Originally Posted by
Tjamaica
I've been interested in a 3 for a little while now. For those driving it, what kind of range is realistic? I have a 325 mile round trip commute that is all interstate with a super charging station at the half way point. Also, I assume the battery will drain a little while it sits in the employee parking lot... if so, how much?
Spend a little time on YouTube educating yourself on lithium ion batteries and how they relate to these cars. Lots of good videos out there, especially lectures by a subject matter expert by the name of Jeff Dahn. Once you spend some time geeking out on it you can have a much better idea on how much range you can expect; so much goes into the answer to the question “how far does it go after I unplug it?”.
For us, range isn’t an issue as local daily drivers. We only charge to 70-80% daily for reasons you’ll figure out when you research the topic. For road trips the superchargers are obviously paramount; the charge rate is incredible but also related to what SOC (state of charge) you desire...again, something you’ll learn with research. FWIW, our P90DL MX is “rated” at 250 mile range; we feasibly get 180-200 miles on road trips. I also don’t go slow (parasitic wind drag is the killer), run the a/c hard and have a 200 mile bladder anyway. We really only do one road trip destination (family beachhouse) and only do it a few times a year. The MX is HEAVY and we have relatively old battery technology; the M3s of today have much greater range.