driven that day. Ends up being every second or third day. One other thing is that when it is 100% charged, the range shown is often way more that the 61km that is given. I seem to get from 67 to 72km showing. It may be the algorithm that calculates the expected range is based on the efficiency history. I am a conservative driver. This is based on 2 1/2 months of use. Loving the NX 450h+ after having had (and also loving) two RX450h.
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reillye (06-19-22)
06-19-22, 12:08 PM
#3
There's a guy on YouTube that talks through this kind of thing for Toyota cars that I found helpful (Toyota Car Care Nut or some such), basically states that keeping it fully charged for long periods of time isn't good for the battery. Most dedicated EVs seem to favor around 70% as a typical "max charge," suggesting 90-100% only when you're going on road trips and immediately depleting the battery from that state.
You should be able to set up a charging schedule that will replace the 10 or so mpg you drive a day without going overboard to full each night (read: let it get down to, say 15 miles remaining and then tell it to charge for 4-5 hours overnight to get back up to the 75% ish range), but if that's all you're driving, it may be tough to find that sweet spot. The video also indicated that you don't want to let fuel (especially that contains higher concentrations of ethanol) sit in your tank for long periods of time. Even if you CAN get away with only ever driving the EV mode, you still should drive the gas engine regularly (even if for a little while) in order to keep things moving. Even if I have EV range left, I will typically turn on HV mode for some parts of most drives (especially when at highway speed) to ensure that the engine is consistently getting at least a little bit of time on. So far, this has kept the switch between the two modes buttery smooth though I wouldn't expect that to become an issue for some thousands of miles even if you didn't do that.
To be honest, if you only drive 10 miles on a regular basis, getting the hybrid likely would have been a better choice, followed by a true EV, even one with a really limited range as then you wouldn't have had to worry about the battery issue at all.
Think the idealized use case for this vehicle is a commuter that will travel maybe 25-30 miles each way with no charging at work or will travel 50 or so miles with charging at work. That way, a fair chunk of one or both directions are covered by charging completely, but the gas engine still works a bit to go the last bit, which still saves a good bit in fuel consumed and therefore lowers the cost.
You should be able to set up a charging schedule that will replace the 10 or so mpg you drive a day without going overboard to full each night (read: let it get down to, say 15 miles remaining and then tell it to charge for 4-5 hours overnight to get back up to the 75% ish range), but if that's all you're driving, it may be tough to find that sweet spot. The video also indicated that you don't want to let fuel (especially that contains higher concentrations of ethanol) sit in your tank for long periods of time. Even if you CAN get away with only ever driving the EV mode, you still should drive the gas engine regularly (even if for a little while) in order to keep things moving. Even if I have EV range left, I will typically turn on HV mode for some parts of most drives (especially when at highway speed) to ensure that the engine is consistently getting at least a little bit of time on. So far, this has kept the switch between the two modes buttery smooth though I wouldn't expect that to become an issue for some thousands of miles even if you didn't do that.
To be honest, if you only drive 10 miles on a regular basis, getting the hybrid likely would have been a better choice, followed by a true EV, even one with a really limited range as then you wouldn't have had to worry about the battery issue at all.
Think the idealized use case for this vehicle is a commuter that will travel maybe 25-30 miles each way with no charging at work or will travel 50 or so miles with charging at work. That way, a fair chunk of one or both directions are covered by charging completely, but the gas engine still works a bit to go the last bit, which still saves a good bit in fuel consumed and therefore lowers the cost.
06-20-22, 07:44 AM
#4
3rd Gear
Thread Starter
There's a guy on YouTube that talks through this kind of thing for Toyota cars that I found helpful (Toyota Car Care Nut or some such), basically states that keeping it fully charged for long periods of time isn't good for the battery. Most dedicated EVs seem to favor around 70% as a typical "max charge," suggesting 90-100% only when you're going on road trips and immediately depleting the battery from that state.
You should be able to set up a charging schedule that will replace the 10 or so mpg you drive a day without going overboard to full each night (read: let it get down to, say 15 miles remaining and then tell it to charge for 4-5 hours overnight to get back up to the 75% ish range), but if that's all you're driving, it may be tough to find that sweet spot. The video also indicated that you don't want to let fuel (especially that contains higher concentrations of ethanol) sit in your tank for long periods of time. Even if you CAN get away with only ever driving the EV mode, you still should drive the gas engine regularly (even if for a little while) in order to keep things moving. Even if I have EV range left, I will typically turn on HV mode for some parts of most drives (especially when at highway speed) to ensure that the engine is consistently getting at least a little bit of time on. So far, this has kept the switch between the two modes buttery smooth though I wouldn't expect that to become an issue for some thousands of miles even if you didn't do that.
To be honest, if you only drive 10 miles on a regular basis, getting the hybrid likely would have been a better choice, followed by a true EV, even one with a really limited range as then you wouldn't have had to worry about the battery issue at all.
Think the idealized use case for this vehicle is a commuter that will travel maybe 25-30 miles each way with no charging at work or will travel 50 or so miles with charging at work. That way, a fair chunk of one or both directions are covered by charging completely, but the gas engine still works a bit to go the last bit, which still saves a good bit in fuel consumed and therefore lowers the cost.
You should be able to set up a charging schedule that will replace the 10 or so mpg you drive a day without going overboard to full each night (read: let it get down to, say 15 miles remaining and then tell it to charge for 4-5 hours overnight to get back up to the 75% ish range), but if that's all you're driving, it may be tough to find that sweet spot. The video also indicated that you don't want to let fuel (especially that contains higher concentrations of ethanol) sit in your tank for long periods of time. Even if you CAN get away with only ever driving the EV mode, you still should drive the gas engine regularly (even if for a little while) in order to keep things moving. Even if I have EV range left, I will typically turn on HV mode for some parts of most drives (especially when at highway speed) to ensure that the engine is consistently getting at least a little bit of time on. So far, this has kept the switch between the two modes buttery smooth though I wouldn't expect that to become an issue for some thousands of miles even if you didn't do that.
To be honest, if you only drive 10 miles on a regular basis, getting the hybrid likely would have been a better choice, followed by a true EV, even one with a really limited range as then you wouldn't have had to worry about the battery issue at all.
Think the idealized use case for this vehicle is a commuter that will travel maybe 25-30 miles each way with no charging at work or will travel 50 or so miles with charging at work. That way, a fair chunk of one or both directions are covered by charging completely, but the gas engine still works a bit to go the last bit, which still saves a good bit in fuel consumed and therefore lowers the cost.
Thanks for the reply. I've looked at the videos you mentioned - it's "The Car Care Nut" on youtube. He walks around the question I asked here, but doesn't really answer it, because I think my situation is not the norm.
Some days I only drive 10 miles, but yes, absolutely there are days when I will drive to depletion of the battery. And my car is the "road trip" car. I couldn't get a full electric because of range anxiety on road trips. That mustang mach-e looked really nice, though....
I think my solution for now will be to drive several days until I get to where it has to go to auto hv/ev. Then plug in. I'll keep looking for a real answer, though....
06-20-22, 08:31 AM
#5
Hi,
Thanks for the reply. I've looked at the videos you mentioned - it's "The Car Care Nut" on youtube. He walks around the question I asked here, but doesn't really answer it, because I think my situation is not the norm.
Some days I only drive 10 miles, but yes, absolutely there are days when I will drive to depletion of the battery. And my car is the "road trip" car. I couldn't get a full electric because of range anxiety on road trips. That mustang mach-e looked really nice, though....
I think my solution for now will be to drive several days until I get to where it has to go to auto hv/ev. Then plug in. I'll keep looking for a real answer, though....
Thanks for the reply. I've looked at the videos you mentioned - it's "The Car Care Nut" on youtube. He walks around the question I asked here, but doesn't really answer it, because I think my situation is not the norm.
Some days I only drive 10 miles, but yes, absolutely there are days when I will drive to depletion of the battery. And my car is the "road trip" car. I couldn't get a full electric because of range anxiety on road trips. That mustang mach-e looked really nice, though....
I think my solution for now will be to drive several days until I get to where it has to go to auto hv/ev. Then plug in. I'll keep looking for a real answer, though....
So, discharge all you like and then charge to target 75% or so at max unless you're driving and discharging it every day.
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