R2 Range Limitations and Rivian's Response

[Bullwinkle]

It's kind of shocking how bad the charge curve is on the Tesla MY with how many years head start they've had. But I guess that efficiency makes up for it!

As for the R2, it's actually great for a 400v vehicle. They had to make compromises to get it to market at that price point as it's sink or swim for them.

It will be interesting to see if over the coming couple months, through manufacturing process tweaks and software updates, Rivian can add 5-10% more range. A 7% increase puts real range at 270 miles based on the OoS results.

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[Vik]

Yep, the Gen 2s are also victim of the Rivian/EPA upside down range world/testing…it seems like they intentionally pretended like all the new 2024/2025 vehicles were more efficient when they weren’t…

I have a Gen 2 2025 R1S Dual Perf Max and a 2022 Tesla Model S Long Range. They both have the same EPA rated range of 400 miles. My Rivian can travel significantly farther than my Model S on the same trip. About 15% more range. Some of that may be age/degradation, which is a topic that these range tests do not factor.

Take the same R2 and Model Y 2 years later with 20k miles and run the test. I have owned 3 Tesla's and they have all degraded heavily in the first year and continued to degrade slightly every year after. My R1S seems to have little to no degradation after 2 years and 15k miles.

 

[rvnxyz001]

Please reference a cheap EV that can do 0-60 in 3.6 seconds, the 1/4 mile in 11.3 seconds, get to 100 mph on 7 seconds, handle 19” of water, has 9.5” of clearance, and can handle light to moderate off-roading.

These are not the reasons most people buy a car. From what I've seen so far, R2 drivers use conserve mode...

 

[Qamera]

This is all academic to me, since I don’t drive fast on road trips. I am a bit surprised by the difference between EPA and real world but it’s pretty obvious that for those of us who do drive slower, the difference will become less meaningful.

 

[rvnxyz001]

because range is only one of many factors for consideration?

Range is most important in ev

 

[redditnewb92]

Sure, but I assume it is still the most important factor when people decide to buy an EV, and I'm not sure Rivian offers anything magical as a car. It is not a luxury car, just a good $45K-level car, and it is not materially better inside or out than any other good EV.

I'll concede the range could scare away a few first time EV buyers that are laser focused on that. That said, Rivian is the only competitor to Tesla that I would confidently say is a software defined vehicle and for me, that's the "magic" they offer. Well, that and the fact it has more than 6 inches of ground clearance.

Rivian ships real OTA updates that actually make it better, and they have the entire software/hardware stack owned end-to-end for the most part. My R2 is already not the same car I drove off the lot. I drove a Mach-E for a few years and could count my updates on one hand. They were mostly recall remediation dressed up as a feature drop.

Personally, I'll gladly pay $60k for a vehicle that is both good at being a car AND software defined. My experience with the Mach-E made me swear off legacy automakers for good.

 

[tivoboy]

It will be interesting to see if over the coming couple months, through manufacturing process tweaks and software updates, Rivian can add 5-10% more range. A 7% increase puts real range at 270 miles based on the OoS results.

there almost certainly won’t Be Any engineering tweaks in coming couple months. I doubt they would do anything that wasn’t a clear error before next year at the earliest.

Software tweaks, something MIGHT be possible, but its going to land in the 2-5% range at best, and most likely 2-3% if possible.

 

[rvnxyz001]

Rivian ships real OTA updates that actually make it better, and they have the entire software/hardware stack owned end-to-end for the most part. My R2 is already not the same car I drove off the lot.

I don't believe the average buyer decides to buy a car because it updates itself. I believe, based on what I've seen in other manufacturers' presentations, that software updates are more about improving owner satisfaction. You get some kind of dopamine hit when you receive new, shiny updates that keep changing how your AC works, and you feel like your car stays new. That's probably one of the reasons Rivian owner satisfaction is so high, but technically, there isn't much value. Why not make the AC work well from the beginning? Regular users don't even update their phones or computers. Sure, there are critical software updates, such as those that fix the drivetrain, but they are extremely rare.

Personally, I'll gladly pay $60k for a vehicle that is both good at being a car AND software defined. My experience with the Mach-E made me swear off legacy automakers for good.

My reasons for the R2 are very simple:

* It looks good inside, with good material choices. There is a bit too much plastic, especially on the backs of the seats, but it is acceptable. The exterior is nice, except for the headlights.

* Cargo capacity: I can fit two bikes inside, camp in it, etc.

* Ground clearance, so I can occasionally go off-road.

* I use my car in the city a lot and for short trips, so the efficiency will be much better than any gas car, with no need to change the oil every 3,000 miles.

* Overall range, although this does not seem very good.

* OEM spare tire (!)

* Software updates are nice to have, but I would prefer never to see them. I have PTSD from years of working as a systems engineer because updates always break something.

* Some kind of AWD. It seems like it will not drive in AWD mode unless it decides to, but at least I can force it to run in "Subaru mode." However, I still have little trust in Rivian's software quality or its ability to make the AWD system react quickly enough in critical conditions.

* wheels with no plastic

 

[Apprunner]

EPA mileage has always been a very prescriptive test which allows for manufactures to tailor their tuning to get an unrealistically inflated number. In the gas world this, IMO, is in large part the reason for so many cars seeing turbos being spec'd. A turbo's boost tuning can be set to kick in just above the EPA test cycle so during testing the car is almost never in boost and gets a great number. In real world driving the engine goes into boost much more often and real world mileage takes a huge hit. Ford 3.5L Ecoboost on the F-150 is probably the best example of this, especially since Ford has continued to make the 5.0L NA available for comparison. The Ecoboost consistently underperforms EPA numbers while the 5.0 exceeds them. Heck, VW even got caught programming the ECU to recognize the testing cycle and specifically adjust to the test (I know it wasn't mileage testing where they did this, but the point stands: car companies "teach" to the test, not the real world).

As far is Rivian and specifically the Out of Spec/Rivian Trackr R2 vs Model Y 50-80 MPH mileage test it has issues, to say the least. Kyle loves to use the word "scientific" in his testing but he needs to be much more judicious in the claims he makes based on a very limited comparison like the one he did with R2 and MY Perf. Each of the speed tests he did were of very limited distance (6-30 miles) on a single day. There was very little in any of those tests that qualify as scientific. If Kyle had severe time limitations to do this comparison test to the point it compromised the test then the video should not have been released. Junk data leads to junk results. On top of the fact that the Model Y Performance he was using is a company loaner that he requested specifically to perform this comparison. Given all that Tesla has riding on maintaining its market leader status can we really assume that they didn't send in a ringer?

I don't doubt that R2 Performance does worse than MY Performance on a Miles/KW basis but R2 also has an ~18% larger battery. It is unfortunate that Out of Spec released a video along with claims based on very limited data that are driving a narrative that the Rivian R2 has range issues.

He also ran the 70 mile range test as a comparative benchmark and both cars started at 100% and ran the cars until dead. Its a good a test as any and OOS's test is far better than a single range test without a control. At this point, its not really debatable at all that MY is about 20-25% more efficient on the highway.

 

[Bullwinkle]

Range is most important in ev

More important than esthetic, fit/finish, handling, features, utility, and ride quality? I disagree.

 

[dcdttu]

I would be a little cautious using ABRP for R2 at this stage. Not that I think it changes much for my use case when I started editing the consumption to compare, but the default consumption is basically a placeholder.

We're having a discussion here about ABRP and R2 here in case you have some thoughts or questions: https://www.rivianforums.com/forum/...nsumption-for-r2-at-279-wh-mi-accurate.62233/

Thanks for the info! I will wait and see if the reference consumption changes as we get more data, but seeing that Rivian owns ABRP, it may not. Ha.

From what I am seeing, the drive times I have in the R2 don't vary much from the cars I compare it to because the other cars don't have enough range to start skipping chargers that the R2 would have to use in any meaningful way. This means similar stops, and somewhat similar drive times.

I modified the R2 reference consumption to 400Wh/mi and the total trip time for a Austin-to-Colorado trip I make yearly went up about 40 minutes out of a 14 hour trip. Compared to my current car (a 2018 Model 3), it's a little bit more but if you factor in that I likely won't ever stop for just 5 minutes like ABRP suggests (I have to pee, walk the dog), the difference in time drops a bit more as I'm spending more time at chargers regardless of vehicle.

She's definitely a brick, though. No way to get around that other than to add more energy to the battery pack.

 

[rvnxyz001]

More important than esthetic, fit/finish, handling, features, utility, and ride quality? I disagree.

Everything you mentioned goes after range Even Toyota/Subaru EV range is acceptable to me, but they are extremely ugly inside with plastic wheels, so I won't buy them because of this.

 

[Qamera]

Range is most important in ev

For you?

 

[ksurfier]

I have a Gen 2 2025 R1S Dual Perf Max and a 2022 Tesla Model S Long Range. They both have the same EPA rated range of 400 miles. My Rivian can travel significantly farther than my Model S on the same trip. About 15% more range. Some of that may be age/degradation, which is a topic that these range tests do not factor.

Take the same R2 and Model Y 2 years later with 20k miles and run the test. I have owned 3 Tesla's and they have all degraded heavily in the first year and continued to degrade slightly every year after. My R1S seems to have little to no degradation after 2 years and 15k miles.

10 year old S and 8 year old 3, 3 is ~250 miles range, not sure what if any degradation has occurred in R1S, less than 15k so who knows…

 

[rvnxyz001]

For you?

Uhm, yes, I'm the only one in the world who cares about the range. What a comment.

Available driving range remains the top EV concern for U.S. consumers surveyed (47%), followed by charging time (44%) and overall cost (40%).

https://www.deloitte.com/us/en/about/press-room/deloitte-launches-gacs.html

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