Re: Tesla Roadster
RC:You know that the Tesla S battery needs a certain temperature to be able to engage ludicrous mode, right?
Think I've written about this in other threads several months ago... But since I've had experienced a P100D for several months and tested it in all sorts of conditions, here is a bit input on the topic of Ludicrous...
Tesla sent out an OTA update to all P100D beginning of 2017 with an "Easter egg" called ludicrous+, which improved performance for 0-100km/h by 0,1 second. While engaging the Easter egg you get a notification warning that using this mode can accelerate wear on the drivetrain so it should be used with caution. There is also a complementary feature that can heat up the battery. It's labeled "Max Battery Power" and with this engaged it is possible to warm up the battery quicker. At 50 degrees the battery gives max performance and there are also visual extra gauges added in the instrument cluster, that is not there in normal Ludicrous mode. You can see temperatures and motor power for instance.
Based on my tests I couldn't hardly notice any difference while having the car in L+ mode with max battery power warmed up to 50 degrees. And I tested several times. And after having tested it a few times I then never bothered to engage it again because the cooling fans were running all the time in this mode which was a bit annoying. In normal Ludicrous mode the cooling fans are not noticeable. Not sure anyone would be capable of feeling any difference of 0,1 anyhow so it's just not worth fiddling with battery heating etc for gaining 0,1 sec to 100 but at the same time increasing wear on the drivetrain and loosing power much sooner while performing lot's of accelerations.
What in general is a misconception is that the battery needs to be warm to engage Ludicrous mode. This is simply false. You could wake up in the morning jump into the cold car and just floor it. You will then maybe get 0-100km/h in 2,8 sec instead of if you take all the above described steps, then you can improve by 0,2 sec to 100km/h. Worthless if you ask me! Actually, I never had anything else than "Ludicrous" mode engaged while I had the car and it was default mode when I got into the car. So no need to push any buttons etc, all power on tap at all times.
I tested quite a few consecutive accelerations from 0-100km/h on several occasions. No problem at all. And I can with 100% confidence say that even after the 10th run during a 20 minute (or there about) interval it was no difference. Maybe it slowed down from 2,7sec to 2,9 sec, I don't know, but I for sure couldn't tell any difference. This was in normal Ludicrous mode and not L+
The performance specified on Tesla homepage for P100D is 0-100 in 2,7 sec, which is for Ludicrous mode. The L+ is not even mentioned. It's clearly a gimmick and to be honest I think it would've been better if they never did release that L+ mode at all.
I think Porsche did their tests with L+ mode and in this mode they got some earlier power fades. Not sure how they would have accomplished this otherwise. For normal usage it's a none issue anyway. The battery might limit the performance after crazy many accelerations in a row, but who needs that anyway?