People really don't even understand the whole range thing.
All those multitude of real world tests out there that show a Tesla doesn't get the advertised range aren't doing the tests as the EPA tests are defined.
Yes, a Tesla doesn't get the advertised range when you go out of the test specs, shocking.
The EPA says this is how we're going to test the car. They even say, you can test it doing a partial test suite, or a full test suite. Tesla does the full test suite, while many others don't. This costs Tesla more money, but does seems to work out to their advantage.
I don't doubt that Tesla then went, okay lets design the car (set the gear) to get a good range on the test the EPA is going to use so we can advertise a good number. The EPA set the rules.
I can't recall if it was the EPA or some other testing agency, but Tesla once even rejected their initial rating saying you did the test wrong and made them re-do the test (a door was left ajar or something), and the retest came out to the number Tesla was expecting and wanted to advertise. As per the other article something also went wrong once and the EPA made them lower it by 3%. So problems can go both ways, and both were fixed.
Aside from Porsche who have a multi gear system in their power train, everyone else has to deal with the problem of a single gear not having the same efficiency across all speeds.
There's only a few other models out there besides Porsche (who's different) that meet their claims at 70mph+ tests, which means they did one of two things. They either lowered their EPA approved number and advertise a smaller range than they are capable allowed, or they're going to be less efficient elsewhere, but do good at high speeds.
If you want to perform better at high speeds (70mph+) , you're going to perform worse somewhere else in a single gear system, but I imagine most people care about the high speeds, and people don't seem to care about real world 25-35mph tests where cars go well past their advertised range. I don't really blame them for this, it's what people care about.
We really need to get the EPA to change their tests and make everyone do the same test, make the test better reflect real world driving scenarios, and probably make them advertise city/highway/high speed eMPG instead of just the single number.
