Yes, You Can Still Rescue a Bricked Tesla with Regular Jumper Cables
It may surprise you to know that your Tesla, and every EV, has two batteries. It has the big lithium-ion ātractionā battery. But it also has a 12-volt battery like any other car. And when its battery level is truly at 0%, its 12-volt dies as well. When this happens, you canāt unlock its doors or even plug it into a charger. Luckily there is a quick fix.
What youāll need to do is jump start the carās 12-volt battery. But first you must get to it by opening the frunk. Youāll pop open a cover on the driverās side of the bumper and connect a jump pack, 12-volt battery charger, or jumper cables to the positive and negative wires inside. This will short circuit the frunk latch and open the frunk.
Next, youāre going to remove the plastic cover on the shelf at the rear of the frunk. Beneath this, youāll look for battery terminals. On your left (passenger side) is a positive terminal with a red plastic cover. On your right is a metal stud that is the negative terminal. Connect your jumper cables from a regular car, your jump pack, or your 12-volt charger and you can charge up the small battery.
Once the small battery is charged, you should be able to unlock your Tesla and it should also begin charging if its hooked up to a Tesla Supercharger.
Get all that? Itās OK if not, you can see the demonstration below. Then Iāll go over why some owners are seeing Tesla ranges drop dangerously.
After South Korea sued Tesla, the company admitted that the first half of its dashboard range indicator reflects ārosyā range estimates. These seem to be more in line with marketing materials than the carās actually battery capacity.
Around the mid-point, your dashboard indicator will begin to calculate your Teslaās actual range. So after 50%, you may see a quick drop off. This can be especially severe in cold weather or other battery draining conditions. Make sure to get used to your Teslaās range before you try any cold drives across remote stretches of road.
Next, read more about Teslaās range indicator subpoena, or learn more about a Model 3ās cold weather range in the video below: